Chapter Eight
My phone dinged with an e-mail—a second one. From Cali Dynamics.
The first was to inquire if I was still interested since my weenie call, when I asked for more time due to a family emergency (not a lie, it qualified). The second had a form attached. For me to fill out on my preferred date to Skype, with all my info.
My insides quivered, and I tossed my phone onto the bed, where Ralph stared at it from his sprawl. He didn’t look concerned, and I couldn’t be, either. I couldn’t deal with that, yet. I had swimwear to don.
“Why are we doing this again?” Nick called from down the hall.
I had been asking myself the same question at least fifty times in the last hour, as I dug for a swimsuit. I couldn’t find my normal one, so I pulled out a second one from the bottom of a suitcase I hadn’t unpacked yet. The way too skimpy one I bought on a lark, that I’d only worn once, and for some silly reason threw into the suitcase.
“Because the Clarks will be there. And we were invited,” I called back.
“By your ex-boyfriend who still wants to do you,” he responded.
“That again?” I said, more to myself, really. I tied my bikini top around my neck and held it to my chest as I rooted around for my long cover-up. “Seriously, his wife is there for one. And he’s all hot air for—”
“Jesus.”
I turned to realize I’d been bent over in just skimpy bikini bottoms, my back bare. I instantly jolted upright and pulled the strings around my back to tie them.
“If you’re gonna be that naked, close your door,” Nick said, suddenly behind me and taking the strings from my hands.
“Excuse me?” I said, trying to ignore the shiver that went down my back at the feel of his fingers sliding along my skin. “You walk around in only a towel. Every night.”
Dripping with water and giving me all kinds of increasingly un-game-like thoughts.
His hands moved upward. “Lift your hair.”
“Why?”
He was already pulling the top string loose, and I hurried to grab my hair and clutch my top to my chest.
“Always have to retie,” he said.
I felt the friction of fabric against fabric as he pulled it free, and heat rushed straight to my core. I suddenly felt entirely too naked to be this close to him. The swimsuit was too skimpy, and it wasn’t even on yet. Every instinct was to back up against him, to feel him against me, and I had to shake my head to come back to reality. To shut down the mini-movie that had already begun in my head.
“Spoken like a man with experience,” I managed.
A snort of disgust came entirely too close to my ear.
“My ex-wife practically lived in these things,” he said then, even closer as he finished tying.
Don’t back up. It’s on if you do.
I turned around instead. And that wasn’t much better. I focused on a long slow inhale to cover up the sharp one my heart slamming caused.
It was like the towel-troll but with swim shorts and all up close and I was definitely far too unclothed for this. When I made it to his face, I lost the feeling in my toes. His gaze was heavy-lidded and looked like he wanted to go swimming in my cleavage, which may or may not have been of my own fantasy, since I had a mad urge to lead him there.
But something—something knocking on my brain said that we were alone and that was playing with fire and we needed to save the sparks for the public eye.
“So the towel bothers you?” he said when our eyes met.
The game was all up in his tone, but we were home. There was no one watching.
“It’s a bit distracting, yes,” I said. “I am human.”
“And you don’t think this is distracting?” he said, his eyes panning south. “Or the tank tops with no bra at night?”
I felt the heat rush to my face at the knowledge that he’d noticed that. Enough to make a point of it. “Sometimes I wear—”
“T-shirts,” he finished for me. “Yeah, long ones with nothing underneath.”
I put my hands on my hips. “I wear shorts.”
“Well, it looks like you don’t,” he said, backing up. “You don’t think that’s maddening to see every night?” He raked both hands through his short hair, the muscles in his arms rippling, and God help me, that move was maybe right on up there with the trolling.
I licked my lips. I had to keep it together.
“We should probably go.”
He nodded. “Please tell me you’re wearing clothes over that,” he said.
“Of course I am,” I said, scoffing. “I’m not sixteen.”
“I’m glad one of us isn’t,” he muttered, walking out.
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing,” he said. “Did you do something with my black hat? The ball cap?”
“Do something?” I asked. “No.”
He sighed and kept walking. “It was on my chair and it’s gone. Along with the shirt I just put out to wear. Guess your aunt didn’t like it.”
* * *
The Clarks were already there when we came strolling up the road like natives. Our hands found each other as if on automatic pilot, our fingers interlacing so naturally you’d think we’d been together for years instead of three weeks.
They saw us coming, evidently, as Alicia was already waving and Bryce and his wife stood next to Alan, stoically staring at us as we approached. Nick transferred his hands to my shoulders as he stationed himself behind me and pulled me back against him.
Oh, dirty pool.
All the air left me for a second as the solid wall of Nick pressed against my back and warm hands traveled down my bare arms. He was getting too good at this.
Alan’s grin went decidedly car-salesman-slash-politician as he winked at me and held out a hand for Nick.
“Glad y’all made it,” he said.
I looked around at a yard full of people and a good dozen more in the pool. Which although it was off to one side, was technically in the front yard. Because that was logical.
It was like a who’s who of Charmed. Anyone who had money, clout, or sway was there. Essentially, the whole upscale crowd from Bailey’s Pond, where all the moneyed houses sat on the water on the north end of town with their cute little floating docks. Carmen’s ex, Mayor Dean, was there. As was Bash, who owned Anderson’s Apiary (But I liked Bash. And to his credit, he wasn’t talking to Dean.). I recognized some city hall officials and business owners. So why the hell were we there? Why were the Clarks?
“Wouldn’t miss it,” Nick said, gripping Alan’s hand, his words vibrating against my back.
“This is a few friends?” I asked.
Alan chuckled as if that made him super popular. I suspected it was either more about who he schmoozed to be there or about his wife. And I was willing to bet that the redhead strolling around in a tiny white swimsuit with tits the size of my head, laughing and handing out Jello shots, was said wife.
As she got closer, I saw more of her than I wanted to, as what little fabric she had was sheer and outlined pretty much all God gave her. I also remembered her. She was the gropey, short-shorted ginger from the Blue Banana that couldn’t keep her hands off Nick.
Good times.
“Heyyyy!” she said, her eyes going as large as the areolas I could see way too well. “Nicky!”
Okay.
I turned in my Nicky space to give him the appropriate WTF look, but I never made it that far. I was halfway around when warm boobs pressed against my back. Or boob to be more accurate. The other one was on Nick. As she squished me into him and made me the filling in a Nicky/skank sandwich, floating in the scent of coconut oil.
“I’m so glad you came,” she cooed, hugging him-slash-us.
I wrestled out a hand and raised it.
“Excuse me,” I said, my face pressed into his collarbone. “Lanie Ba—McKane.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she said, backing up and chuckling.
I turned to see those things moving like they were animated.
“Try not to accost the guests, honey,” Alan said on a laugh, stepping forward to wrap an arm around her waist. “This is my wife, Katrina.” He pasted on a grin for Nick. “Evidently you’ve already met.”
“Nick’s the talented new chef at the Blue Banana,” Katrina said, with a wink at me like that made us soul sisters. “You know I love that place. And what he can do with an alfredo sauce is just—”
She closed her eyes and parted her lips, and I swear everyone in a five-foot radius stopped breathing while she looked to have a sexual experience. Bryce sweated more. Alicia snatched a Jello shot and walked away. Even Alan’s eyebrows went up as he watched Katrina.
“Guess I need to try this magical sauce of his,” I said, gazing lovingly up at my husband. I laid a hand against his abs, letting it slide to settle just an inch or two lower. Just for the satisfaction of feeling his muscles twitch. “Nicky’s never made it for me.”
“I’ll make it for you any time you want,” he said, running a finger from my cheek all the way down my neck. “A special private tasting.”
I had no idea if the five-foot radius thing applied that time, but all the blood left my head for other journeys.
Yeah. Game was definitely on.
“Nice to meet you,” Katrina said with a head tilt. She did look genuinely sexy-ditzy, to the untrained eye, but I caught the spark of intelligence hiding back there. The one that said she totally knew what she was doing and just how to play it.
“You too,” I said.
“I hear you and Alan were an item back in the day?” she asked, winking at me again. I wanted to give her a pirate patch for that eye.
“Oh,” I said, chuckling. “A very small item.” And then I heard what that sounded like. “I mean, we just hung out in high school,” I tried to amend as Alan’s scalp glowed a little brighter. “Us and Carmen and Dean. Is Carmen here?” I asked, trying to divert.
I knew she wasn’t. She wouldn’t be caught dead at the same event with our esteemed Mayor Dean Crestwell, who—dammit—was walking toward me. Or even anything with Alan, for that matter, after that little word swap on the day we arrived.
The day we got married.
Good Lord, that felt like three months ago instead of three weeks.
“No,” Alan said. “I never saw her again to invite her.”
Yeah, tried real hard, too, I was sure.
“Lanie!” Dean said, hugging me right out of Nick’s grip.
“Dean,” I said, giving the polite pat. “How are you?”
“Good,” he said. “Mayor. Have to behave and all that, can you believe it?”
I laughed. “Like that would stop you.”
“Well,” he said, giving the endearing smile that had initially won Carmen over many moons ago. Before Sully Hart smiled better. “I just have to work harder at not getting caught.”
Everyone laughed. That Mayor Dean—what a charmer.
Not.
I knew too much.
“Hey, I’m sorry about your aunt. Let’s grab a coffee or something and catch up later, okay?” he said, a hand on my shoulder as his eyes already panned to his next networking opportunity.
I nodded with a placating smile as he already moved on. “Sure thing.”
No way in hell.
“Nicky, could you come help me with the hors d’oerves?” Katrina asked, looking totally innocent. “I think they need a little something. I know you’ll know just what they need.”
Really? I bet I knew what they needed too. A little caress and rub down from the hunky chef?
I felt Nick’s hesitation, but we needed to look comfortable with that sort of thing. Like we weren’t attached at the hip. Alan and Katrina were certainly way past comfortable. Bryce and his wife were—I don’t know what they were. They were like mannequins with sweat glands.
“It’s okay, babe,” I said, reaching up to touch his cheek. The soft stubble sent zings through my fingers.
It wasn’t just zings, however, when he squeezed that hand and kissed my fingertips. Holy shit balls. That was a clear point, set, and match in his favor.
“Okay,” he said. “Be back in a bit.”
“Bring me something delish!” I called after him as Katrina curled her arm in his and dragged him off to God knows where, slapping Mayor Dean on the ass as she passed. “Should I send in the cavalry if he doesn’t make it back?” I asked Alan.
He laughed and threw an arm around me. “Kat’s harmless. Let me show you around out here.” He walked straight away from the Clarks, who didn’t look the least bit put out by it, and little bells sounded in my head. The kind that come with stupid-sticks to poke at me.
It was a setup. To separate us and either get the truth, or individually cop a feel to prove a point and start shit. Or both.
“So have you ever had the Cajun infused honey that Mrs. Boudreaux sells at the feed store?” Alan said, his fingers lazily tracing my shoulder before they pointed ahead. “I buy it like crazy to glaze these stuffed jalapeno wraps.”
My mouth watered on command, as he probably remembered it would. I was nothing if not shamelessly in love with food, and that hadn’t been any different then.
“Oh wow,” I said as we approached a card table that was nicer than my rent house.
Alan picked one up and fed it into my mouth before I could stop him. And the visceral reaction to it couldn’t be stopped either, as the sweet and salty and spicy combined to give me a euphoria I hadn’t known in a long time. I closed my eyes to savor it. I probably needed to get laid.
My eyes sprang open on that thought, and I looked around in case I might have said that out loud. I might need sex, but not for another two months and some change. Not till I wasn’t married anymore, or at least till Nick and I were coming up on the end of it.
God, did I just think that?
Not that I planned to have sex with him. I actually had most definitely decided to not have sex with him in the beginning. But that was three weeks ago. Things were getting a little—warm—at times now.
Three weeks ago. Good grief, I was saying that in my head like that was such ancient history.
“Man this is really good,” I mumbled, trying to be ladylike or mannered or any of the things I’d never been.
“Isn’t it?” Alan said. “They’re like my crack cocaine,” he said on a laugh. “I have to make them once a week, I can’t quit. Hopefully, one day I can try to match it. Enter the honey wars.”
I rolled my eyes. “The honey wars.”
“You know how competitive that gets,” he said. “And believe it or not, it affects sales. I’ll bet you ten dollars if Mrs. Boudreaux enters this stuff, she’ll take first place and be sold out at her store for six months.”
“Cajun honey?” I asked. Wanting another one so badly it gave me a twitch, but I was really aiming for that ladylike thing.
“Yeah, she won’t give up her secret, either,” he said, his hand back on the center of my back, steering me around and away from the food porn.
To the pool. Where there were all manners of fake boobs, made more prominent as five women suddenly decided to all float on their backs at the same time. It looked like a bunch of life buoys decided to dress up.
“So, what makes you want to come back here, Lanie?” he said, that hand sinking lower. “I mean, I remember you practically attaching a rocket to your ass when you left for college.”
It had been true. And up until the reading of the will, I thought it still was. So having to defend that train of thought was a little shaky. Funny how that part didn’t feel like ancient history.
“Yeah,” I said. “And I can’t honestly say that I know—” I cleared my throat. “We—that we know what we want to do. It all kind of happened quickly.”
“Well, if you ask me—”
“I’m not,” I said, smiling as sweetly as I could in the sweltering sun. Or maybe it was the conversation that was melting me on the spot. Or his hand now riding just above my ass crack. “It has nothing to do with you, Alan. It barely involves me. It’s my aunt being a pain in the butt to make a point, turning everyone’s lives upside down.”
“So then walk away from it,” Alan said, his greasy smile starting to nauseate me. “There are other players on the field, what’s keeping you here?”
“My home.”
“Excuse me?”
I raked my hair back, suddenly feeling like I could jump in that pool with all my clothes on. I lifted it off my neck and cursed not bringing a hair tie. Or a pair of scissors. It was like it was suddenly weighing me down.
“It was my home, Alan,” I said, taking a step away from him and his need to touch me. “My only family. Whether I live there forever or not, it’s my roots.”
My phone buzzed with a text, and I looked down to see the California number, ironically.
Sent you an e-mail, please advise that you have received.
Shit.
And why shit? I had no idea. It was the job I’d always wanted. But to have to tell them I was stuck here for a while, and hear them give their regrets and move on… I didn’t think I could bear it. Plus there was Nick.
Wait, what? No. There wasn’t Nick.
“You okay?” he asked, panning from my tapping foot to where I held my hair up.
“I’m—just feeling twitchy,” I said. “My hair’s heavy. Must be the heat.”
“Well, hop in the pool,” he said. “I’m sure Kat has a swimsuit you could borrow.”
Right. If we had two volleyballs to stuff the top with. And then some sanitizer for me to bathe in to rid myself of the full body slide trip his eyes took at the mention of me in his wife’s swimsuit.
“I have my suit on under this,” I said. “Just waiting on Nick. Do you think your wife hid him in a closet or something?”
Alan laughed. “I don’t know, if she jumped him, we may have to retaliate.”
I laughed too, but it was more the uncomfortable I-might-puke version. “I’m gonna go find—where can I get some water?”
“Right up there on the porch.” He pointed. “There’s a big wooden cooler with a variety of drinks.”
“I’ll show you,” said a tall, dark, and gorgeous guy, swooping in to loop an arm through mine and never losing a step.
“Bashhhhhh!” I squealed quietly as we walked away so Alan wouldn’t know my great giddiness at being escaped.
“I heard you were back,” he said.
Sebastian Anderson had always been either in the row next to me in class or two lockers over in the hallway. He was drool-worthy and usually dating a cheerleader or something, but we always said hi. Senior year, when we ended up science project partners, we hit it off big. As buddies. Then he left for the Marines and got even hotter before coming back to Charmed and kicking off his own bee business. It kind of wasn’t fair.
“Sort of,” I said.
“Also heard you were married,” he said.
“Like recently?” I asked. “Or from my aunt?”
“Your aunt,” he said. “She told me every time I saw her.”
I laughed with relief. “So are you here because you want to be?”
“God, no,” Bash said. “Strictly business.”
“With Alan?”
Bash shook his head. “I throw him a bone now and then to shut him up, but I’m here simply to put a face with the label.” He nodded toward a group of way too shiny looking men clustered together. “Money.” He sighed. “I have to give up watching baseball in my recliner to come talk to people with money.”
I laughed and patted him on the arm as we approached the porch and he hugged me as he headed to the money people. Just in time to hear a full hearty female giggle that got louder as the French door opened. Nick came out adjusting his shirt, looking uncomfortable as he quickly shut the door behind him.
No. Way.