Dee

I snarl at Kim who’s still smiling as mama paces the lock up and rails at me about my poor choice in men. As if it’s a bad thing that I decided to date an upstanding citizen and a man who protects his people.

Kim just grins, knowing she’s not in the least amount of trouble because one, the sheriff likes my uncle’s moonshine too much to toss his favorite niece in the slammer for assaulting an officer of the law.

Two, as far as the melee went, and one of the reasons we’ve been taught to melee since we were knee high to Aunt Luanne is that the confusion makes proof impossible.

Zac was yelling about assault at the top of his lungs, but Sheriff Dun told him to prove it seeing as my daddy swore to hell and high water Zac slipped and tripped on a chair.

How that chair gave him two black eyes, kicked him in the balls and bit him is beyond me, but there you have it. I am now sitting in a jail cell with almost every female member of my clan, listening to mama yell about me, while in the cell opposite daddy gives Cord a lesson on the best way to break a man’s hand with a punch.

The bride is just lying on my lap, chuckling, her wedding dress making a snow white pool as it drapes across the concrete floor.

“Mama, I said I was sorry.”

“Sorry? You’re sorry!” she yells, stalking around on legs short enough she should not cover that much distance that fast. “Were you sorry that Luanne had to shove Floyd’s face into my poor Jack’s cake?”

“Be fair! Luanne dragged him halfway across the room to get him to that cake,” I defend, throwing my hands up when Jack and Kim both high five Luanne for her tenacity.

Savages.

“That’s beside the point!”

“Well, what is your point you old fart? Keep in mind that I wasn’t the one who tried to kill a man with a glass. That was Kim. Why don’t you yell at her?”

“I remember seeing the glass in your hand. Just like that recipe you stole,” she rages.

“Oh, for the love of God! Mama, it’s a family recipe, and I made a copy.”

“It’s mine! I make double chocolate mars cake for Christmas. No one else.”

For God’s sake. Is this never going to end, I ask myself, slumping back in the cell with my arms folded because the men are all plastered to the bars of their cell avidly watching the proceedings.

Damn gossipy assholes.

“I only tried it and besides, it was dry. I had to adjust the recipe,” I say, watching her whole body grow at least an inch with anger.

Shoot, should not have said that.

“The only thing that’s gonna be dry is you. After I plant you in an unmarked grave,” she rails, shaking her fist at me.

See, I am the baker in the family. Learned everything I know from this bottle of vinegar called mama and she hates that I make things better than she does. In my defense, it isn’t that hard.

Mama’s a good homemaker, but she despises sweets and baking is a sweet endeavor. She does it because daddy likes sweets, saying his sour apple is enough sour in his life.

I stole her crown of glory the year I turned thirteen and made a batch of muffins my daddy would not stop singing praises to. Since then it’s been a competition with mama trying to reclaim her crown as the homemaker–baking included here.

I have tried to tell her I only bake for one person–okay well I haven’t because if I ever admit to that little fact and who it is, my entire family would be all over it like ants. Or herpes.

About a year ago I asked mama if I can borrow the cake recipe. Mama being mama she said no and hid it. I found it. It was sneaky and wrong, I will admit since it’s the only thing mama has to lord over me but in my defense, I really wanted it.

“Mama, be reasonable, it’s just a recipe. I used it to make Jack’s wedding cake,” I say, cringing back when her eyes narrow and she shoots me a glare.

“It was mine. And now here I am, arrested because not only did you bring a cop to my baby’s wedding, you did it after I told you not to.”

Which is mostly why I did it, I think, my mouth twitching when she throws her hands up because Kim just bursts out laughing.

“You realize you’re using this fiasco to rail at her about a recipe that’s shit to begin with? Mama, the only reason we all eat that cake in the first place is because you changed it and added ‘shine to make it palatable. Face it, it’s crap unless it’s got booze in it. Or we’re too drunk to get cotton mouth.”

Mama’s lips twitch, making Kim laugh harder and I roll my eyes at daddy when she flops down beside me. I’d flinch away, can’t trust mama too easy, but Jack doesn’t budge an inch and keeps sucking at the vodka they let her bring in, being as her wedding was ruined and they felt sorry for her.

If they only knew that not two seconds before they busted in this ‘poor bride’ was shoving someone’s face into the punch bowl.

“I’m sorry I ruined your wedding,” I say softly.

Jack shrugs, sucks at the vodka and hisses when Bay tries to take it for a swig.

“It was awesome. Cord! Wasn’t it exactly how you pictured?” she asks dreamily, smiling over at where her groom is clutching the bars and pouting.

Because he’s about five hours behind on his honeymoon.

“Perfect,” he agrees, smiling when she starts singing “Drunk in Love” and Bay joins in, sounding scarily like a cross between Eeyore and Beyoncé. Shudder.

“You could have just let it go, Kim,” I mutter.

“Hell no. That old asshole really was in the grocery store spouting off about you. Then she got into what a bunch of white trash we all were, and well, I couldn’t just let that go.”

Kim never lets anything go. She waited two years for her ex’s new wife to have a kid before telling her that he was sleeping with his best friend’s wife.

Kim’s just patient that way. She can outwait a mountain lion, and yeah, I have seen her do it. Daddy has the head over his mantle to prove it.

I mutter, trying to avoid Ky’s eyes because the man has been staring at me for a good two hours now without cease. It’s both hot and scary the way he’s focused on me, and all I can remember is the smell of him and the way it felt when he covered my body.

I’ve spent the last hour fantasizing about some real dirty things where that body is concerned, and my favorite involves me, his dick, and the frosting I have in the fridge.

“So, I guess this means you’re single,” Bay drones at the top of her voice, making me flinch and my eyes flit over to Ky.

It’s involuntary but, man oh man, is it hot when I lock eyes with him and his brown orbs go molten. He’s got a girlfriend, I remind myself, hating Janice so bad I could go to hell right now if I keeled over.

“Shut up.”

“Here, have a celebratory drink,” Jack slurs, handing me her bottle.

I take more than a few glugs and hand it back, grinning when she slaps mama’s hand for daring to reach for it.

“That isn’t fair.”

“Tell it to someone who cares ol’ lady.”

It’s another hour before the cops let us all go and I laugh when we get out of the police station only to see Uncle Flea standing there, his bald head emblazoned with a bright green four leaf clover.

“You post bail?” Kim yells, shaking her fist at the sheriff.

“Nope, no charges. That Telman woman was making noise about her boy’s face, but the sheriff said they had to prove assault and not just melee so she slunk her fat ass home and they haven’t moved since. I got Skeet watching them in case he decides to come out of his hole and finally get off the teat.”

We all laugh, and I stand and watch as Cord kisses the life out of Jack, swings her into his arms and finally pushes them both into the limo they were supposed to have taken hours ago.

Kim hitches a ride with Luanne and Jimbo, Bay just disappears as if she’s made of smoke and by the time I turn around everyone is gone save for one person. Ky.

“You’re single.”

“You’re not,” I retort, turning to walk down the sidewalk because it’s that or a taxi and I’d sell a toe before I paid those charges.

He falls into step beside me, his hands shoved in his pockets as we take Side Street where my building is, right across from the diner I love to frequent.

The food is cheap and honestly, I bake, I don’t cook. I don’t say a word as I walk through the door and I’m not surprised when he slides into the booth opposite me.

He’s always like this. He doesn’t leave me alone. He watches. He teases. He flirts. He makes me want him so much that sometimes I wonder if I will ever want another man.

I shacked up with Zac to avoid doing something with Ky that I know could never work. For many reasons. He’s too handsome. He flirts with women all the time and no, despite what his mama says about him just trying not to be hurtful, I don’t like it.

Like now.

“Hey honey, your usual?” the waitress asks, giving Ky a slow smile that is all bedroom eyes.

He smiles back, giving her a once over and proceeds to flirt as if he was born to it. By the time she leaves with our orders, I’m pissed and not a little impressed with the man.

He’s a natural which is part of the problem I have. I don’t want to be with someone who takes that easy to making other women happy. I don’t want to constantly worry about why he’s saying the things he is or what will happen one day.

In school I had the biggest crush on him, and I’d have seriously gone there but for two things. He had a girlfriend who beat the shit out of me while the cheer squad watched, and then this.

Ky’s always been nice and funny and sweet, but he’s also always had a harem following him. The first, namely getting trampled by cheerleaders wasn’t so bad. Sure I got kicked off cheer squad, but my sisters…they beat the shit out of those girls.

The second, I guess it occurred to me somewhere between junior and senior year when he left for college that he and I just would never work.

I want a guy who doesn’t flirt with other women just because he’s nice and he likes to make them feel special. I’m a possessive woman, I like being the center of attention.

With Zac that was easy but for his mama. When we were together it was just us. Sure it was mostly sex–good sex I admit–but when he took me out to dinner, or we barbequed with his friends he was always one hundred percent with me.

He didn’t flirt with the waitress or smile at the middle-aged mother sitting behind us like Ky is currently doing. It was just him and me.

If I thought I could have that with Ky then yeah, I’d be on his dick so fast his balls would erupt. But it won’t be. And for that reason I won’t give credence to the looks he gives me, and I won’t notice that he’s got a hard-on beneath the table.

“When are you going to stop running and finally give us a shot?” he asks when we have our coffee and food.

I roll my eyes, mostly to keep from staring right at him and look at my food that I suddenly don’t want because my mouth is dry with longing.

“Ky–”

“You know what I was thinking all through last night while you let that baboon put his arm around you?”

“I don’t–”

“I was thinking about what it would be like to take you home, lay you out on my bed and finally see if all that sugary sweetness that is Dee Brady is centered between your legs.”

My sex goes hot and needy, and I hold back a moan when he looks at me and slowly licks his bottom lip, the heat in his eyes showing me that if I let him he’d throw me onto the table right here to answer his question.

“Ky–”

“I’d eat you so slow, Dee. I’d lick you the way I lick those peanut butter squares you make for me, and suck on your clit until you release all that syrupy goodness I crave so bad. I want to put my tongue inside you and masturbate you to orgasm so I can feel you clamp around my tongue. Then I’d drink down the honey you made just for me,” he purrs, making me shift and clench my legs together to stave off the lust I feel.

“This isn’t a good idea,” I try, breathing rapidly because oh, my heart is beating so hard.

Ky shakes his head, bites his lip and stares at me, his eyes heated and heavy-lidded.

“You wanna know what I did night before last when I was down to one peanut butter square, and I knew I’d have to wait a whole week for more?” he asks.

I don’t want to know! I don’t. But I find myself staring at him as if I’m in thrall and unable to look away. He smiles slowly, shifts in the booth and leans close to whisper.

“I ate it in bed. I licked it slowly, the way I want to do your pink folds and I imagined the sweet, salty taste was your sex. It made me so hard I couldn’t stop from touching myself.”

“Ky–”

God, I am so wet right now it’s embarrassing. My folds are swollen, throbbing in time with my hard clit, and my inner sheath is fluttering as if it can already feel the smooth slide of his cock inside me.

“It wasn’t nearly enough, but I jerked off while thinking of you sitting on my face, giving me all of you. When I came, it was your name I shouted, Dee.”

And that makes me happy, stupidly happy but it doesn’t change a damn thing. Sex with Ky would ruin me, I know it and then…what?

Maybe he’d want a relationship, and yeah, that would be good, but it would also be bad. Because I’d be happy and I would love him, and he would end up making me miserable because he won’t change.

The truth is I don’t want him to change, but neither do I want to be in love with a man who I don’t know if I can trust. It would hurt too much and I can’t do that kind of hurt.

I saw what loving this strongly did to Jack when she thought Cord cheated on her and that man worships her. How would I feel, seeing him flirt every day, hearing him talk a woman up…

I can’t do that and not turn into some green-eyed monster, and that would ruin whatever we could have. I know I’d try to change him and make him see only me and that would make him resent me and eventually things would just crumble and die.

I don’t, can’t, won’t do that to a man I adore.

The problem is me, I know that, so instead of giving in and taking him home to my apartment across the street, I have to stand up and leave here and protect what little dreams I have left in me.

Years of crushing on this man have not changed the facts, and those are that we just do not suit, no matter how much I wish we did.

“Now you’re going to tell me that we’re not suited and you’re going to walk away, and next week you’ll bake for me and pretend it’s for my mom and it will all start over again,” he says knowingly.

“Whatever this is between us won’t work, Ky. We’re too different,” I say softly, wishing that it wasn’t true. “You’re a jock who flirts with everything in skirts, and I’m not the kind of woman who is up for that, Ky. I don’t want anything but an easy relationship where the most dramatic thing that happens is I make spaghetti on pizza night,” I tell him, hating the lie but needing it.

“Are you telling me that you don’t want what we could have?”

I hate seeing the light go out of his eyes, but right now it’s safer than the heat he was throwing at me. The heat makes me hot and needy and want to throw caution to the wind and just take the leap.

With Ky I’d end up falling to my death because he’s so busy telling some troll that he likes her hair, just because he wants her to feel good about herself.

See, it’s not his intent that is the whole problem, it’s that it would happen. Eventually, he’d hurt me, most likely unintentionally and that I can’t allow.

“You have a girlfriend, Ky, I suggest you call her and let her know you’re okay.”

I rise, leaving him there with the bill and a piece of me as I swallow sadness and walk home where I am alone and unhappy but free of future pain.