CHAPTER NINETEEN
LAWSON STARED AT the bottle of whiskey in his bottom-right desk drawer. Usually the only time he felt the overwhelming need for a shot was after a nightmare about Brett. But apparently fatherhood was having the same soul-sucking effect.
Well, the fears of fatherhood, anyway.
Tessie needed help, and he didn’t know how to fix it. Hell, he didn’t know how to fix himself or his tangled relationship with Eve. And now that tangle included their daughter.
Daughter.
At least the word wasn’t sticking in his throat though there were still plenty of sticking points in his head. Not because he didn’t love Tessie.
He did.
That had been a weird sort of realization that a DNA connection could produce such a strong feeling of love. Stronger than anything else he’d ever felt, and that’s why he was scared spitless. If he screwed this up, there’d be no coming back from it.
But how did he not screw up? Lawson still didn’t have a clue, which was the reason he was staring at a whiskey bottle in the middle of the day. Ditto for it being the reason he’d been avoiding Eve and Tessie. He was hoping a fix would come to him before he had to see them again.
Cursing, he kicked the drawer shut and opened the bottom-left one. No whiskey here, but it was a torment of a different kind.
A manila envelope.
Unlike the bottle of whiskey, it wasn’t in plain sight. Years ago, shortly after he’d gotten this office at the Granger Ranch, he’d made sure there were plenty of layers of paperwork and supplies on top of the envelope. Lawson hadn’t wanted to risk seeing it when he was rummaging for a paper clip. That’s why it was puzzling as to why he felt the need to see it now.
There was no label on the envelope, but over the past eighteen years, he’d given it a mental label. Usually with the word shit on it. Shit to forget. Shit you should toss. Shit you should never open. And the most often used one—shit and more shit.
Evidently, he had a somewhat limited vocabulary when it came to such things.
Despite the mental label-warning he’d once given the envelope, Lawson opened it now, and he dumped out the two small gift boxes on his desk. They were still tied up shut with the ribbon that’d once been white. It was now more the color of piss—which was probably some kind of metaphor for his life.
He didn’t open the gifts. No need. His superpower was the unwanted ability to see what was in both. Gifts that he’d intended to give to Eve at the ill-fated Sadie Hawkins dance so that she would have, well, choices about where they were to go from there. She’d never gotten them, though, because where they’d gone from there was precisely nowhere. They’d broken up, and the gifts had gone in an envelope and eventually shoved into a bottom drawer.
According to what Cassidy had told him, Eve had hung on to an unused memento from that night, too. A dress that she’d intended to wear. And also according to Cassidy, Eve had been planning on telling him something.
Welcome to the club.
Lawson had rehearsed a thing or two he’d been going to say, as well. Things that he’d added to his shit-to-forget pile. Of course, he’d never forget them.
He was still staring at the two boxes when the sound of his phone ringing shot through the room. Lawson made a grunt of surprise that he hoped no one else in the house had heard, and he quickly raked the boxes back in the envelope. He shoved it in the drawer before he even looked at his phone screen.
Lucian.
Too bad he couldn’t add his big brother to an actual shit-to-forget box, but since this call could be about their mother, Lawson answered it instead of doing what he usually did when he got a call from Lucian—let it go to voice mail.
“Have you heard?” Lucian asked right off.
“Is this a game of twenty questions?” The stab at sarcasm was a knee-jerk reaction, but Lawson quickly ditched it. “Did something happen to Mom?”
“Not Mom. She’s at the house, resting. The trouble’s with Tessie.”
Lawson had already been steeling himself for Mom news, but there wasn’t enough steeling in the world for Lucian saying Tessie’s name in that tone. The same tone Lucian used with botched business deals and symptoms of stomach flu.
“What happened to Tessie?” Lawson couldn’t get that out fast enough. But he reminded himself that Lucian could be calling because their mother had told him that Tessie was Lawson’s daughter.
Lucian cursed. “You haven’t heard.” More cursing. “Someone at the rehab center in Austin sold info about Tessie’s stay there to the tabloids. Then one of her so-called friends gave an interview about her getting drunk. It’s about to be plastered all over those magazine covers where you don’t want your picture plastered.”
Hell. Now Lawson was cursing. And thinking of suing that half-assed clinic. “Tessie only stayed in rehab a couple of hours.” But he knew that wouldn’t matter. Eve was a celebrity, and Tessie was her daughter, so that made Tessie tabloid fodder, too.
“I tried several contacts but couldn’t stop the pictures from being printed,” Lucian added.
Well, crap. “There are pictures?”
“Yeah. Of Tessie in the hall of the clinic. Of Tessie coming out of the clinic. A third of Tessie drinking what appears to be margaritas with two friends. And a fourth photo of Tessie and Eve driving through the Heavenly Pastures gates at the ranch.”
Ah, Lawson understood Lucian’s concern then. It wasn’t actually for Tessie. It was because the ranch and therefore the Grangers would get looped into this tabloid scandal. Dylan wouldn’t care a rat about it since he was often at the center of local scandals. Lawson wouldn’t have cared, either, but he didn’t want Tessie’s name dragged through the mud.
“There are LA reporters at the Longhorn,” Lucian went on. “They’re fishing for a story.”
Lucian didn’t demand that Lawson get over there now and put a stop to it, which meant his brother knew Lawson had a personal stake in this. “I’m on my way there,” Lawson said, grabbing his keys and hat, but he was talking to the air because Lucian had already hung up.
Lawson headed out of the house, already trying to rein in his temper, but it riled him to the bone that someone had done this. Yes, Tessie had been wrong to get drunk and then run off the way she did, but news like this could cause her to go off the deep end. That meant after he took care of the reporters at the Longhorn, he needed to drive to Eve’s and check on them.
However, Lawson hadn’t even made it out of the driveway before he realized a trip to Eve’s wouldn’t be necessary. That’s because he saw her car heading his way. The tires squealed when she braked to a too-fast stop, and she threw open her door while she was still turning off the engine.
She’d been crying.
Eve hurried to him and went straight into his arms. “Did you hear?”
He nodded, pulled her closer than necessary, considering this was supposed to be a hug of comfort. Since he didn’t know what to say, Lawson just stayed quiet and let Eve continue.
“I just came from the Longhorn,” she said. “No one from Wrangler’s Creek is talking to the reporters, but they’ll just make up the story they want to print, and it’ll be far worse than the truth.”
“They might not do that if I kick their asses,” Lawson offered. He hadn’t exactly meant it as a joke, but it caused Eve to pull back and give a brief, weary smile.
The smile vanished as quickly as it’d come, and she groaned. “Wellsmore is a private, conservative college. They have strict rules of conduct for their students, and this could get Tessie expelled. Or even arrested for underage drinking.”
Lawson hated that because he didn’t want her to have a juvie record. Or any kind of record, for that matter. Plus, school might be the anchor that Tessie needed to turn her life around. But he could definitely see where the dean would have grounds to kick her out.
“How’s Tessie taking it?” he wanted to know.
“She’s crying and locked herself in her room. I hid her car keys because I didn’t want her driving off anywhere. Cassidy is there at the house, of course, and will call me if Tessie tries to leave. I would have stayed, but I was hoping I could talk the reporters into nixing the story. But they just started taking pictures of me.” She motioned toward her tear-streaked face. “Now this will be in the tabloids, too.”
Lawson had to fight that ass-kicking urge, but it was a sick SOB who made a living off someone else’s misery.
“What can I do?” he asked. It wasn’t lip service, but he figured there wasn’t a whole lot that could be done by anyone right now.
Still, Eve pulled back and looked up at him. It had those sexual overtones that all their shared looks had, but the overtones were significantly diminished by her tears, bunched-up forehead and teeth clamped over her trembling bottom lip. She seemed on the verge of falling apart, and she probably didn’t want to do that in front of the ranch hands who were milling around.
Lawson considered taking Eve to his office, but Nicky and the kids were home. Eve probably didn’t want to face anyone right now. That’s why Lawson got her into his truck and started driving.
“I can’t go home right now,” Eve said when she saw the direction he was going. “I don’t want to be around Tessie or Aiden when I’m like this. This crying-mess is best for adult eyes only.”
“I’m taking you to my place.” It was risky. Eve and he usually had no willpower around each other, but Lawson figured they were safe from having sex, considering Eve’s and his state of mind.
She didn’t object to the destination, maybe because she’d be closer to Tessie but not right there with her. In fact, Eve could keep watch of her place with the binoculars that Lawson hadn’t gotten around to throwing out.
Eve rummaged through his glove compartment and came up with a Kleenex so she could blot at the tears. “I was going to tell Tessie about you being her father, but I’ll hold off. I don’t want to add it to what she’s already feeling.”
“Uh.” That’s all Lawson managed to say because Eve snapped toward him.
Her teary eyes widened. “You told her?”
“She guessed when we were at the apartment in Austin, and I didn’t lie to her. So, she knows.”
He couldn’t tell how Eve felt about that. She sure didn’t look relieved. “How’d Tessie take it?”
That wasn’t an easy question to answer. Tessie hadn’t seemed upset. Not with him, anyway. But she had unleashed a little wrath about Eve. Lawson kept that to himself though. Eve was already beating herself up enough without dumping more on her.
“I think she’s still trying to work out how she feels,” Lawson said, settling for that. “That’s why I haven’t been by to see her. I wanted to give her some time.”
Eve stared at him. “I thought you stayed away because you were avoiding me.”
“I was but not for the reason you’re probably thinking.” It was the truth, but Lawson wished he’d thought about it before blurting it out.
She blinked. “Oh.”
Yeah, oh. He’d wanted to give Eve and himself some thinking time, too. So they could come to terms with the fooling around they’d done in Austin.
He expected Eve to launch into a discussion as to what he was feeling, et cetera, but she sat in silence as they drove to Heavenly Pastures. The silence ended, though, when she saw what someone had left by the gate. The pile of curled horns looked as if a bear had taken a dump.
“Tessie’s story will only make this sort of thing worse,” she muttered.
Lawson knocked some horns from the top of the security box and entered the code to open the gate only after he checked around to make sure there were no hornies or paparazzi. He didn’t see anyone, but with all the woods nearby, someone could be watching—that was likely how someone got that photo of Eve and Tessie. Just in case that someone tried to rush in and snap some more pictures, Lawson waited until the gate was fully closed behind them before he continued the drive to his house.
The first thing Lawson saw when he pulled into his driveway was something he didn’t want to see. Not a heap of horns or a Swaron trespasser. But rather Prissy Pants squawking and running around.
“Uh, what’s a chicken doing here?” Eve asked.
Lawson had no idea how the hen had gotten there. Vita didn’t have the security code for the gate unless the fates had revealed it to her. With the way his luck had been going, it was possible.
Lawson soon saw a clue as to the appearance of the chicken. A note was stuck in his door, and he immediately recognized the handwriting. It was Dylan’s.
“‘Saw Vita in town, and she insisted I bring this ugly chicken to you because she said you were in danger of being cursed again,’” Lawson read aloud. Dylan had triple underlined insisted. “‘FYI, you’re paying for the shit to be cleaned out of my truck. Dylan.’”
Lawson could only sigh. He wasn’t in danger of being cursed. The curse seemed to already be there.
Since he rarely locked his door, Lawson was cautious when he opened it, and he looked around for any other curse paraphernalia from Vita. Or for Darby naked beneath a raincoat. Nothing, thank God. Maybe the fates felt they’d already given him enough for one day.
At least he didn’t have ass stitches.
Not yet, anyway.
Eve took cautious steps when she walked in, too. She glanced at the binoculars by the front window and the bottle of whiskey on his coffee table.
“It’s been a rough couple of days,” he grumbled.
She went to the bottle and had a closer look. “It’s not open.”
“If it hadn’t been a rough time, I would have opened the bottle and had a shot or two.” Lawson fully expected to have to give her some kind of explanation to go with that, but Eve only nodded and made a sound of understanding.
“It’s like Ooey Gooey for me,” she said.
Lawson was sure he gave her a blank stare because now he was the one who needed the explanation.
“It’s ice cream,” she added. “Or guaranteed cellulite in every bite, as Cassidy likes to call it. I only eat it if I want it, not because I’m trying to choke down my sorrows.”
So, she did get it. More or less. He only hoped he didn’t have to explain their coping mechanisms to anyone else.
Eve went to the window and used the binoculars to look at her house. “Tessie’s car is still there, so no escape attempt yet.” Her back was to him now, but he had no trouble seeing her shoulders drop. “God, Lawson. What are we going to do?”
It was another tough question, but at least Eve had made it a “we” instead of an “I.” He’d been mulling over some possibilities in between tamping down the whole lust thing he had whenever Eve was around.
“Have you grounded her?” he asked.
She nodded. Sighed.
“Maybe we could arrange for her to see a counselor,” Lawson suggested. “Roman’s son, Tate, has been seeing one since he had some problems last year.”
Another nod. “She has an appointment day after tomorrow. Not sure she’ll go though. When I told her about it, she just grunted.”
If Lawson thought it would do any good, he’d volunteer to take Tessie. Heck, he’d go to the appointment with her.
Lawson made a third suggestion. “I could try to talk to Tessie if you think it’ll help.”
Judging from Eve’s even faster sigh, she’d already considered that, too. “She’s just so angry, and it might stir her up even more than she already is.”
He couldn’t believe he was even thinking this, but he was going to take a page from Kellan’s book on this. Right now, it could make things worse for him to be around his own child.
Even if that’s where he wanted to be.
Well, hell. Sometime in the past couple of days, the daddy switch had flipped inside him, and suddenly none of his other problems could hold a candle to what was going on with Tessie. Ironic that the biggest issue in his life was one that he couldn’t do anything to fix.
“I’ve even considered talking to Vita,” Eve went on. Not a sigh this time but a groan, and she quickly waved it off.
Obviously, this was eating away at Eve for her to have thought of something that extreme. “I could lend you the chicken.” It was a lousy joke, but Lawson was pleased when it earned him one of those half smiles from Eve.
With that half smile on her mouth and the weariness everywhere else on her face, Eve looked at him. Really looked. It was a connection that could only lead to trouble. Which was probably why she glanced away. She took her looks and glancing to his house, and it occurred to him this was the first time she’d been here.
“The place looks great,” she said, putting her hands on her hips. She probably didn’t know that the gesture stretched her shirt buttons to the max. It created a gap that allowed him a peek at her bra.
He felt his body clench, then beg.
She walked past him and to the kitchen, and her face twisted up a little when she saw the green granite. “I’m guessing this wasn’t your first choice,” she said, running her hand along the smooth surface.
“It wasn’t even my one-millionth choice.”
That brought back some of the smile, and she kept walking, going through the kitchen and to the wall of windows that faced the creek. “Now, this was your first choice for a view.”
Yeah, it was. And while he’d never actually imagined Eve standing there like that, she sure made a pretty picture with the light haloing all around her. Haloing through her thin top, too, since he could now see the outline of her body.
His body begged some more, but Lawson planted his feet and didn’t move.
She sighed again and mumbled something he didn’t catch. However, Lawson had no trouble hearing the rest of what she had to say. “This might be the only house in Wrangler’s Creek where we haven’t had sex.” And with that comment, she looked over her shoulder at him. “Did you bring me here for sex?”
The right answer to that was no. And it was truthful. Well, truthfulish, anyway. He hadn’t been thinking about sex when he’d brought Eve here, but he was thinking about it now.
“On a scale of one to ten, just how bad of an idea would it be?” she added. But Eve didn’t wait for him to answer. She came charging toward him, hooking her arm around him and pulling him to her.
“Screw it,” she grumbled. “Let’s go for making it the worst idea we’ve ever had.”
* * *
EVE KNEW THIS was wrong, but that was probably only adding an extra layer of heat to it. Forbidden fruit combined with bad timing and privacy was a recipe for unplanned sex. Of course, when it came to Lawson, breathing was its own recipe for what was happening.
And what was happening was full-blown foreplay. Right out of the gate.
There was kissing, groping and a level of urgency that made all of this seem as if sex was the cure for all their problems. Maybe the cure for world peace, too. Eve was pretty sure it would give her some peace, anyway. Well, it would after Lawson took care of this pressure-cooker need that was flash-firing inside her.
Thankfully, he had the cure for that.
Eve went after his clothes, aiming for the buttons on his shirt and the zipper of his jeans. She sucked at both, a reminder that as teenagers they’d often had sex while nearly fully clothed. That’s what happened when lovemaking venues were truck seats and semipublic places. Panty removal, his zipper down, freeing him from his boxers, and a condom.
Easy peasy.
But now that escalating need gave her the fine motor skills of a toddler.
She gave up on the shirt though she did pop some of the buttons. Lawson, however, proved to her that he still had nimble fingers and an ample undressing skill set. He yanked off her top and tossed it somewhere before he scooped her up and went in the opposite direction of her shirt.
Wherever he was taking her, he kissed her along the way, which made the trip very pleasant indeed. He hadn’t lost a step with that magic mouth because he managed to kiss her neck and the tops of her breasts before he maneuvered his way down a hall and to a bedroom. And he kept kissing when he laid her on the bed. At least he did until he pulled back.
Eve reached for him, hoping he hadn’t changed his mind about this, but he was merely shimmying off her shoes and jeans. Panties, too. Leaving her stark naked except for her bra. But Lawson rid her of that as well, and while she very much wanted to be naked to hurry this along, she also wanted to be able to ogle him the way he was ogling her.
Oh, mercy. He was ogling her.
“I have stretch marks,” she said, wishing that she’d done some extra time on the elliptical. And cut out that last carton of Ooey Gooey.
“I like stretch marks,” he drawled, and he kissed a couple of them as if to prove that.
Eve had no idea if he was lying, but when he kept going, kissing her lower and lower, she didn’t care about such trivial things as truth. When he gave her a kiss right between her legs, Eve no longer cared about ogling or oxygen. Yes, breathing was definitely overrated compared to this.
She let him continue with those special kisses until she was so close to an orgasm that she could feel it rippling through her. That’s when she latched on to Lawson’s hair and pulled him back up so they were aligned in just the right way for more than just special kisses. She also got serious about getting him out of his shirt, jeans and boxers, but she might have failed again if Lawson hadn’t helped her with all three.
He fumbled around in the nightstand drawer and came up with a condom. Eve didn’t even try to help with that because she was too busy getting in some of that ogling. It had definitely been worth the wait and the effort that it took to get him out of his clothes. This was no longer a boy’s body but rather a man’s. Lawson had filled out nicely.
In all areas.
She reaped the benefits when he finally got the condom on and pushed inside her. It was possible that fairies had strewn gold glitter behind her eyes and in her head. Possible, too, that she’d reached some level of pleasure that no woman had ever reached before.
Part of her didn’t want to move for fear of scaring off the fairies and bringing on a too-quick climax, but Eve’s body didn’t give her a choice about that. She moved, lifting her hips to benefit from every one of those “filled out” thrusts. She hooked her legs around his waist and moved right into the rhythm with him.
The years just melted away. So did her troubles. So did the memory of her stretch marks. The only thing she could feel, see and taste was the amazing man who sent her and the fairy glitter soaring and flying. Lawson did his own soaring, too, and she felt the climax rack through him.
Well, it racked for a couple of seconds, anyway.
“Shit,” he grumbled.
That wasn’t the response Eve had been expecting. Lawson wasn’t a talker when it came to climaxes. She’d never even gotten an Oh, God from him, much less a word like that.
Nor had she gotten the words that followed next.
“Shit,” he repeated. “The condom broke.”