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“I promise not to tell any of your old football friends that you’re a softie. Your secret is safe with me.”
“See, my mother hates men. Hates. So getting married was out of the question.” “She’s…an angry lesbian?” I guessed.
For the first time in my life, there was nobody telling me I was a worthless piece of junk.” Fuuuuck. That had to be an exaggeration. “She said that to her own child?” “Oh sure.”
She even called up the sperm bank when I was in high school to ask if they’d discovered any issues with that donor. I think she wanted to sue them. Fun times.” I found myself white-knuckling the steering wheel
“It’s the ‘but’ that really gives you pause, right?” Her butt sure made me want to pause.
I felt a small hand slide onto my belly. The heat from her palm warmed my Shipley Farms T-shirt.
As she continued her conversation with the man in the back seat, those fingers popped the button on my shorts. Oh. Hell.
She cupped me, her thumb slowly stroking me, coaxing me harder. Remembering to breathe, I inhaled carefully. Yeah, she’d said she’d get even with me. And here I’d thought it was nothing but an idle threat.
I tried reciting the periodic table. Hydrogen. Helium. Lithiummmmmmm. Her hand tortured me
I knocked Audrey’s hand away a second time and sped the rest of the way home, tortured by her proximity and the husky sound of her laugh whenever Jude said anything funny. God, I wanted her so badly. And she knew it, the little vixen.
“Be a dear and carry this into the house, will you? I know you hate it when I carry things.” She gave me a cheeky grin I would have liked to wipe off her face with my tongue. Then I carried that fucking squash in front of my crotch all the way indoors.
I watched him blend ciders every year of my life.” Her face gentled. “He said it was a lost art.” “Not lost on me.”
He’d called me a “stupid little rich bitch” and “uptight,” too. I was not uptight! An uptight girl would not have given Bryce a blowjob while he Skyped with his parents. Demanding that my boyfriend be loyal did not make me uptight, damn it.
Griffin had been there, his eyes on me from the moment I walked in. He’d made me feel beautiful at a moment when I’d been feeling like a cast-off.
When Griff had invited me to dinner after our second tryst, I’d hesitated. He’d been a senior and a football star. He’d pegged me as an easy lay. Which I obviously was. Trusting another man not to use me wasn’t something I was ready to do.
Zach was the only one who dove for a shirt when I got out of the car. Jude—who was heavily tattooed—ignored me. Kyle actually flexed, then gave me a wink. Showoff.
Crap. I was a terrible businesswoman. Mentally undressing your vendor was definitely a no-no.
I bought a lot of fennel today.” “That’s fenntastic,” he quipped, wiping sweat off his forehead. “Omigod. You did have your sense of humor surgically removed, didn’t you? Did it leave a scar?”
I was always looking for an excuse to visit the Shipley kitchen.
He put his ear against the tank. “Hear that?” Alone with a half-naked Griff, I put my ear against the tank to humor him.
“Aren’t you staying for lunch?” The offer surprised me
I asked myself a question. WWMBMD? What Would My Bitchy Mom Do?
“Sure! Hey Griff—it’s Audrey.” I heard a snicker before the phone abruptly changed hands. “Princess?”
Okay. Eat up. You’ll need the energy.” The phone went dead before I could ask why. Whatever.
“How do you want to celebrate?” The question came out husky and desperate. My whole life I’d never been any good at playing it cool. He grinned suddenly. “Got two choices. We could drive to the Whippi Dip for some soft serve. What’s your favorite flavor? I’ll bet you’re not a plain vanilla girl.”
“Is, uh, the soft serve organic and blessed by virgins under a full moon?” “Doubt it.” His eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled down at me. “Then I suppose I’d better go with choice number two.”
The taste of Audrey Kidder always made me lose my mind.
I wanted her in every way a man could want her. I wanted her in my bed, underneath me. I wanted her up against this wall. I even wanted her to sit beside me on the way to the market, giving me lip for everything I said. And I wanted her hanging out in the kitchen putting cherries in the barbecue sauce and chatting up my sisters. Fuck, I had it bad.
Grabbing her hand, I walked her over to the passenger’s door, which I opened for her. Then I climbed into the driver’s seat and slid the seat back by about ten inches.
I already knew with Audrey that what you see was not always what you got. Beneath her girl-next-door facade beat the heart of a perfect sinner. If there was a more attractive package on the planet, I’d never met her.
I had everything a man could ever ask for at that moment. I knew Audrey wasn’t mine. She lived hours away, and she’d be gone before the month was out. For this brief moment, though, everything was right with the world.
“That was…” she whispered. “We… Urrmh.” My thoughts exactly.
“Don’t know what it is about you, princess,” I admitted when I finally stopped laughing. “You make me crazy.”
I had the loopy, impractical idea that we might just belong together for keeps. Audrey was a hoot. She made me forget all the stressful parts of my life.
When he emerged a few minutes later, I expected him to pull on his shorts and go. But that’s not what happened. He lay down on the bed again and pulled the covers up over both of us.
I pinched his ass. He pinched my boob. “Ow!” “You started it,”
Griff Shipley was surprisingly cuddly after sex.
I loved football, and I went to every home game at BU. Every time Griff Shipley had taken the field in his tight pants, my eyes had been glued to his very fine ass. Not that I was about to admit that I paid way too much attention to him well before we ever hooked up.
His smiling mouth moved to cover mine, and then we were kissing again, his beard chafing my face. I loved it.
We didn’t have a relationship at all. That’s when loneliness set in. Hard. This always happened to me, too. It was why I didn’t have many one-night stands. It wasn’t that sex embarrassed me. I wasn’t ashamed. It’s just that if something was good, I wanted more of it.
You called the house phone last night, which means I don’t have your number. Here’s mine. 802.228.4330.
Aw. Okay, Audrey, I coached myself. You are not going to get all giddy about this note. Nope. Bad idea.
While I might be deep in lust with Griff, I’d already fallen head over heels for his family.
Then again, if I were a Shipley, that would make Griff my brother. Ew. Bad plan.
“I’m, um, familiar with the problem.” She raised her pierced eyebrow. “The problem of penises?” “Yes. No.” Hell.
“He loves his apple trees and his family. And that’s a lot of trees and a giant family. So it’s almost as if they use up all his emotional availability. Half the county has it bad for Griff Shipley.”
“If you’re here in the mornings, you should sell coffee.” “I’ve thought about it.”
The morning I woke up beside Audrey was a good one. Even though I had to jog two miles to my truck at dawn and then put up with all the smirks in the cow barn, I was a happy man.
“Can you, like, snarl at us? Just once? It’s weird seeing you smile all the time,” Kyle complained.
the buzz kill was that Audrey hadn’t called. I don’t know what I was expecting, really. All I knew is that I wanted to see her again.
