A Dark & Stormy Knight: A McKnight Romance (McKnight Romances) (7 page)

“See? You didn’t even try to work out
whatever was wrong.”

“I tried,” Georgia said, her tone more
defensive than she’d have liked.

“How hard could you have tried in only
six weeks?”

She really didn’t need this. Stopping off
for a drink instead of going home made her feel guilty enough. She didn’t need
to pile old guilt on top of the new. “It’s not like I stopped trying the moment
I walked out. Sometimes you walk out in an attempt to get their attention.”

“Did it work?” His tone said he already
knew the answer. Which she supposed he did.

“Not as well as I’d hoped.” Not well at
all. But that’s what happened when you were barely eighteen and an idiot. Young
and stupid. They went together like peanut butter and jelly.

A scream of laughter erupted from Missy’s
table.

He shot another look their way. “Well, it
got my attention when Missy moved out.”

“And how’s that working out for you?”

“Not so well.”

“She’s got you jealous, though, doesn’t
she?”

His mouth drew tight. “Sol ever get
jealous?”

“Does a one-legged duck swim in circles?”

His mouth quirked again. “Still?”

“God, yes. I don’t think he knows how to
let go of anything, let alone a woman he thought he had branded.”

“What about you? You ever get jealous of
him?”

She shook her head. “Not for a long time.”

“Guess you don’t care, then, that he went
out with Missy after she left me.”

Georgia
blinked at him. Sol had gone out with Missy? Missy, who’d been everyone’s
goodtime girl in school? The carnival ride behind the bleachers? That Missy?

She glanced at their table in time to see
one of the guys slip his hand around the back of Missy’s neck and pull her into
a kiss. Even from the bar, Georgia could see she was frenching him. Had she
kissed Sol like that? Probably. Sol and Tommy hadn’t liked each other much in
school, so Sol wouldn’t worry about Tommy’s feelings. Had he slept with Tommy’s
slut of a wife?

Georgia
looked back at Tommy, who was watching her with a tight focus as though he
could shut out what was happening at the pool tables. She was willing to bet he
knew exactly how many breaths the kiss lasted. And there wasn’t a doubt in her
mind Missy had come into The Lariat with every intention of flaunting her date
in front of Tommy. That was how some women thought. Her heart broke a little
for him.

“Why would I care? He’s a free man.”

“Yeah.” The skepticism in Tommy’s voice
said he hadn’t missed that telltale moment when she’d wanted to pull every
single bleached blonde hair out of Missy’s head.

Georgia
took a gulp of her drink.

“She always liked Sol.”

Georgia
almost spit the drink at Tommy. She forced herself to swallow. “She did?”

“Oh, yeah. She had a thing for him in
school, but Sol was kind of oblivious to girls.”

Georgia
made a disparaging sound. “Sol was never oblivious.” Having been “the girl with
the boobs” back then, she knew beyond the shadow of a doubt which boys had been
oblivious. Sol had not been one of them.

“Yeah, well . . . Maybe he
just hadn’t figured out what to do with them yet.”

She smiled, remembering how much she’d
wanted Sol to kiss her and how long it had taken him.

Tommy’s mouth tightened. “Of course, he’s
figured it out since then.”

Dismay washed over her. She hoped it didn’t
show on her face.

“But you don’t get jealous over old Sol,”
Tommy mocked.

Apparently, it did show on her face.

It wasn’t until Tommy set a fresh drink
in front of her that Georgia realized she’d finished the first one. She took a
sip.

“You wouldn’t be interested in extracting
a little revenge, would you?”

“Revenge? For what? I don’t own Sol.
Besides, I’ve got enough on my plate. The last thing I need is Sol jealous. He
gets completely irrational.”

“Really? What’s he done?”

“What hasn’t he done? Do you know that
one time he told a guy I was dating that we adopted Eden because I couldn’t
have children?” She took a breath, allowing a dramatic pause. “The reason I
couldn’t have children was because the name on my birth certificate was George.”

“George?” Tommy laughed. “Nice implants,
George.”

“It’s not funny. I liked that guy.”

“Well, it’s kinda funny,” Tommy said,
still smiling.

“Yeah, maybe you should try telling that
to the guy inspecting Missy’s tonsils with his tongue.”

“Hey!” The reminder wiped the smile off
Tommy’s face.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t pour salt in your
wounds.”

His gaze went past her. Georgia swiveled enough to see the two guys from Missy’s table approaching.

“Another round, tarbender.”

Without a word, Tommy started pouring
drinks.

The one Missy had been climbing as if he
were a jungle gym said to his buddy, “Man, that Missy’s a hot number. Looks
like I’m rolling sevens tonight.”

“I wish mine would loosen up a little,”
his buddy said. “She’s not nearly as friendly as yours. I don’t suppose you
wanna swap?”

Georgia
looked straight ahead, wishing she didn’t have to listen to this.

“Do I look stupid?” Missy’s date asked.

Georgia
wanted to say,
Uh yeah, now that you mention it,
but she bit her tongue.
These guys wouldn’t understand. All they cared about was whether or not they
were getting laid.

“Hey, Georgia.” Tommy slid a couple of
ones across the bar at her. “Why don’t you feed the jukebox for me?”

Why hadn’t she thought of that? She
smiled her thanks at Tommy and left the morons at the bar.

When she returned, Missy’s friends were
back at the pool table, Garth had just started singing
Friends in Low Places,
and a fresh drink awaited her.

Tommy seemed helpless to look away from
the poolroom where Missy was thanking the guys—both of them—for the drinks the
only way she seemed to know how. Maybe the only one who wouldn’t get laid
tonight was her frigid, little girlfriend.

Georgia
would have enjoyed her catty thoughts if Tommy hadn’t been so obviously
miserable. That look on his face was enough to bring back how alone she’d felt
when she’d left Sol. Not that her family hadn’t been supportive. They’d taken
her in, after all, but the way her mother had focused on the mistake she’d made
marrying Sol in the first place with comments about how Georgia should have set
her sights higher or the way she had of sighing whenever Georgia showed any
softness toward Sol, the support had felt more like punishment than love.

Tommy looked as though he didn’t even
have that. No one could cure the hurt he felt, but a friend who understood
would at least make him feel like someone was on his side. She could at least
do that for him.

“You sure you don’t want a little
revenge?” he asked softly.

She sympathized. In the name of
friendship, she might even have agreed to help him out if she wasn’t so sure
Sol would flip out.

“Why don’t you just move on, Tommy? Find
yourself somebody new.”

He shook his head. “I’m not ready. It
wouldn’t be fair to whoever she was.”

Wow. He’d really grown up since high
school. Too bad she couldn’t say the same for certain other people.

He was still watching his soon-to-be ex. “I
wouldn’t mind getting a little myself.”

For a second, she wasn’t sure if he was
talking about revenge or sex.

His eyes came back to her and focused in.
“I just need a partner to help me out.”

Revenge, she decided. But he probably
wouldn’t turn down sex. He was still a guy, after all.

She was almost willing to help him out
with the former, but the latter was out of the question.

Maybe he should run a personals ad, she
thought as she sipped on her drink.

###

Sol parked beside Georgia’s tin can. What was she doing at The Lariat?

She might be a native of Hero Creek, but
she hadn’t lived there for a long time. The regulars might well see her as
fresh meat. She’d be a lone gazelle on a plain full of lions.

He spotted her as soon as he walked in.
Sitting right at the bar as though she was looking to get picked up by some
local yokel. He’d fix that.

His cock stiffened as though volunteering
for the job.
Down, Obie.

As he came up behind her, he saw she had
some creamy, chick drink on ice in front of her. He propped one cowboy boot on
the bar’s brass foot rail, braced a forearm on the bar, and leaned on it.
Without greeting her, he picked up her glass between forefinger and thumb and
took a sip. “Whoa!” He ran his tongue across his lips, sucking a stray drop
from the fine hairs of his mustache. “Tasty way to drink whiskey.” Not quite
the chick drink he’d expected.

She didn’t look surprised to see him. “That’s
not whiskey. It’s Baileys Irish Cream.”

“Honey, I know whiskey when I taste it.”
How could she not know she’d been drinking whiskey? “You put it in a milkshake,
it’s still whiskey.” Sol studied her, evaluating. Georgia had never been a big
drinker. She didn’t look drunk now except for the sheen in her eyes, as if they
weren’t focusing quite as well as they should. “How many of these have you had?”

“A few.”

His erection got stiffer.
Opportunistic
Bastard.
If he let her drink a few more, she’d be easy to get into bed. “Okay,
it’s not whiskey,” he said, happy to humor her. “Let me buy you another.”

“It’s
not
whiskey. It’s a liqueur.”

“I ain’t arguing with you.” He gestured
to the bartender. “Tommy, get the lady another. On me. And get me a barley pop.”

Tommy brought a Lone Star with Georgia’s Baileys. “When did you start drinking those?” Sol asked as he watched her take a
sip.

“About a year. A guy I dated introduced
me to it.”

A guy she dated?
Fuck.
“Pretty
pansy drink for a guy.”

Georgia
’s
eyes narrowed. “You think so?”

Sol took a swallow of his beer. “Yeah, I
think so.”

Her foot slipped as she tried to stand on
the brass foot rail, but she got it repositioned and leaned over the bar. “Tommy!
C’mere.”

Tommy responded quickly, and Sol wondered
if Tommy had been trying to make time with her before he’d walked in.

“I want two shot glasses, Tommy. Half
Baileys, half Jameson’s Irish Whiskey.”

Sol’s eyebrow twitched as Tommy turned to
make the drinks. “Shooters?”

She looked disdainfully at him. “Of
course. You don’t sip out of a shot glass.”

“This concoction got a name?”

“A shillelagh.”

When Tommy put the shot glasses in front
of them, Georgia threw hers down in one quick motion. Sol felt a smile trying
to pull at his lips as he calculated how many it would take to get her loose
enough to go home with him.

She looked up at him. Her beautiful baby blues
sloe-eyed. Still glazy. “Come on, tough guy. You’re not afraid of little pansy
drink, are you?”

“Nothing in a shot glass is a pansy
drink,” Sol said, and he picked his up and threw it back. He licked his lips
then rolled his lower lip up over the edge of his mustache as he peered into
the empty glass. The sweet of the Bailey’s on the flat of his tongue and the
whiskey burn on the edges made an interesting combination.

“Not bad.” He pushed his cowboy hat back
on his head. “Tommy, set up a couple more.”

When the drinks were in front of them, Georgia reached for her glass, but Sol put his hand on her wrist. He held his drink up and
waited for her to raise hers. “To women and horses . . . And the
men that ride them.” Then he threw the drink down his throat.

When his empty hit the bar, she was still
holding her full glass, glaring at him through slit eyes.

“Too pansy for you?” he asked with a
smirk.

“Too misogynistic,” she said then drank.

Damn, I hate when she uses them two-dollar
words.

He walked over to the jukebox and fed in
a couple of dollars. Did she still like Garth Brooks? He punched in several
numbers.
The Dance
started as he walked back to bar.

Georgia
held on to the bar and leaned back, swaying to the slow strains of the song
with her eyes closed.

“Careful, honey.” Sol put a hand against
her back in case she lost her grip.

“I love this song.”

“I know.”

“Dance with me?”

He fought to keep the surprise off his
face.
How many did she have before I got here?
“Sure.”

He led her to the open space by the
jukebox and opened his arms. She wrapped her arms around his neck and leaned
against him. He didn’t even try to lead; all he really wanted to do anyway was
hold her.

They didn’t get through the first chorus
before he knew this was a bad idea. At this close proximity, he wasn’t going to
be able to hide his body’s response to her. But even though she couldn’t
possibly miss his erection pressed up against her, she didn’t pull back. She
was, in fact, rubbing against it every time they swayed back and forth, making
it worse by the minute.

He dropped a hand to cup her ass and pull
her closer. She didn’t protest and, for the first time, he thought he really
might have a shot at getting her to go home with him.

Don’t be stupid,
he told himself. But she felt so right
in his arms, the way no other woman ever had. And he was sick of missing her.

“Sol.”

“Yes, honey?”

“Sol.”

“What, baby?”

“Sol.”

He pulled back to look at her. She looked
green around the gills.

“I think I’m going to puke.”

He grabbed her wrist and dragged her
toward the ladies’ room, shoving her through the door when they got there.

So much for taking her home.

He leaned against the wall next to the
door to wait.

Several minutes passed. He knew she hadn’t
passed out because he could hear faint retching noises.

“Hey, Sol,” Missy said as she passed him
on her way into the ladies’ room.

“Hey, Missy.”

Nearly five minutes later, the door
opened again. Missy had Georgia by the arm.

“This what you’re waiting for?”

Georgia
jerked her arm out of Missy’s grasp. The movement spun her around. Sol grabbed
her, hands on her hips, stabilizing her.

“Yup.”

Missy gave him a sympathetic look. “See
ya ‘round.”

He nodded and pulled back to look closer
at Georgia. She was the kind of pale he’d seen in people who’d just upchucked
their socks.

“It’s time you go home,” Sol said.

“I don’t want to.”

“Well, you’re done drinking for tonight.”

She started to step around him but
misjudged and tripped over the toe of his boot, falling into him instead. He
caught her in his arms.
Yup. I shoulda figured.

The few times he’d seen her drunk, it had
always ended like this, with the liquor smashing into her as suddenly as a
runaway train. He held her in one arm as he pulled his cell phone out of his
pocket. She didn’t struggle to right herself.

“Yup.” Zach answered on the second ring.

“It’s Sol. I’m at The Lariat. Georgia’s
here but she ain’t fit to drive herself home. Come get me at her folks’, will
you?”

“I’ll be there.” Zach hung up without a
good-bye.

“C’mon, honey. Let’s go pour you into
your car.”

“I don’t wanna go home.”

“Then where do you want to go?”

“Anywhere but there.”

Was it that bad?

“Take me home with you,” she said as
though she’d been struck with the inspiration, and his cock got hard again.

“Sweet Jesus,” he swore softly. If she
were just a little less drunk.

Of course, if she were a little less
drunk, she wouldn’t think it was such a great idea.

As Sol buckled her in to the passenger
seat of her car, he reflected that this was the story of his life.

###

Sol walked Georgia to her parents’ door,
making sure she didn’t stumble on the way, then sat on the steps to wait for
Zach. The worst of the heat had dissipated with the fall of night, allowing him
to relax as he gazed up at the star-strewn sky. The Big Dipper, the North Star,
and Orion’s Belt were the only stars he knew well enough to pick out, but that
didn’t matter. Looking for patterns in the sky was too much of a distraction
anyway. He just liked the way it all shimmered, so cold and distant. All silent
and peaceful.

How could Georgia stand living in the
city where it took a power outage to see stars like this? He did some of his
best thinking staring up at stars, letting them put his troubles in
perspective.

And Georgia was trouble for him. She had
been since the day she’d left.

Over the years, he’d tried to move on any
number of times, but it never worked. It seemed he was like a goose. Mated for
life.

Georgia
,
unfortunately, was not a goose.

Over the years, he’d done some pretty
shitty things to make sure she stayed single. Things he should regret, but he
couldn’t find an ounce of sincerity for it. As far as he was concerned, Georgia was his, and she had been since their first kiss.

He could get her into bed; he’d done it
before. It was only a first step, but if she stayed the whole summer, he’d have
time to work on the rest of the plan. Getting her back in his life. For good
this time.

Now if he could only figure out how to do
that. He was pretty sure whatever strategy he came up with would involve curbing
his idiot streak.

A pickup slowed near the road and turned
into the ranch yard in front of the house. Sol dusted off the seat of his jeans
and walked to the idling truck.

“So Georgia got drunk,” Zach said in lieu
of a greeting as Sol settled in. “Was that your fault?”

“Nope. Not this time,” Sol said as they
pulled back out onto the road. “Taking care of her parents has her stressed.”

“Huh. I’m not surprised. Her daddy’s not
too bad, but her mom’s kinda snooty. She’s always made me feel like us
McKnights are a wad of gum stuck to her shoe.”

“That’s just ‘coz you’re related to me.
She’s probably not like that with other folks.”

Zach shot him a skeptical look. After a
few moments of silence, he asked, “So how long you gonna keep riding?”

Sol shot him a long look, wondering what
had prompted his brother’s question. “I don’t know. This season’s kinda
screwed, but there’s always next year.”

“Huh.”

“Why? You think I’m too broke down for
another season?”

“No, I don’t think that. I’ve just been
thinkin’ about our stock business. I could use some help.”

Zach needed help with the breeding
program like Sol needed another hole in his head. No matter how Zach phrased
it, it would be a pity job. Something to make him feel useful on the ranch. Not
that what he did when he wasn’t off riding wasn’t useful, but any of his
brothers could do it just as well. He’d have to accept being just another
interchangeable cog in that wheel soon enough, but he wasn’t interested in
rushing it.

“You do just fine without me,” he said as
they turned onto the road that would take them back to his rig, glad that the
trip was too short for his brother to make a concentrated attack.

###

Georgia
woke up in the clothes she’d worn the night before with a headache pounding
against her temples and a mouth tasting as sour as moldy limes. She wobbled
down the hallway to the bathroom, found her toothbrush, pumped too much
toothpaste on it, and started brushing her teeth. She cringed when she looked
in the mirror. Her hair looked like an abandoned rat’s nest.

Bits of the previous night started coming
back to her. Had Sol been there? She stopped brushing, the red handle of her
toothbrush sticking out of her mouth, to stare into the mirror. Aw, hell. She’d
danced with him. And she’d . . . Had she really rubbed up
against him like a cat in heat? She was pretty sure she had. She could damn
near still feel his erection.

A knock sounded on the door. “Hey, Georgia,” her daddy said through the thin panel. “You gonna fix breakfast?”

She took the toothbrush out of her mouth
and tried to answer without spraying foam everywhere. “In a minute, Daddy.”

“We want eggs. Over easy. Toast. Ham.
Maybe some strawberry jam.”

Like she couldn’t remember from one day
to the next. The only thing that ever changed was the jam. “Yes, Daddy. I’ll be
done in a minute.”

Adversity builds character. She told Eden that sometimes when things didn’t go the way her daughter wanted them to. At this
rate, Georgia was going to have so much character, no one would be able to
stand her.

###

Sunday morning, on the way back from
church with her parents, Georgia’s car lost power three miles from home. After
coasting to the side of road, she called her sister.

“I’m in the middle of fixing Sunday
dinner,” Bethany complained.

Georgia
walked away from the car, not wanting her parents to hear them arguing. “We
only need a ride home, Bethany. Mama can’t walk twenty feet without getting her
feet tangled. There’s no way she’ll make it home. It’s not like I’m asking you
to carry her on your back. Send Carl if you’re too busy, but we need a ride.”

“Why don’t you walk home and get their
car?” Bethany suggested.

Through gritted teeth, Georgia said, “Get your ass in your car and come get us. Now!”

Bethany
’s
husband showed up ten minutes later. Georgia’s daddy smiled when he saw Carl.
Her parents liked their son-in-law almost as much as they detested Sol.

Georgia
didn’t understand it. Because of Carl, Bethany hadn’t gone to college. She hadn’t
done anything but become a farmer’s wife, but for some unfathomable reason,
their parents didn’t hold that against Carl the way they had when Sol had
wanted to turn her into a house frau.

Georgia
couldn’t help resenting it.

She refused to ask Carl to look at her
car, and he didn’t offer. It still took her another hour to work up to calling
Sol.

When she finally did, she was relieved he
said only that he’d be there in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. She hadn’t really
expected him to bitch about the car. When the chips were down and she really
needed him, he was always there. And he left his bad attitude at home. It was
only when she asked him to stand back and not get involved that he griped at
her.

When he pulled into the farmyard, Georgia’s father said, “You called Sol? Why don’t you have him bring your car here? I’ll
fix it for you.”

“It’s okay, Daddy. You’ve got enough to
do. Sol can help me with this.” She grabbed the car keys and ran out to Sol’s
truck before her father could argue with her.

Sol didn’t greet her when she slammed the
passenger door after her. When they pulled onto the road, she said, “Thanks for
helping me.”

“Ain’t no big deal. I should be thanking
you for calling
before
your daddy works on it.”

“I know. And I’m sorry about that,” she
said, remembering the last time she’d had mechanical problems at her parents’
house.

She watched him hook a chain to the
undercarriage behind her front bumper then she got in her car to steer and
brake as he towed her to the McKnight ranch. The set-up was illegal as hell,
but everybody did it. They’d be fine as long as they stuck to back roads.

“How long will it take?” Georgia asked as Sol unhooked the car beside the shed where they worked on the ranch
equipment.

“I’m betting it’s the alternator. If it
is, it shouldn’t take more than an hour to change. I’ll call the parts house
when they open tomorrow and see if they got one in stock.”

Georgia
touched his arm. “I know this isn’t a big deal to you, but I really appreciate
it.”

“Okay. Then next time, you buy me a beer
at The Lariat.”

Georgia
winced at the memory of her last visit there. “This is worth more than a beer.”

Sol dropped his gaze to meet hers. “How
much more?”

The speculation she saw in his eyes made
her take a step back. “Not that much more.”