Bent Not Broken (A Cedar Creek #1) (15 page)

Thinking of Larry, I doubted that the determined kind of aggressive could or would ever turn into the violent kind. That would go against his principles. Cal seemed to be the same. Fair enough, I didn’t know him that well yet, but if something like opening doors for his date was part of his man code and he stood firm on things like that, then being violent in any way with a woman would go against his principle on respect.

So there you go. I could feel safe in the belief that he would never physically hurt me. But why did I
want
to trust him? That’s what this was, the crux of the matter. I
wanted
to trust him and I had no explanation as to why, since I had never had that urge in any form or capacity, at least not to this degree. I wanted to trust Cal Bennett. Which went completely against
all
my principles.

I didn’t trust.

I always doubted.

I always waited, no, I knew, was absolutely certain that something bad was going to happen. Even with Macy I had always held that small part of me back. I hadn’t trusted her and Larry enough to fully disclose everything that had happened to me until last week.

But wanting to trust Cal was different.

I had hardly spent any time with him. So what was it about him that made me want to do exactly what he asked me to do in his truck? To trust myself in his hands and trust that I would be safe there? I had no explanation for that.

On this thought I heard, “What’s going on in that head of yours?” coming from my left.

I blinked and realized that I had zoned out, completely wrapped up in my own head. I turned my eyes on him and said, straight up, “I don’t know what to do about you.”

“Thought I made that clear,” he muttered.

“Yes, you made yourself clear. You’ve been very straightforward. That doesn’t mean I know what to do with you. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“What doesn’t?” he asked.

“Why me? What made you go after me all of a sudden? And why do I like it? Why do I want to trust you? I shouldn’t—” I was interrupted in my babbling.

“Yes, you should,” Cal interrupted me, coming close, his hand going to the back of my head, his fingers in my hair.

“And you will. You already do. Or we would not be sitting here. I would be nursing a bruise on my shin if I heard you correctly this afternoon, instead of enjoying a nice meal with you. For now, don’t worry about the
whys
and the
whats
. Though, Ivey, you already know why. The
what
I will get into later. You want to trust me. You just said so yourself. So just do it.”

“It’s not that easy,” I whispered under my breath, trying to avoid his eyes by looking down at the table.

“I know, baby. I’ll help. I told you I’d take it easy on you and I will.”

“This is you going easy on me?” I asked, looking back up at him, astonished.

“Yeah,” Cal answered, his lips tipping up.

“What would not easy look like?” I wondered out loud and felt his intensity hit me. At the change I saw happening in his eyes I forgot everything. His eyes were all I could see.

I forgot how to breathe.

I forgot how to blink.

My heart forgot how to beat.

What came alive instead were my nether regions. I felt a spasm between my legs and my panties got wet.

Good lord.

“Yeah,” Cal rumbled, correctly reading my reaction. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes for a second trying to get control. Thus giving me the opportunity to try and do the same.

“You call that guy?” Cal changed the subject. He still held me close and spoke quietly.

“That guy?” I asked stupidly, still trying to fight my way out of the Cal fog.

“Your boy toy,” his voice was getting impatient.

At those words I snapped out of the fog and focused my eyes on him again, getting annoyed.

“Don’t call him that! His name is Grant!” I snapped.

“Don’t care what his name is. What is he to you?” Yes, getting more impatient.

Not knowing how to answer that I snapped, “I don’t know. A friendly acquaintance. Calling him my boy toy makes it sounds cheap. He is a nice guy. I like him.”

“Call it as I see it, babe. Now, you call him?” Yup, impatient.

“No,” I again snapped at him.

“Ivey—” now there was a warning in his tone.

I interrupted him, “I didn’t have to, okay? I cut him loose last week.”

I tried to move away from him and crossed my arms across my chest, but he just pulled me closer.

“You cut him loose last week?” The warning had changed to surprise. And something else. Relief?

“Yes,” still snappy.

“Why?”

Was he for real?
Just let it go already!

“What does it matter?”

His face was coming close to mine, his eyes boring into mine.

“It matters a great deal to me why you would cut someone loose you’ve been hooking up with for 18 months. Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad you did. Now, I wanna know why.” His voice had gone back to firm and impatient. He knew I’d been meeting Grant for 18 months? How? Did he keep tabs on me?

“How do you know how long I’ve been meeting him for?”

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about that. Answer. My. Question.” He tipped his head even closer to mine, underlining the warning in his tone.

Now in a snit, my voice was getting louder. “
My pretty little head?
” I hissed in his face while my back went ramrod straight.

“Ivey—” he rumbled through clenched teeth.

“Don’t you
Ivey
me, Mr. Hot Guy! I—” Cal crushed his mouth down on mine, effectively shutting me up. He kissed me for a good long while until I melted into him. Then he retreated, but didn’t go very far, as in not far at all.

“Now, baby,” he said against my lips, “answer my question.”

Realizing he wouldn’t give up and not really having a reason for not telling him, I whispered against his lips, “He wanted more.”

“More?” Cal asked.

“More than just sex,” I kept whispering. At the mention of sex his hand tightened at the back of my head for a split second. Then I felt his lips on mine in a soft kiss before he moved his head back an inch.

“I like that,” he stated quietly, confusing me again.

“What?” I asked.

“You cutting another man loose ‘cause he wanted more from you. I already got more from you and I haven’t even had you yet,” Cal explained in a smug voice, which made my eyes go wide in realization and I cursed inside my head.

Shit!

He was right. I hadn’t looked at it that way. But he was absolutely right. I was giving him more than sex already without even having had sex yet.

Shit!

I closed my eyes and planted my face in his chest. I heard Cal chuckle his deep masculine chuckle and felt his lips brush the top of my head.

Shit again!

“You done?” he asked there.

“Done?” Did he mean my snit?

“With your food, baby.” I nodded my head in confirmation, still leaning against his chest. He gave me another brush of his lips, then moved back and out of the booth, pulling me with him by my hand and saying, “Then let’s get you home.”

*****

Lying in my bed in the dark, I stared up at my ceiling, thinking. Thinking about everything Cal had said to me, and what that meant for me. Clearly, my plan of making him not like me had failed. He had me figured out with barely having to look at me.

That was concerning.

Usually, men would shy away from a woman who played games. It was too exhausting and they were right. It absolutely was. I hated it when women played games and was astonished at what lengths they would go to to get what they wanted. I thought that kind of behaviour was abhorrent.

Maybe that’s why I sucked at it. My heart wasn’t in it. Still, it confused me that Cal could see straight through my plan. And what confused me even more was that he called me out on it without hesitation instead of running the other way as fast as his legs would take him.

He clearly had my ticket.

When Cal had dropped me off after dinner, I had expected him to try and come in for a drink. He didn’t. After walking me up my front steps, holding my hand tightly in his, he stopped me by my front door and kissed me. That kiss was different from the other kisses he had given me. It wasn’t urgent, it wasn’t demanding. Instead, it was slow and searching and teasing and tasting. It lasted a good long while. So long that when he ended it, I was again in a Cal fog.

One of my arms was wrapped around his waist, the other one around his neck, my hand fisting in his hair. One of his arms was gripping my waist, holding me tight to his body, while the other one was wrapped around my shoulder blades, his hand touching the side of my breast. It was the best kiss I had ever had.

When he ended the kiss with his mouth open against mine, we were both breathing hard. I was in such a fog that it took me a while to open my eyes, and when I did, I could only manage to open them halfway. I could feel a growl against my mouth coming up from deep inside Cal’s body.

“Inside,” he said strangely in that growly voice. Still deep in the fog, I didn’t react, couldn’t, but kept staring up at him with half lidded eyes.

“Baby, if you don’t go inside right now, I’ll lose my hold on going easy,” he kept growling, giving me a little shake.

The shake was what snapped me out of the fog, and I took a careful step back hoping my legs would hold me. I took a deep breath, turned around, opened my purse to get my keys, and being successful in that endeavor—which meant something seeing as my hands were shaking badly—I stepped towards the front door to unlock it. I turned my head to look up at Cal and said in a soft voice that I didn’t know I had in my arsenal, “Goodnight, Cal.”

His hand had come up to my cheek, his thumb stroking my cheekbone lightly, his eyes roaming my face until they had come to rest on my eyes.

“Night, baby. Breakfast. Nine,” he reminded me in a gentle, low voice.

“Okay,” I breathed, then stepped into the house and closed the door behind me.

I didn’t make it far.

I was grateful that my legs didn’t give out before that—because that would have been embarrassing—but as soon as the door was closed, I had to lean my back against it for support.

Then I heard, ”Lock up!” from outside.

God, he was such a good guy! I steadied myself and locked the door, upon which I heard him turn around and walk down my front steps. I waited until I heard his truck drive away before I again leaned against the front door and let my head fall against it with a loud bang. I took slow, deep breaths.

The night replayed in my head again and again, but I kept coming back to the same conclusion: benefit of the doubt.

It’s what Macy said I should do.

Don’t wait for bad things to happen, Ivey. Give Cal the benefit of the doubt and see where it goes. If he screws up, he screws up and you move on.

Okay, I could do that. I think. It scared the shit out of me, but he promised he would go easy on me and he promised he wouldn't hurt me. So I promised myself to give this a chance, to give Cal the benefit of the doubt and see where this went, before I got ready for bed and fell into a deep and restful sleep.

Cal

Lying in his own bed, staring at his ceiling in the dark, Cal was asking himself one thing. Why in
the
fuck he hadn’t gone after what he wanted sooner.

The promise of Ivey had been so huge that he had told himself she deserved better. Better than a single dad who screwed up and got his college girlfriend pregnant, then found out that Stacy wasn’t ready to be mom, so she left him with the baby when Tommy was only a year old. Which left him to be a single dad at twenty-five years old. He loved his son, had never regretted making him, but that wasn’t something that you burden a good woman with. A woman, who was broken and didn’t trust anyone, especially men. If he was honest with himself, he also hadn’t been ready to trust a woman again, seeing as the mother of his son had left him in the middle of the night never to return. He hadn’t looked for her or trying to get her back. She had made her decision and had left them, and that was that. No second chances.

So he had stayed away from Ivey when she had moved to town a year after Stacy had left him.

Now he regretted that decision.

He had thought the promise of her was huge, but it was getting better and better with every moment he spent with her. He liked it all. Her funny, her sweet, her embarrassed, her giving attitude.

Yeah, he liked it all.

She was perfect.

But that was not the only reason he regretted not going after her sooner. The reason he regretted it most was the episode in his truck on the way to dinner. A panic so palpable he could still taste it had come off of Ivey in waves, had left him with a sour taste in his mouth and a bad feeling in in his gut. What the fuck had happened to her? What had been done to her that would send her into a state that was so painful to watch that all he could do was pull her into his lap and cradle her like a baby trying to soothe her?