Cody (10 page)

C
ODY FELT THE INTOXICATING
throb against his tongue and heat exploded in his belly. His jaw ached and his fangs tingled. The very tip of his incisor rasped her tender flesh and desire speared him. One sweet drop of blood beaded on her fragrant skin, the scent teasing and tempting.

The salty sweet taste hit his tongue and sent a firebomb straight down his throat to his stomach. Heat exploded and his body shook and it was all he could do to force himself away.

But he did.

He slid his lips down, licking at her throat, nibbling her collarbone. But not drinking.

Drinking from her as she’d drank from him would solidify the connection between them. Distance wouldn’t matter then. There would be no pushing her out of his thoughts. His heart.

He shook off the last notion and concentrated on holding tight to his control. He might have agreed to the sex. But he wouldn’t—
couldn’t
—indulge in her blood.

Her body, however, was a different story.

He’d been there, done that, and so the damage was already done. No sense denying himself.

He tightened his grip on her bottom, anchoring her in place as he thrust upward. Her insides tightened around him, milking him and the sensation sent him over the edge. His climax hit him hard and fast, like the swift jerk of an angry bull. He stiffened, hanging on for dear life as the adrenaline rushed through him and every nerve in his body started to vibrate.

Cody slid his arms around her and held her tight. Relishing the frantic beat of her heart against his chest. Feeling it inside his own.

Not that it felt half as good as his eight seconds, he reminded himself.

Hell,
no. That high was much more potent and satisfying.

This…This was just sex.

Sustenance.

The end.

The two words echoed, so clear and distinct, in Miranda’s head and she stiffened.

“It’s not like I think there’s more to this than there is,” she said as she climbed off of him. “Trust me, I know it’s just sex, and I know it doesn’t mean anything.”

His gaze narrowed. “I thought you weren’t the meaningless sex type?”

“I’m not.”
Regardless of what the folks in town might think.

The minute the thought echoed in her head, his gaze narrowed and she knew he’d picked up every word. “It doesn’t matter what other people think.” His voice was deep and gruff. “All that matters is what you think.”

“Easy for you to say. You don’t live here.” Grabbing
the steering wheel, she held on as she climbed down to the ground and retrieved her panties. Her skin heated as she slid them on, all the while conscious of his gaze.

“If it bothers you, pick up and move.”

“Believe me, I’ve thought about it.”

“But?”

“But this is home.” She shrugged and snatched up her T-shirt. “The only one I’ve ever had.” She slid the soft cotton over her head and tried to ignore the fact that he was still perched in the tractor seat, still naked. “Besides, things have changed some. Once people realized I wasn’t the same as my mother and sisters, they started treating me differently. There are still quite a few who haven’t come around, but I can’t say as I really blame them. My mother wasn’t the most upstanding woman.”

“Too much meaningless sex?”

“Exactly. The thing was,” she blurted, desperate to distract herself from the nearly overwhelming urge to ditch the panties and climb back into his lap for another ride, “she wasn’t after meaningless sex. She thought it meant something.” She grabbed her shorts. “Unfortunately none of the men she brought home ever did.” She stuffed her legs into the denim and pulled them up. “They were just using her and she let them.”

“The way you’re letting me use you?” The voice came from directly behind her and she turned to find him fully clothed, his shirt buttoned as if he hadn’t just been buck naked in the seat of a John Deere.

“This is different. I don’t have a choice.”

She
didn’t,
she reminded herself.
Vampire. Mind
control.
She didn’t stand a chance. Sure, she’d been the one to proposition him. But only because he’d manipulated her to the point that she couldn’t stop thinking about him. And the list. And sex. Miranda had no choice in the situation.

Her mother had had a choice. She’d had the power to say no and walk away from the endless string of cowboys who’d propositioned her. Instead, she’d given up her power for pleasure. And when that pleasure had turned into the pain of rejection, she’d given up her life.

Her daughters.

“It doesn’t mean she didn’t love you.” His deep voice slid into her ears and eased the vise tightening in her chest. “She did. She just didn’t know how to show it because she was too busy trying to deal with whatever was eating her up inside. Loneliness, maybe. Insecurity.”

“How would you know?”

He shrugged. “Because I’ve been there.” His gaze met hers. “Sometimes people get so busy running from their own demons that they can’t stop long enough to see what matters most. Not until it’s too late.”

What happened?

It was there on the tip of her tongue, but she held it back. The less she knew about Cody Braddock, the better. Even if she was extremely curious. About the man he’d once been. The vampire he’d become. The vampire he pursued. Her gaze went to the small scar on his face and the questions burned inside of her.

She stiffened. “It’s getting late. We really ought to get out of here.”

He looked as if he wanted to say something, but then
he swept her off her feet. In the blink of an eye, they stood on the opposite side of the fence.

“Tomorrow night,” she blurted as he set her on her feet. “The football stadium. Nine o’clock.” And then Miranda turned and walked away from Cody Braddock.

Because she
wasn’t
her mother.

While she might not be able to resist Cody physically, she could damned well resist him emotionally. That meant keeping her real life and her fantasies separate. No talking to Cody, getting to know him. No sharing the past or the present or the future with him. No getting hung up on him,
consumed
by him the way her mother had done time and time again with every man in her past. Nothing.

Just sex.

C
ODY WATCHED HER WALK AWAY
and damned himself for wanting to go after her. For once, he wasn’t going to let his common sense take a backseat to impulse.

He fought the urge and focused on the tingling in his body.

It was the sex.

He could still feel the rush of warmth, the zing of electricity as the current flowed into him and he soaked up her delicious energy. Even more damning was the sizzle of excitement and the rush of pleasure as he’d exploded inside of her.

Again.

He’d written off the first orgasm as a fluke. But tonight…He’d crashed and burned so quickly that it bothered him.

She
bothered him because she was different from all
the women in his past. They’d all done their damnedest to be as sexy, as alluring as possible. But Miranda did her damnedest NOT to be. She was holding back.

He’d felt it in the trembling of her body. The stiffness as she’d tried to resist the impulses pushing and pulling inside of her.

Despite her determination to cut loose and live out the damned list, she wasn’t letting go completely. She was afraid to go with her feelings, to follow her lust, to let it rule her. Afraid she might like it too much.

She would never admit such a thing. She’d convinced herself it was
his
fault. The uncontrollable lust. The need. The urgency.

She was wrong. While he was completely capable of mesmerizing her, he hadn’t done any such thing. She was reacting to him because of her own desire.

Even now, as she walked the short distance back to the motel to pick up her car, she was still burning for him, her nipples pebbled, her sex moist. He could see her in his mind’s eye, feel her heartbeat in his chest.

And she could feel him.

He slid the button in place on his jeans and his fingertips grazed the head of his cock. Her soft sigh echoed in his head as her breath caught. She’d felt it, too.

Just to prove it, he stroked himself. Once. Twice. He heard her sharp intake of breath. Felt the trembling in her fingers. Smelled the wet heat between her legs.

She felt him, all right, on a level that went much deeper than anything he’d ever experienced. And damned if he didn’t like it.

He’d spent his entire afterlife tuning into everyone
else with his heightened senses, but no one had ever tuned in to him.

Until now.

Miranda had drank from him and in doing so, she’d taken in a piece of him. He was a part of her.

His mind did a fast rewind to their encounter and he saw her sitting on his lap, her head tilted and her back arched as she offered herself to him.

She’d felt his hunger, and she’d understood.

His mother had been the only other female to ever really get what lurked inside of him as a man. The restlessness. The desperation. The fear. And so she’d let him do as he pleased, making excuses for him, putting up with him. She’d known he needed to burn off the steam before it burned him up from the inside out.

Once he’d turned into a vampire, the restlessness had turned to something much darker and more consuming. Something far more powerful than anyone could conceive. But Miranda had understood. He hadn’t coaxed or mesmerized or enticed her.

She’d accepted who he was, what he was, and offered herself of her own volition.

The realization shook him to the core and conjured all sorts of crazy thoughts. Like maybe, just maybe, Miranda Rivers wasn’t just the only woman to give him an orgasm. Maybe she was the only woman, period.

The
woman.

So?
While she might be
the
woman, no way was he
the
man. He was a vampire, for Christ’s sake. Even more, he was wild. Reckless. The exact opposite of the nice, reliable, safe type she envisioned for her future.

The truth bothered him a hell of a lot more than it should have and sent Cody over the fence toward the handful of horses that grazed in the adjacent pasture.

They spooked immediately, but he was too fast for them. In a flash, he gripped the mane of one of the cutting horses and hauled himself onto her back. The animal’s survival instincts kicked in and she went crazy, twisting and bucking while Cody held on tight.

The ride got wilder and more intense, the animal desperate to get loose of the demon clinging to her. But Cody wouldn’t let go.

His fingers clenched and his thigh muscles tensed. He arched his back and leaned into the movement. Adrenaline pumped through him. His nerves trembled. His brain buzzed. The horse twisted, his muscles jerked, and his entire body came alive.

It was a feeling he knew all too well.

One that didn’t begin to compare with what he’d felt when he’d exploded inside of Miranda.

Bullshit!

He was riding a goddamned
cutting horse.
Of course the ride wasn’t as fierce. If he’d been on the back of an ornery bull, that would have been different. More intense. More explosive. Much more than any orgasm.

All the more reason to deal with Garret Sawyer as soon as possible and get the hell out of here. Back to his career. He was at the top of his game. Living for the moment. Enjoying it.

Miranda might be denying her wild side, but Cody liked his. It was the one thing that kept him going day
after day, year after year. The one thing that made an eternity bearable.

The thought of settling down in one place, of denying his impulsive side for the rest of his existence made him want to stake himself.

Walk away.

That’s what he’d always done in the past. What Miranda fully expected him to do once his business in Skull Creek was finished.

Cody had no intention of disappointing her.

He just wished that fact didn’t suddenly bother him so damned much.

“I’
LL SEE THEM FANCY LACE
britches and raise you one Double D Playtex Extra Support with removable inserts.” The declaration came from Eula Holly, a small, stick-like woman in her nineties. She had dyed red hair and a pair of matching eyebrows that she’d had tattooed on during a shopping trip to Austin last year. She pursed her pink frosted lips and reached for the edge of her flower-print blouse.

“Hold it,” said the old woman to her right.

Beula was Eula’s twin sister. Same pink frosted lipstick. Same dyed hair. Beula had opted not to go for the eyebrow tattoos, however. She’d gotten her belly button pierced instead.

Needless to say, Miranda had made a promise to never leave either of them alone with a debit card ever again.

“Don’t you dare let the girls loose,” Beula told her twin. “How many times do
I
have to tell you? This ain’t strip poker. It’s bunko.
B
-
U
-
N
-
K
-
O
.”

“Bunko?” Eula adjusted the thick bifocals that sat on her pointy nose and looked around as if seeing everything for the first time. “If this ain’t strip poker, then why is there a pair of underpants sitting front and center?”

“That’s not undies. It’s a doily.”

“A dolly?” Eula adjusted the glasses again and leaned closer to look at the center of the table. “That don’t look like no dolly to me.”

“Not a do—llee. A doyyy-leee. You know, for stuff to sit on. Martha Hamburg crocheted it especially for our table. See?” Beula pointed a bony finger. “It’s got our team name—The Bunko Bimbos—right there in pink thread.”

Eula leaned even closer and reality seemed to strike. “Why, it certainly does.” She smiled. “That’s some nice craftsmanship.”

“Glad you approve. Now can you hurry it up and roll?” Beula shoved the dice into her sister’s gnarled hand. “I’d like to get a turn before my arteries harden.”

Eula started shaking the dice while Beula chanted, “Come on, twenty-one!”

Miranda glanced at the plate full of cinnamon rolls sitting near Beula before moving on to make sure that the next table had plenty of “stakes” to play with.

She’d started Breakfast Bunko when she’d first come on board as the activities coordinator at Golden Acres. The object had been to give the seniors something to look forward to beyond Sunday visits from their children. Especially since most of them spent Sunday waiting for children who often got too busy with their own lives to show up.

She knew the feeling.

She’d spent many nights waiting for her mother to come home. Half the time she hadn’t shown up at all and the other half, she’d stumbled in with a cowboy on her arm. Either way, she’d been too busy for Miranda.

Too busy falling into lust.

Cody’s image pushed into her head, his eyes a brilliant, sparkling purple, his fangs glittering in the moonlight. He’d wanted so much to bite her, yet he’d held back. She’d felt it in the tension of his muscles and the fierceness of his touch.

So? That’s a good thing.

She knew that. At the same time, she couldn’t help but wonder why. Because she wasn’t attractive enough? Sexy enough?

Bingo.

It only made sense. She’d spent a lifetime suppressing her sexy side. Maybe she’d finally buried it so deep that there was no unearthing it now. Maybe she’d been so determined to turn out different from her mother and sisters that she’d gone too far in the other direction.

If only that thought didn’t bother her almost as much as the notion of following in her mother’s footsteps.

She ignored the strange push-pull inside of her and turned her attention back to the table full of seniors to her left. The Rolling Romeos—a duo of old men who prided themselves on dancing with every female whenever the center held a big “shindig”—were about to take their turn. One clutched the dice fiercely while the other chanted, “Come on, Earl. You can do it. Just shake off the arthritis and let ’er rip.”

“Hey, there, Mr. Hartford,” Miranda said as she came up to them carrying the platter of cinnamon rolls.

The old man paused to give Miranda a wink. “Howdy, little lady.” He blew on his closed fist and threw his hands forward. The dice hit and rolled. He high-fived his
partner while the other two men at the table—the Geriatric Gringos—booed and clacked their dentures.

“You old cheat, Earl,” one of them cackled.

“Ain’t no cheating involved. That there’s skill.”

“Says you.”

“We’re just better than you, George,” Earl’s partner said as he reached for the dice. “You might as well climb down off your high horse and admit it…”

Bickering. One-upmanship. All was right at Golden Acres.

Miranda finished replenishing the cinnamon rolls and set the remaining platter on a nearby refreshment table. “Orange juice?” she asked a white-haired lady humming past her in a motorized wheelchair.

“Only if it’s got a little extra kick.” Martha Louise McCall swerved to a stop and smiled, revealing a row of bright white dentures.

“What did I tell you about drinking and driving, Martha? Last time you drank mimosas for Harriet Sandford’s birthday party, you took out the bird bath in the courtyard.”

“And it was the most excitement we’ve had around here since Dora Lee Strunk got arrested for indecent exposure when the elastic on her Depends broke and she mooned the men’s choir during the Christmas pageant.”

Miranda barely resisted the grin that tugged at her lips. “Dora Lee didn’t think it was funny.”

“Yeah, well she’s got a stick up her keister. Speaking of which,” Martha motioned to the woman pushing a metallic blue walker. “Hey, there, Dora Lee. You playing this morning?”

“And send my sugar sky high?” The old woman gave a loud
harrumph.
“Those cinnamon rolls are poison, I tell you. We ought to be playing for something useful. Like some Dr. Scholl footpads or a bottle of Mylanta.”

“The membership voted for cinnamon rolls,” Miranda reminded the woman. “It won almost unanimously. We only had two write-ins. One for Mylanta and one for Cosmopolitans.”

The old woman snorted and gave Miranda the evil eye. “I knew the moment they hired a Rivers to run things around here that we’d all be going to hell in a handbasket.”

The words grazed old wounds and reminded Miranda of the time she’d been on the playground and one of the girls had thrown a volleyball at her.
“Rivers, Rivers. You’re a no good Rivers.”

“It doesn’t matter what everyone else thinks.”
Cody’s words echoed in Miranda’s head and oddly enough, Dora Lee’s remarks didn’t sting the way they usually did.

“You ought to take up motivational speaking, Dora Lee.” Martha smiled. “Spread the joy with that stellar personality of yours.”

Dora Lee wagged a finger. “You’re every bit the heathen she is.”

“A Cosmopolitan-drinking heathen and damned proud of it.”

“You’re both going to hell,” Dora Lee muttered. “Straight down, no detours.”

“Just so long as they have in-flight cocktails,” Martha called out as the woman waddled away. “Don’t let her
bother you,” she told Miranda. “She’s just mad because she wasn’t the one who got lucky last night.”

Miranda became instantly aware of the tingling on her face courtesy of Cody’s stubble-roughed face. “I, um, used this new face cream and it must have irritated my skin.”

“I’m not talking about you, sweetie, though the good Lord knows you could use a little cayenne pepper in your life. I’m talking about me.” She beamed. “I beat the pants off Nicki and Jake at last night’s poker game.”

Sunday was poker night at the center. Another brainstorm Miranda had come up with to divert attention from the fact that Sunday was visiting day. Miranda attended every once in a while, but since she spent five days a week plus every other Saturday at Golden Acres, she usually opted out of poker night to plan her weekly schedule. That, and she’d all but lost her shirt the last time she’d gone up against Jeanine Picklebaker, a ninety-three-year-old once-upon-a-time blackjack dealer from Vegas. The woman gave new meaning to the word “card shark.”

“Not literally, mind you,” Martha went on. “Otherwise I would have had another heart attack for sure. My old ticker ain’t what it used to be. ’Specially if there’s a naked man involved. Anyhow, I got big time lucky at poker last night and I’ve got a whole jar full of lemon drops to prove it. Plus a lifetime supply of motor oil for my wheelchair. Jake promised to do the change himself, and throw in new spark plugs.”

Miranda eyed the motorized chair. “You have spark plugs on that thing?”

“I haven’t got a clue, but it gives me the opportunity to pay a visit to Skull Creek Choppers and indulge in some serious eye candy. Why, if that man weren’t already taken, I’d introduce him to my granddaughter Jenny.”

“The accountant?”

“Unfortunately. I swear, that girl wouldn’t know exciting if it jumped up and bit her in the backside. Do you know what she got me for grandparents day last year? A coupon to get my taxes done for free.”

“It sounds practical.”

“That’s the problem. She needs some serious eye candy to sweeten up things.” She wagged a bony finger at Miranda. “That goes for you, too.”

“Greg is eye candy.”

“Greg is a Tic Tac. I’m talking a Goo Goo Cluster. Sweet, yummy and dee-licious.”

Miranda’s lips tingled and she remembered the taste of Cody’s mouth on hers. Sweet. Forbidden.
Dee-licious.

She cleared her suddenly dry throat. “I really should get more orange juice,” she blurted, desperate to change the subject and push Cody out of her head.

It was just sex, she reminded herself. No letting him get under her skin and into her head. Her heart.
No.

Holding tight to the thought, she refilled the orange juice container and checked to make sure that the kitchen still had enough cinnamon rolls for the play-off round. After that, she headed for her office and the pile of work that waited for her.

Work was good.

Distracting.

She powered up her computer and spent the next half
hour finalizing the details for Friday night’s sock hop. She finished the menu, ordered the food and sent an e-mail confirmation to Bob Waller, one of Skull Creek’s finest who moonlighted his security services at various functions around town—the VFW spaghetti night, the town fair, the Ladies Who Pray annual clothing swap. She was just sending a reminder to the disc jockey—complete with a request for Fats Domino’s “Blueberry Hill”—when her inbox gave a loud
bleep.
The username
cleanfreak223
blazed back at her and she debated whether or not to click on the message. It was Greg.

What if he wanted an answer now?

She wasn’t sure why the notion suddenly bothered her. It wasn’t as if Cody was going to stick around. He was a vampire, for heaven’s sake. He didn’t have relationships with women. He had sex and sucked their blood. End of story.

Other women, that is, except for her.

He only had sex with her. No blood-sucking involved.

She ignored the spiral of jealousy that went through her and opened Greg’s e-mail.

The conference is going good. I’ve got a whole suitcase full of spot remover samples. I even won the nightly drawing for five hundred free hangers. Can’t wait to get back and start using some of this stuff. Speaking of getting back, I was thinking we could forget a long engagement and go ahead and tie the knot at city park. That way we won’t have to waste a ton of money on flowers. We can have the reception at The Hungry Pig barbecue. They’ve got a
buffet special that includes ribs, fried alligator and macaroni salad. The pecan pie will save us from having to buy a wedding cake. We’re going to keep it simple.

And cheap.

The thought struck, followed by a wave of guilt. Greg wasn’t cheap. He was practical. Safe. Perfect.

Even if he didn’t want a wedding cake.

Not that she was one of those women who spent countless hours envisioning her own wedding. She didn’t. But she’d sort of counted on at least a wedding cake. Something small and tasteful. Maybe with a few sugar roses. Roses were her favorite, after all, and Greg knew that.

But they weren’t
his
favorite.

He liked daisies and so he always brought daisies for special occasions. He liked to garden and so they spent every Sunday gardening. He liked to have meatloaf at the diner every Friday and so they had a standing reservation even though Miranda didn’t really like meatloaf.

“It’s the best meatloaf in the county,”
he’d told her too many times to count.
“You have to eat it.”

And so she had.

The way she’d done everything else he’d said—from gardening to listening to jazz to giving up linen because it was a bitch to clean and polyester blends were so much easier. She’d wanted to please him. To be good enough for him.

Because she hadn’t been good enough for her mother.

The thought pushed its way in and she pushed it right back out.

This wasn’t about her past. It was about her future. A different future. She wanted to change things. She already had. She’d earned the love of a good man.

She eyeballed the e-mail. There were no terms of endearments. No
I miss you so much
or
I can’t wait to see you again.
Not even a simple
Love, Greg.

Because he didn’t love her.

A spiral of relief shot through her. A crazy reaction considering this wasn’t about love. They were a good match. She wanted reliable and practical and safe, and Greg was all three. He was perfect and she
was
marrying him.

Then do it. Say yes.

She clicked on Reply. Her fingers touched the keyboard and Cody’s image pushed into her head.

Not the sexy picture he’d made last night sitting buck-naked in the seat of the John Deere. No, she saw him standing in front of her, fully clothed, his eyes a deep, mesmerizing blue. His voice filled with conviction as he murmured,
“It doesn’t matter what other people think.”

Her heart skipped its next beat and a strange warmth spread through her. It was a feeling that had nothing to do with lust and everything to do with the sense of camaraderie she’d felt with him during those last few moments at the feed store.