Rough (RRR #2) (2 page)

A small crowd of Scarlet’s friends and family circle around us, talking, clapping me on the back, words flying, humming, I meet her mother, her older sister, and Scarlet and I ignore them, focused on each other. How did it go so wrong, what did I miss? The fucking presumptuous doctor is nowhere in sight and I get the feeling that he isn’t in the picture at all, he’s not part of her group, her
life
, she’s not with him, maybe I jumped the gun assuming she’d go back to him so readily.

Penn reaches up on her tiptoes to kiss my cheek and I have to bend down, she’s so tiny, she slaps me HARD and hisses in my ear— “Hurt her again and I’ll tie you to a fucking ant hill, slice off your dick, and feed it to the coyotes!”

“Got it,” I say lifting my fingers to the handprint on my face and just hap-hap-happy as shit that Penn thinks I have a chance with Scarlet.

I sign a graduation program for Penn’s dad, say ‘yes’ and ‘no’ and ‘thank you’ as he babbles on, but all I can see is Scarlet. Her eyes have gone from surprised to wounded, her teeth dig into her bottom lip as she tries to get her bearings, and I’m sick that I’ve hurt her when that was never
ever
my intention.

“Are we going for lunch or what? It’s hotter than Hades out here, Lord the humidity, my hair has completely fallen,” the woman who I thought was Scarlet’s aunt but turns out to be her much older sister says. “Mother, invite Scarlet’s guest to come with us to the Argyle and let’s go for God’s sake.”

“Oh. Well, we’re having lunch at the Argyle… Holt, is it? It’s a private club let me give you the directions and you’re welcome to join our family. Of course if you were only dropping by to offer your congratulations to my daughter and need to be on your way, we understand completely,” Scarlet’s nose-in-the-air Mother says, dabbing perspiration from her cleavage with a tissue.

“I know where the Argyle is, thanks, I’d like to join you,” I say and finally Scarlet finds her voice.

“You never called, I only got two texts from you. One asking how my dad was doing, and the other was the thumbs-up emoji when I said he was going to be alright,” she says ignoring her mother’s seething stare and taking a step back.

I step toward her and hold her gaze, “I thought you were back with your ex, it looked that way. In the hospital corridor I heard him ask if it was what you wanted.”

“You heard what? What looked what way… are you dreaming? Why would you think that, it
looked
that way? You were in…”

“Atlanta. I came after you, about an hour or so after you left. Midnight died and Jon-Wylder and I flew up to… I got to the hospital, as fast as I could… but I should have left the damn horse and gone with you in the first place.”

“Alright, sorry I slapped you, there will be no ant hill,
this time
!” Penn says. “Oh, Mr. and Mrs. O’Neal, just to let you know, Holt doesn’t use big words, he doesn’t waste many words at all. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t know plenty, I think he just kind of hordes them and doles them out a few at a time. Thought you should be aware of that, don’t underestimate him, he might just turn out to be a pretty good guy,” she winks and hugs Scarlet tight and says she and her dad have to go, they’re flying to California to meet with the CEO of
Alice-Anne’s Farm Markets
before she starts her internship at the store in Austin. Scarlet and Penn are laughing and crying, clinging to each other, and I can’t help but hope that some of Scarlet’s tears are happy tears because our two month separation was a colossal misunderstanding.

“Daddy, Mother, why don’t you two go on ahead and Scarlet and I will ride with Holt. I’m Holly, Scarlet’s slightly older and way more beautiful sister. GO, Mother, we’ll meet you there!”

“Alright then, but hurry up, we have reservations and they weren’t easy to come by with all the Trinity graduates and their families celebrating. Tell them not to dawdle, Chandler, the Argyle is very strict, thank God Scarlet’s gentleman friend had the sense to wear a suit,” Scarlet’s mother says and Scarlet shushes her and casts a pleading glance at her father.

“For Christ’s sake, Caity, ‘her gentleman friend’? Our daughter isn’t a call-girl. Holt, get the girls to lunch on time, would you, please?” her father says with a twinkle in his eye and I see that everything Scarlet told me about him is true, he’s a good man who tolerates his prissy, uptight wife for the sake of keeping their family together.

*

“Where did you park?” Scarlet asks, a slight breeze lifts the filmy hem of her dress and her hands are busy trying to hold it down as we cross the tree-shaded campus to a small parking lot.

I press my hand to her back, instinctively letting it drift to her waist as I steer her toward the convertible with a big white bow on the hood.

“You bought a new car?” she says and it’s almost a whisper, her eyes turn up to me and they’re lightening from amber to honey again and my cock begins to throb.

“Wow, a red Jaguar convertible?” Holly says, “I had you pegged as black monster truck kind of guy.”

“You’d be right, but not today,” I say and click the door lock.

“This car is seriously gorgeous, it’s the new body style, right? The two-thousand-sixteen F-Type? What do you think, Scarlet, a man his size, can he even fit in this car?” Holly asks and she’s practically drooling.

“I fit just fine, and it’s hers,” I say, holding the driver-side door open for Scarlet.

“W-what? It’s mine?” Scarlet says and I swear to God when those amber eyes widen and dilate I want her naked, under me, screaming my name, ASAP! “You were there? At the hospital? You followed me to Atlanta?” She says ignoring the car, her hand flying up to twirl a strand of hair as she fits the pieces together in her mind. Her voice is dreamy and that’s when I’m certain, she feels what I feel, this need, yearning, the same unquenchable hunger.

I pull her against me and her dress swirls around us and I don’t give a damn about her sister or the car or the two months of agony as her hands clasp behind my neck and pull my lips to hers.

“I was worried about you,” I whisper against the sweet warmth of her succulent lips. “How upset you were when you left my ranch. I thought I should stay with the horse, or that maybe I’d be intruding with your family... but I couldn’t
not
follow you….”

“I wish I’d known… I was in the corridor with Corey giving him the okay to do an angioplasty on my dad, I have power of attorney over his medical affairs, he and my mother don’t really get along.”

“Can we go to lunch now or what?” Holly says tapping her foot and fanning herself with the program from the ceremony. “You two can make up and make out later, Mother will be impossible to deal with if we’re a minute late.

*

At the Argyle I hand the car keys to the valet and straighten my tie, although I’d like to rip the damn thing off and get some much needed air. Scarlet asked me to drive and I can tell she’s not sure about the car or me, her eyes have deepened to dark whiskey-brown and they are wary with indecision. Holly sat in the back seat and I could feel her watching as her little sister turned sideways in the seat to study me, trying to figure this out, but with her hand clasped firmly on my thigh. Now I’m so hot and bothered I feel like a kid counting the minutes until the prom ends and he gets his date to the closet Motel 6.

“I’m going to the powder room to freshen up,” Scarlet says when we spot her parents seated at a table with a view of the oak-studded expanse of lawn. “Order me a Tipsy Palmer and tell Mother not to get her granny-panties in a twist, I’m old enough to drink, and I’ll be right back.”

“You look windblown, Holly, your hair’s a mess. Where’s Scarlet?” Caity O’Neal asks, craning her thin neck to look for her younger daughter.

“My hair’s just fine, Mother, thank you for coating it with enough hairspray so that it basically looks exactly like your helmet-head-do,” Holly says, pushing the short, dark strands away from her face and giving her mother a bratty little ‘fuck you’ look.

“Have you ever had one of these? Iced tea and lemonade with a splash of bourbon, looks like you could use one Holt,” Chandler O’Neal says and for whatever reason, I know this man has my back.

“Daddy, you’re a mind reader! Scarlet specifically asked for a Tipsy Palmer, she’s gone to the restroom to make herself beautiful for the
very
generous Mr. Corrigan. Why don’t we order a round for the table?”

“Generous? In what way?” Caity asks, and I didn’t think she could raise her eyebrows any higher but she does as soon as Holly tells her about the Jaguar.

“I’m just gonna go check on Scarlet, excuse me, please,” I say, shedding my jacket and tie and not giving a damn about the club’s dress code.

The Argyle was once a fine Southern mansion built as the main residence of a pre-Civil War horse farm, now it’s a super snobby ‘members and guests only’ venue, and I know it well. I’ve been to countless events here with the McCauley brothers. Their dad, Wes, and my dad, Tom, grew up together, best friends who were dirt-poor cowboys moving herds of cattle from ranch to ranch, barely making enough money to survive. They were a dying breed of true cowboys, never in one place for long, living in tents or bunk houses, so skilled on a cutting-horse they often slept in the saddle. Until they were lucky enough to snag jobs on the famous Corazon Perdido and Wes McCauley caught the attention of the ranch owner, Jon Walker Campbell the third. Jon Campbell had one ‘spinster’ daughter, Meredith, his only child and sole heir. When Meredith refused to choose a husband, her father forced her to marry Wes, the illiterate cowboy who was ‘big, brawny, good looking, and good with horses’—prime breeding stock for producing sons to ensure that the Campbell bloodline would grow and prosper. The Argyle in the exclusive Alamo Heights enclave of San Antonio was the place Wes liked to hang out with his rough-and-ready sidekick Tom Corrigan and flaunt his newly minted wealth and society status.

I take the stairs two at a time and tap my knuckles on the door of the powder room, I’m so fucking ready to plant my face and my cock between Scarlet’s thighs I can hardly think straight.

“I’ll be done in a minute,” Scarlet calls out and her voice is as shaky as I feel.

“Unlock the door, Scarlet,” is all I have to say and the door swings open and she grabs the front of my shirt and drags me inside and this is happening right now,
right here
!

“I’ve fucking missed you, beauty!” I growl against her lips as I lift her perfect curvy little ass onto the sink counter.

“Show me,” she says, groaning low and hungry. “Show me how much.”

I push the dress straps off her shoulders and the skirt up around her hips and her hands are on my clothes, my skin, everywhere at once. She’s gasping as she rubs the thick length of my cock through my pants, untucking my shirt, scratching up my stomach to my chest, pulling my lips down to her naked tits.
Fuck!
She didn’t wear a bra to her college graduation, this girl is
wild
, she feels like silk, and smells like a fucking dream, and I know I’ll never get enough of her. An image forms in my mind of that anemic looking ex with his milk-pale hands on her body and it makes me want to
hurt
his presumptuous ass, he couldn’t handle this girl—MY girl!—on his best day.

My lips are on her pretty pink nipples, sucking hard as she stifles a groan and my hands spread her legs and rip the tiny excuse for panties away. She moans against my skin, saying my name over and over, her tongue licking, lashing my neck, hot and soft and urgent. My fingers slide over the shocking-sweet folds of her pussy and she spreads her knees wider, bucking up into my touch, moaning, begging, as I thrust a finger inside her. She leans back, hands braced behind her on the counter as I kiss her, barely stopping to let her breathe, she jerks against the rough assault of my fingers on her tender skin, and then she arches her hips higher, wanting more, needing the slide of calloused fingers over and inside her, my lips sucking at hers, as she murmurs those fucking erotic little sounds.

She tears away from my mouth, her eyes fall closed and she bites my shoulder to stifle her cries. My thumb circles her clit, hard and fast, we don’t have time to be slow, I thrust a second finger into her shockingly tight, wet, scorching pussy and curl them, pumping in and out, and she’s soaking my finger and pulsing, clenching hard as she comes. Tears spill down her cheeks, and she hisses out an endless string of
Ahhhhhh,
Holt, Holt, Holt!

I need her to love this, crave it, crave
me,
and what I do to her
.
She needs to remember the sex, how it is between us, everything we did that week, how fucking good we are together, how we’re still not finished. “Look at me,” I say. Her eyelids flutter, eyes meeting mine, and her mouth forms this pouty little O, her legs are shaking as she wraps them around my waist, heels digging into my ass, pulling me in closer as she fucking loses it and explodes against my hand.

She slumps back against the mirrored wall, her eyelids fall closed against her flushed cheeks, her breath as labored as mine. My cock is so fucking stiff it’s painful and I want to unzip my pants and fucking rub all over this, her pussy is pink and swollen, glistening, so fucking inviting, and I have to force my eyes and my thoughts away from the beautiful sight of it, and her.