Thursday Nights (The Charistown Series) (4 page)

Excitement rushed through Janie’s body at the impending ride…and she wasn’t just thinking about Max’s Ferrari.

Scanning the bar, Lyla watched as people began to pair off and leave together. Once Janie and Max left, she’d sat back down and ordered another drink. She glanced toward the corner table where she had seen the guy she wanted desperately to take home herself earlier in the evening. She had seen him at the bar on other nights but never talked to him. They had shared some pretty steamy looks, too, though he had never approached her. Normally she wouldn’t play so coy, but there was something about him that kept her from making the first move. She could tell he’d be dangerous for her. Not menacing or scary, but something worse…

She tried to shake his shadowed face from her mind. Her body reacted every time she saw him, and now even when she just thought of him.
See? Dangerous.
She was never lacking for male companionship, as Danny so thoughtfully pointed out earlier that night, and she snorted to herself. Something about her mystery man was different. He was the kind of guy she would write about in her novels. Tall, dark, brooding, and all alpha male. She didn’t know how she knew this without ever speaking a single word to him—she just did. But his chair sat empty, so what did it matter?

She shrugged and took another sip of her drink, then snickered to herself as her thoughts slid back to Janie and Max. “All I had to do was light the match. Here’s to the fire.” Lyla raised her glass to toast her good deed and took a deep pull of the sweet concoction.

“Don’t stand too close to the fire until you’re ready to feel the burn.” A gravelly voice whispered the words in her ear from behind and sent tingles down her spine.

“What?” The startled response that eked out of her mouth was almost unrecognizable.

A sexy chuckle escaped the throat of the man whose warmth was radiating into Lyla’s skin. She attempted to turn around, curious to see the face that was attached to that voice, but a large hand at the base of her neck stayed her movement. As his thumb gently stroked her neck a whisker-roughened cheek murmured in her ear. “No reason to turn around, sweetheart. You know who I am. And everything else you need to know you can feel pulsing through your body right now. Enjoy your drink. I’ll see you soon.”

The cool air seeped into her body as the warmth of his hand left her skin. By the time Lyla got up the courage to turn around, all she got was a glimpse of a firm ass covered in perfectly worn jeans, a tight, white T-shirt that hugged a broad back, and inky-black hair that hung just below the neck of said T-shirt.

“What the fuck just happened? Who the hell was that?” Lyla gasped as Ashley, the bartender who stepped in for Max when he left, just smiled. “Ashley, Goddamn it! Seriously, did you see him?”

Ashley looked at her with a grin. “That’s Max’s friend. You’ve probably seen him here before.” She put a glass of ice water in front of Lyla, gestured to her cheeks, and gave a devilish smile. “You look like you could use this.”

“So, your place or mine?” Janie asked nervously as they left the parking lot. The butterflies in her stomach were starting a revolution as she took in the sexy profile of the man sitting to her left with one hand on the wheel and the other on her thigh. Was she really doing this? Not to mention, doing it with Max DeLucca?

Removing his hand from her leg, Max placed both hands on the steering wheel of his black Ferrari Spider.
Janie held in the whimper that threatened to escape from the loss of his touch.

Max pulled over to the side of the road, and she felt the butterflies once again trying to take flight. Why was he stopping? Had he changed his mind?

“Janie,” he said, his voice strong but calm. “Janie, look at me. I need to see your eyes.” She looked into his grassy-green orbs. Callused fingers stroked her jaw, sending shivers through her body. “I won’t hurt you. Your body is safe with me. Do you understand?”

She wasn’t sure she did, but she nodded silently.

The innocent, doe-eyed look on her face brought out his every possessive instinct. “Words, Janie, I need words,” Max demanded.

“I think I understand, Max.” She couldn’t help the breathless tone in her voice. “But what is this about?”

He inhaled, holding the air in his lungs for an extra second before letting it go, his eyes smoldering while his body still held the relaxed pose that had become so familiar to her. She could hear her own heart beating, and she could also hear it stop when the next statement left Max’s lips.

“I intend to fuck you tonight, Janie. I intend to fuck you
very
well. I am going to make you come in every way imaginable. With my fingers, my tongue, and my cock. I am going to do things to you that you and Lyla have only
teased
about at Danny’s, things that you have
fantasized
about, and things that have
never
even crossed your mind. You will have a say in whether or not we stop, but Janie, you will not have a say on whether it is your place or mine. Got it?”

She stared at Max and her mouth formed an O. She was thoroughly and truly speechless. So she nodded again.

“Words, Janie. I need words.”

“Okay.” Her heartbeat started speeding up again as Max’s car did the same.

Max grinned as he drove them toward her place. How is it possible that he finally had Janie Silver in his car?
Fuck.

One word…Lyla. He was going to have to send her those raspberry truffles that she liked so much.

Keeping both hands on the wheel proved to be more difficult than he ever imagined. Just a few more minutes, and he would finally have Janie, his Janie, alone in her house, on her bed.

His house or hers?
Max laughed to himself. What a ridiculous question. Didn’t she realize the answer had to be the place that was the closest to wherever they were? He was barely hanging on as it was. He had to be practically superhuman to have restrained himself from taking her in his car when they had pulled over for that quick chat. He’d wanted to run his hands through her long hair practically since the first Thursday night that she and Lyla had walked into Danny’s on Main. He’d been dying to know if her brown-and-copper cascades would feel as soft as they looked wrapped around his fingers.

For months he had been waiting for the right time. Watching her with the last loser had caused an unfamiliar pang of possessiveness to grip his gut and squeeze it like a vice. Hearing about the ten years of douche bags prior was enough to make him insane. Every workout with the heavy bag was him beating the shit out of all the faceless men who had hurt Janie in the past. Every MMA session had his partners feeling the pain that he wanted to inflict on the cheating sons of bitches that made Janie think she was unworthy of being worshipped. He got through each punishing run telling himself that one day he would be the man to teach her what the John Mayer song, “Your Body is a Wonderland” really meant. She was the one woman who made him wish he could have a relationship. If he still possessed his heart, he would give it to her. And that’s why he had stayed away from her. Until tonight.

Tonight he finally lost his power to control the lust he felt toward her, and now, he had her. His woman…
No
, he thought,
just her body. That’s all I want.
No emotions, no entanglements
…

He ran his hand slowly up Janie’s jean-clad thigh and breathed in deep.

“Fuck,” he sighed out loud. He was in trouble.

Lyla nursed the last of her drink and tried to push the mystery man with his whisky-laced voice and his leathery, cedar scent out of her mind. Danny came back to the bar to regale her with disgusting stories of bathroom horror. Laughing hysterically, she dipped her head, covered her eyes, and begged him to stop the torture.

“Ew! Stop! You’re gonna make me pee myself,” she squealed. “Then your poor staff is going to have another mess to deal with. Plus, I would never be able to show my face in here again!”

Danny’s expression went from relaxed to tense in a blink. “Oh, honey, don’t ever say that. You and Janie are like family now. Go ahead and pee on the floor! I won’t care. In fact, after we’re all done laughing at you, we will bronze the spot!”

Lyla knew that Danny and his wife Julie had tried for years to have children unsuccessfully. They treated their employees like family, and she and Janie, in the few short months, had become like surrogate daughters to the couple.

“Thanks, Danny. You know that means the world to me…especially since I don’t really…” She didn’t finish her sentence.

“Yeah, and you have ADD when it comes to men.” He effectively changed the subject without any sense of how he got from point A to point B.

She lifted her eyebrows, ready with a sassy comeback, but it wouldn’t come out of her mouth. Because he was right. Lyla could practically choose her sexual partner any night of the week. But sex is where she drew her line. She didn’t do commitment. Hell, she didn’t even do sleepovers. She let them use her body, and she used theirs right back. Two consenting adults—perfect.

“I don’t need anyone but Janie…and you guys, of course.” She smiled sheepishly. The truth was the thought of getting close to any one man made her physically ill. The men she had trusted in her past had not just let her down but had nearly killed her. She was no longer a full person, just a bunch of broken pieces held together with glue and hope. She didn’t want or need a man in her life. She could take care of herself. Lyla had her own money, so financial security would never be a problem for her, and she certainly didn’t want some guy thinking she was going to support his ass. She needed a man, not a boy, anyway. Someone who didn’t need constant ego stroking, who knew how to handle her body.

God, what was she thinking? That sounded like relationship talk. Hence the reason why she always stuck to the one night stands. Two nights if the sex was actually good, but no more.

Danny gave her his best fatherly smile-hug combo—at least that was what she thought it was, since she had never received one from her own father—and he whispered in her ear. “Ly, you are not an island, and you deserve so much love…so much.”

She felt her throat tighten but refused to show any emotion. While she could, and would, help people deal with their own feelings, hers were off limits. So she took a deep breath and gave him one final squeeze before letting go.