WILD RIDE (10 page)

Nate
chose a small, French-style Bistro with a roof garden that had been decorated
with palm trees, fairy lights and cream-colored umbrellas.  The place was
crowded but comfortably so, with modern Euro-style music filling the space.  He
pulled my chair out for me, something no one had ever done for me before.  We
sat in silence for a second or two but it was a relaxed silence, filled not
with awkwardness but instead with a shared appreciation of where we found
ourselves.  And of who we found ourselves with.

“Let’s
start here,” he said.  “Right here, right now.”

What
we’d so far shared had been utterly wild, borderline illicit and also
beautiful, in a way that I could never explain to anyone and would never need
to.  It seemed clear enough that we’d be spending the afternoon and evening
together.  And if I was going out to dinner with him, and meeting up with Riley
and their clients, well, it was possible that I might be staying in Dallas for
another night.  Beyond that, though, the future was wide open.  I understood
his meaning.  We already had a mini-past.  A very intense one.  If there was
ever to be anything of a future – which was unlikely at best – this was where
it would begin.

The
waiter poured two glasses of a light red wine Nate had ordered and he clinked
his glass against mine.  I hadn’t tasted a lot of wine before.  I found it
earthy and delicious.

“Your
family must be wondering where you’ve run off to,” he said.

I
looked at him and decided to give it to him straight up, because he was
interested, I could tell, and because I wanted to.  “My mama died three and a
half years ago.  My daddy skipped town when I was twelve and never bothered to
even send so much as a postcard.  I’m an only child.  My boyfriend of two years
is a loser and a thief and well and truly out of my life, which I told him
right after he punched me and stole all my money.  All I’ve done for the past
eight months is work double shifts to save enough money to give myself an out,
which didn’t pan out quite like I’d hoped.  So the only people that might be
wondering where I’ve run off to is the choice clientele of The Rusty Nail. 
It’s about time for me to start fresh, which is exactly what I’m planning to
do.”  That pretty much summed it up.  I wasn’t looking for pity, God knew
that.  But there was no point sugar-coating where I’d come from and where I was
going.

“Gutsy
to just take off like that,” he commented, taking a sip of his wine.  With his
hair sort of smoothed back and his arms half-folded across his chest, he looked
less like a fighter pilot and more like a muscular, sun-tanned intellectual. 
The juxtaposition of his brawny physical beauty somehow worked with this air of
power and acumen.  Like he was a superhero dressed in his regular clothes.

“If
I’d stayed in Tulsa,” I said, “I’d probably have run into my ex-boyfriend,
since he knows everyone I know.  I didn’t want that to happen.  If I’d stayed,
I’d probably never leave.  Not now, not later.  It’s a sticky old place, Tulsa. 
I saw a chance to fly so I took it.  Even if I crash along the way, I’ll figure
it out.”

Nate
contemplated me for a while, like he was running a few things over in his mind.

“What
about you?” I asked him.  “Have you lived in Houston your whole life?”

“Yeah,
I have.  But I’ve done a lot of traveling.  Around the States, mostly.  Mexico,
a couple of times.  Europe, once.”

“Your
family’s in Houston?”

“Yeah. 
My parents, my brother and sister.  Cousins.  All there.”

“That
must be nice,” I said, feeling an unfamiliar gnawing emptiness somewhere deep
inside my soul.  That
must
be nice.  To have a family all around you
like that.  Supportive and there if you wanted to drop by unannounced or if you
needed something or a place to stay.  Or just someone to talk to.

“Have
you ever been to Houston, Lacey?” he asked.  My name, spoken in his
kindness-edged man’s voice, almost startled me.  It sounded so
good
the
way he said it.  The way it rolled off his tongue all soft and sexy like that.

“No. 
This is my first time to Texas, believe it or not.”

The
waiter brought our meals.  Steaks and gourmet-style potatoes and vegetables,
with a drizzled, fancy-looking gravy that sort of decorated the plate like
something you’d see in a food magazine.

I’d
never tasted anything so sublime as that steak.  And that tangy polka-dotted
gravy.  Its flavor went perfectly with the earth-toned wine.

We
ate in silence for a minute or two.  Nate took a sip of his wine.  “Your
ex-boyfriend sounds like a piece of work.”

“Yeah. 
I think I knew it was doomed.  But we got into a routine, I guess.  Once you’re
stuck in a rut it’s sometimes hard to dig out of it.”

“I
know what you mean.”

I
remembered Riley talking about Nate’s girlfriend of two years that he’d
recently broken up with.  “You’re newly single too?” I ventured.

He’d
left her, that’s what Riley had said.  I wasn’t going to push him into talking
about it if he didn’t want to, and I was a little shocked when he said
matter-of-factly, “I walked in on her and another guy.  In my bed.  A couple
weeks ago.”

I
stared at him.  “Wow.  Nate.  I’m sorry.”  What I was thinking was
why? 
What
woman in her right mind would cheat on
this?

He
sort of shrugged it off, as though he was over it.  As if he’d
just
realized
he was over it.  “I wasn’t all that surprised, to tell you the truth.  Things
hadn’t been great for a while.  I worked too much, she said.  She hated that I
was never home.”

I
ate the last bite of my steak, giving him time, waiting for him to continue, if
he chose to.

“Once
I got over being fucking pissed off about it, I felt relieved,” he said.

Intrigued
by our common ground, I nodded.  “Trust is crucial.  I don’t think it’s something
you can really repair once it’s broken.”

Nate
went sort of still when I said that, staring at me with an almost disconcerting
seriousness.  “Yeah,” he agreed, and then he was quiet, contemplating me as he
fingered the stem of his wineglass.

“Tell
me about your companies,” I said, hoping a change of subject might lighten the
mood.  “How’d you get into business?”

“I
got my MBA in Houston, in finance.  I worked for a while for a web design
company and got a feel for it, then decided I thought I could do it better
myself.  So I started my own company and took on some investment work on the
side.  Which ended up being a lot more lucrative than I ever imagined.  I
brought in Riley and my brother Leo to run the company with me so I could spend
more time on the portfolios.  We’ve taken a couple of property management
contracts as well.  It’s something Leo’s always been interested in, and it’s
worked out well.”

I’d
never met a single person who owned a single stock, but I’d read about it.  I
always carried books around for when a shift was slow, and one day I’d brought
along a book about investing that I’d picked up at the library, on a whim.  When
it came to reading, I wasn’t particular.  My mother told me I was the only
person she knew who read a cereal box,
Doctor Zhivago
and Cosmo all at
the same time.  Books, magazines, travel brochures, newspapers: I read it all. 
Reading transported me and I never got tired of learning stuff that was beyond
the scope of what reality offered me.  “I’ve always imagined the stock market
was a little like gambling,” I said.  “You must need to know a lot to win.”

He
smiled.  “It’s not as hard as you might think.  It’s all about controlling
emotion and doing your research.  It’s surprisingly straight-forward.”

I
sipped my wine, fascinated by the topic and also by his insights.  I had never
had a conversation like this before, or at least not for a long time.  One that
encouraged and inspired me.

Nate
pushed his clean plate to the side and leaned forward, setting his folded arms
on the table.  “Maybe you should try it out sometime.  You seem to me like
you’d be good at it.”

“Sure,”
I laughed lightly.  “I could invest my last one hundred and twelve dollars and
sixty-two cents in Berkshire Hathaway and hope for the best.”  I wasn’t sure
why I was in such a good mood, especially considering the subject at hand. 
Then again, I knew
exactly
why I was in such a good mood.  I could worry
about tomorrow when it reared its ugly head.  For now, I was having lunch with
the most virile, alluring,
magnetic
man I had possibly ever met.  Who
had not only a spectacularly beasty wild side but also a charming, steady
stability in the light of day that was dazzling me.

“You’d
get a slow return,” he said, “but a secure one, if you’re prepared to sit it
out for the next decade or so.”

“That’s
a little longer than I need for a return, I’m afraid.  Rented couches in Austin
don’t come cheap.”

“You
know,” he said, his fingers brushing mine as he reached for my hand.  His tone
had become more serious.  “Bookish little mermaids shouldn’t be hitchhiking to
unknown destinations with no money and no reliable place to stay.  Especially
when they look like you do.  It’s downright dangerous.”

“Danger
is my middle name,” I smiled, but the smile fell flat.

“Well,
Lacey Danger Callihan, let’s see if we can work out a better plan, how about
that?”  Then he pulled the roll of cash from his pocket and peeled off two
hundred dollar bills, placing them on the table.  He stood up and offered me
his hand.  “But it’s gonna have to be later, because if we want to go back to
the hotel to shower and get changed before meeting up with Riley for drinks, we
should probably head back.”

I stood
and slipped my hand into his, following this yellow brick road just a little
further, to see where it might lead me.

Chapter
Seven

There
was no sign of Riley back at the hotel.  And Nate seemed restless.

I
turned on the shower and as I waited for the water to heat up, I laid out the
red dress on the bed.  Nate was sitting in a chair, only steps from where I
stood, talking on his phone.  We were sharing a room, after all.  His suitcase
was there and so was mine.

I
could tell by the conversation that he was talking to Riley.  The conversation
was brief, and noticeably tense. 
He’s a little irritated with me.  I told
him I don’t want him touching you again.

Nate
finished the call and tossed his phone onto the bed.  He ran his hand through
his hair and looked up at me.  I was standing close to him, and I bridged the
small divide.  I stood between his spread knees.  A raw and visceral current passed
between us, a ripple of lust that almost unsettled me.  Yesterday we’d been
opportunists, swept away by something wild and uncontrolled.  Today the mood
was different.  There was emotion involved now.  Friendships, our pasts and an
unmistakable note of reality had entered the fray.  We weren’t just in this for
the loose abandon of it all this time, for the fun and the freedom;
this
time, it was closer to the bone.  A deeper connection was being made, and this
would begin to cement it.

“You
trying to tell me somethin’ by steaming up the hotel room?” he said, and I was
encouraged by the play of a half smirk at the corner of his mouth.

I
twirled a coil of my hair.  “I guess I’m wasting a lot of water.”

“Maybe
we should do our part to conserve.”

“I
think maybe we should, yes.  Carbon footprints and all that.”

His
indigo gaze painted me with low, slow-burning heat.  He placed his palms on my
thighs and just left them there, making no move to slide them higher.  “You’re
so damn pretty, Lacey.  You just about break my jaded heart every time I look
you.”

“You’re
not jaded,” I whispered, touching his hair.  “You’re a romantic.  All you need
is a romance that lives up to what you’re hoping for.”  I didn’t, before I said
it, mean to suggest that
I
could be the one to provide such a thing. 
But once the words were out, I just kept going.  “You need someone who you trust. 
Who trusts you.  Who lets you fly as high as the sky.”  I leaned over to kiss
him, and his eyes closed like he
was
high, just on the anticipation of
my touch.  Very, very gently, I touched my mouth to his.  His quiet sigh was a
revelation to me.  I could sense that he was drinking in the feel of my lips,
soft on his, and the words I was telling him, too.  Like he wanted more.  “You
need someone who makes you feel
good
,” I murmured.  “
So
good.  Like
this.”

I
licked his lips gently, opening them to the soft exploration of my tongue.  I
kissed his face, across his jaw, his cheekbones.  I kissed his eyelids. 
Empowered by the knowledge that I knew how to pleasure him and already
had
,
to devastating effect, I kissed his lips.

“Last
night was a crazy place to start somethin’,” he drawled, and I noticed again
the way lust deepened the Texan accent.  Of Riley.  And of him.

“It
was.  So’s Mars or the wide-open frontier.”

He
laughed as I continued to kiss his face.  “Not sure I get the analogy, but
yeah, I guess so.”

“Doesn’t
mean it shouldn’t be done.”

“No,”
he murmured, like a cat’s purr.  I kissed him again, concentrating on his
mouth, teasing, enticing him to say something.  I already knew that little
litanies of sweet, poetic foreplay were his style.  “I like your smile,” he
started, his eyes still closed.  “I like the sound of your voice, so sweet and
sincere.  I like how I believe what you’re tellin’ me, how I want to know what
you’re thinking about.  Every second.  I like the way you move.  Like a
hometown girl.  Like a dancer offstage.  And how your hair coils at the very ends. 
Little angelic white-blond curls.  I like how you look all sparkled and wet in
the pool.  I don’t know where you came form.  Or how or why or what do to with
you.  All I know is I want you with me.  I want you.”

My
God
, I thought.  This is a guy that could kill
me softly.

And
he wasn’t even done.  “I don’t think I can let you go just yet,” he continued.  “I
haven’t had nearly enough of you.  I want to
look at you some more.  I
want to
feel
you.”  He licked his tongue softly across my lips, closing
his eyes briefly as he did.  His grip on me tightened, and I could feel the potent,
rapt tension in him like a magnetic pull.  “And the way you
taste
drives
me out of my fucking mind.”

I
kissed him deeply, dipping my tongue into his mouth.  He played mine with his
own, drawing me into him.  I grasped at his shirt and he helped me pull it
off.  “I like you, too, Nate Walker,” I told him.  “I like you a whole lot.”

“How
much?”  His voice was low, graveled, and his eyes were still closed.

“Come
and take a shower with me before we use up all the hot water in Texas.  I’ll show
you how much I like you.”

It
took about three seconds flat for us to get our clothes off.  Nate lifted me
and carried me into the shower.  I think he could’ve lifted twelve of me
without breaking a sweat.  Anyway, I wrapped my arms and legs around him to
ease his burden.  He was still saying things between our insatiable kisses.  The
shower was huge and modern, with a bench and lots of nozzles, which sprayed us
from various angles.  Water sluiced across our skin, running in tickling, sensual
rivulets.  Words escaped into the steam now and then, between long, lush kisses. 
I heard ‘beautiful’ a couple of times, ‘crazy’, and a few others that weren’t
exactly repeatable.  The whole shower was full of steam.  Nate leaned me up
against the tile wall.  I could feel him pressing against me.
 Into
me. 
The heavy bulk of him was voracious, starkly hot, insanely hard.  As soon as he
touched me,
there
, opening me with his body and forcing his thick
possession, the pleasure rushes began.  Already.  I tried to form a coherent
thought.  The consideration of consequences ghosted outside the fringe of my
body’s storming urges.

I
gripped onto him, fighting to stave off my release.  But it wouldn’t be held. 
I came in jolting bursts, and each wet, welcoming compression drew him deeper,
and deeper, until his massive arousal was fully rooted.  The stretching
totality of his slick depth caressed me as one gigantic trigger.  He thrust
once and I came again.  Just like that.  Rolling surges that tugged him
strongly, lavishing him with soft, clamping adoration.

“
Fuck
,”
he groaned, and pulled himself from my boneless body.  I unwrapped myself from
him, and he set me down on the high cedar bench.  Taking his outstanding cock
in both my hands, I fed the head of it into my mouth.  He was so close.  I
licked my tongue across the crown and that was all it took.  Milky jets pulsed
out of him, spilling into my mouth and down my chin, dripping onto my breasts.

I
held him and I licked him until the final twitches of his climax had calmed.  He
muttered a few curses and we both let out a shaky laugh.

Nate
pulled me up to him and held me against his big frame.  He held my face between
his hands as the water rained down on us.  “I can see why your middle name is
danger,” he half smiled, but his expression was textured, almost confused. 
“That was close.  I’ve never done it without a condom.”

“Never?”
I asked, intrigued. 
Why not?  And why now?

“Never,”
he confirmed.

“Me
either,” I admitted and as I did, I understood.  I’d been on the pill, until I
hit the road yesterday and left them behind in my haste.  Still, I’d always
insisted Cal wear condoms, just in case.  The last thing I ever wanted to be
saddled with was a baby, I’d thought at the time.  With
Cal’s
baby.  I
had no idea why I’d suddenly become a sex-crazed hussy who thought of nothing
else but getting laid as thoroughly and immediately as possible, throwing all
caution to the dusty wind.  To say that I was glad Nate had summoned the
control to pull out would have been an understatement.  A baby would definitely
have cramped my slumming-it-while-working-three-jobs style.  The good news was,
I was no longer a frigid ice maiden.  I would take my triumphs where I could.

“Really?”
Nate said.  “Never?”

“Nope. 
Never.”

We
sort of stared at each other through the mist, coming to terms with the
connectivity of what was taking place.  It was heavy, in a way.  We’d both been
in long term relationships that, on some level, we’d been less prepared to
commit to than this extended one night stand, or whatever this wild ride might
be classified as.  We’d jumped in at some ridiculously-uninhibited deep end and
were now attempting to swim to shallower waters, just to get our footing a
little.

Nate’s
eyes were an unusual shade of dark blue.  His eyelashes were black and spiked
from the water that dripped from his hair.  As I stared into those eyes, every
cell in my body sort of calmed and melted with a vast, effortless craving.  I
wanted to stay with him, to share things with him and explore all the
complexities of who he was.

I
didn’t know what was happening.  Or why.  All I knew was that something
was
happening.  A shift.  A curling, rambling bond was taking hold.  I’d never
experienced anything like this before but I could recognize it for what it was. 
A beginning.

“I
think you’re beautiful,” he whispered.

“I
feel like I’ve died and gone to heaven when you’re inside me,” I whispered
back.

***

Nate
wore a black suit jacket with a blue shirt and no tie, and jeans.  His dressier
clothes, I noticed, looked expensive and were worn with an almost-artistic
flair that to me seemed outrageously sexy and sophisticated, especially against
the bronzed, beefed-up backdrop.  He’d floored me with the sheer magnitude of
his handsomeness before, but this was taking it to a whole new level.  Then
again, I liked dusty cowboy Nate just as much as I liked swish, professional
Nate.  There wasn’t a version of this man I’d
yet
to be floored by, come
to think of it.

I
was in my new red silk dress.  I’d pulled my hair up into a simple twist,
leaving a few wavy strands loose.  Nate couldn’t keep his eyes – or his hands –
off me.  I didn’t mind.  Of course I didn’t.  But I wondered, as we walked into
the bar, if Nate’s possessiveness had anything to do with Riley.  Presumptuous
of me, possibly, to think that I might play any role in coming between the two
of them – something I most definitely did not want to do.  I knew it, and Nate
knew it: tonight would probably be the last I spent in his company.  For now, all
I wanted to do was bask in Nate’s presence, Riley or no Riley.  I’d already
made my decision.

It
hardly mattered either way.  Most likely, we’d part ways in the morning, and
they’d laugh it all off as one hell of a crazy road trip.

Maybe. 
Or he would think it was too soon, too good, to say goodbye.

I
shook off that little fantasy that kept creeping in. 
Damn.
  I was
getting swept away by this Mustang-driving, smooth-talking, cowboy-sophisticate
sex-god whose burly arm, even now, was snaked around my waist in a protective
hold that infused me not only with desire but with a sense of safety so
profound I almost stepped away from him.  Almost.  Who wouldn’t get swept away? 
I was only human.  A realistic human, for better or for worse.  And I knew this
fantasy would soon come to a jarring end.  We’d made a few heartfelt
declarations in the heat of a steamy moment, but I didn’t allow those sweet
nothings much airtime.

What
I
could
do, to give me something to concentrate on, was to was put
Nate’s mind at ease.  He’d made it clear and I agreed: last night was a
one-off.  A very spontaneous, uninhibited orgasm-fest that probably couldn’t
have been bested or even recreated if we’d wanted to.  I didn’t know what Riley
thought about the matter one way or the other.  I just hoped to spend some time
talking to Nate, maybe enjoy a nice dinner, and beyond that I had no plans
aside from making my way to Austin to find myself a very necessary job.   As
soon as our gilded moment sputtered out.  Tonight, I would stick close to Nate,
and give him whatever he asked of me.  Because I wanted to, with a dedication
that could have disarmed me a little, if I’d let it.

We
walked into the bar.  The décor was swanky and modernistic, all glass and
chrome, decked out with orange globe chandeliers and colorful neon-light wall
art of longhorn bulls’ heads.  Some decorator had gone nuts with this place,
but the overall look worked, in an over-the-top Texas kind of way.  The music
was loud and the place was crowded for happy hour.

I
saw Riley standing near the bar.  He was being fawned over by not one but two
scantily-clad girls.  They were laughing at some story he was telling, riveted
and coy.  He wasn’t telling the story to them, he was talking to two men – the
clients, I could only assume – both of whom were ogling the girls.  The girls
paid little attention to the clients.  It didn’t take a rocket scientist to
figure out why they’d set their sights on Riley.  He was as dazzling as ever.  His
blond hair gleamed along with the chrome, and I could see the blue of his eyes
even from a distance.