Make Mine a Bad Boy (14 page)

Ever.

The pain in her heart moved to her butt.

Colt Lomax stood at the bottom of the bleachers in a tight black T-shirt that made him stand out in the sea of purple like the black sheep he was. He casually leaned against the concrete wall that ran in front of the stands, one biker boot crossed over the other and a worn leather jacket hooked over his tattooed arm.

He didn’t look at her with loving warmth. More like steamy lust. Steamy lust that caused her breath to hitch and her heart to thump wildly. This man would never blush if she threw him a kiss; more than likely he would catch it and place it somewhere really nasty.

The pervert.

Of course, he wasn’t the only pervert in the stands. Every time she was alone with the man, she broke every moral instilled in her since birth. Even now her body heated from the message in those devilish silver eyes.

If you show me yours, I’ll show you mine.

“Colt Lomax!”

Hope jumped guiltily when Shirlene stood up and yelled.

“Quit blockin’ the view and get your cocky butt up here!”

His eyes remained on Hope for a brief second more before he pushed away from the wall and ambled up the steps. Without asking permission, he sat down on the end of the bleachers, sandwiching Hope between his broad shoulders and Shirlene’s puffy down jacket.

Faith leaned over and smiled down the row at him. “I thought you were leaving, Colt.”

“Change of plans,” he merely stated, before he reached over to grab a handful of popcorn, his bare arm brushing
against Hope’s boob in the process. She pulled back, only to run into Billy Joe’s knees.

“Pardon me,” she choked out, before sitting back up.

Meanwhile, Colt munched the popcorn as if nothing was amiss, although when he reached for the next handful, Hope quickly crossed her arms over her chest. One corner of his mouth twitched, but he didn’t say a word.

With Colt sitting there smirking, she thought it would be hard to concentrate on the game. But it didn’t take long for her to get caught up in the thrill of competition, especially when the Bulldogs’ lanky quarterback had an arm that would make pro scouts drool.

The kid’s talent quickly turned the game into a rout, so much so that Hope’s attention began to wander. Unfortunately, it didn’t wander very far. In fact, no more than a few inches, to the man who sat with his arms propped on his hard thighs and his gaze riveted to the field.

His dark hair didn’t shine like liquid gold in the stadium lights, but rather gleamed like Shirlene’s polished onyx kitchen countertops as it spilled over the ribbed neck of his black T-shirt. A T-shirt that stretched over broad shoulders and lean back muscles, stopping just short of the waistband of his jeans. A very tiny bit of skin peeked out, just enough to make Hope swallow hard and shiver.

He glanced over. “Are you cold?”

Since she wasn’t about to claim otherwise, she nodded and, within seconds, found herself engulfed in the folds of his thick leather jacket.

“No, really…” She tried to slip it off, but her mother jumped in.

“Don’t be rude, Hope Marie.”

Not wanting to cause a scene, she acquiesced and
slipped her arms into the smooth satin lining. It smelled of him—raw and dangerous, something she tried not to notice as her gaze returned to the game. But only a few seconds later, her eyes left the green of the field to stare down at the tattooed arm resting on one knee.

It was the first chance she’d had to study the tattoo up close—in the Chevy, her mind had been riveted on a different part of his anatomy. Still, the blue-ink design was so cluttered and detailed it took her a few minutes to figure out what it was.

A snake coiled around the corded muscles of his forearm, its opened-fanged mouth poised over the huge knot of Colt’s biceps and its rattle curled around his wrist like the watch he never wore. Along the diamond-backed reptilian body, other tattoos jutted out. The front forks and tire of a motorcycle. A banner with “Desperado” written across it. A tombstone with his father’s initials. The Texas state flag. A queen of diamonds playing card. A thorny rose. And at the very top, peeking out from beneath the tight sleeve of his shirt, was some kind of snarling animal.

A wolverine?

A javelina?

Hope leaned closer. But before she could figure it out, his arm moved from beneath her nose, and she glanced up into Colt’s curious, gray eyes. Caught in the act, there wasn’t much she could do.

“What kind of animal is that?” She pointed.

“A rattlesnake.”

“Not that one. The one—” Before she could finish, he jumped up.

“I’m headed to the snack bar. Anybody want anything?”

“More than you can carry, big brother.” Shirlene quickly
got up to go with him. Surprised that Shirlene would leave a football game for food, Hope glanced back at the field, only to discover it was halftime. Where had the time gone? There was no way she had been looking at Colt for an entire quarter. But as the band performed their marching routine, she realized she’d done just that.

Stunned by the revelation, she didn’t pay much attention when Emma Jean flopped down next to her and started chattering up a storm.

“… and she’s only been doin’ this for a couple months, but I think she’s got real talent, and I just know with your expert Hollywood advice she can go on to great things—possibly even a hemorrhoid commercial.” Emma Jean pointed out at the field. “Look, there she is! Isn’t that the cutest little outfit you’ve ever seen in your life? I wanted to get it in the school colors, but wouldn’t you know it, it only comes in red, white, and blue—which is almost as good.”

A little girl strutted out on the field in a white cowboy hat and a sequined outfit with a blue star on the front. She wore little white boots with huge blue tassels and red sequined cuffs around her wrists. Hope had to admit that she looked cute and was about to say so, when she noticed Emma Jean’s husband, Chester, following behind her, holding two batons and a blowtorch.

“Oh, no.” Hope shook her head. “I don’t think this is a good idea, Emma. Especially if she’s only been doing this for a couple months. I mean, I’ll be more than happy to help her anyway I can—”

Before she could finish, the blowtorch flamed, and the batons were lit and handed to the little girl, who didn’t look the least bit worried. Obviously, she’d done this
before. But that didn’t stop Hope from leaning forward in fear.

The band struck up “You Are My Sunshine,” and flaming batons took flight. And darned if the little girl didn’t manage to toss and twirl those burning sticks like a pro. Impressed and relieved, Hope stood and clapped and whooped as loudly as the rest of the crowd as the performance ended in a blur of whirling fire and a cute little hat-tipping bow. The batons were handed off to her daddy, who was beaming like any proud papa should.

Hope sat back down and sighed in relief.

It was a tad bit premature, because while Chester had brought something to light the batons with, he’d failed to bring anything to put them out. And while most people might snuff them on the ground, football turf was as sacred as the Shroud of Turin to the people of West Texas. So he stood there with the flaming sticks, uncertain what to do or where to go. Things might’ve turned out alright if the team hadn’t come out of the locker room, forcing the band to leave the field.

Hope had never been in the marching band, but she’d listened to enough practices to know members did not get out of line for anything less than a natural disaster. And these kids had learned the lesson well. Without breaking file once, they marched right past those flaming batons as if they weren’t there—eyes straight ahead and instruments held vertically in front of them as a drummer tapped out a beat.

Chester did his best to avoid bare faces and hands, and it was easy to see where his daughter got her baton-twirling skill. As the tuba section left the field, it looked as if a catastrophe had been avoided. It wasn’t until the
band members took the steps back up to the bleachers that Hope noticed the flaming poof on the cap of a trombonist.

“Fire!” Hope hollered at the top of her lungs and pointed down at the kid.

Everyone froze.

Everyone except Colt, who was headed back from the snack bar. Retaining the 64 oz. Big Slurp, he handed the tray of nachos off to Shirlene before knocking the hat to the ground and stomping out the fire with one big biker boot.

Hope might’ve commented to Emma Jean about his quick reflexes if her attention hadn’t been caught by the giant of a man who had just entered the stadium behind Colt.

It had been years since she’d seen Rachel Dean’s cousin Bear, and she had forgotten how appropriately he’d been nicknamed. Bear stood a good head and a half taller than the other men who were filing back into the stands with their nachos and drinks.

Except Bear wasn’t carrying a cardboard tray of goodies. Instead, his huge paw was clamped over the shoulder of the short man that he pushed in front of him. A man Hope recognized immediately.

“Sheldon?” Hope spoke more loudly than she intended, her voice quieting the mutters that had started after the fire had been put out.

Bear looked up and grinned broadly, flashing an incomplete set of tobacco-stained teeth. “See, Harley,” he yelled as he shoved poor Sheldon up the stairs. “I told you I would find the baby’s daddy!”

“T
OO BAD
S
HELDON
didn’t turn out to be the daddy,” Kenny Gene said as he piled his paper plate high with food the women of Bramble had brought to feed the crowd that had showed up to move Slate and Faith into their new home. “Besides that sissy fit of tears he broke into when he saw Hope, I kinda liked the little feller.”

Standing beneath a cedar tree behind Slate and Faith’s just-completed house, Colt couldn’t help feeling a little annoyed. He might not want to be part of the daddy-hunt, but it was a little ego-deflating that he didn’t even rate above a man who wore orange pants and used more hair products than Twyla. If Sheldon was straight, Colt would eat Kenny Gene’s hat.

He took another bite from his own heaping plate of food, while he continued to eavesdrop on the group of townsfolk clustered around the long table.

“Still,” Sheriff Winslow wiped the barbecue sauce off his chin with the edge of the paper napkin tucked into the collar of his uniform shirt, “since Hope insisted we throw this one back, Harley says the hunt is still on.” He glanced
over at Bear, who sat at the end of the table in front of two heaping plates. “But this time, Bear, try to pick out one who doesn’t act like Darla’s nephew.”

“I’ll do my best, Sam,” Bear said, over the sparerib he’d been annihilating.

At that point, Colt probably could’ve stepped in and tried to set things straight about Hope not being pregnant. It would be the right thing to do. But Colt had never done the right thing where Hope was concerned, and it seemed a shame to start now.

His gaze wandered through the crowd until he found her. She wore jeans today. Not tight Wranglers, but worn jeans with a relaxed fit that hung low on her hips, along with a long-sleeved navy T-shirt with the name of a California surf shop printed on the front, and a pair of flip-flops that showed off her pretty pink-painted toenails.

The October sun had reddened her nose and deepened the tan of her cheeks, a tan that had been brought to his attention in the front seat of the beat-up Chevy. And in the last few days, he’d thought of little else but the tiny triangle of pale skin Hope had revealed beneath her panties. Even now, he had to do a little covert adjusting at just the thought of Hope in the tiny bikini that had left that triangle. The kind of bikini with ties that took only a swift tug to undo.

Hope glanced up, and he got lost in the blue of her eyes. A blue that turned all dark and sensual, as if she, too, was thinking about their naughty fun. Of course, her eyes didn’t remain sensual for long. It only took a few blinks before the passion turned to annoyance.

But her sass made Colt even hotter, and he tossed the remainder of his food into the trash bag taped onto the table, with the intention of joining the group of townsfolk
that she was talking with. But before he could make his way through the crowd, a strawberry blond head of hair caught his attention, and he looked over to see Jesse stuffing his face with a hot dog, the ketchup dripping off the end onto his Batman T-shirt.

“Hey, Kenny,” Colt said. “You know that kid?”

Kenny looked up from his plate at Colt and registered surprise. “Hey, Colt, when did you get here?” He glanced around. “What kid?”

“The one over by the hot dogs—Jesse.”

Kenny’s eyes landed on the boy, who had moved on to the chicken wings. “Sure, everyone knows Jesse. I bought Twyla one of them stand-up hair dryers from him that made her happier than a pig in mud.”

Sam Winslow jumped in. “He sold me a wet vac that had more suction than a ten-dollar hooker—” He shut up when Darla walked past. “Anyway, that thing was well worth the thirty dollars I gave him.”

Colt couldn’t help but grin at the kid who was now munching on a wing. No wonder Jesse could afford the fancy cell phone. The kid was a real shyster.

“What does his father do?” Colt asked.