The One Girl (4 page)

Jesus Christ, she was fantastic.

Talking softly in an attempt to not break her daze I said, “You ready to take your break or you gotta finish up with your tables first?”

She fought herself, but eventually, and unfortunately if you ask me, she broke out of her fog.

“I just finished up with my last table, so I’m ready to eat. Do you know what you want? I’ll go ahead and put in our order.”

“Yeah, sure. Just a tuna melt and fries sounds good.”

“‘Kay. I’ll be right back.” She turned on her converse and headed for the kitchen to put in our order as I took a few steps and slid into our normal booth.

I could feel several sets of eyes on me, and I knew it was because people were dying to know what was going on. The only thing better than a rumor in this town was the truth. They could use the truth as a bartering tool for status of sorts. It was a big deal to be the one person who had the real story because it served as a pretty impressive popularity booster.

They knew me well enough not to approach me though. People knew I wouldn’t react well to blatant prying into my private life. Hell, that’s why they avoided the subject of my parents like it was the plague.

Hopefully, no one had been giving Talie a hard time. She was connected to me, and therefore, by association, they should know better. But you just never know. Those boundaries were hazy and people looked for any excuse to be able to step over a line with a reasonable defense at their disposal.

Ruthie walked by and gave me a look that made it seem like she was trying to shoot bullets out of her eyes. I guess she was still a teensy bit upset about me helping Jace trap her.

I chuckled and spouted a quick, “Hey Ruth.”

She whipped around prepared to give me hell when, before she could say anything, Talie got close to the table, her hips swinging with every step of her approach.

Talie took in both of our faces perfunctorily and upon interpreting our expressions, voiced her confusion. “Uh, what’s going on guys?”

When Ruthie turned her ice glare toward Talie, I chuckled again.

Ruthie’s voice escalated with every word she spoke. “What’s going on? Are you
kidding
me? You threw me to the wolves! Both of you!”

I was full out laughing now, but Talie was taking offense. “Hey! What did I do? I didn’t have anything to do with it!”

“Exactly! Every other conversation known to man, you’re impossible to shut up! Then one comes up where I need you, and you’re like a freaking mime!”

“What was I supposed to do? Tuck forced me to move in with him too! If I can’t stop it from happening to myself, I can’t stop it from happening to you!”

Ruthie turned her rage back on me, but I just smiled and shrugged my shoulders. “Sorry, honey. You needed a push. You’ll like it in the end, you’ll see.”

She growled an “Ughhhh!”, stomped her foot, and stormed off. It was cute. Looked like Jace was a lucky man as well.

Talie slid into the booth, speaking in a whisper as she did it. “What’s going on with Kayla? Did she make it there okay?”

It didn’t take her long to switch gears, and to be fair, I knew this had been bothering her all day. I had thought about coming in as soon as I heard from Kayla, but it had been right when I was in the middle of feeding the horses. And it was only an hour ago, so I had waited. I felt a little bad now that I saw firsthand how anxious she was.

“Yeah, Babe. Heard from her an hour ago. She’s fine. Made it there without any problems. The bank was already closed for the day when she got there so she’s gonna go in the mornin’. She said she’d call as soon as she had it.”

She visibly relaxed, her shoulders sinking down to reveal more of her beautiful neck, and I reached out to grab her hand. “I know this is hard on you, Babe. But it’s gonna be over soon, and you’re not gonna have to worry about anything ever again.”

She shook her head, “You can’t promise that Tuck, it’s completely unreasonable.”

I started to talk, but she cut me off. “Besides, I don’t want you to promise that. As long as you’re around, I’m pretty sure I’ll make it through everything else. You don’t have to worry about me.”

Man, she was a strong woman. But I knew she didn’t want me to tell her that, so I told her the next best thing. “Alright, then I promise everything will be at least mediocre. And I’ll definitely be around.”

A grin settled on her face just as a plate with my tuna melt was slammed down in front of me.

“Here. Enjoy your food.”

Those were the words that came out of Ruthie’s mouth, but it sounded like she said “Screw you.” In fact, if she could have spit on me at the end, I think she would have. Apparently, she was really angry. Oh, well. Angry women didn’t scare me. They were actually pretty attractive when they were riled for reasons like this.

I gave her a huge smile and a murmured “Thanks”. Her glare cracked for just a second until I added, “Save some of that anger for Jace. I guarantee you’ll like the results.”

Ruthie’s scowl came back full force at the same time that Talie spewed her Coke all over me.

Evidently, karma
will
get you.

Chapter 5

The next morning Talie stayed home from work so that she would be there when Kayla called about the safe deposit box. The suspense from yesterday had apparently topped off her quota for the foreseeable future, and she wasn’t going to count on me passing the information along to her again.

It was understandable. We both had a lot invested in finding out exactly what happened, and this was the first and only place we had to start.

The bonus to her anxiety-driven morning of hooky was that I got to wake up and stay in bed with her for a little while. Or, at least, close to the bed.

I was on my knees on the floor beside the bed and I had her thighs thrown over my shoulders. I was flicking her nub with my tongue, her hands were buried in my hair pulling my head closer, and I could hear repeated soft moans escaping her throat. She tasted delicious, and more than that, I loved the reaction doing this caused in her. I thought her legs might fall off of my shoulders because she kept opening wider for me, trying to get me closer, deeper, somehow get more of me. She was wet and getting wetter, but she wasn’t close yet.

So I languidly ran my hand up the inside of her right thigh, swirled my tongue around her opening one more time, and then sucked her nub into my mouth. I moved my eyes up and watched as she threw her head back screaming, “God, Tuck. Ah, it feels so good.”

Her hair flew up and out as it went over her head and landed in a fan like configuration on the bed. Eventually, my fingers made it to my mouth, and I circled and massaged her folds a few times before pushing two fingers inside. She was so wet and hot all over my fingers, her inner muscles squeezing and sucking hard, that I instantly wished it was my cock inside of her.

I had the power to make that happen, and there was no reason not to, so that’s exactly what I did. Giving her one more swipe of my tongue and leisurely but precise finger thrust each, I lifted her satiny but muscled thighs off of my shoulders, stood up, lifted her higher, positioned myself at her entrance, and pushed inside.

She wrapped her legs around my waist, locking her ankles together, the rest of her body still laid back on the bed, and I reached down and under her to grab two delicious handfuls of ass. My head fell back from the sheer pleasure of being inside of her as the same tight, wet heat that I’d felt on my fingers enveloped my cock.

“Fuck, Baby. So wet and tight. Couldn’t take it. Had to be in you.”

She convulsed, squeezing her inner muscles around me, and got wetter the instant I said it.

“Ah, Tuck.
God
, yes.”

Still connected, I lifted and scooted her deeper into the bed at the same time that I put my knees into the mattress and fell forward. I quickly leaned toward her and pushed the fronts of our bodies together, picking up my rhythm again.

I moved fast with long strokes, pulled her legs up so that they were high at my sides, and then whispered in her ear, “Touch yourself, Baby. Do what you need to do to finish with me. I wanna go together.” I could tell she liked that, so I pushed her harder as she did what I told her. “Come on, Babe, hurry. Hurry Talie. I’m close.”

Two strokes later, she came hard. Her face was so beautiful when she let go- soft, trained on me, and completely free of worry. It was the best sight and accompanying feeling in the entire world if you asked me.

When I got my fill of watching her, I let myself join her.

And, God,
that
felt pretty good too.

********

We were showered and down in the kitchen, Talie having a Coke while I had coffee, when Kayla called us.

Talie jumped up headed for the phone like she was on fire. I moved more slowly, but followed close behind her.

She picked it up, pushed the button to answer, and pressed the phone to her ear. “Kayla?”

She listened for no more than a few seconds. Her eyes widened, and her voice was frantic when she spoke again. “What do you mean it wasn’t there?”

That was my cue. I could tell she was right on the cusp of flipping out.

I reached out, grabbed the phone, and pressed it to my own ear. “Kayla? You got Tuck. What’s goin’ on?”

Talie was pissed that I took the phone from her, but I needed to make sure she didn’t miss any details that Kayla may relay because she was freaking out. Plus, I liked to be in control.

Kayla spoke quickly and efficiently. “I went to the bank, they let me in the box, but there was nothing inside. If you ask me, that leaves two possible answers. Either she lied and there was never anything in the box or-”

“Or someone else already claimed it.”

“Bingo, Hotman.”

“Hotman?”

“Yeah, my new name for you. Like Batman, except I wouldn’t describe you as a bat, I’d describe you as Hot. Thus-”

“Hotman.”

“Bingo again.”

I shook my head and smiled as I gave her instructions. “Alright. We’ll have to find another way to do this then. Just get back here and do it safe-like. You got me?”

“Roger, Hotman. On my way. Tell the lovely psycho, that I’m sure is breathing down your neck as we speak, that I’m fine and headed back to the safety of her clutches.”

I chuckled to myself, and I immediately found I had dead air. Apparently, when it was really important she didn’t mince words and she got down to fucking business.

Man, she was fucking funny too. She’d make a great sister-in-law.

Unfortunately, as good a job as she had done and no matter how much comedic talent she possessed, she had also had bad news. I didn’t see a reason for Winnie to have lied about there being something in that box, so someone else must have gotten it. That was really deleterious.

The only person I could imagine having it was the one person we wanted to use it against.

Drew.

What a nightmare.

I used my thumb and middle finger to rub my temples gently with the rest of the length of my hand covering my eyes. Moving my hand from there to my hair, I moved it back and forth a few times, ruffling my spikes and clearing my head.

When Kayla got back, we needed to do something fun, something to take our minds off of this mess. I refused to stop enjoying my life with Talie just because Drew was here now. I was gonna live everyday like it was the last day I had to love her.

Talie watched me the whole time, eager to find out what I had been talking about with Kayla, but I didn’t give it to her. At least not yet.

“We’re doin’ somethin’ fun when Kayla gets back, Babe.”

She was completely thrown by the new subject. “What do you mean? Where in the hell did that come from? You want to go to the Lizard or something?”

I thought about it, remembered something I had forgotten about, and then answered her. “Nah. Somethin’ better than the Lizard. We’ll do that too one night, but I remembered my friend is comin’ close soon. We’ll go watch him.”

I read her face to see that now I
really
had her confused. “My friend Cade’s a professional bull rider. The circuit is comin’ close soon. We’ll go watch.”

She was starting to understand, but she still had questions for me. “How do you know him? Is he from here?”

“Nope. He’s from Kansas. Met him one night many years ago when I was out gettin’ rowdy and he was doin’ the same. We just always stayed in touch, and then after everything happened, with him travelin’ all the time, he always kept an eye out for any sign of Winnie for me.”

“Well I’m sure I’ll like him if you do that much. Either that or I’ll end up throwing him attitude.”

I chuckled and shook my head. Cade was the best kind of friend you could hope for, but he loved to get some ass. “Definitely gonna be the attitude, Babe. And I figure Kayla will probably have some fun with him too. I’m no chick, but from the amount of women he goes through, I’d surmise that he’s what you women would say is hot.” I quickly mulled over my statement and amended it. “Though, you think you’re sister will get her heart broken over somethin’ casual, you keep her away from Cade. You got me?”

Talie closed her eyes and let her chin fall to her chest in an exaggerated movement. “Oh, Tuck. He’s you when I first met you. All rough, male hotness and he uses it to get in the panties of every attractive female. Probably says all kinds of offensive innuendos and women don’t even care. Right?”

I bit my bottom lip and smiled at her. She concluded correctly from my actions that she was, indeed, probably right.

She heaved a heavy sigh before finishing, “I’m gonna end up being a total bitch to him. He’s gonna hate me.”

God, she was hilarious. All her attitude ever did to me was turn me on, and it would likely do the same to any other man. I stepped forward, grabbed her hips, and pulled her into my hard crotch. “Babe. It look like I hate you?”

Her lips parted and she slowly shook her head. “Yeah, well, he ain’t gonna hate you either. I’ll probably have to keep a close eye on you, make sure he doesn’t try to claim you for himself.”

She smirked and murmured, “Kayla will be there. He can just claim her.”

She didn’t get it, and to be quite honest, I didn’t really understand it either; I just knew it was the truth. “Babe. Kayla is awesome. Hot like you. Funny like you. But you got somethin’ special. Somethin’ extra. Somethin’ intangible, but there all the same. You put you and Kayla next to one another, he’s gonna go after you, whether you’re taken or not, if I don’t set down some ground rules.”

She narrowed her eyes at me as she spoke, her voice escalating in exasperation. “That doesn’t make sense. You said we were like two peas in a pod. You
said
Kayla could have some fun with him.”

“Yeah, Babe. Casual fun. He will definitely go after some ass from your sister, but he would go for everything with you.”

She huffed, sighed deep, and rolled her eyes. “God, you men are so goddamn confusing.”

I answered her through my chuckles. “We say the same thing about women.”

Wrapping my arms tight around her, I squeezed her once and spoke into her hair. “Look, I can’t really explain it, but you’ll see.”

She looked up, threw me a fake smile, and said through gritted teeth, “Great. I can’t wait.”

I had succeeded in distracting her for a few minutes, but it didn’t take her long to get back on track.

“Now what in the hell did Kayla say?’

Done being torturous I told her. I had made her wait long enough.

Besides, she looked like if I didn’t tell her then, it might lead to a painful encounter of her knee and my balls.

No thank you.