Hard Edge - Tess Oliver Page 0,57
particularly hot summer day, we’d been sitting on the cement steps in front of our elementary school and he blew and blew, hoping he’d find the perfect pitch for his ‘lady-wooing whistle’. Then the summer custodian came out to chase us off. Grady stood so fast and his head was so light from blowing he fell down the steps and landed on his knees. It had scared me plenty. I raced to him, thinking my best friend had just had a heart attack or stroke or some other fatal, hospital worthy episode. By the time I reached him, he was laughing. ‘Guess I need to swallow some oxygen in between’ he said, still laughing. I slugged him on the shoulder. He complained about it hurting all the way home.
I faced forward again. It was amazing what being back in Mayfair did to me. I wasn’t a kid anymore, and Grady wasn’t riding up behind me on his bike, but those vivid memories of us growing up together were like priceless gold to me now.
Caden was standing on the porch as I walked up to the house. His smile flashed white from beneath the shade of the overhang.
“I was afraid you might get lost with your tequila buzz.”
I climbed the steps. “It’s a pretty straight shot from my house to this one. Besides, I had an incentive to make it here.” I walked into his arms, realizing that I badly need him to hold me. “An extremely hot man invited me for some extremely dirty sex. But I’m hoping that there is no actual dirt involved. I prefer the other kind of dirty.”
His arm slid down and he took hold of my hand. “Then, my sugary smelling darlin’, we have a lot in common.” He led me into the house.
It had been years since I’d stepped into his mom’s house. The front room was filled with overstuffed couches and distressed pine furniture painted to look shabby. “Your mom really embraced that whole country chic look, huh?”
“Yep, just wait until you see my bedroom, or, as she named it, the lilac guest bedroom.”
“Lilac?” I asked as he led me down the narrow hallway to the back bedroom.
He pushed open the door. There was purple in every corner and the bed linens were dotted in lavender flowers. “Ah yes, I see.”
“Fucking missed you, Trinket.” Caden pulled me into his arms and kissed me. He ran his tongue across my lip. “Hmm, tastes like booze. I like it.” He squinted down at me.
“What?”
“Just trying to assess how drunk you are. It might play a part in how much fun we can have.”
My mood had been slightly dampened by the flashback on the way over. I pressed myself into Caden’s arms again. “You know what I really want?”
He gazed down at me, more serious now than seconds before. “What’s that, Trinket?”
“I want to hear those last three words you said to me on the phone just now. I want to know that this is still real and not just one of the many images and memories I have floating through my head.”
He pressed his hand against my face and kissed me lightly on the lips. “Kenna, I need you. I need you in my life.”
I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him back. He swept me into his arms and carried me across the room. Seconds later, I was surrounded by purple flowers and soft pillows. Caden took off my shirt and bra. He kissed my bare breasts and my stomach as his hands worked at the buttons on my shorts.
He straightened and stared down at me with such intensity, it made my already light head spin more. Not just from the anticipation of sex but from the reality that Caden Stratton, the boy I had been completely nuts about, was standing over me, wanting me, needing me in his life.
His shirt came off. The chiseled muscles of his arms and chest pulsed with strength and power. My heart raced with the thought of being in those steel arms. His eyes glittered with an almost feral gaze as he stripped naked. A smile flashed across his face, and instead of climbing on the bed, he walked over to the dresser and opened the drawer.
“What are you up to?”
“You’ll see.” He spoke without looking up from the drawer. “I figure, you don’t drink much, so I’m going to take a little advantage of the tequila. Ah ha, this will work.”
His hand emerged