Hotter than Texas (Pecan Creek) - By Tina Leonard Page 0,25
was an amazing mother, one of the hardest working women I’ve ever seen.”
“I don’t understand,” Sugar said. “If you love her so much, why don’t you just be honest with her?”
He reached over and ran a finger down her straight nose, then traced her lips, entranced by the softness. “I told you. Vivian is a fixer. I don’t want her fixing my life.”
“You really think she’ll never find out?”
He turned away from the siren’s call that was Sugar. “Too many questions for one day.”
Sugar looked back at the sky. Paris settled behind them on the dock, laying herself out to enjoy the sun. “You never told Averie about your restaurant?”
“No way. I discovered two years into the relationship that Averie was a fixer too. Now, no more questions, or I’ll make you pay.”
“I have no money, so you’d be hard-pressed to get anything out of me.”
“I’d settle for a game of pool. For every shot you make, you get to ask a question.”
She rolled her head to look at him again, which he appreciated. He loved looking at her, could do it for hours. “And for every shot you make?”
He grinned. “You remove an item of clothing.”
“Pretty stiff odds.” She thought for a moment. “Nothing about you interests me, so I have no more questions.”
“You sure were nosy a minute ago.”
“Just making idle conversation. Nothing to get your inner pervert on about.”
He rose on an elbow to look down at her. “Don’t chicken out just because you don’t like the odds. It’s a fair exchange. You didn’t state up front that you were something of a pool shark, anyway.”
“What if I run the table and you don’t get a shot? Not saying it’s likely, but it’s important to know the house rules up front.”
He grinned. “Then you’ll know the story of my life pretty fast, won’t you?”
“You really don’t want to talk about her, do you?” Sugar said.
“Who?”
“Averie with an ie not a y.”
He moved her red hair away from her cheek, revealing a huge, thin golden hoop hanging from her ear. He wanted to kiss her neck so badly it hurt, and suddenly, he sympathized with Kel’s unrequited attraction to Lucy.
“I don’t really care what you ask me,” he said. “I just want to get your clothes off, Sugar Cassavechia.”
She gazed at him, her eyes huge in her face, stunned by his words.
Before he realized what she was doing—her breasts moving in the ribbed cotton as she quickly rose had him poleaxed as he belatedly realized she wasn’t wearing a bra and Kel and Co. hadn’t been exaggerating her charms—Sugar shoved against him with a surge of strength that caught him off balance. He tumbled into the water with a splash.
Paris joined him, barking joyously, dogpaddling around him with delight.
He wiped the water from his eyes, looked up to see if Sugar was staring over the dock at him. But her tight butt in those wrinkled khaki shorts was already headed back through the grove with her basket, leaving him with the cold bath he probably richly deserved.
“She seriously digs me,” he told Paris.
Paris barked.
“You say not so much since she threw me back into the water? Literal dog,” he said, hauling himself out of the creek. He sat on the pier to drip, thought about those sweet lips and curved breasts. Paris got out, shaking and spraying him with water droplets.
“That woman is hotter than a Texas day,” he told Paris. “I think she’s after me.”
Paris took off running after Sugar.
Jake went to find reality.
Lucy and Maggie were in the kitchen when Sugar found them. She wanted a cold drink to cool her steaming temper, and she wanted to tell her family that their landlord was something of a rat.
Which she’d known from the beginning, darn him.
They turned around from the pan they were staring at on the stove.
“Hi, Sugar,” Lucy said, and her cautious tone stopped Sugar in her tracks.
“What’s happened?” Sugar asked.
Maggie glanced at Lucy. “Ramon called.”
“What?” Sugar sat down at the kitchen island, thinking that she had rat karma today.
“He couldn’t reach you on your cell,” Lucy said, “so he called mine.”
“My phone is in my bedroom. I don’t need it much. You’re the only people I talk to, and you’re here, so…” Sugar’s voice drifted off. “What did he want?”
“He says he wants to come see you,” Lucy said, her face a bit pale.
“No,” Sugar said. “That’s not happening. I’m sure you told him that.”