Hotter than Texas (Pecan Creek) - By Tina Leonard Page 0,7
about the time you’ve got your lady bits and your life figured out, so I’d like to get the juices flowing again and feel the heat. Without guilt. My God, even the wrapper on the eighty-five-percent-cocoa chocolate bar I eat for my heart warns the consumer to remember to enjoy chocolate responsibly. When chocolate bars carry prissy-ass warnings guaranteed to take the edge off your pleasure, it’s a crying sin. I reserve the right to live my life without guilt, with not one ounce of sex-and-cocoa-starved guilt.
As I say, my sex life is not in my daughters’ plans. But, dear journal, you can keep my secret. And one day, I intend to tell you a story of an unfulfilled life: a story of love and passion and forgiveness, and learning the hard way that no matter how bad you hurt the ones you love, it’s never too late to tell them you’re sorry.
And that you’re proud of them.
It’d probably be easier to grow citrus in hell.
But Pecan Creek, Texas is where we’re beginning our family Normal Rockwell card, so that’s where I’ll be hanging my lacy black bras on the clothesline from now on.
Participating on the sly,
Maggie
It had been only a week since the Hot Nuts had come to town, and Jake knew that the foundations of Pecan Creek were already quivering. He intended to ignore the preliminary fits and starts of the getting-to-know-you phase as long as he could. Vivian had been by with an apple pie to introduce herself to the newcomers, but no one had been home. She’d been disappointed and left it on the porch with a note.
Jake was relieved. There was plenty of time for everyone to get to know each other. He couldn’t say for certain that the ladies wouldn’t all get along, but Vivian was a force to be reckoned with, and Maggie seemed pretty well versed in don’t-give-a-shit. Those two attitudes usually lay at odds with one another.
He set the balls in a triangular-shaped rack on the pool table, squaring them with his thumbs so that no space remained. Nice and tight, a great rack, which made him think about Sugar’s rack, which was also a great rack, one more thing in Pecan Creek he intended to ignore.
“When Lucy Cassavechia flounced into church on Sunday morning with that short skirt and those high purple heels and that heart-shaped tattoo on her ankle,” Kel Underwood said, “my pecker went so stiff I was afraid it was gonna fly out of my pants like a NASA rocket.”
Jake looked at the perfect rack and sighed with regret. He owned the Bait and Burgers, unbeknownst to Vivian, along with his three best friends from high school, who were also his military brothers, and sometimes the dead weight he wore on his back. Like right now. “Shit, Kel. You made me mess up the perfect rack.” He sighed, glancing over at the two-hundred-thirty-pound, six-foot-five ex-linebacker. “You know you love Debbie, Kel, and those ugly kids of yours. There’s no reason to get all excited over a short skirt.”
Kel shrugged, his long brown ponytail shaggy and a bit dispirited. “Every guy wants to take a new car out for a drive occasionally. And Debbie doesn’t scream for me anymore. She used to come so loud the chickens would fly out of the roosts.”
“Damn it, Kel, you don’t have chickens,” Jake said.
“I think Lucy would scream. I’d put money on Lucy being a screamer.” Kel finished the bottle of homegrown. “I like ’em loud.”
“Not me.” Jake shook his head. “I’m on a mission for peace and quiet in my life. No excitement.” He kissed his pool cue and broke, watching the colored and striped balls fly with satisfaction. “There’s your hard-on. An easy run of the table. Watch and learn.”
“Lucy’s hot, but Ma ain’t bad, either,” Bobby German said, and Jake miscued on what should have been an easy put-away of the six ball. “Has anybody taken a good look at Lucy’s mother?” Brown-skinned, tankheaded “Big” Bobby took a swig of his beer. “I’d do her in a heartbeat if I was twenty years older.”
Jake leaned his pool cue against the bar and looked at the fourth member of their group. “Go ahead. Screw up my whole day. Tell us which one of the new ladies in town you want to do so I can get on with my game.”
Evert Carmichael shrugged. “All of ’em would work for me, but my girlfriend over at the coffee shop’s taking care