SLOW PLAY (7-Stud Club #4) - Christie Ridgway Page 0,30
be tuned in to the universe. “So this time you were off.”
His friend shook his head. “It’s not right.” He turned his back on the surf and faced the tables, food, drink, crowd. “There’s a disturbance somewhere.”
Another eye roll. But Mad dutifully turned too. Then, a concerning thought. He ran his gaze over the people on the beach, talking, laughing, dancing. Whew. No sign of the woman he’d seen on Shane’s arm the other night. By itself, that wouldn’t be bad, but he was particularly relieved not to see the woman with Raf at her elbow.
“Is there anything wrong?”
“Not a thing.” Especially now that he didn’t need to warn one of his best friends about said best friend’s willing-to-poach half brother. “Not a thing’s wrong.”
“I wouldn’t think so,” Shane said, spreading his legs in the sand and crossing his arms over his bare chest. His chin jutted toward the circle of dancers on the sand. “Girl mush pot. Doesn’t get much better than that.”
No one said Shane didn’t appreciate the female form.
Or wasn’t part-caveman.
Then one woman’s form caught Mad’s eye. A big canvas hat obscured her face as she moved sinuously to the beat. When she spun around, giving him a view of her back, he blinked hard. “Jesus.”
“What?” Shane asked.
“When did female bathing suit fashion mean exposing everything with such…cheekiness?”
Shane snorted. “You’re just getting around to noticing? Let’s just be grateful it doesn’t extend to men. Look at Geoff Simms over there. Imagine having to look at his hairy ass.”
“Don’t put that in my head.” He squeezed shut his eyes, then managed to take a careful peek through his eyelashes. The view remained blinding. “Shane…”
His friend laughed. “Is this a cop thing? You’ve been keeping your eyes at shoulder-level the past few years?”
“But that…that…” Mad gestured vaguely.
Turning his head, his buddy sent him a strange look. “You do know that’s your former girlfriend under the big hat and sporting the, uh…”
Harper? He gulped. “Can those scant pieces of fabric really be termed swimwear?”
“She always had a wild side. Or a side at least wilder than yours.”
“Vegas,” he said darkly. “That’s where she’s been.”
“Well, she’s wearing it well,” Shane said lightly. “And by the way, have some advice. You should take that cop stick out of your ass.”
The boring, predictable, stick.
He decided to stop staring at Harper, because it only made him feel more dull in comparison to all that movement, life, skin. But just as he shifted, Hart stepped up and groaned. “God, look who’s back.”
Mad’s head whipped toward the dancers again. The women had a man in their midst now. Tatted Arms, whose hand had previously been in Sophie Daggett’s back pocket, was now leering at Harper Hill, with her poppy blossom of a hat and her dental floss of a bathing suit. He spun her around and she laughed, throwing her head back and twirling on her bare feet. The big hat fell to the sand, revealing Harper’s flushed face.
“That guy,” Hart said. “I can’t decide whether I hate him or I hate him.”
“I hate him,” Mad replied, then regretted it. “Of course I don’t give a shit about him.” Or the fact that he appeared to be hitting on his former girlfriend.
Why should he care about that, either, after all? She was free to enjoy any guy she wanted. Smile at him, laugh at him, hold his hand. Over the last six years she’d probably had a good time with any number of other men.
“How many would that be?” he asked Hart.
“How many would that be what?”
“Over six years, how many…people would someone encounter, enjoy, whatever.”
Hart blinked. “What the hell are you talking about?”
With another glance at Tatted Arms, Mad told himself it couldn’t be jealousy surging through his veins. Harper had been away from him, from town, for so long he should barely remember what she felt like. How she tasted. How his tongue enjoyed flirting with the hollow behind her ear.
And the curve of her ear.
And her nipple.
Her clit.
“Gah,” he said and pressed his palms to his temples. How many other men had similar memories of her in his head? The idea of it made his blood chug hot and thick in his veins. Cut him and he’d bleed green.
And Mad had called Shane a caveman.
Still…how many could it be?
One man a month, times six years…or one a week? That would be…
His brain hurt, which was stupid, because he was his father’s son and his father could have made this calculation without wishing he