SLOW PLAY (7-Stud Club #4) - Christie Ridgway Page 0,45

bush.

His halting gait made her chest ache. “Grandpop…”

He looked over. “Yes?”

“When I go back to Vegas, I’m going to worry.”

His smiles could make scraped knees and friend squabbles all better. How had she survived without regular exposure to them? “I have an easy solution,” he said.

“Which is?”

“Don’t go back to Las Vegas. You don’t want to be there.”

Her jaw dropped and she stared at him. “Grandpop—”

“I’ve made it my personal rule not to judge you and your choices, Harper, or to offer unasked-for advice.”

“Which has always made you the best grandfather in the world.”

“But you can’t possibly think that’s your place, honey.”

“No?”

“No,” he said firmly. “When you first traveled and taught, I believed striking out on your own was a good way to gain experience and confidence.”

As well as independence. After reading her mother’s journals, Harper had seen a vision of her future that terrified her. So you settled for the loneliness of the long distance traveler, an inner voice said. Avoiding attachment had been her strategy for not ending up like her mother…a woman always pining for the kind of love she’d given but never received.

“Now you’re back in the States, though, you’ve got to see that Las Vegas is no Sawyer Beach and Sunnybird Farm.”

“It’s just hotter. With more desert. And more neon.” And more lonely hearts. She sighed. “And lots of people pretending to be hopeful—well, maybe that’s just those who belly up to my bar.”

Grandpop shook his finger at her. “Not your place, see?”

“My boss disagrees.” Her sterile apartment was waiting as well as her rubber bar service mats that smelled of both yeasty beer and bleach simultaneously. “So I wish we could think of a way to lessen my concerns when I’m away.”

Mad.

His name popped into her head, which could be a bad sign, but when she gave it a second thought, she decided her subconscious had a good point. Mad. Law enforcement officer Mad. She would get him over here for a meal, and as a detective he’d deduce that Grandpop and Grandmom and her mother could use another person looking out for their interests.

In her upstairs room, she dialed Mad’s number.

He picked up after one ring. “Hey, Harp.”

“How did you know it was me?”

“I know the area code for Las Vegas.”

“Oh.” She held the phone away then put it to her ear again. “I guess it’s a detective thing.”

“I guess,” he said, his tone amused.

“Everything okay?”

“You called me, sweetheart.”

“Right.” The “sweetheart” knocked her back a step, took her back to those years when he would smile at her, stroke her cheek with his knuckles, call her that name with a tender croon in his voice. She was a sucker for the tender croon, she supposed. Men should know that. Tender crooning was a winning tactic. Swooning tactic.

“Hey, Harp? You ran out before I could tell you how much I enjoyed your company.” His voice lowered to that sexy, velvety timbre.

“Just my company?” she inquired, and her tone might have been more girlish and flirty than intended. Blame it on the “sweetheart.”

Mad laughed, also low and velvety. God. She was a slut for that laugh.

“To be specific,” he said, “I particularly enjoyed the sleek skin of your thighs and the heat and wet between them. Then there’s the taste of your tongue and your nipples and—”

“I wanted to invite you for dinner tonight,” she interrupted, fanning herself.

“Oh? And why would that be?”

She opened her mouth, then reconsidered telling him about the truck, her concerns, Grandpop’s continued stubbornness. If she did, he might put on his police hat during the meal and spook her grandfather. Better to let the problems at their organic farm come up—heh heh—organically.

“I would like to see your smiling face across the table,” she said, and realized it was true.

“What should I bring?” he asked.

“Just yourself.”

“I have to bring something. Everyone knows that.”

She laughed at him. “You’re such a rule follower. Have you ever done anything illegal?”

“I let you sip my beers before you turned twenty-one.”

“Rarely.”

“And I let you show me your tits at our make-out spot.”

She gasped. “I can’t believe you just said that. First, that can’t be illegal, and second, you seduced me into displaying my…my breasts. So admit it, you’re the straightest of straight arrows.”

He laughed again. “Harp, it’s not like you can claim criminal tendencies.”

“Shows you what you know. It’s possible some friends and I may have…appropriated one of those beer bikes in Prague and were chased through the streets by a very slow and very old