she doesn’t pull away.
“Zadie.” I tip my hat in her direction and glance between the two of them. “How did you girls get here?”
Lemon bites her lip. “Um …”
“Lemon,” I warn, taking the tone her father and brothers so often use with this little fireball.
She leans up on her tiptoes, her breath washing across my face and smelling too much like whiskey as she whispers, “Don’t worry about it, champ.”
“Have you two been drinkin’?”
“Oops,” Zadie says. “Busted.”
Lemon giggles, throws one arm wide, and proclaims, “Tonight we’re Winchester Wild!”
“Oh, Jesus. Do your mama and daddy know you’re here?”
“Nope,” Lemon says. “We snuck out.”
Fuck. I am a dead man. I may not have had anything to do with this, but I have no doubt they wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for me.
“Oh my God,” Zadie squeals. “Could you imagine if they knew we’d hitchhiked?”
“You …” I pinch the bridge of my nose, my high from the ride and from having Lemon throw her arms around me vanishing, and replaced almost instantly with dread. “Your daddy’s gonna kill you, and then West is gonna kill me.”
Lemon rolls her eyes. “Daddy and West need to lighten up.”
“Lemon, promise me you’re never gonna do this again? Not the sneaking out, not the drinkin’, and definitely not hitchhiking. What the hell were you thinkin’?”
“We wanted to see the champ in action.”
“Then you wait until you’re old enough to drive yourself or better yet, ask your brother to bring you.”
“Can we go? I’m starvin’,” Zadie says.
“No. I’m taking you girls home.”
“Okay, but can we eat first?” Lemon asks. “I could really murder a funnel cake right now.”
“Oh,” Zadie crows. “And cotton candy.”
“You two are gonna be eating burgers. You need something’ to soak up all the alcohol. Where the hell did you get it anyway?”
“Daddy’s liquor cabinet.” Lemon frowns and then shakes her head as she says, “Well, the whiskey came from there. The beer I bought with a fake ID.”
“You got a fake ID? And who the hell would buy that you were over twenty-one?”
“I get by with a little help from my friends.” She toys with the collar of her plaid shirt, popping one button too many so her cleavage and the black lace of her push-up bra are visible. I swallow hard as I try not to look. She strokes her finger along her collarbone and down the swell of one breast and my dick is pulsing. Jesus. This girl is diabolical. God help every man on the planet when Lemon Winchester comes of age. “I like to call them boobs.”
I bury my head in my hands. “Come on. Before you girls kill me.”
“I don’t think your friend handles her whiskey too good.” I tilt my head toward Zadie, who’s wrapped in a blanket in the bed of my truck, drooling on the metal floor.
“I know. Who’d have thought she would be such a lightweight?”
“I still can’t believe the two of you did what you did. Why? You have some hot cowboy you had to meet up with?”
“Yep,” she says without elaborating. I regret the words instantly. What the hell am I doing? Fishing for compliments? She’s sixteen years old. I shouldn’t be encouraging her. Lemon Winchester don’t need no encouragement.
Still, empty food wrappers litter the floor around us and the girls are sober enough that we should be on the road already, but I can’t bring myself to move. Not while Lemon’s cuddled up to my side, a blanket over our outstretched legs and the field of stars above us.
“What about at home? There ain’t no boys your own age beating down your door for a date?”
She makes a pffting sound. “No one is even looking in my direction, Colt. Not with the Winchester boys breathing down their necks.”
“That’s not true.”
“Yes, it is.”
“I look at you all the time.”
A coy smile lifts the corners of her lips, and my heart skips a beat it has no right to be skipping. “And you’d be dead if West ever caught you. Not that someone like you would ever look at me the way I want you to.”
“Maybe you’re just not seeing things clearly.” I tuck her hair behind her ear and her brows pinch together. I’m on dangerous ground here. Lemon wasn’t exaggerating. If West knew I was here with his little sister, he’d beat the shit outta me. He’d never let me near her again.
She leans forward and presses her lips to mine. She tastes like whiskey and cherry-cola lip gloss and I