King Stud Read online

  “If you don’t want to mess with them, I can find somebody else.”

  He might hate the hell out of plumbing and tile work, but no way would he let her hire it out. He willed himself to sound cheerful. “Nah, I’ll do it.”

  “I mean, you can give me some names or something.”

  “I’ll give you anything you want, Princess.” He made it sound deliberately flirtatious.

  Her eyes got big, and even in the semi-light from the drive-in’s fluorescent bulbs he could see her blush. “Ryan O’Connor.”

  He winked at her, and after a weak attempt at looking stern, she smiled back. “You are trouble, young man.”

  “Guess I need an older woman to keep me in line.”

  He got a peek at her grin before she covered it with her hand. God she was fun to flirt with. He let her stew for a minute, then turned the key in the ignition. “Let’s get your new prize home.”

  She carefully folded up her burger wrapper and put it in the empty Dick’s bag. When she spoke, her voice was almost too quiet to hear. “What am I going to do with you?”

  Anything you want. Maeve can go to hell.

  Chapter Nine

  Friday sucked. Danielle got a call from a familiar number, one with a 3-2-3 area code. L.A. Braden. She let it go to voicemail. Then two different roofers came out to give her bids, and both wanted well beyond what her savings could handle, which meant talking to Uncle Jonathan. Which would be hard, but way easier than asking her mother for money.

  Ryan called to say he wouldn’t be over and Maeve invited her out for dinner and cocktails, but Danielle wasn’t in the mood to party. Instead, she sat at the big cherry wood table¸ listening to music and searching eBay for some vintage pottery for the fireplace mantle. She was supposed to be putting together a Power Point for work, and the irony of spending money on decorations for a place she’d never live in gave each bid a dollop of desperation, as if someone — her boss, her mother, her guardian angel — would walk in, see the mismatched Red Wing vases, and say, ‘Of course, Danielle. It was meant to be’.

  If what was meant to be?

  A pair of headlights streaked across the front window, interrupting her bid war. A minute later, heavy footsteps crossed the porch. Then someone knocked hard on the door.

  She jerked out of the chair, her confusion exacerbated by the heavy pounding of her heart. No one should be here. The door rattled like someone was messing with the lock. She made a sound halfway between a bleat and a scream when the door opened.

  Ryan came in. “Hey, you’re here,” he said, dimples flaring.

  “What are you doing? You scared the shit out of me.” She braced herself on the table, pulling in a deep lungful of air.

  He just stood grinning at her, hands in his pockets, curls gelled into something close to order. The laptop streamed soft music that all of a sudden sounded romantic, and she panicked, hoping he wouldn’t get the wrong idea.

  “Glad you think this is funny,” she said.

  “I thought you’d be out with Maeve.” He held up his hands, calming her, placating her. She really wanted those hands touching her.

  Down girl.

  “I just had to finish up a couple things.” She straightened up and rested her knuckles on her hips. Instead of his usual worn jeans and tee shirt, he was dressed in black pants and a light blue button-down shirt that looked like silk and made his eyes crazy bright. His tie was navy and he’d changed out his usual UW hoodie for a black leather jacket. “You look … um…”

  “Company Christmas party.” He spoke too quickly, like there was something going on under the surface.

  “You should be out hanging with your crew.” And not here torturing me.

  “I need to take the clamps off those cabinets I glued up.”

  The expression on his face had nothing to do with carpentry. He took a couple steps toward the dining room, then veered over to where she stood, moving fast. She fell back, carried by his wave of energy, and in seconds he had her up against the wall, his hands bracketing her head, his hips pressed tight to hers.

  “Ryan, no. What are you…”

  He covered her mouth with his fingers. “Sh. Just let me be close to you for a minute.”

  She tipped her chin up and his fingers slid down her neck, stopping when his thumb hit the hollow at the base of her throat and his strong hand cradled her shoulder. He rocked forward, resting his mouth against her forehead.

  She stood still, caught up in the heat of his breath on her skin and the soft woodsy smell of his aftershave.

  “I know I’m not supposed to do this, Dani.”

  The scratch of lips against skin made her mouth water. “It’s … okay. Just … we shouldn’t.”

  His head turned and lowered. He meant to kiss her. If he succeeded, there was no way she’d stop. She wanted him so, so bad. He cupped her face with both hands, pinning her.

  Crap.

  His mouth closed over hers like the final piece of a puzzle dropping into place. She stilled, time stopped, the universe paused. She didn’t push him away.

  Sometimes not choosing becomes its own choice.

  Instead, she reached up and grabbed the collar of his silk shirt and hauled him closer. This was what she wanted. To hell with all the arguments against it.

  He shoved a thigh between her legs, and his hands grew rougher, grabbing her hair to change the angle of her head. He tasted of mint and gum and beer. The heat rose between them, and oh my God she wanted it. Wanted him. He pulled back, flicked her lips with his tongue. The sound she made was nearly a sob. She drove her hands under his leather coat and pulled his shirt free. When her fingertips reached the warm, velvety skin of his lower back she almost sobbed again.

  His kiss got harder, rugged, more demanding, and his hands dragged her ass closer still. Her body lit up, her core turning to liquid flame. He got under her sweatshirt, kneading her breasts. Her head rocked back against the wall and her laughter swirled out under the exquisite torture of his hands on her nipples. His lips and tongue mauled her ear and down her neck, and she keened a victory sound, tiny and high-pitched, her hips rocking slowly against the growing bulge in his groin.

  She went to work on the buttons down the front of his shirt, ready to indulge in exploring his muscular chest, but he wrapped her hands in his and shifted his weight away from her.

  When he spoke, his voice was rough, heavy. “I’m sorry.” He turned slowly, moving like a man three times his age. “Jesus, I know you don’t want … I’m sorry, Dani.”

  She let the wall support most of her weight, breathing hard, all that warm liquidy goodness turning to ice. Her sweatshirt rode up around her ribs and her bra was off kilter. She tugged everything back into place, embarrassment verging on mortification washing over her. Why the hell did he stop? He’d acted on an impulse she felt just as surely as he did. Then he tipped forward a little, unsteady, almost losing his balance, and she put the pieces together. “How much did you have to drink tonight?”

  He scrubbed his face with his hands. “A bit.”

  “A bit too much.” She punched his shoulder. He reached out like he would gather her in for a hug, but she sidestepped him. “None of that, now. Let me get my stuff together then I’m going to drive you home.”

  “Nah, I’m fine.”

  “Um, right. Give me your keys.”

  After a brief staring match, he flipped his car keys in her direction. She’d seen pain in his eyes, hiding behind a whole boatload of frustration.

  All emotions she could relate to.

  “I’m going to go lock the back door.” Dodging the kitchen construction zone, she headed into the mud room. She’d just thrown the deadbolt when she heard a sharp crack, along with an indecipherable curse.

  Looking back through the dining room, she could see most of Ryan framed in the doorway. He stood with his head bowed, flexing the fingers of his right hand. When she reached the living room, she saw a fist-sized crater in the wall. Without a word, she we
nt back to the kitchen, to the first aid kit she’d stashed in one of the new cabinet boxes. Bringing an ice pack back into the living room, she took his hand in hers.

  He didn’t look up, letting her hold the ice pack over the raw skin on his knuckles. His shoulders seemed to fold forward, wrapping around her protectively even though he kept his arms at his sides. “I’m trying, Dani,” he whispered, raising his head enough to meet her gaze.

  That did it.

  Her world tightened down to the curve of his upper lip, the faint depressions left by his dimples when he wasn’t smiling, the shadow of his beard. “Me too.”

  The knuckles of his good hand brushed her cheek. She turned into the caress, pressing her lips into his palm. He shifted his weight, resting his forehead on hers. Calm. Quiet.

  They stood that way for a long time, until the icepack dropped to the floor and he gathered her in. She arched up, stretching out against the length of his body. The relief from finally being close to him made her dizzy.

  Still, when he turned his head to kiss her, she eased out of his grasp, a move requiring more inner grit than she knew she possessed. Maeve and age and L.A. and Cherry. “Let’s not press our luck.”

  The humor was undercut by the tremor in her voice, but he got the message. He picked up one of her hands for a kiss, his lips gentle against her skin. “Right.”

  It took her a minute, but she pulled her hand away. “Let’s go.”

  He laughed, sounding as shaky as she felt. “I’ll patch the wall.”

  “At least,” she said, doing her best to look stern. He smiled, then she laughed, and in the time it took her to pack up her laptop, things started to feel more normal. They might have stood closer together, and when Ryan held the front door open, Danielle could have skimmed his body with hers as she passed. She didn’t. The brush of his heat against her skin barely satisfied her. She refused to return his keys, and after some halfhearted protests, they both got in her car.

  His presence in the passenger seat was like a magnet, pulling all the little fibers in her being toward him. She had to use all her concentration to keep the car on the road.

  She had to use all her willpower to drop him off alone.

  Danielle was up and out of the apartment early Saturday morning, making it as far as the Magnolia Coffee Company for a latte and borrowed Wi-Fi. Camped out in one of the overstuffed chairs in front of the gas fireplace, laptop open, she searched for self-help articles on how to date a friend’s brother. She needed to get a handle on the transition, because the whole “keep away from Ryan” thing was very close to going down in flames.

  Basing a strategy adjustment on one kiss might be an overcall, but it never hurt to be prepared. Besides, it had been a flaming, sparks-flying, blow-up-the-fuse-box kind of kiss. Her adult mind could list the reasons to stay away from Ryan from now until next Tuesday, but as Gram told her more than once, “the heart wants what it wants.”

  Some of the webpages were surprisingly helpful. Don’t diss your boyfriend to his sister. Made sense. Limit the PDA aspect. Made even more sense. Make sure to spend time with your friend so she doesn’t feel left out.

  Danielle would make a point of it, providing they were on speaking terms.

  After caving in and buying herself a second latte, she headed over to the house, cutting through a neighborhood of huge old homes hidden behind fat rhododendrons and dense green lawns. Closer to the water, the number of Madrona trees increased, their twisted branches and peeling cinnamon bark adding an interesting texture to the fusty grey sky.

  She’d never been one to act rashly. She’d done the school thing, working her way to a Master’s degree. She’d done the work thing, moving from staff nurse to charge nurse to assistant manager. She met a man who fit her lifestyle, they got serious, and things moved along according to her plan.

  Then Braden left, and Danielle-Red-Riding-Hood had come straight to Grandma’s house.

  And found a wolf.

  Leaving L.A. was the most reckless thing she’d ever done. Until she met Ryan. Now, she’d apparently made ‘reckless’ her middle name.

  She drove up Perkins Lane, surprised to find Ryan’s truck in the yard. Literally in the yard. He’d backed up across the grass, aiming the bed of the truck at the front porch. The truck’s gate was down, ready to be loaded.

  Edging past it, she heard noise before she even reached the door. A heavy thud, followed by the sound of something shattering. The front door was open, the floor lamp in the living room was on, and one of Ryan’s sweatshirts was draped over the wing chair.

  She found him in the bathroom. He wore a pair of wrecked jeans, shabby even by his casual standards. One sleeve of his old tee shirt hung crooked because of a huge rip in the shoulder seam, which was okay because the gap showed off his muscular shoulder. Sweat pasted down curls at the edge of his hairline and his shadowy beard suggested it had been over twenty-four hours since he’d shaved. Chunks of the bathtub spread across the bathroom floor, and the smell of mold gagged her.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Surprise added a bitchy tang to the words. She hadn’t been 100% set on replacing the old bathtub.

  Oh well.

  “Penance.” Shoulders rounded as if exhaustion weighed him down, he turned back to the ruined tub. Sections of the tile had given way, revealing a moldering black mass underneath it.

  “Ooh,” she whispered. “That’s ugly.”

  Using the sledgehammer, he tapped the wall, knocking off another chunk of the yellow 4x4 tile. “I’ll get all this out of here today, then pick up some new cement board to replace the rotten stuff.”

  It was only nine in the morning, and God only knew how long he’d been working. Sweaty and filthy dirty, he was the sexiest thing she’d ever seen. She set her latte cup in the sink, fighting hard to keep from grabbing the closest part of Ryan she could reach. “You got drunk last night and now you feel bad.”

  He stared down at her, keeping a wall between them with his gaze. “About some of it, yeah.”

  Despite all the warm fuzzy reading she’d done, the grown-up part of her mind refused to give in without a fight, so instead of flirting, even a little, she kept on-task. “All right, well, is there anything I can do in here to help?”

  “Nah.” He tapped the hammer on the floor and chuffed a laugh. “This room’s too small for both of us. I might not be able to keep my hands to myself.”

  Apparently his adult mind didn’t get the memo. “Listen, about that. We should probably talk—”

  “I’m in the middle of disemboweling Jabba the Hut over here and now you want to talk?” he snapped, rubbing his forehead with the back of his hand.

  She wasn’t used to him using anger to keep her away. “Later then.” An idea hit her head and made it out of her mouth before she could consider the consequences. “We could grab dinner after we’re done working.”

  The sledgehammer thumped against a piece of the broken tub. “Did you just ask me out?”

  “Not exactly.” She raked a hand through her hair. “I guess. Maybe?”

  He didn’t smile at her weak attempt at humor.

  “It’s not like a date-date, but we do need to figure things out,” she said, scrambling to find a way to make it all better.

  He still didn’t smile.

  “Don’t worry about it, then. I’m being silly.” She ran out of words.

  He gave the demolished bathtub a long, considering look. “I’m just hung over, Princess.” Meeting her gaze, some of the tension left him. “You’re right, we should talk. Dinner sounds great.”

  “Really? Like, pizza or something?”

  His smile showed the ghost of a dimple. “That’ll work.”

  For the next few hours Danielle searched online for bathroom fixtures and tried to find the cheapest price for white subway tile. Then she sanded some sheetrock and applied a layer of stain to the molding she’d stripped.

  In response to her multiple offers, Ryan said the one thing he needed her
help with had nothing to do with a bathroom remodel.

  The only hitch in the otherwise quiet morning was a phone call from her mother. She almost picked it up, paused, and then let it go to voicemail. She could listen to the message later, after she’d had some time for strategizing.

  If she was really brave, she’d listen to the message from Braden at the same time.

  Ryan spent more hours than he cared to think about clearing the broken tub and tile and hauling the mildewed lathe and plaster wall from the main bathroom. His hangover faded by lunch, helped along by the teriyaki take-out Dani brought him. The only awkward moment happened right before he took his filthy butt home to clean up.

  He chucked the last armload of tub debris into the bed of the truck, and Dani met him in the doorway with a towel. He wiped sweat off his face and rubbed down the back of his neck. When he opened his eyes, she was staring straight at his right ear.

  The damned tattoo.

  Her face got a tight look, like the reminder of Cherry discouraged her. She came right up into his personal space, her hand reaching for him.

  “Don’t,” he said, jerking away. “I smell worse than I look.” He was still steamed that he’d let himself get talked into the tatt in the first place.

  “At least it’s not as obvious as some.” Her hand dropped, her expression tightening farther. “That your only tattoo?”

  “Yep.”

  She made a soft, satisfied noise, like she’d been afraid to get any closer in case Cherry’s face peered out from between his shoulder blades or something.

  “So?” He phrased it as a question, giving her one more chance to change her mind. It would kill him, but if she meant to back away, now was the time to do it.

  She fluttered her hands in the direction of his driver’s side door. “So … go take a shower. You’re all gross.”

  He reached for his keys, taking one last swipe at his face with the towel. She crossed her arms under her breasts, her semi-flirtatious smile tagging him with a heady surge of heat. His eyes dropped to her chest, obvious enough to make her laugh. He gave her a half-assed wave, and, acting like he couldn’t stop looking, got into the truck.