Page 35 of I'm Not Yours
Desire zigged and zagged through my body, and I felt weak.
“Maybe we should discuss this kiss in bed, babe?”
“Ahhh . . . not in bed.”
“Kiss me, Allie. One kiss. For the barn dance.”
I couldn’t help it, I was shivering for the man. I put a hand behind his head and brought his lips down to mine.
“Please don’t leave, Allie,” he said, between marvelous kisses that traveled all over.
My dad kept holding open the door with his urn.
I didn’t know what to do with his ashes.
People often spread their loved ones’ ashes.
But where would I spread my dad’s? He was not a “loved one.” He was a scary, manipulative, drunken loser. Did I even owe it to him to spread them?
Jace came by at seven o’clock the night of the barn dance.
“I told you I’m not going to the barn dance.” Heck no. “I don’t dance anymore, and you tricked me with those smokin’ hot kisses.”
He laughed, walked into my house, and shut the door.
I had showered with apple-scented body wash and apple scented shampoo, not because of the barn dance and Jace, but because I like apples, and for no other reason. Same with the apple-scented lotion I spread all over afterward, too. I also put on a low-cut, lined, white lace shirt; a pretty yellow bra; my tighter blue jeans; cowgirl boots; and lipstick, because I was tired of being frumpy, and surely Margaret and Bob—he who hates squirrels—would appreciate my efforts. “I don’t dance, Jace. I don’t need to meet people, I don’t know how to play the fiddle, and Marvin, Bob, and Margaret need my company. They’re lonely. And I need to find Margaret’s pink stuffed bear. She can’t sleep without it.” By the time I stepped back from Jace’s smokin’-hot kisses that night, all my clothes were on thefloor and he was shirtless. Oh, how I loved that sweet man naked . . .
“I’m lonely for you, too, Allie. You kissed me last time, and that makes you my date for the barn dance, per our agreement, and you look . . . you look . . . absolutely gorgeous.” Jace’s chest heaved up for a second, and his jaw was held pretty tight. “As for the dancing, I know you dance, I’ve seen you dance, you have perfect rhythm, you don’t need to know how to play the fiddle, and the animals have had you all day. Marvin wants me to tell you to go to the barn dance.”
I looked at Marvin. He meowed. I refrained from meowing back in front of Jace. Marvin meowed again, irritated with my lack of conversation.
“I’m staying home to embroider.”
Jace studied me and I studied him back. He had on jeans, a blue shirt, a cowboy hat, and well-worn cowboy boots. Man, if he was any sexier, I would pass out, I would. I so loved that weathered look he had, too—that tough, rough, I can round up cattle, ride a horse, and sew your leg up if you need stitches look. My heart beat like a fool.
Jace smiled, free and easy, the tough-guy face softened by indulgence and humor. “You’re going to stay home to embroider? Well, okay. We’ll stay here together. I’ll hand you the thread.”
“I can’t embroider when people are watching.”
“You can’t embroider at all, Allie.” He winked.
“That’s true. I think I’m going to dust.”
“Looks clean enough in here to me”—he glanced around—“plus housework bores you out of your mind.”
“And I’m going to take a toothbrush to the wood floors and clean them.”
“I’d like to see that. Maybe you could do it naked.”
“I have told you not to make comments like that.”Stop, foolish heart!
“Okay. Well, you could be naked and so could I. We could clean about a foot of floor and then do something else.”
Full-blown, 3-D images of what he and I could do after we cleaned a foot of floor, nude, filled my mind. My gaze went to his chest. Wide, strong,safe.Then his hips. Ah, how they moved.“I’m trying to stay out of trouble with you, Jace.”
His face became serious, but I saw the kindness there. “We’re not going to get in any trouble together, Allie. We never did, we never would. We’d be together. That’s it.”
That would not be it. He doesn’t know. He is so irresistible.
