Colorado 02 Sweet Dreams (22 page)

Then he moved me back out of the spray.

Not even thinking, I tipped my head back and informed him, “I wash twice, then condition.”

He dipped his bearded chin, grinned at me, dipped it further, touched his mouth to mine then he washed my hair again and, after, massaged in conditioner.

I was deep in a mellow zone, again out of mind, when Tate turned me to face the spray and I felt his soapy hands moving on me. They were everywhere and I just stood there, his front pressed to my back, and gloried in his slick, wet, soapy hands gliding along my skin.

Then one glided between my legs and stayed there while the other glided to my breast and cupped it.

My eyes opened and I blinked against the spray hitting my face.

“Tate,” I whispered.

He didn’t respond except his finger and thumb rolled my nipple.

My conditioner covered head fell back and hit his shoulder.

“Tate,” I breathed.

The fingers of both his hands moved and he took me there again, this time it took longer but it was no less fabulous. When I came, my hips bucked, my body jolted, my legs went weak and Tate’s hand at my breast became an arm wrapped around my ribs to hold me up.

As I came down, I did it with Tate holding me close to his body, arm still wrapped around my ribs, his other hand cupping my sex and when I was steady on my legs again, he turned me and his fingers went back into my hair to rinse out the conditioner.

When done, he pulled me out of the spray, switched our positions so his back was to it and I was out of it and his arms went around me, bringing me close.

I tipped my head back to look at him.

“Get out, finish gettin’ ready,” he ordered softly.

I could do nothing but agree. “Okay,” I whispered.

He grinned, touched his mouth to mine again, let me go and turned to the spray.

I got out but stilled with my hand on the curtain when I saw the gigantic black ink eagle, its wingspan covering Tate’s back from the bottom of his right lateral muscle sweeping up his left lat and over his shoulder with the body of the bird painted on a slant across his back, lat and even curling around his side. The other wing, I knew, curled over his shoulder, going down his arm and partly down his chest to his pectoral. His left shoulder was covered in glorious ink, his right was naked.

It was extraordinary and somehow sexy and I felt my legs get weak at the sight.

His hands were lifted to press the water through his hair then he reached for the dregs of the little shampoo bottle.

I resolutely shoved the curtain closed.

I grabbed a towel and ran into the bedroom. I quickly toweled off, rubbed the wet out of my hair and wrapped the towel around me. I eschewed lotioning. Indiana was a moist climate, I could get away without lotion. Colorado, even in a freak out to get dressed before Tate got out of the shower, I’d consider it.

I went to my suitcase which Tate had clearly moved back to the luggage rack this morning because, thankfully, it was there. I pawed through it lamenting Wendy and my shop-a-thon where, in throes of ecstasy that I was two sizes smaller, I bought nothing but sexy undies and threw away every piece of underwear I’d owned.

My choices were baby pink with ecru lace; fire engine red with black lace, full on black; sage green with taupe lace; it went on – but nothing unsexy.

Darn!

I grabbed the sage green, tugged the panties on under the towel and then whipped off the towel and frantically put on the bra because I heard the shower go off. I was wrapping the towel back around me when Tate walked out of the bathroom with another one wrapped around his waist.

My eyes went to him and I marveled at the fact that he looked fantastic with wet hair. Then again that wet hair came with a full on view of his bare chest and broad shoulders and that chest and those shoulders would look good with a head on top of it that had wet hair, dry hair or no hair.

His eyes came to me and slid down the towel.

He looked back at my face. “That as far as you got?”

“I had an underwear selection to make,” I explained and my voice sounded weirdly breathy.

He grinned again and before I knew what he was about, he gripped the edge of my towel and whipped it off.

I gasped and made a grab for the towel.

Tate tossed the towel on the bed, captured me with hands at my waist, tilted me back and took a long look.

Then his eyes came to mine. “Good choice, Ace.”

I tried to be cool even though, with his eyes on me, I was freaking out. “I’m glad you approve, now can I have my towel?”

His hands at my waist slid around, one arm wrapped around my waist, the fingers of the other hand sliding up into my wet and dripping hair.

I put my hands on his shoulders and exerted pressure.

“We need to get breakfast,” I whispered.

His head was coming toward me. “After I kiss you.”

“Tate,” I was still whispering.

He kissed me, I slid out of my mind and into my body. By the time he was done I was all about my body.

So was Tate. “Don’t cover up, baby,” he muttered against my mouth. “I like the view.”

“I’m –”

“I like it.”

“But –”

His hand slid over one cheek of my bottom and he pulled my hips deeper into his.

“Babe, spent a month thinkin’ about this moment, when you’d be mine and this was what I could look forward to. Don’t hide it from me.”

In complete shock at his words, I stared into his eyes. “You spent a month thinking about this moment?” I repeated.

“Actually, no,” he answered. “Spent a month thinkin’ about what I did to you in bed,” he smiled, “and the shower.” His smile got so sexy my fingers curled into his shoulders. “And what I’m gonna do to you later. Seein’ you in sexy underwear was just bonus footage.”

I had no reply to this. I couldn’t even process this. All I could do was stand in his arms, my body pressed to his, and gaze in his eyes.

“You gonna stand there lookin’ at me, kiss me or get ready?” he asked.

“Get ready,” I answered softly but didn’t move and I didn’t move mainly because I was thinking I preferred option two (but option one of just staring at him had its merits).

He grinned. “Babe.”

“What?”

He let me go but his hand didn’t leave my ass. It stayed there so it could push me toward the bathroom.

I grabbed my stuff as I went and camped out in the bathroom, wiping the mirror and starting to get ready. I’d pulled a comb through my hair, put on a white headband, washed my face, brushed and flossed my teeth, moisturized and I was preparing for minimal makeup when Tate walked in, still in his towel, and he brushed his teeth standing next to me.

This was when I came fully back into my mind, in fact, I came speeding into it at Mach Three.

How on earth was I standing in my new sage green satin and taupe lace underwear in a bathroom in a Marriott in Indianapolis with Tatum Jackson?

My blush brush arrested in mid-air and I turned woodenly to him.

“How did this happen?” I asked.

He took his toothbrush out of his mouth and with a mouth full of white foam, he asked, “What?” then kept brushing.

I swirled my blush brush in the air indicating the entirety of our situation with a flourish.

He turned to the sink, put a palm in the counter, bent his neck and spit. Then he rinsed. Then he twisted, reached across the counter in front of me, grabbed a hand towel and wiped, throwing it on the counter when he was done.

“You jumped me,” he answered.

“I didn’t jump you! You threw me on the bed!”

“Right,” he grinned. “
Then
you jumped me.”

“I didn’t jump you, I was on my back!”

He moved so he was behind me, his hands came to my upper hips and his head bent so he could kiss my neck, which he did. I watched him do it in the mirror and watching it made me lose my hold on my mind again.

Then his head came up and he looked at me in the mirror.

“Thanks for remindin’ me of that,” he muttered. “So, I guess I shouldn’t say you jumped. It was more like you…
attacked
.”

“This isn’t funny,” I told his reflection.

He grinned yet again and said, “Babe.”

“It isn’t!”

“We’ll talk about it later,” he declared.

“Tate –” I started.

“Get ready.”

“Tate! We need to talk. This is insane.”

“We’ll talk.”

“When?”

“Later.”

“When, later?” I asked.

“Later, later,” he answered with a non-answer.

I pulled in breath. Then with his hands still on my nearly naked hips, me in my underwear, in a bathroom, in a hotel with Tatum Jackson, I started swiping my cheeks with blush while said Tatum Jackson watched.

“That reminds me. Mom called this morning and she’s going to try to talk you out of going today. She wants you to see our farm,” I told him.

“She won’t have to try too hard.”

My blush brush arrested on the apple of my cheek and I stared into his eyes in the mirror.

His eyes moved to the brush. “Ace, you keep fuckin’ around, we’ll never have breakfast.”

“You’re staying?” I whispered.

He dropped his bearded chin to my shoulder and his arms wrapped around my belly.

“Baby, you just came three times,” he said softly, his mouth close to my ear. “You think I’m flyin’ across four states when you’re topped up and tonight I get a chance to play?”

I felt my knees wobble.

“Tate,” I breathed.

“And your ex is a fuckwad and until I know he’s on a fuckin’ plane on his way back to suburbia, I ain’t goin’ anywhere.”

Oh.

My.

God.

“Tate,” I whispered.

“And we don’t know about your Dad yet and until he’s stable, I’m here.”

I stared at him in the mirror.

Who
was
this man and what did I do with him?

“What about the bar?” I asked.

“I’ll call Bubba, reem his ass, tell him about your situation and he’ll dry out and go back.”

I asked the all important question, “What about Wood?”

His chin came up but his arms didn’t leave me.

“That’s later.”

“I need to call him,” I whispered.

“No, you don’t need to call him.
I
need to call him. Wood and I need to have words. He’s got more words for you afterwards, we’ll see.”

“We’ll see?”

He nodded. “We’ll see.”

“I should –”

“Later.”

“But –”

His arms gave a squeeze. “Jesus, Lauren.
Later.
”

We held each other’s eyes in the mirror.

Then he said, “Breakfast, babe.”

“Right,” I whispered.

He dropped his head, kissed my shoulder, his beard tickling my skin and he left the bathroom.

I looked in the mirror at myself wearing my sexy undies. If I was honest, I didn’t look half bad. It was all Tyler’s “working the core”. Weeks of my abs aching like crazy was paying off, there was even some definition at my midriff and the mini-Buddha belly was more like a soft pooch. I hadn’t noticed. It was even kind of cute.

My eyes went from my pooch to my makeup bag; I dropped the blush brush in and pulled out some eye shadow.

Chapter Ten

Grape Kool-Aid

I was lying in the rope hammock between the two elm trees that butted the front edge of my Mom and Dad’s big, square, cement front porch, my eyes on Tate and Mack who were both standing at the raised bottom end of the huge pond that took up the side of our long front yard.

Mom was at the hospital with her best friend Norma.

We’d had breakfast. Tate had let Mom talk him into staying. Mom had let Tate pay for breakfast but not without a fight. She’d pulled the Dad card again, Tate’s eyes had sliced to me and I knew he was about to blow so I’d pulled the my-boyfriend-is-a-macho-man-bounty-hunter-and-if-you-don’t-let-him-pay-my-life-will-be-a-living-hell card and Mom had spent a full minute assessing Tate’s big, bearded badassness and what that might mean to me should he get miffed and wisely relented.

We’d gone to the hospital. I’d visited Dad for ten minutes, all of that time he was sleeping and I was thinking that he looked exactly like he’d had his chest cracked open and how that was the way wrong look for my big, tall, strong, farmer Dad. Carrie had her visit and Mom had hers and then my Mom’s best friend Norma showed up and Mom talked Mack into taking us to the farm and out to lunch at The Station before we came back. Mack drove with Tate in the passenger seat and Carrie and I in the back. Mack talked. Tate didn’t. Carrie and I looked out our windows, both of us, I was sure, not seeing the landscape and instead seeing our Dad in a hospital bed.

Now, Carrie was inside the house, Mack and Tate were inspecting the land and I was freaking out and not just about my Dad.

I heard Carrie approach and I looked up at her.

“Skooch over,” she ordered and handed me one of Mom’s Tupperware tumblers filled with purple liquid.

“No, is that –?” I started as I skooched.

“Grape Kool-Aid,” she affirmed.

It was official, I
was
home.

With grace borne of years of practice because Mom stretched that hammock out at the beginning of every May and rolled it up and took it in at the end of every September for as long as I could remember, Caroline got in the hammock while holding her tumbler.

Then, as if drawn by an invisible force, both of our eyes went to the men.

“Tate’s hot,” she whispered.

She had no idea.

I took a sip of ice cold Kool-Aid. Delicious, refreshing and Tyler
and
Wendy’s heads would explode if they knew I was drinking it which made it perfect.

“Laurie, you look awesome,” Carrie said to me and I looked from Tate to her.

“Thanks, honey.”

“And more than just being tan and having cool hair. You look…” she studied me, “happy.”

This surprised me. “I do?”

“Well, outside of looking sad about Dad but, you know, deep down. Content-like.”

I looked toward Tate.

“Is it him?” she asked quietly and my eyes went back to her.