Colorado 02 Sweet Dreams (43 page)

“No,” I replied. “I’m making a Moist Factor Five Hundred cake, I’ll be busy.”

“A Moist Factor Five Hundred cake?”

“Shambala told me one of his secrets. I’ve been dying to test it out.”

“Ace, we got five pounds of lemon shit in the truck. Do we need a cake?”

“Everyone needs a cake and I haven’t had a kitchen for months, except when I was home and then I didn’t get to enjoy it because my Dad was in the hospital after having a serious heart attack.”

“You a good cook?”

I shrugged. “Passable.”

Tate stared at me.

“I’m a passable cook but I’m a hell on wheels baker,” I bragged truthfully.

“So you like bakin’,” he noted.

“Love it.”

“Miss it?” he asked.

I nodded.

He stared at me again. Then he cupped my jaw with his hand, tilted my head back, bent his head and touched his lips to mine.

“Then you can make your cake,” he whispered.

“Thanks,” I whispered back.

He grinned. “After that, you can be friendly to me.”

The twinges came back double strength, he let me go, beeped the locks and pulled up the back of the SUV. We loaded up our bags, Tate let me in the cab, returned the cart, came back, climbed behind the wheel and we went home.

* * * * *

I was in Tate’s kitchen chopping cucumbers and tossing them in the bowl with the rest of the veggies I’d prepared for the salad we were having with dinner.

The Moist Factor Five Hundred cake was in the oven and the bowl of my grandfather’s famous mustard glaze I’d mixed together was fermenting in the fridge ready to put on the pork tenderloin which would go into the oven after the cakes came out.

I sensed movement and my head came up from chopping to see Tate walking through the dining room toward the kitchen, a drill in one hand, the handle of a toolbox in the other. I was so busy chopping, I hadn’t noticed I wasn’t hearing the drill anymore. His eyes came to me, I smiled at him, his face got soft in a warm way when he caught my smile and he walked right through the kitchen to the hallway leading to the garage.

I stared after him long after he disappeared.

I didn’t think I’d ever seen his face get soft like that but I figured I didn’t because it was definitely a look I’d never forget seeing.

I pulled myself together, dropped the knife, wiped my hands on a towel and walked to the bedroom.

The curtains were up. They were to-the-floor, dark denim with loops at the top that were hooked over rusty-looking thin, square rods that had killer jagged ends. Tate had two big windows in his bedroom, one facing the front of the house, one the side, the bathroom and walk-in closet took the back of the room. The curtains transformed it. The new sheets and comforter were one thing but the curtains offered a big slash of color, giving the room personality, making it homier and making the big room seem almost cozy.

All the room needed now was a paint job (the walls were a little tired and I thought a nice, warm, pale blue would be awesome, maybe with a terracotta accent wall); blinds (because with those dark curtains closed, it would be a blackout situation); and some pictures on the walls.

And I knew exactly what picture would be perfect.

I’d seen it through the window of one of the biker shops in town. A large frame around which was a sepia photo of two bikers riding side by side into town. There was no one on the straight road for as far as the eye could see except those bikers, they had their backs to the camera and to their side was the sign that was still there that read “Welcome to Carnal”. Even though the bikes were older, the picture taken probably decades ago, the long Main Street of Carnal lay in front of the bikers and it didn’t look much different. When I’d spied it, I’d stopped and studied it through the shop window. It was awesome and it would be perfect over Tate’s bed.

Buster pranced in and jumped up on the bed. She stood there, blinking at me, her tail swishing then she blinked at the curtains at the window facing the bed that had a view out the front of the house. Then she collapsed on a flank, stretched out her other flank and delicately licked her foot.

I decided to take that as approval.

Tate sauntered in.

“They look great,” I told him.

“Yeah,” he agreed, coming to stand by me.

I twisted my head to look up at him. “Now you need some venetian blinds,” I informed him. “Just in case you don’t want blackout conditions but still want to mute the light.”

He looked down at me then he curved an arm around my shoulders and began to curl my body to his.

When my front was pressed to his, he stated, “I’ll get right on that, Ace, soon’s I pay off the million dollar lawyer’s bills I’ll be accumulatin’ in order to get Jonas.”

I bit my lip because I hadn’t thought of that. He’d spoken several times about his money situation. He had a son to win; he didn’t need to be buying home wares.

“Captain –” I started but Tate had turned me and was moving forward, pushing me backward toward the bed. I felt my legs hit it, Buster jumped away, I went down and Tate came down on top of me.

His face went into my neck and he declared, “Rods are up. Time for you to be friendly.” Then I felt his tongue slide along my neck.

My arms circled him, the fingers of one hand going into his hair as I turned my head to say in his ear, “Cake’s in the oven, honey.”

His head came up and he looked at me. “How long we got?”

I shrugged, my shoulders moving on the bed. “Ten minutes?”

His mouth came to mine. “Time enough to start bein’ friendly.”

“Tate –”

“Then you can finish bein’ friendly later.”

“Tate –”

He kissed me and I instantly got friendly, so did he. I thought he was friendlier than me but he might have been able to argue that.

We got so friendly, we were both shirtless by the time the buzzer on the oven interrupted our friendliness.

“Cake’s done,” I breathed against his mouth as I shivered when his hands slid lazily along the skin of my sides.

“Yeah,” he whispered then knifed up.

I’d moved on top and therefore automatically straddled him. He lifted us both up from the bed, putting me on my feet. I started to pull away to bend and get my shirt but his hands at my hips turned me and then they guided me to the door.

“Tate, my shirt,” I protested.

“Takin’ cakes outta the oven doesn’t require you bein’ fully-clothed,” he replied and I didn’t exactly agree but we were out the door, he was moving me down the hall and I was wearing nothing but a pair of khaki shorts and my bra.

I decided not to fight it. I was into being friendly and as soon as the cakes were out of the oven, I could go back to that.

We went to the kitchen and I opened the oven. The cakes smelled amazing, the house reeked of it and I forgot how much I loved that smell. I stuck my hand in, did the press test, the cake bounced back so I grabbed a kitchen towel and took them out, putting them on the burners of the stove.

I turned the oven off and looked up at Tate to see he was staring down at the cakes.

His eyes came to me. “Looks good, babe.”

I grinned. “Yeah.”

Then he moved and I was over his shoulder. I let out a little, surprised scream and grabbed onto his waist.

“Tate!” I shouted when we were going through the dining room.

“Friendly,” he returned.

He wanted to carry me to his bed? All right, well, whatever.

He threw me on the bed, came down on top of me and we started getting friendly again.

We were redefining friendly in a very good way when something strange happened. Something mammothly strange. Something so strange it tilted the foundations of all that I’d come to be.

Tate’s fingers were curled around my breast, my hand cupping his behind, his lips were trailing down my throat and I was out of mind and in my body when I came back to my mind with a vicious snap.

“So you forgive him for bein’ a cheatin’ asshole and a liar and a dickhead who’s so fuckin’ dumb he throws away a good thing but you can’t forgive me for sayin’ somethin’ stupid?”

My eyes opened and my body stilled. Tate’s mouth moved down my chest.

“You want sweet dreams, lose the attitude and you might find I’ll give you reason to have them.”

I closed my eyes and my arms around Tate flexed.

“Laurie, baby, wake up. You’re gonna fry out here.”

Tate’s lips moved along the lacy edge of my bra.

“You were sleepin’ in the sun, babe, not goin’ to the mall to get a phone. So I got you a phone.”

I turned my head to the side and closed my eyes tighter trying to focus on what his mouth was doing and block out his voice in my head.

“Yeah, Ace, fucked you so hard you couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything but sleep. Exhausted you. You were in my bed, couldn’t sleep, that’s what I’d do.”

I bit my lip and felt the tears sting my nose.

“I get back, Lauren, you’re on the back of my bike.”

My hands lifted and slid into his hair.

“Sucks, but
fuck
Laurie, it’s good to be home.”

My fingers curled into his hair.

“Then you shouldn’t have thrown her away when she
was
your wife. Now she ain’t. Now she’s somethin’ to me and I don’t let men I don’t like get close to her and I gotta tell you, man, I do
not
like you.”

Tate’s head came up.

“No way you can look like all the rest.”

“Laurie,” Tate called.

“Pure class.”

“Lauren,” he called again, his body moving up, his hand coming to my jaw.

“Two kinds of women get under your skin. The ones who do damage, they don’t feel good there but once you’re fuckin’ stupid enough to let them in you got no choice but to take the time it takes to work them out. Then there are the ones who don’t do damage, who feel good there, feed the muscle, the bone, the soul, not rip it or break it or burn it. The ones you don’t wanna work out.”

I righted my head, opened my eyes and looked in his handsome face.

It was then my mind filled with him, with Tate, all things
Tate.
It filled so full, it felt like my head would explode.

“Never had better.”

“That’s how I know you didn’t give it to that asshole the way you give it me. You did, no way in hell he’d ever…”

“Three weeks, after fuckin’ you, knowin’ what you taste like, what you feel like, the sounds you make when you come, three weeks I’m on the road and all I got is a couple minutes of your voice on the phone every night. Fuckin’ you, that’s all I can think about, like a teenager, at night in the dark, it’s the only thing in my goddamned head. So I jack off, hopin’ to cut through it, but nothin’ compares to you. Then I know you can’t sleep so I can’t fuckin’ sleep wonderin’ if you’re sleepin’. That shit’s whacked and I come home, fuckin’ beside myself it’s over.

“But Neeta, she’s not like you. She isn’t smart. She doesn’t work hard.”

“So I find this woman, see. High-class, great fuckin’ hair, legs that go forever…”

“So we find out about each other and who we are together. I’m gonna piss you off ‘cause I can be a dick. That’s who I am. And you’re gonna piss me off ‘cause, babe, you got attitude. That’s who you are. And that’s who we’re comin’ out to be together. And I’m all right with that because, with what I had before, even when you’re a bitch, I like it. But when you’re not, it’s a sweetness the like I’ve never tasted.”

“You said you were waitin’ for something special and he took away your chance to figure out that you were carryin’ it with you all this time.
You
are special, Laurie.”

“… they did it because you go all out to protect beauty like that.”

And last,
“Sweet dreams, baby.”

“Jesus, Lauren, baby, what the fuck?” Tate whispered and I realized tears had pooled in my eyes and were sliding down the sides into my hair.

“You like me,” I whispered back and his head gave a small jerk.

“What?” he asked.

“You were right.” I was still whispering, a sob moved up my throat, I swallowed it down but my voice was thick when I kept whispering. “You were right.” I gulped back another sob as I felt more wet trail from my eyes. “I… I’m lost.”

I couldn’t hold it back any longer. I burst into tears and tried to slide out from under him but he held strong.

“Baby,” he muttered.

Without any other way to escape him, I lifted my head and shoved my face into his neck as my arms wrapped around him and I held on tight.

“I’m l… l… lost,” I choked as my body bucked when a powerful sob tore through me.

Suddenly Tate rolled off and I was moving. He went up the bed, pulling me with him, arranging the pillows behind his back and he rested against them, settling me tight to his side. I wrapped an arm around his abs, pressed my forehead into his neck and held on as my body shook with my tears.

One of his arms was wrapped around my waist, the other came across his chest to sift through my hair and he was quiet while he held me as I wept.

This lasted awhile and when it subsided I tilted my head down so my temple was at his collarbone and I saw my bare, tanned legs tangled with his long, jeans-clad ones.

It came to me again.
“You said you were waitin’ for something special and he took away your chance to figure out that you were carryin’ it with you all this time.
You
are special, Laurie.”

“Talk to me,” Tate urged gently.

It was time, it was time to let him in but more, it was time to let me out.

I took in a shuddering breath and my arm gave him a squeeze.

“My first was my college boyfriend,” I whispered. “His name was Matt. He was lovely. When we did it, he took me to a fancy hotel and he’d arranged it so there was a bouquet of red roses by the bed when we got to the room. After he made love to me, he told me he’d love me forever. A year later, he got a job where he had to move to Tennessee and he asked me to go with him. I was young and I couldn’t even think of leaving Indiana, leaving my family. It scared me so I let him go. We tried the long distance thing but it didn’t work. He’s married now to a nice woman named Ellen. They have three kids. He calls me every year on my birthday, though. He never forgets. I call him on his. We talk forever and we laugh like crazy.”