Destined for Love (Love in Bloom: The Bradens, Book 2) Contemporary Romance (5 page)

JADE FLUNG HER body toward the door, trying to escape. Rex was too big, too strong—an immovable wall. He grabbed both of her wrists in one hand and held them over her head. In an effort to push him away with her feet, she fell back on the bench of the truck, taking him with her. Her hands were still held captive in his palm, his other hand pressed into the bench beside her head. Her body lay beneath him, and boy, did he feel good. His hard shaft against her leg sent shocks through her core.

Face-to-face, breath-to-breath, they didn’t say a word.

Kiss me
.
Just fucking kiss me already
. She could barely breathe under the weight of him, but she didn’t care. Her body ached for him, and she had no control of her hips as they pressed into his groin or of her chest as she arched toward him. She had to know how his lips felt on hers even if for only one kiss. Her heart might burst from her chest if he didn’t kiss her soon.

“I told you not to move,” he finally said. His words were forced, harsh.

Jade couldn’t answer. All she could do was remember to breathe in and breathe out as he released her wrists, swung her legs into the truck, and flung the truck door closed. She lay there in the awkward position, her arms high above her head, her legs on the floor, the vee between her legs pulsing, wanting, and then his door was open and he was settling into the driver’s seat. Jade pulled herself to an upright position as he started the car. Her pulse still raced, her body still ached, and he wouldn’t even look at her.

When they turned off the highway into Weston, her urges and her anger simmered to a boil.

“You had no right to kidnap me. I was just fine. Maybe I wanted to be with that guy. Maybe it felt good that he wanted to be with me. You don’t know what I was—”

Rex looked at her from the corner of his eye. He drove down the three-mile stretch of rural road that led her to her father’s property. Trees lined the pavement and arched over the road like an umbrella, creating a long, dark tunnel.

“Look at you. What kind of a man throws a woman into a truck like a hostage? What kind of a man doesn’t talk to her?” Jade didn’t feel the truck slowing beneath her as she flung accusation after accusation at the man who had just saved her from a guy who wanted nothing more than to screw her. “Look at you, sitting there all smug and proud of yourself for rescuing me. What the hell makes you think I wanted to be rescued?”

REX COULDN’T SPEAK. He didn’t trust himself to say one single word to her, not when she was all riled up, with her breasts heaving up and down, calling out to him. When she was beneath him, it took all of his willpower not to answer the plea of her pressing hips. She smelled so sweet, and damn it if he didn’t have to stifle a groan when she pressed her breasts into his chest.

Every accusation she thrust about his manhood spurred him on. Desire had been mounting all night as he’d watched her press her body against that guy on the dance floor the guy’s hand sliding down to her ass. If she said one more word about him being a man, he was afraid he wouldn’t be able to restrain himself. A man could take only so much before he gave in to the urges that adrenaline and testosterone pumped through him.

“What kind of a man hauls a woman over his shoulder like a sack of feed? I swear, Rex Braden, no wonder my father hates your family.”

Rex swerved to the side of the road and slammed the truck into Park. Jade flew across the seat, falling into his arms. He could taste the sweet alcohol on her breath. Every nerve caught fire with the weight of her hips against him. He tried to deaden his simmering rage, and as he pulled her closer and looked into those seductive sea-blue eyes, he recognized that simmering heat for what it was and lowered his mouth to hers. Her body went rigid, then relaxed beneath his touch as he deepened the kiss. Every lick of her tongue gave rise beneath the zipper of his jeans. Holy shit, she tasted good. He explored her mouth with his tongue, learning every curve, the arch of her palette, then drew away with her lower lip between his teeth. She licked the tender spot, and he had to have her again, had to savor her. His mouth was on hers and he never wanted to come up for air. He placed his hand beneath her silky hair and pulled her mouth tighter against him. She moaned as he dropped his hand to her waist. She was so small in his grasp, so feminine and sweet. He’d waited to feel her lips on his for nearly fifteen years, and they were everything he’d dreamed and more.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled her legs beneath her, leaning forward on her knees as she kissed him deeper.

He parted from her long enough to look down at her dress hiked up to the crest of her thighs, her knees opened to him, and her eyes—those deep valleys of blue—tantalized his already raging desire.

“Jesus, you’re delicious. I’ve wanted to taste you for years.”

“Taste me,” she said, and reached for his mouth again. She took his hand and drew it to her thigh.

Rex’s chest swelled with need as he ran his hand beneath the edge of her dress and felt her damp heat through the thin veil of her panties. She moved in closer, urging him on, her hips pushing against his fingers until they were damp, too. Something in the back of Rex’s mind told him to stop. His father would never forgive him if he found out that Rex had dishonored him this way. But as he slipped a finger under the edge of her panties and felt those wet, sensitive folds of skin, he knew he had entered territory from which he could not retreat.  

“Rex,” she said breathlessly, trailing kisses down his neck to the ridge of his shoulder, where she sucked until he thought he might come.

He slipped his fingers inside her, and she gasped a breath before taking his mouth against hers in a deep, greedy kiss. He teased her with his thumb as his fingers stroked her sweet, velvety insides. He buried the lingering thoughts of his father and wrapped his arm around Jade’s waist. In one swift move, she was beneath him, his fingers still teasing, probing, furtively seeking the spot that would send her over the edge. She fumbled with his shirt, and he tugged it over his head, tossed it on the floor.

She leaned up and took his nipple in her mouth. He groaned as she sucked and teased him with her tongue. He couldn’t breathe; he had to have more of her. He pushed her down with his free hand and pulled her dress up to her neck. God, she was beautiful, lying there in her black panties and lacy bra. She grasped the back of his head and pulled him to her breast. He licked her through the fabric until she arched into him with a needy moan, then unhooked the front clasp and exposed two beautifully perfect mounds. She trembled beneath the slow drag of his tongue around her taut nipple.

Her skin shimmered against the darkness as he dragged his tongue down the center of her belly, slowing to take little suckles of her skin. He felt her tighten around his fingers, and he probed faster, harder, until she grabbed his wrist and bucked against his hand, her orgasm pulsing around him, drawing out sexy little moans as she climbed higher and higher. She called out his name as she reached her peak. Tiny aftershocks clenched around his fingers, still buried within her, until she lay spent, panting, one arm across her forehead, the other still grasping his wrist.

“God, you’re beautiful,” Rex said, as he drew his fingers from between her legs and sucked them slowly between his lips.

I’M DYING. I just know it
. Jade lay on her back beneath Rex, unable to think past the orgasm she’d just had with nothing more than his fingers.
Jesus, what could he do with the monster trapped in his jeans?
She could barely breathe. Her legs were numb, and her skin was so sensitive she thought she might have another orgasm with the lightest of touches.

Rex drew his fingers from his lips with a hungry look in his eyes, and Jade’s body responded with a gentle tug from her center.
So cowboy is a dirty boy
. A thrum of excitement ran through her as he rolled his eyes down her body, her knees splayed wide, her panties still on.

“Jade,” he said in an unsteady voice.

His voice alone had her craving more of him.

“We can’t do this,” he said as he moved away.

 Jade stopped breathing. If she wasn’t dying before, she surely was now. What the hell was he talking about?

“Rex?”

He leaned over her and snagged his shirt from the floor, slipped it over his head.

Jade sat up and touched his arm. “What’s going on? Did I misunderstand something here?”
When you had your fingers inside me? Or maybe when you were sucking the taste of me off of them?

“It was a mistake,” he said, staring straight ahead at the darkened street.

“A mistake?” she snapped. “This? This was a mistake? I was a mistake? Is that what you really mean?” She tugged her dress down. “Look at me,” she said, barely keeping the neediness and anger from her voice.

Rex dropped his eyes.

“Rex Braden, what is wrong with you? Are you trying to make me feel like a cheap whore? Was that your plan all along? Take me so no one else would, then toss me aside like I was a conquest?”

Rex met her angry eyes with a sorrowful gaze. “Jade, if you were a conquest, then I didn’t do a very good job of conquering you, did I?”

She felt the sadness in his voice like a slap to her angry face. “Why, then? Is it me? You don’t like who I am?” She looked out the window, stifling tears. “That makes no sense,” she said with a feigned laugh. “If that were the case, you wouldn’t have even helped me in the first place. “

He pulled her to him, brushing her hair from her cheek. “It’s not you. It’s our families. This could never work. No matter how much we might want it to, it’s not like the Hatfields and McCoys of Weston are going to throw their arms up in the air after a forty-year battle and be done with it. It’s a fantasy. You’re forbidden fruit.”

Our families. You know better than to do anything to embarrass this family, right?

“That is ridiculous. We’re adults, for God’s sake. Why does it even matter what happened so long ago?” She pushed away from him and stewed. “Why can’t we just be like any other couple? Make out? Date? Tell them and make them deal with it? Be a man, stand up, and stake your claim.”

“We don’t even know what
this
is,” he said testily. “And if you question my manhood one more time, Jade Johnson, I swear to you, I’ll…” He scrubbed his hand down his face and eased the tension from his tone. “Look, you’ve only been back a few weeks; my family is going through changes. This whole thing might be nothing more than a reaction to circumstance.”

She spun in his direction and narrowed her eyes. “A reaction to circumstance? Is that what this was?”

He shrugged.

“Is that all you’ve got? A shrug? Really, Rex? You just told me that you’ve wanted me for years. I don’t call that a reaction to circumstance.”

His silence was like a spear through her heart. She wasn’t going to sit there and try to convince him that whatever it was between them was worth exploring. She liked him—a lot—and every time she looked at him, she craved his touch. Having tasted him, and having felt him inside of her, she’d crave even more of him now. But she’d misjudged him. If she wasn’t worth standing up for, even in the discovery stage of whatever this was, then fuck him.

She swung open the door, grabbed her purse, and jumped from the truck. “Thanks for the ride,” she said right before she slammed the truck door and stomped off toward the driveway.

REX PUNCHED THE steering wheel with a grunt.
Damn it. Damn it. Damn it
. This was so fucked up. He finally felt something for a woman—really felt something—and he’d fucked it up. When he’d seen her with that guy, it had triggered a massive protective urge that until then he’d thought belonged only to his family. When he kissed her, when that sweet tongue was stealing his brain cells lick by delicious lick, everything became fragmented. He wanted to touch her, taste her, and
consume
her, protect her, love her, and heal her in equal measure. And as he watched her stomp down to the barn, with only the moonlight leading her way, all those feelings radiated within him like little pinpricks. The divine feeling of being with her coalesced with the guilt of having been with her and left him watching the one person he wanted spiraling away out of reach.

STUPID DIDN’T EVEN come close to describing how Jade felt when she woke up the next morning. She’d gone into the barn the night before, flicked on the light, and sat outside Flame’s stall. Her body was still reeling from the feel of Rex’s rough, strong hands touching her, inside of her, exciting her. She’d shivered with the memory, then gave in to the tears that pulled at her heart. Before she’d gone to bed, she showered, trying to scrub the thoughts of him away, washing herself under the cold water until her skin went numb.

Now, hours after he’d touched her and she’d tried to scrub his touch away, she could still feel the way her body hummed to life with the first thrust of his tongue in her mouth. When his fingers entered her, he’d brought her to new heights. No man had aroused her to orgasm with just his hands before. That had to mean something.

She looked in the mirror as she dried her hair. “Right?” she asked her reflection. At almost thirty-two years old, she knew how these things worked. The chances of her and Rex ever getting together again were slim to none, and maybe that was for the best. She really didn’t want to hurt her father. She knew the damage it would cause if he ever found out. She’d chalk last night up to a mistake.
The heat of the moment
. Now, if she could only convince her heart to do the same.

She iced and massaged Flame’s leg and was pleased to see that he was still walking normally. She was fairly certain that he was perfectly fine and what he’d experienced was a quick nag of pain rather than a sustained injury, but she’d still take it slow with him for one more day. She knew he was climbing out of his skin to be set free.
Like me
.

Inside the house, she was reviewing her schedule for the remainder of the week when her mother appeared in the kitchen.

“I thought you were sewing Daddy’s new curtains for his office today.” Jade’s mother was the best seamstress around, and her father was continually asking for new curtains, blankets, even shirts,
to keep her creative juices flowing
.

“I am. I just wanted to visit with my daughter.”

Her mother sat beside her on the couch in her capri pants and flowery blouse. “Jade,” she said in a voice that made Jade stop what she was doing and look into her mother’s brown eyes. “What’s your plan?”

“My plan, Mom?”

Her mother put her hand on her leg. “Honey, you know I love you, but you’ve been here nearly eight months. I just want to know what you’re thinking.”

Jade smiled. “Ah, I get it. You want me to get out. You and Daddy are used to having the house to yourselves, and now I’m in the way?” She wasn’t hurt by the thought; she was just a little surprised by it.

“No, no. It’s not that. I mean, I guess it is a little. Children are supposed to grow up and define their own lives. Granted, you had a bad experience with Kane, but you can’t let that hold you back from starting anew.” She folded her hands in her lap and looked at Jade expectantly.

“I am. I have a number of clients, and I’m trying to figure out where I want to be with all of this. I mean, do I want to stay here in Colorado, or move somewhere else altogether?”
Which at the moment seems like a really good idea. Maybe then I could completely forget Rex and his captivating moods
.

Her mother nodded, but Jade could tell she had something else to add.

“Mom, what is it? Did I do something? Do you want me to pay rent? What’s really bothering you?”

Jane pursed her lips and furrowed her brow, glancing at Jade and then back to her lap.

“Mom, whatever it is, just spit it out, please.” Her chest tightened just watching the anguish on her mother’s face.

“Let’s take a walk.” Jane nodded toward Earl’s office.

“Sure.” Jade followed her mother out the door, noticing determination in her gait and a quickness in her pace. The knot that had tightened in her chest twisted and pulled. She could remember the handful of times her mother had taken her out of the house for a discussion, and none of them were to relay positive news.

Once they’d cleared the yard and were deep into the property by the cattle field, her mother’s shoulders relaxed, and she slowed her pace.

“Mom, what’s wrong? You’re starting to scare me a little.”

“Honey, please don’t let your father know I said anything. Normally, I wouldn’t talk about family business, but you’re an adult, and with what’s going on, I think you need to be aware—”

Jade touched her mother’s arm to get her attention. When her mother took a breath, Jade said, “Mom, you’re rambling. I won’t tell Daddy. Is he sick? Are you sick?”

“No, it’s nothing like that.” Her mother looked at her then, giving a little shake of her head and letting out a sorrowful sigh. “We might have to sell the ranch.” She choked on the last word, holding back tears. Her hand covered her chest.

“Sell it? Why? I thought the business was doing well.” Sell their home? The ranch was the only home she’d ever known. She and her brother had grown up there, and her father had owned the property for forty years.
The feud
. She wondered if not selling the property that they owned with the Bradens had had a severe impact on their finances. The Bradens had plenty of money, but she wasn’t so sure that that was true of her family.

“Your father has worked very hard to take care of all of us. He’s a good man and he runs an honest business. It would kill him to know that I told you about this before he did.”

“Okay, I won’t say anything. You have my word.”
Sell the ranch?

“He thought the business would bounce back, and it hasn’t happened. The bank has been very gracious and for three years has fronted us the money to continue, but now…” Her eyes ran over the fields, the cattle, the house.

“Mom, if the property that Dad bought with the Bradens was sold and he received half of the profit, would that enable him to keep the ranch?” She searched her mother’s eyes as she contemplated the question.

“With what land is going for now, there’s a good chance it might, but your father is a prideful man. That property is dead to him.”

But not to me
.

“WHAT THE HELL are you doing?” Rex hollered at Treat, who was loading the truck with fencing materials.

“Whatever animal got the fence in the winter has been back. There’s a twenty-foot section torn out in the lower pasture.” Treat threw another roll of wire into the truck. “Are you all right? You seem on edge.”

“Fine.” Rex was far from fine. He’d stewed all night over the way things had ended with Jade, and what made it even more difficult was that every thought he had carried with it her scent, her taste, the image of her writhing with pleasure as she moaned beneath his touch. He’d spent the night angry and aroused, and it was a deadly combination. Anger surged through his limbs, and no matter how he tried to quell the mounting confusion, it kept ending the same way—as one bursting ball of rage.

“Wanna come give me a hand?” Treat asked.

Treat didn’t shy away from the grueling physical labor, and he was able to use his honed negotiating skills to save them thousands over the course of just a few months. The man was a stealth businessman. Stealth or not, he was in Rex’s line of fire.

“Leave it. I’ll take care of it later,” Rex snapped.

“No, I’ve got it.”

Rex wanted a fight. He was aching to release his pent-up frustrations. “I said, leave it,” Rex challenged.

Treat set the last of the wire in the truck and leaned against the tailgate. “What crawled up your ass and died?”

Rex took a step forward and fisted his hands. He ground his teeth so hard he was sure they’d crack, but he didn’t care.

“Take a breather, Rex.”

Treat took a step toward the front of the truck, and Rex strong-armed him, stopping him in his tracks.

“What the hell? We’re too old for this shit, Rex. You have an issue, deal with it.” Treat pushed past him and climbed into the truck.

Rex grabbed him by the collar and pulled him out.

“What the fuck?” Treat challenged him, chest to chest. “You really want to do this over a fence? Fine.” He threw down his gloves and fisted his own enormous hands. “Go ahead. Take a swing. I haven’t had a good brawl in twenty years.”

Seeing his brother ready to fight just to appease him pissed him off even more. He slammed the truck door shut and spat, “Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“That’s more like it,” Treat said with a pat on Rex’s back. “Spit it out, so it doesn’t coil up and fill you with venom.”

Treat leaned against the truck while Rex paced, sweating in the afternoon heat.

“Wanna talk about it?” Treat asked.

Rex stopped pacing and stared at his brother. “You can’t possibly understand! You have the woman you want, and she obviously adores you. You never have obstacles that stand in your way that are bigger than you. You’re the
golden
child.”

Treat laughed. “Is that what you think? The golden child? I sure as hell wish I felt that way. It would be a hell of a lot better than going through all the shit Max and I went through for seven months. There are no golden children, Rex. It just looks like it when you’re so deep in your own shit that you can’t see the grass.”

“Come on, Treat. You’ve always done what you wanted when you wanted. Women lined up to be with you.”

“They lined up to be with all of us, and the guys lined up for Savannah. We’re good-looking, successful people. You know you’ve never hurt for the company of a woman. They swoon around your muscles like you’re Adonis himself.”

“Right,” Rex sneered. He leaned his hand on the truck and looked at Treat. “I’ve put my whole life into this ranch, for this family. Everything I’ve ever done is for this family.” He ran his hand through his hair and paced again. “Do you know why I don’t sleep with the women in our town?” Before Treat could answer, he said, “Because I don’t want to embarrass Dad. Because I don’t want him to feel like he can’t hold his head up high because his son is a douche bag who sleeps with women and never looks back; that’s why.”

“Rex—” Treat shook his head.

“It’s true, bro. I’ve got no ties to the women I sleep with. Ever.”

“And?” Treat asked.

Rex leveled him with a harsh stare.

“None of us do—or in my case, did—Rex. Look at Hugh. He’s got a different woman on his arm every night, and he can’t even remember their names. Dane’s got women all over the world, and Josh, hell, we don’t even know how many women he sleeps with—it could be one or it could be one hundred. He’s been snapped in all the rags with some of the hottest actresses and models around. I doubt long-term commitment has ever entered his mind, considering he’s never brought any of them home.”

“Yeah? Well, even if I want ties, I can’t have them.”

Treat shook his head. “Jade. You’re talking about Jade?”

Rex clenched his jaw. He wanted to tell Treat what had gone on the night before, but he was ashamed at how far he let it go before pulling the plug—and he was pissed that he’d been the one to stop them from going any further. They’d been so intimate, and he wanted so much more, but not like that. Not in a truck. Jade wasn’t some girl from another town. She wasn’t
some girl
at all. He wouldn’t have sex with her and then walk away, and he couldn’t be with her without hurting his father. The whole situation sucked.

“I should have put two and two together,” Treat said with a supportive smile. “You’re a good man, and you’re loyal. So stop giving me that
I’m not worthy
shit and stop dancing around the crux of your issue. Either tell me what the hell is going on with her—or what you want to go on—or let me get back to work."

Rex didn’t know what he wanted. He only knew what he needed, and what he needed came in a mouthy little package and lived a few miles down the road.