Firestorm (24 page)

“Give ‘em a few minutes, honey. They’re always like this.” Jake let go of her hand and put his arm around her shoulders. “You’ll get used to it. Maybe.”

“When do you want to get married?” she asked, remembering having heard that question more than once while everybody had been talking at the same time.

“As soon as possible. Could you do it in a couple of months?”

That depended on just what kind of wedding Jake had in mind. “A real wedding?”

He shrugged. “Sure, if you want one.”

Kate hadn't had time to consider how they’d get married, so she paused for a moment. Yes, she decided, she’d like a wedding to remember, but she’d assumed Jake would rather find a justice of the peace and get the legalities over and done with. After all, he came right out and said he didn't love her.

“Do you?” she asked.

He shrugged. “It’s up to you, honey. You haven’t gone through it all before.

Weddings are mostly women’s doing, anyhow. My only request is that whatever kind Ann Jacobs

Firestorm

142

of shindig you want, you set the date as soon as possible—and that we do it here in Houston. The Old Man won't be in shape to do any traveling for a while. We can fly in your family and friends.”

Jake looked away from her to eye his squawking family members. “I’m tired of listening to them chatter like magpies,” he said, and he tapped on his glass with the handle of a spoon.

“Would you all shut up long enough for us to get a word or two in edgewise?” he asked when the dining room was finally quiet. “Thank you for your good wishes. We haven’t talked about any details yet. No, Deb, I haven’t bought Kate a ring, but I’ll do that this afternoon. Yes, I know Dad will want to be at the wedding. Kate and I would like to tell him ourselves, so we’ll appreciate it if you give us the rest of the day to do so before you spring the news.”

“Will your mother want to help you with your wedding plans?” Adele asked with what seemed to be serious concern.

“My mother died when I was twelve, and Pop passed away this spring. I really don’t have any relatives, unless you count some distant cousins I hardly know.”

Pop would have liked Jake. Eventually. Jake would have put him off at first with his tough outer veneer and commanding physical presence, but they’d eventually have gotten along. Kate wished they’d had a chance to meet.

She smiled at Jake, then turned back to his mother. “I’d like for us to get married quietly here in Houston, and have a small dinner afterward at some nice restaurant. I shouldn’t need a lot of help to arrange a simple affair.”

“Nonsense, child.” Adele’s dark eyes sparkled with excitement. “Just pick a day and leave the rest to me. It will be my pleasure to arrange a wedding you and Jake will never forget.”

“Mom. It’s Kate’s wedding you’re trying to take over.” Jake sounded as if he had climbed onto a roller coaster that wouldn't stop.

Kate certainly felt that way.

“Well, maybe she’ll have to do a bit more than just tell me what day you want to get married. Let’s see.” Adele lifted her eyebrows and stared out the window for a minute.

“Kate. You’ll have to pick out your wedding gown, of course, and decide who you want to be your attendants. Shana, can you think of anything else you had to do before your wedding? After all, you’d insisted on going with Bear when he took those flying lessons in San Antonio, so you weren’t here to do for yourself.”

Shana grinned at Kate and Jake. “I had to make up a list of people I wanted to invite who weren’t already on your list. And help Bear get together the names and addresses of his friends and family. And oh, yes, I picked out my bridesmaids’ dresses and added a couple of special dishes to the menu for the reception. And I did most of it over the phone.”

Ann Jacobs

Firestorm

143

Jake cleared his throat. “Look, Mom,” he said affectionately. “We’ve just decided to get married. I’m sure Kate will want your help in planning whatever kind of wedding we want. When we decide, you’ll be the first to know. We’re going now to look at rings.

Then we’ll stop by the hospital and visit Dad.”

* * * * *

Jake watched Kate fiddle with the huge, round-cut stone in the ring he’d insisted on buying for her at a friend’s jewelry showroom. Wearing the frankly ostentatious diamond seemed to make her nervous.

She’d wanted a smaller stone. There was no way, though, he’d have bought her anything smaller than the gaudy marquise-cut rock Alice had selected so many years ago.

Kate would soon get used to the weight of the ten-carat solitaire, he told himself as they waited for the elevator to his father's hospital suite.

“Will your father be pleased?” she asked, straightening the ring so the stone was centered on her finger. She looked embarrassed when she glanced away from the sparkling diamond that nearly hid the first knuckle of her ring finger.

“He’ll be ecstatic.” And that was no exaggeration. “We won’t stay long. His doctors told Mom everyone should limit their visits to fifteen minutes or so.”

Jake wouldn’t be surprised if the Old Man was unusually tired after their earlier conversation and the long talk he’d had earlier with Scott. He paused and laced his fingers through Kate’s when he saw a nurse hurrying out of his father’s suite.

“Is he up to having company?” he asked the woman when she stopped and gave him a stern once-over.

“Not if you plan on upsetting him the way you did this morning. We had to call the doctor to come in and give him something to settle his heart down.”

“I think our news will do more to perk Dad up than any medicine.” Jake grinned, and the nurse moved away from the doorway after a momentary pause.

“See that you don’t disturb him,” she warned them. “And don’t stay more than a few minutes.”

With that warning, she strode toward the nurses’ station, her starched skirts swishing noisily. Jake put an arm around Kate and let her precede him into the Old Man’s room.

* * * * *

Later, Kate realized how tired she was. Between her morning with Jake’s sisters, Jake’s surprise proposal and his family’s enthusiastic reaction, and an afternoon of Ann Jacobs

Firestorm

144

selecting a ring and breaking the news of their coming marriage to his father, she hadn't had a moment to think.

Now, while Jake conferred with Skip on the phone, she lay back in the swirling water of the hot tub and tried to collect her thoughts.

Everybody in Jake’s family wanted her to marry him.

She stared at the immense diamond Jake had put on her finger hours earlier. Sick as he was, his father had seemed thrilled at the news of their impending marriage. She’d nearly cried when he’d hugged her and welcomed “another daughter” into the family.

And Jake’s mother and sisters had overwhelmed her, even before Jake told them she was to be his bride. She’d be hard pressed not to let Adele get carried away with her plans to make the wedding Houston’s social event of the year.

Kate had trouble believing it. She was going to have a husband she adored. And a family. Children of her own.

Just one cloud hung over her happiness. Yes, she understood Jake’s reluctance to commit himself emotionally. He’d been terribly hurt.

Understanding, though, didn’t cure the pain of knowing he didn’t love her.

She hated Alice. That woman, Jake’s sisters had called her. For eight years, Alice had possessed his love. But she’d betrayed Jake, left him bitter and distrustful. Damn the woman and the power she’d once had to make Jake love her. Damn the cruel sword she’d wielded to destroy that love. And double damn the power she apparently still possessed to keep Jake’s heart frozen, make him afraid to love someone else.

Pulling her left hand out of the water, Kate looked at the ring that weighed so heavily on her mind. It had cost Jake a fortune, many times as much as the smaller, more delicate one she’d liked.

He’d laughed and said he didn’t want folks thinking he was a piker as he slid this ring on her finger and closed his fist over her hand. Had that been true? Jake didn’t strike Kate as being the kind of man to give much of a damn about what folks thought of him.

Kate thought it was more likely that Alice had insisted that he buy her expensive tokens of his love. Or that she’d spurned his simpler offerings.

Jake wanted the world to think he valued her more than he ever prized his faithless ex-wife, Kate decided. She hoped the day would come when he’d actually feel that way.

“You’ll get used to wearing it, honey.”

She looked up at the sound of Jake’s deep voice. Clearly, her reservations about the ring amused him. His grin—and the sight of his powerful, naked body framed in the open doorway—took her breath away.

Ann Jacobs

Firestorm

145

“It’s so big, Jake. But it’s beautiful.”
Like you
, she thought, her mouth watering at the way his long, thick penis stood at attention against the muscular ridges of his belly. She wanted to take it in her mouth, tease him until he lost his iron control.

“Come here.” She moved over to make room for him on the sunken bench at the edge of the tub.

He moved like a predator, smoothly and quickly. Every well-honed muscle rippled under deeply tanned skin that was only a shade lighter across his lean, powerful hips.

As she watched, his penis grew bigger, harder. His testicles tightened.

Her mouth went dry, and her body turned liquid inside when he sank down beside her in the swirling water.

“Skip caught the other guy who torched your barn,” he said as he traced a path of fire with his hands from her cheek to her aching breasts.

His tension showed in the almost imperceptible tremor of the hand that was plucking at her left nipple.

“Is the trouble over now?” Kate asked.

“It will be, assuming your sheriff can make one or both of the bastards rat out whoever hired them.”

Kate shuddered, setting off a chain reaction of tiny ripples on the water’s swirling surface. “Surely they won’t keep quiet. Not now.” She couldn’t fathom the kind of sick mind that would want to destroy a company enough to risk human lives.

“I’m beginning to think the trouble will never stop. Seems that no one we’ve caught so far knows who hired them to do their dirty work.”

“Jake, I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t mind me, honey. What I do know is that we’ve got to get back to Groveland.

Skip has enough to do without keeping on the district attorney’s back, just to be sure he goes for these guys’ throats—and the balls of whoever in hell hired them.” His expression softened. “Hey, let’s forget about this right now. I’m thinking we’ve got more important things to do.”

Taking her hand, he dragged it down his body, and when she curled her fingers around his rigid erection, he covered her hand with his own and coached her in the motions that drove him wild.

“Milk my cock, honey. Like this.”

When she held the pulsing life of him in her hand and looked into dark eyes full of hot, wild passion, Kate turned to mush inside. His willing slave, she did all he asked.

She loved Jake with all her heart. And right now, every cell in her body demanded to join him in a carnal feast.

Ann Jacobs

Firestorm

146

“We’ll go back day after tomorrow. You can spend tomorrow with Mom and whoever’s available of the terrible threesome, so you can let them know anything special you want for the wedding.”

Then he kissed her. His tongue plunged deep in her mouth the way Kate knew he’d soon thrust his rock-hard penis inside her body. With callused hands, he played a symphony on all her erotic places. Her nipples. The sensitive spots behind her knees.

Her thighs. Her clitoris. Finally he dipped two fingers inside her and brought her to a gentle little climax.

Kate wanted more. Wanted to see stars, experience the mind-blowing orgasm she got whenever she took all of him into her body. She climbed on his lap and kissed him hard…but he shoved her away as though she’d suddenly gotten the plague.

Swearing viciously, Jake climbed out of the tub and stalked into the bedroom. She fought back tears, wondered what she’d done wrong.

“Stay there, honey. I’ll be right back.” Dripping water onto the carpet, he padded into the bedroom and opened the nightstand drawer.

He ripped open a condom wrapper and sheathed himself, the thought registering that soon this wouldn’t be necessary.

The prospect of riding Kate bareback, feeling the rush of her wet, fragrant heat and spurting his semen into her body, made him swell almost to bursting.

“Okay, buddy, you’re gonna get yours now,” he muttered to his cock. He strode back to the bathroom and stepped into the hot tub.

Kate’s eyes were wide, darkened almost to the color of a raging sea. Her tongue darted out when she raked her gaze over his body as though she wanted to taste every inch of him.

He lifted her, letting the smell of flowers and hot, wet woman surround him. “I love it when you get turned on. Bend over and hold on to the rim of the tub.”

Silky soft, hot, and wet, her ass cheeks glistened above the swirling water. His cock jerked, more than ready to get inside her. But he wanted this to last, so he rubbed his cock head slowly between her parted legs with one hand while plucking and tugging her hard little nipples with the other.

Her pussy muscles contracted against his cock, as if she was trying to coax him in.

Her tits swelled in his hands the way a woman’s should, and her ass nestled trustingly against his groin.

“Want this?” he asked, pulling back and nudging her pussy playfully with his cock.

The sudden pressure of her small hand on his erection did in his resolve to wait.

Shifting slightly, he let her position his cock head at the hot, tight opening to her pussy.

Then he sank inside.

Ann Jacobs

Firestorm

147

Chapter Twelve

He filled her so completely that her body wept around him.

She’d never get enough of Jake’s hot, wild loving. Kate clasped the rounded edge of the hot tub and watched the sparkling reflection of fiery rays from the diamond in her ring.