Healing Pleasure (11 page)

He shot her a disbelieving look. “Lemon drop?”

Her beautiful blue eyes twinkled with mischief and humor. “You keep calling me
sugar
. What goes better with that then a lemon drop?”

He glanced at Brit over her head to find the man grinning like a loon. Though it was an awesome sight to see his buddy so amused, it wasn’t so cool that it had come at his expense. He hooked an arm around Lena’s waist and drew her shapely body against his. The move surprised a soft gasp out of her and her head tilted back, the mischief and humor in her eyes replaced by a heady, needy heat.

“Lemon drops are usually covered with sugar.” He dipped his head, stopping with his mouth a mere breath from hers. “Is that what you’re planning to do? Cover me with your sugar?”

Her throat worked in a visible gulp. She licked her lips and his cock hardened to the consistency of stone behind the zipper of his jeans.

“You haven’t told me about your parents.” Her tone was breathy, hot, and gave him every reason in the world to think that suddenly the last thing she wanted right now was to hear about his childhood.

Still, he slowly released her and started walking again. They weren’t too far their destination now. He’d wait until they got there before grabbing hold of her again.

“They’re dead.” He said it simply because, to him, it was.

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m not.” He didn’t feel an ounce of love lost for the man and woman who had created him. A flash of surprise moved through her angelic face, but it was almost immediately replaced by an obvious struggle to understand. “I’m sorry if that sounded harsh, but like Brit, it comes with good reason.”

“Were you abused, too?”

Trey shook his head. “Not like him. My mother OD’ed when I was five. I heard my father was gunned down by a druggie he owed money to about a year after Horace, Hank, and May took us in. Neither one of them ever did shit to raise me, feed me, or, hell, even put clothes on my back. I guess Jane, that was her name, did some when she came down off her high, which wasn’t often. I had a hell of a lot more to eat before she overdosed. After that, I was on my own. Paul didn’t give a shit.”

He’d told him he was worthless, that he wanted to him to die so he didn’t have be burdened with him anymore. When Trey had begged him to buy a loaf of bread instead of an ounce of cocaine, Paul had told him to starve. Then he’d be rid of him.

“You just said you were five when your mom passed away,” Lena said as if he needed a reminder.

Trey nodded. “A five-year-old boy can con just about anyone into a bowl of pudding or a plate of spaghetti. It’s a little harder when five turns into twelve, especially once he realizes how to really fend for himself.”

“You turned to stealing.”

Though her tone made her words more statement than question, he repeated, “I turned to stealing. I had to eat somehow, though the people I stole from didn’t quite see it that way.”

The trees opened and he bit back a grin at the soft moan that escaped her throat as she caught sight of the pond. Her lips parted on a smile, and he followed her gaze as it swept over the open area. A blue jay perched on a branch high in a tree gave a song, breaking the surprised silence.

“This is amazing!” She stepped away from them, turning slowly as she walked, taking it all in. “God, I can’t imagine what it was like to grow up here.”

“Far different than the city, darlin’.” Brit had stopped at the tree line and leaned a shoulder against the trunk as he watched her.

Trey moved further into the clearing, stopped a few feet from the water’s edge, and set down the picnic basket he’d been carrying. “Have you ever been out of the city, sugar?”

“Not really. I mean, I’ve passed through country like this, but never stayed.” She turned to face him and Brit. “I’m guessing both of you lived in the city before coming here. Did you go to school together? Is that how you met?”

“Neither of us did much school back then.” Brit pushed off the tree and moved to Trey’s side. “We met on the streets. This dumbass nearly got caught shoplifting at a convenience store. Dude behind the counter would’ve called the cops on him if I hadn’t passed him off as my brother and fed the guy a line about intending to pay for the things Trey had shoved in his pockets.”

Lena’s eyes narrowed. “You pretended a boy you didn’t even know was your brother and paid for what he stole to keep him out of jail. Where did you get the money?”

“My father’s wallet. The bastard was gonna beat me anyway. I started figuring I might as well give him a reason. Some weeks I took from him, others I took from my mother. I saved most of it. I thought I could con my way into buying a car off some poor sap even if I wasn’t old enough to drive and get the hell out of dodge.”

“Did it work?”

“Naw, I got impatient.”

Trey kneeled to pull out the blanket May had rolled up inside the picnic basket. Brit hadn’t gotten impatient. He hadn’t been able to save fast enough because he’d spent half the money he stole each week feeding Trey.

“So you…” Lena prompted.

“Thought I’d take a page out of Trey’s book and steal one. I saw this old pickup outside a hardware store. It looked like easy pickings. Turned out, it belonged to Horace and Hank. Long story short, instead of calling the law on me, they took us to lunch, needled us into bearing our souls, and offered us a home on the ranch.”

Her gaze shifted to Trey. “You were with him?”

Trey straightened and unfolded the blanket on the ground. “I was waiting for him around the corner. He wouldn’t go with Horace and Hank until they came for me.” That had been the second time Brit had changed his life. He’d refused to go with Horace and Hank unless they took Trey in, too.

He didn’t like the knowing look that moved through Lena’s eyes. She was a sharp one. She’d no doubt figured out how indebted he’d always felt to Brit. She’d probably figured out how guilty he felt over the whole clusterfucked op, too. He’d get passed it, though, and he didn’t need any bit of counseling to help him. All he needed was for Brit to get his head straight, for his buddy to return to the teams with him, and then everything would be all right.

Brit saved him from the questions he saw forming on Lena’s lips, yet again coming to his rescue. His friend moved to her, drew her in, and dipped his head to cover her mouth with his. “Enough talk about all that,” he told her as he ended the kiss. “Let’s go for a swim.”

* * * *

Lena blinked at Brit as her mind tripped and stumbled over his words. One thing about it, the man knew how to shut her up. Her lips tingled from the kiss. The heat of it shimmered through her system, hardening her nipples until the pressed insistently against the hard wall of his chest. Apparently, the walk through familiar ground had worked like a charm. The shadow that had been so apparent on his handsome face wasn’t so dark anymore. She hated to bring it back, but she knew the only way to get rid of it once and for all was to coerce him into talking about the op.

“I didn’t bring a swimsuit.” The devious glint in his eyes had the heat spreading to her pussy.

“Neither did we.” Trey’s easy gait brought him closer. He rounded her and Brit, moving in at her back. “They aren’t necessary when you’re in the country on private land, sugar.”

Were they crazy? And what was Trey doing following Brit’s lead?

He’s doing like he’s always done.

Yeah, she’d figured that out. She wouldn’t have pegged Trey for a follower, but, when it came to Brit, that was obviously what he did. He had to know she’d been using the talk about how they’d grown up and come to live at Rescue Ranch as a way to get Brit talking. Except, that talk had revealed things about Trey he’d apparently not wanted her to know.

“All right,” she said slowly, her mind frantically working even as her hormones went haywire. Being between them again, feeling the hard walls of their bodies against her front and back, absorbing the heat and strength of their embraces, pulled things from her mouth she knew she shouldn’t say. “I’ll get in that pond, but the talk keeps going.”

“Darlin’, once you get naked, I promise you talking will be the last thing on my mind.”

“Trey and I will help you keep your thoughts straight.” She leaned her head back on Trey’s chest and angled it to look up at him. “Won’t we, lemon drop?”

Trey snorted. “You’re going to be on your own with that one, sugar.”

Well, hell. He wasn’t going to be any help. She left her head laying on his chest, but turned her attention back to Brit. “Tell me how you really hurt your knee and I’ll take off my boots.”

The shadow returned to his expression in full force. “You’re not gonna let up, are you, darlin’?”

She cupped the side of his face. “Try it my way, okay?”

“What is this, your version of strip poker?”

“The way I figure it, we’ll be both holding a royal flush when it’s over.”

He sighed, but she caught the amusement that mixed with a dark dread in his eyes, creating a dangerous concoction that sent equal parts trepidation and excitement racing through her. “Add the shirt to that and I’ll play along for a while.”

She was getting in too deep, but it was too late to back down now. Shutting off the warning bells sounding loudly in her head, she shifted between him and Trey and pulled off the boots she’d borrowed from May.

Satisfaction sparked a new heat on Brit’s handsome face as he eased back, giving her room to take off her shirt. Trey’s hands stayed where they’d come to rest on her hips, but he moved back a fraction as she fisted the hem of her shirt and pulled it up and over her head.

Brit’s gaze felt like a physical caress as his attention dropped from her face and did a slow glide over her chest. “Damn, darlin’, you’re one sexy woman.”

“Thank you. I believe you owe me an answer now.”

He puffed out a hard breath, raked his fingers through his hair, and nodded once. “I tripped, felt myself going down, and twisted. The knee took the impact.”

“What did you trip over?”

“Take off the bra.”

She held his gaze and reached behind her back. Her hands glided over Trey’s solid chest as she found the clasp of her bra, reminding her of his continued presence. It was funny how his holding her helped her follow through with her part of the game. It somehow steadied her and made her feel safe. She couldn’t explain it and didn’t bother to try.

She unfastened the clasp and let the bra fall to the ground at her feet. “What did you trip over?”

“A dead teammate.”

She didn’t like the way his tone had lost all inflection, as if he were recounting a fact that meant nothing to him. “How did he die?”

He held her gaze for a long moment, his eyes unreadable. This time when he spoke, his tone took on an authority that sent a wicked thrill straight to her pussy. “Pants.”

She shook her head. “Not yet.” She was losing her clothes fast and he was picking apart her questions, only giving bits of the full answer. “How did he die?”

His gaze flicked over her shoulder before returning to lock with hers. “IED. Improvised explosive device,” he clarified. “Terrorists use them a lot. He was too close when one hit. The explosion took out a chunk of his torso.”

Oh, God. How close had he been when the IED had gone off? She started to ask when he repeated his command.

“Pants, Lena.”

The fact that he called her by her name rather than
darlin’
or
sweet thing
compelled her to obey as much as the hardness in his tone. He was using this, she realized, not just as a way to get her naked, but to keep himself from completely falling into the nightmare in his mind.

She unfastened the button of her jeans with hands that had started to shake. She should have never agreed to this, should’ve never come here. She’d known she was getting in over her head. For the first time since she’d started her practice, she felt helpless. No amount of her schooling and experience had prepared her to help someone with these kinds of haunting memories.

Trey’s hands slid from her hips to her sides as she lowered the zipper of her jeans and wriggled them slowly down her hips. He must have felt her shiver, maybe even sensed her fear, because he nuzzled his face in the side of her neck and whispered in her ear.

“You’re safe, sugar. You wouldn’t be doing this, you wouldn’t be following his orders, if it wasn’t what you wanted to do.”

How did he know that? Was she so transparent that he could see into her soul? She wanted Brit to talk about the op, firmly believing it was the best way to help him heal. Yet, she no longer understood the game she’d started. An article of clothing in exchange for an answer to a deep, probing question…What had she been thinking? It was wrong on so many levels, but that didn’t stop her from letting her jeans fall in a pool around her ankles.

“Kick them out of the way,” Brit ordered as he closed the distance between them again. She did and he didn’t wait for her to ask another question before hooking his thumbs in the thin strips of material holding her panties on her hips. Rather than pushing them down, he twisted the straps around his fingers until they snapped, and tossed her panties over his shoulder.

“You’re breaking the rules, cowboy.”