Read Love Me: The Complete Series Online

Authors: Shelley K. Wall

Love Me: The Complete Series (47 page)

BOOK: Love Me: The Complete Series
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At home, she dropped her clothes on the floor and crawled into bed in her bra and panties. Her head throbbed from her emotional outburst—or maybe it was dehydration from all the tears. Her bones ached and every movement made her body feel as it weighed a ton. Perhaps it was the guilt. She knew she’d face it eventually. At the moment, she craved rest and a thorough analysis of the inside of her eyelids. Thank God for the weekend and the pleasure of sleeping late.

Thud. Something had fallen.

Amanda opened one eye and peered at the nightstand where the sound had come from. The clock blared eleven
a.m.
She felt like she’d had less than an hour of sleep. Nothing else was there. She lifted her head and peeked over the bed. Her cell phone danced on the floor beside a puddle of water. Had it rang so much it knocked over her nearly empty water glass?

She snagged the phone as it veered toward the puddle and answered.

“Open your door.”

“Wow, nice way to greet someone, Jax. Gets me off to a real good start after a long night. Why not try ‘good morning’ or ‘hello’ or—”

“Good morning, sleepy head. I’m outside your door and I have someone with me. Do you have time to talk?”

“Oh. Okay.” She dropped the phone and searched the room for her clothes. Um, no, it would be gross to put them back on. She rushed to the closet and pulled out a sundress and threw it over her head. The zipper caught in her hair. She tugged. “Ow!” The zipper gave but took a couple of strands of hair with it.

Amanda ran to the bathroom, grabbed her toothbrush, and quickly scrubbed a couple of times. She grimaced at her reflection in the mirror.
Oh my God, I look like death warmed over.
She ran water, scrubbed her face, then brushed her hair. Not great but better. She stuck out her tongue at the woman staring back.

She rationalized he had to look as bad as she did; he’d been up most of the night too. Her footsteps fell like logs on the carpet as she rushed to the door and pulled it open. Damn Jackson. Why couldn’t he look as worn out as she felt? Nope, not him. He was his cool, collected, normal, and annoyingly attractive self in a T-shirt and shorts. He even smelled like soap as he stepped past her into the living room followed by a random—girl?

Without turning, Jackson waved a hand at his guest. “Amanda, this is Celia Hovart. She’s going to help us.”

Celia Hovart was the size of a string, tall and lanky with barely enough meat on her bones to make a steak. Amanda nodded as she took in the hiking shorts and sports bra tank that served to accentuate her litheness. She wore dusty boots with socks rolled down over the laces. She wasn’t the norm for a legal eagle.

Amanda gave her best professional smile. “You’re an attorney?”

Celia shook her short-cropped brown hair. “Nope. I’m a geologist but that’s not why I’m here. Jackson asked me to help you guys with the climb.”

Amanda raised a brow toward Jackson. “Climb?”

He had the audacity to return her look with a sheepish grin. “Uh, yeah. When’s the last time you climbed a rock?”

“The last time … well, that would be the first time … which isn’t going to be today, Jax. You want to tell me how this relates to your contract and why I need to be involved?”

“Sure, but you’ll need to change clothes first. We’re going out to look at the property on the deal and it’s a little dirty. Mostly rocks, trees, and a lot of dust. That dress would be ruined. Put on some shorts or maybe jeans.”

“You’re assuming I didn’t have something else planned, aren’t you?”

His eyes widened. “Do you? If so, we can come back this evening or maybe tomorrow. Celia’s gone after that. She’s just here for the weekend visiting.”

“How nice of her.”

“She’s not visiting me. She’s visiting her parents who live across the street from mine. I was there this morning and saw her outside. I knew she liked to rock-climb so I asked her to help.”

“You keep bringing up climbing. Don’t think you’re getting me to scale a wall or something this weekend. I don’t know anything about that and—”

Jackson held up a hand. “You don’t have to. It’s just that I called the trust for the family that owns the property. They forwarded me to someone named Big or Biggs and he agreed to meet us at the land site to show me the archeological find that’s holding this whole thing up. He said it would make sense once I saw things for myself.”

“Did he tell you what it was?” Amanda envisioned a national archive team showing up and a team of scientists with picks and brushes at work.

“Not exactly.”

“What does not exactly mean?”

“I don’t know. Look, are you going or not? Because if you aren’t then we’re leaving. I have to get this done and go by the hospital to get Dad.”

Amanda felt a tinge of guilt for stalling. “How is your dad, by the way? The rehab efforts are going well?”

“He’s being released today. Rehab will be a lengthy process but all in all, he’s good. His speech hasn’t recovered very well and he’s a little gimpy. His memory seems pretty fuzzy still.”

Celia stuck a hand in her pocket. “Jackson, I didn’t know your father was in the hospital. What happened?”

“Stroke.”

“Oh, God, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. He’s fine.” Jackson moved from foot to foot.

Amanda questioned his analysis but kept her mouth shut. Jackson stepped toward the door he’d just entered and met her eyes. “What’s it going to be? Are you coming or not?”

She desperately wanted to say “not” and head back to her rumpled sheets. “Oh, okayyy. Give me a minute.” She went back to her room. It actually took ten minutes but when she returned in shorts and tennis shoes, he said nothing. Jackson pushed out the door and the two women followed.

Chapter Nineteen

Mosquito spray would have been a great idea. Amanda swatted the pesky bug from her face after its one-millionth attempt to take a nip of her cheek. She tilted her head back and peered through the trees. The sun beat down upon them with laser focus. At least she’d remembered sunscreen.

She trudged behind Jackson and Celia, her eyes focused on the terrain, regretting the decision to abandon her wonderful mattress and pillows.

They cleared the trees and the road leveled, which allowed her to concentrate on something other than her next step. She lifted her gaze to Jackson’s back pockets. Nice.

He chose that moment to turn and catch her staring at his ass.
Crap.
Busted. A slow grin spread across his face while an equally slow burn filled her cheeks. He enjoyed her embarrassment, the jerk. She shook it off and lifted her chin. “So, you and Celia have known each other a long time?”

“Yep.” He turned and trudged forward leaving no alternative but to follow, which she did.

Celia’s thin athletic figure bounded forward, daring them to keep up. “We’ve known each other most of our adult lives. He was a bratty pubescent thug when he moved to our neighborhood.”

Jackson broke off a twig that threatened to take the cap on his head. “Yeah, and you were a scrawny bean pole.”

Celia laughed. “It takes one to know one.”

Amanda stopped walking and watched the two. His footsteps followed hers effortlessly as if he’d done it for years. Followed her wherever she went. Had they? She couldn’t bring herself to ask.

As if he sensed her question, Jackson held back and waited for Amanda to reach him, then leaned down and whispered in her ear. “Just so you don’t embarrass yourself—Celia has a live-in girlfriend. They’ve been together for eight years.”

Oh.
“She’s—?”

He nodded.

“So the two of you never …?” Amanda hesitated.

His eyes widened at the thought, then a look of disgust crossed his face and he shuddered. “Ugh, no. No way. She’s like a sister.”

Ahead of them, Celia bounded over a dead tree that had fallen across their path. Jackson followed. His long legs cleared the debris with little effort. Amanda tried to clear the mess with equal athletic prowess but caught a toe on a wayward limb. She pitched forward and landed face-first in the dust. Jackson’s fingers clutched around her arm and pinched as he pulled her to her feet.

Amanda dusted off her shirt and shook back the hair that threatened to fall into her eyes. “Don’t you mean like a brother?” Celia was well out of earshot and out of view too. The path ahead was quiet.

He shrugged. “I guess that’s why we get along so well. Watch yourself. There’s a lot of snakes in this area and they like to hang out under rocks and stumps.”

Amanda cringed and searched below the wood debris she’d just been splayed across. Nothing moved. Whew. She squinted up at his sinewy frame shadowed by the sun behind. The twitch at the side of his mouth was barely a tick. If it hadn’t been kind of cute, she would have punched him. “You
had
to say that, didn’t you?”

Jackson had one dimple and it only showed when he did something devilish, like try to put the fear of snakes in a woman. She’d noticed it in college and ignored it, unlike many of the other coeds that had trailed his way. Time had lowered her reserves, though, and ignoring it now wasn’t as easy. The tiny indention only served to make her insides warm and tighten. He was oblivious to her discomfort as he gave her a faked innocent grin. “What? You don’t like snakes?”

“Are you kidding me? Does anyone?”

“They’re harmless for the most part. At least, the no-legged kind are. You might want to watch out for the two-legged kind, though.”

Hmmm. Fair warning. “Would that two-legged problem be you? Or someone else?”

Jackson stopped walking and let her catch him. She chose to keep moving and the narrowness of the path made it impossible to pass without brushing his chest. How can a guy smell so good while sweating in the morning heat? He put a hand to her arm and held her against him for a brief second. “Men are never harmless, Amanda. Every last one of us wants to get in your pants if given a shot.”

She met his gaze and instantly regretted raising her eyes. “Then that would make you the safest of all, since you’ve already been there.”

His hand rambled up her arm and clutched into her hair, pulling her head back to hover his lips closer. It was impossible not to focus on that mouth and the warmth of it that she’d felt only hours ago. The nervousness in her stomach spread to her chest and she gulped as he leaned closer, hovering. “I’m the least harmless of all.”

That was meant to put the fear of God in her but she wouldn’t cave. “You don’t scare me, Jax.”

He put his lips right against hers for a second, then spoke softly. “I should because you scare the hell out of me.”

“Where are you guys?” Celia’s voice echoed from the distance, breaking their trance. Amanda felt relief flush through her veins. She stepped past Jackson and kept moving. “Coming.”

Did he mutter
not yet
or was that her imagination?

• • •

The musky smell of the Texas hill country filled Jackson’s nose as he entered a clearing to find Celia standing with her hands on hips and Amanda tiptoeing up a rocky path to meet her. Two ropes hung from the rock face near them and jostled in the wind.

Wait. The wind had died; there wasn’t even a stir. He squinted upward to see dangling legs and the harness of gear strapped around the small ass of his newly found friend, Bigby. The man had a shaved head that glistened with sweat and his sinewy muscles bulged as he reached for a rock, then pulled his weight to an apparent twenty feet above them. He slipped a rope into a tie-anchor, looped it, and grasped with one hand. He tested the hold before stopping to look down. The man lifted two fingers to his forehead and soared a quick salute. “Hello there! Glad you finally made it … I was climbing up to see where you were. Just get your gear on and come up when you’re ready. I’ll meet you on the ledge.”

“This is my attorney friend, Amanda. The one I mentioned,” Jackson shouted, though it wasn’t necessary. They were the only ones within miles and the stillness made their voices echo.

The man kept climbing but nodded. “Bigby Hernandez, ma’am. I’m the caretaker for the estate’s property.”

Jackson’s adrenaline started to hit warp speed. It had been a couple of years since he’d tried climbing but there’d been a time when he was pretty decent. He joined a local climbing group for a while, then work became too much and he slowly extricated himself from the planned outings. It was a shame because he loved the challenge. That was part of the reason he’d decided to join the adventure club where he’d found Amanda.

“Ahem, Jackson?” Amanda’s face held a universe of skepticism. How would he talk her into the climb?

By the time Jackson reached the two women, Celia had dropped her pack along with all the gear and was sorting and organizing. “What’s up?”

Amanda bugged her eyes, an expression that was both cute and irritating. She pointed toward Bigby. “I’m not doing that. Whatever is up there, it’s ancient and dirty. Take pictures and text them to me. I don’t need to kill myself for this consulting gig.”

He watched her blow hair from her face in a huff. She tried so hard to be prissy but he knew under that cool façade, an athletic competitiveness simmered. He’d seen it many times over their school years and the short time they’d worked together. “What’s the matter? You scared?”

Her gaze shot up, then back to him. “Me? You’re kidding, right? I just don’t want to get filthy dirty … and besides, look at those clouds up there. They’re probably going to burst open within the hour and we’ll get stranded and wet.”

She had a point; the clouds had moved in quickly and the stillness in the air was foreboding. In fact the change was a little too quick for his comfort. When did that happen? Probably about the time he’d been focusing on little else but the scent of her skin and the pockets of her shorts. “I checked the weather on the way to your place. There was only a twenty percent chance of showers, which means the likelihood is slim. Besides, I’ve never seen you back down from a challenge before.”

Celia stepped toward her and nudged her arm with a sling of sorts. “Here,” she said. “This is your harness. Wear this and you’ll have nothing to worry about. You step into it like … a diaper.” Jackson appreciated that Celia assumed Amanda would comply and gave her no option. She simply held the contraption open and waited for Amanda to lift a foot. After a moment’s hesitation, she did.

BOOK: Love Me: The Complete Series
2.91Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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