Playing with Dynamite (4 page)

Brick dismissed the disturbing thoughts and snagged Lisa's wrist. “C'mon. Let's go throw a pie for charity. My old junior high school principal is the target, and I owe him.”

Lisa stumbled after him. “Owe him for what?”

“He stuck me in detention for my whole seventh grade year.”

“And you didn't deserve it at all?”

Brick stopped and grinned sheepishly. “Maybe a little.”

“How little?”

“It was just a few harmless pranks…involving a frog and the English teacher, a food fight in the cafeteria and…” He hesitated and his smile faded slightly. “And the homework I didn't do.”

“I can imagine the frog and the food fight, but my father would have killed me if I hadn't done my homework.”

Brick looked away, squinting his eyes under the glare of the sun. “Yeah, well, my dad wasn't paying much attention, my mother had died and my stepmother was a witch.”

The breeze picked up a strand of his sun-lightened hair, and Lisa felt a clutch in her chest. “Sounds rough,” she murmured.

He shrugged his wide shoulders. “You don't want to hear about that, so—”

“But I do,” she said impulsively, then bit her tongue. “I mean, I enjoy hearing about your childhood. You haven't really talked about it much before.”

He rubbed his thumb back and forth over her knuckles in a mesmerizing motion. “It wasn't all happy, Lisa, and the time you and I had together was happy and good. Being with you was too special. I didn't want to drag it down.”

She felt that same clutch again and swallowed hard. “Now that we're friends,” she said in an effort to remind both herself and him, “maybe you won't feel like you're dragging anything down.”

He lifted an eyebrow and glanced meaningfully at her lips. “We'll see.”

He tugged her toward the pie booth, and Lisa surreptitiously wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. It felt as if he'd put his mouth there, against hers.

“You wanna go first?” he asked as he paid the attendant a few bucks.

“I don't know.” Lisa looked doubtfully at the principal's friendly face behind the cutout cardboard. “I was never good at throwing things, or catching them for that matter,” she said under her breath.

“Then let me help you.” Brick gave Lisa a pie and positioned himself directly behind her. He wrapped one hand around her waist and meshed the front of his body with the back of hers. His chest rubbed against her back, the heat of his belly nearly scorching her skin, and his masculinity was deliciously pressed against her buttocks.

Lisa nearly dropped the pie.

“Whoa!” Brick caught it and reinforced her grip on it with his hand.

He stood so close that his familiar scent and the thud of his heart seemed to invade her body. He had a musky scent that she associated with sex and satisfaction. It was the closest she'd come to this kind of intimacy in weeks, and Lord help her, her breasts were tightening beneath the knit shirt she wore.

“I'm not sure—” She tried for a normal tone.

“C'mon. Just throw it a little high.”

Lisa closed her eyes and tossed it.

“Not close enough,” he muttered. “Let's do it one more time.”

She remembered when he'd said those same words to her right after making love. “Oh, no.” She moaned.

“You can do it.” He placed another pie in her hand. Her surroundings began to feel surreal. The principal taunted Brick, but it was Brick's voice and body that became her focal point.

“C'mon, baby. Just a little higher and a little harder,” he coaxed.

She blinked at the sensations his voice evoked, but she felt her nether regions begin a slow, sweet swell. “Higher and harder,” she murmured, and tossed the pie as hard as she could.

She hit the principal dead center, and the surrounding crowd screamed with glee. Brick squeezed her waist and quickly kissed the side of her neck. “You were great, Lisa.”

He meant throwing the pie, but all Lisa could think about was that last time they'd made love.

“That's some
friend
you got there, Brick.”

“Shut up, Troy,” Brick said with a growl.

“Ooh, I'm
all shook up.
Have you told her you and Elvis share—”

“Shut up!”

Troy raised his hands in appeal and backed away. “Just asking.”

Lisa didn't have a clue what their exchange was about, but Troy's first comment hit her like a bucket of cold water. She wiggled out of Brick's hold on her. Avoiding his gaze, she took a few sanity-inducing steps away from him. “Your turn to throw a pie.”

She stood, taking a few moments to regain her equilibrium. Frowning, she admired Brick's well-muscled form. His body attracted her, but it was his inherent male magnetism that drove her to distraction. She didn't like how quickly or easily she'd lost her perspective.

When his pie hit the principal, Brick tossed his head and laughed. His vitality seemed to spill over onto her. She wanted to be immune to him. She didn't want this dizzy, desperate feeling he caused. She didn't want it and she didn't need it.

Brick pulled Lisa against him for a quick hug and felt her stiffen. She'd been so soft and pliant against him moments before that his body had begun to respond. He hoped nobody was studying the front of his cutoffs right now, or the swollen ridge behind his zipper would make a joke out of everything he'd suggested about being “friends” with Lisa.

She tugged her hand away from his when he tried to hold it. Brick sighed. “Don't pay any attention to Troy. He's always had a big mouth.”

Lisa fiddled with her fingers then folded them in front of her. “He reminded me that you and I are friends. That's all,” she added emphatically. “And I'm looking for a husband.”

Brick's view of the day took a sour plunge. His stomach felt unsettled. He pulled an antacid out of his pocket and slipped it in his mouth. Lisa's head was averted so that her gaze didn't meet his. A brooding feeling settled over him. “That's right,” he muttered impatiently. “I forgot to ask. Any proposals lately?”

Lisa's head whipped up. She narrowed her eyes as if she hadn't missed the hint of a sarcastic edge in his voice. He could practically feel the heat of her indignation. She straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin.

Lord help him, there was that chin again. He should have kept his attitude under wraps. “Hey, that was out of line. I—”

“As a matter of fact,” she said, overriding his apology, “I have received a proposal for marriage. Not just one, but two.”

Lisa immediately regretted her words. It wasn't as if she had any intention of marrying either man who'd proposed to her, and she didn't want to have to elaborate on the motivations behind their proposals. Based on the expression on Brick's face, however, she was in for the third degree.

And she would rather eat dirt than give him the details.

She smiled brightly. “I want a hot dog. I smelled them the minute I walked into the park, and my mouth's been watering ever since.” She turned away from Brick. “You think they're over—”

Brick snagged her arm. “Just one minute,” he said in a quiet, lethal voice. “Don't you want to tell me the rest of the story on these proposals?”

Lisa's nerves jangled inside her like a bunch of bells. “Not really. What I want is a hot dog,” she said, relieved that she'd managed not to meet his gaze. “And cotton candy,” she added for good measure.

Brick lowered his lips to her ear. “I thought since I was your friend you'd want to tell me your secrets.”

Lisa felt a sensual shiver buck and shimmy down her spine. Brick already knew far too many of her secrets. It was too easy to want to lean in to his strength, to turn her head and bury her face in his strong neck and breathe in the scent and sensation of him. Too easy, and she couldn't do it. Fighting the fine edge of desperation, she arched away from the lure of his mouth. “If you were my friend, you'd point me to the nearest hot-dog stand because you could see I'm about to starve to death.”

Still holding her wrist, Brick narrowed his eyes. He wanted to press her. She could feel the desire to demand war with the struggle for restraint emanating from him. In an instant his gaze changed and he shifted his clasp so that his fingers twined around hers. For all they'd shared, the gesture felt incredibly intimate, almost as if he were claiming her.

“I wouldn't ever want to be accused of not meeting your needs, Lisa.” His voice caused a deep visceral clench in her stomach. “Remember that.”

Her heart fluttered in her throat. She swallowed hard, but couldn't manage the words to tell him to let go of her hand.

 

Eight hours later after a full day at Beulah County's fair, they were flying up the highway toward Chattanooga with the T-top down and the night breeze blowing over them. Lisa sighed. She was pleasantly tired. At a different time, she would have snuggled closer to Brick and he would have rested his hand on her knee.

That was another lifetime, she told herself, straightening in her seat. Better to focus on something else. “Your family is nice. I like them, but with all those boys I can't help wondering if you fought a lot when you were growing up.”

Brick nodded. “My father let us knock each other around until we were teenagers. By then I guess he got tired of the furniture getting smashed.” He paused. “He worked on me a little earlier since I was the biggest.”

“Worked on you?”

“Yeah. I developed a nasty temper the year my mother got sick. I got sent home from school one day with a shiner.” Brick grinned. “The other guy had two, but my dad wasn't amused. He didn't scream or yell, though. He just told me to get to work on the lower forty. It took the whole summer on the working end of a hoe before I got my temper under control. I haven't hit anyone since.”

“Even Troy?” Lisa asked with a knowing smile.

Brick laughed. “Even Troy.”

“You must get angry sometime. What do you do now?”

“Not often,” Brick said, thinking, however, that he'd experienced some nearly uncontrollable frustration lately. He couldn't exactly explain that fact to Lisa if he wanted her to continue letting him be her friend. What a hell of a farce this was. He didn't want her trying out other men for husband material. He didn't want to stay away from her. He wanted her back. His eyes were focused on the road, but the sound of her voice and the every-now-and-then trace of her scent sent his libido into overdrive and his guts into a tangled mess.

Noticing that she was still waiting for him to respond, he shrugged. “I guess I do the usual things—count to ten, leave the room, crack my knuckles. And if it's really bad I—” He stopped, suddenly self-conscious.

Lisa leaned closer. “You what?”

“It's nothing. I just—”

“You just don't want to tell me,” she finished, disappointment coloring her voice.

Aw hell.
“Okay. I'll tell you one of my secrets if you tell me one of yours.”

She paused only a fraction of a moment. “Deal.”

“When I feel like I'm close to losing it, I whistle.”

There was a long gap of silence, then Lisa smothered a giggle. “Whistle?”

Brick threw a quick glance at her and grinned despite the fact that the joke was at his expense. “Yeah. Go ahead and laugh. You look like you're about to bust.”

Lisa let out a full-bodied, throaty laugh, the kind that made Brick's gut clench in memory.

“I'm just—” She coughed over another laugh. “I'm just trying to imagine how you do it.” She cleared her throat. “And why?”

“Well, it takes a lot of concentration if you whistle something intricate.”

“Okay. I'll buy that,” she said, sinking down in the leather seat. “But you know, I don't think I've ever heard you whistle.”

Brick thought for a long moment. “I guess I never got mad at you. I was too busy—” He stopped, unwilling to finish.

“Too busy?” she softly prompted.

Too busy falling in love.
His heart stopped at the realization. Hell, he would have to deal with that later. “Too busy being happy,” he said instead, and quickly changed the subject. “Time for the flip side of the deal. You gotta tell me one of your secrets.”

Lisa shifted in her seat. “Do I get to pick?”

Brick shook his head. “I want to know who proposed.”

Lisa groaned. “I should have seen this coming. It's no one you know. And I told both of them no.”

“That's a relief,” he muttered under his breath. “Who?”

She gave a long-suffering sigh. “One was this friend of a friend of a—”

“I get the picture,” he said dryly.

“He's a nice insurance salesman. Very religious.”

“And?” he persisted.

“And he wanted some wives. I believe he said six.”

“Six!” Brick shook his head. He couldn't have heard correctly.

“Yes. Six. He's involved in this new religious sect, and they're into polygamy and—”

“He wanted you to be wife number one!” Brick didn't even try to contain his mirth. “Sounds as if he was one helluva three-star guy.”

“Very funny. And you wonder why I didn't want to tell you.”

That sobered him up quickly. He inhaled a deep breath and deepened his voice in an effort to wipe away every vestige of amusement. “You said no.”

“Of course,” she said indignantly.

“What about number two?” They were nearing the city limits so Brick eased off the gas pedal a little bit.

“He's someone I know through my catering business. I guess you'd say he's a—uh—an entertainer type. One night I finished one of my jobs and I was feeling a little down. He took me out to a bar and—”

“Wait a minute.” Brick frowned and glanced at her. “What were you feeling down about?”

Lisa pushed a stray lock of hair behind her ears. “I don't know. It was temporary and he—”

“So why didn't you call me?” He pulled the car to a stop at the traffic light.

Lisa had a blank expression on her face. “I never thought of it.” She shrugged. “I never had before.”

Brick felt a sharp slice of pain as if she'd stabbed him and twisted the knife. It took him a moment to catch his breath. Had he really been so insensitive to her?

Lisa briefly touched his arm. “The light changed.”

Brick resisted the urge to cover her hand with his. He shook his head to clear it. “Yeah.” He mashed down on the accelerator. “Finish your story.”

Lisa gave him a wary glance. “Well, he's from a different country, and he needs to get a green card, so he thought…”

Brick felt a burning sensation begin in his stomach. He patted his pocket in search of his antacid. “You said no.”

“Right. I said no.” Feeling extremely uncomfortable, Lisa knitted her fingers together. After this conversation, Brick was probably going to think the only kind of men she attracted were weirdos. Focusing her gaze on the road in front of them, she braced herself for a string of “I told you sos.” When Brick remained silent instead, the hollow feeling inside her seemed to intensify.

Lisa slid a glance over to Brick. He appeared lost in thought. She looked at her hands again and restlessly tapped her watch. Catching sight of the time, she recalled her promise to check in with Senada. “Do you mind going by the new Renaissance Hotel? I need to see if Senada's doing all right with a party.”

Brick nodded and flicked on his turn signal. “No problem.”

Fifteen minutes later, Lisa and Brick were on the elevator rising to the fourth floor of Chattanooga's brand-new luxury hotel. Between the second and third floors, the car paused and jerked, and for a moment Lisa feared it was stuck. A grinding sound followed, though, and the car began moving again.

Lisa gave a nervous laugh of relief. “This elevator sounds like it needs a little work.”

Brick narrowed his eyes. “Since it's a new building, they may not have gotten all the kinks out yet. I'll mention it to the manager on our way out.”

The doors whooshed open. “You really didn't have to come with me. This will take only a minute.”

Brick followed her down the hall. “I've never seen you in action at work.”

“Since Senada's covering this party, I won't really be in on the action. I just thought I should check.” She led the way to a small kitchen where a group of food servers milled around. She pulled one aside and asked for Senada, whom she learned was in the main room.

“You can wait in here if you want,” she said to Brick, and slipped through a door. “I'll be right back.”

Brick watched the hustle and bustle of the servers as they returned empty dessert plates to the kitchen. From bits of their conversations, he gathered that this was a pre-wedding party for a bride-to-be, and the planned entertainment was the kind that engendered sly looks and snickers.

When he heard the first strains of a tune by Prince, Brick gave in to his curiosity and went into the main room. He scanned the room for Lisa, but the lights were turned down with the exception of a spotlight focused on a gyrating man.

He felt a mild amusement for the dancer until the guy whipped off his tuxedo jacket. His shirt followed next, then Brick shook his head as the man stripped off his pants to the chorus of yells and shouts from the mostly female audience.

Brick had seen a female stripper before. He'd even had a fantasy or two about Lisa baring her body and dancing privately for him. The dance wouldn't have lasted long, though, because he wouldn't have been able to keep his hands off of her. The thought made him tug at his collar.

He'd never watched a man strut around in a G-string, sidling up to the women and thrusting his hips first this way and that.

He felt embarrassed. It was silly. Brick didn't even know the guy, but he felt embarrassed for him. Brick switched his attention to the faces of the women. They seemed transfixed by the sight of the man, eager to touch him and slip money into his G-string. Brick wondered if this was some kind of secret fantasy women had. For all his wild imagination, Brick had never considered prancing around in a bump and grind for a woman's pleasure. He pictured performing the same kind of sensual dance for Lisa and strangely enough, the notion held some appeal.

Suddenly the stripper moved across the room and tugged a woman into his arms. He whirled her in a quick suggestive tango where his hips slid against hers. Despite his discomfort, Brick felt mildly aroused. The seductive tangle of male against female reminded him of how long he'd been without Lisa.

Folding his arms over his chest, he narrowed his eyes and took a closer look at the woman who seemed to be trying to push the amorous dancer away. Brick blinked, and his discomfort, mild amusement and arousal all burned to cinders. Fury rushed through him.

That slimy sonovabitch was dancing with Lisa.

At the front of the room, Lisa tugged one hand away only to have Henri clasp the other.
“Let me go,”
Lisa said as she pushed against his shiny, hairless chest. “You're supposed to be doing this with the guests, not me.”

“But,
chérie,
you inspire me. You will inspire the crowd too.”

“I don't want to inspire you,” she managed through gritted teeth as she freed one of her hands and backed slightly away.

“You're angry,” he said, wearing a hurt expression.

Lisa felt the first tendrils of guilt wrapping around her. Henri was like an overenthusiastic puppy who was prone to mistakes. She hated hurting his feelings. Looking away, she squinted her eyes against the spotlight. “Not really,” she hedged. “Go dance with the bride-to-be and I'll be much happier.”

Henri nodded. “Your happiness is my greatest reward.” He made one last sinuous move against her and whispered in her ear, “We must talk again of marriage.”

“I don't think so,” Lisa muttered, as she finally escaped Henri's clutches. She hurried over to Senada. “I can only pray that Brick missed this little spectacle.”

Senada shrugged and waved for a server to bring more champagne to one of the tables. “What do you care? You said you're through with him.”

“Well I am, but—” Lisa's voice dissolved into a little moan as her gaze fell on a familiar masculine form in the back of the room. Her stomach twisted into a square knot. She felt a wave of defeat. Ever since she'd begun her quest for a husband, it had seemed as if the forces of the universe were conspiring against her.