Stone: At Your Service (Carolina Bad Boys #1) (28 page)

“
That
is Catarina Steele. She runs the accounts side of things with her brothers at Chrome and Steele Auto Parts. We just started working with ’em.”

Catarina was
as cool as they came. Anyone could tell she had a great figure, a nice ass, even under the strictly professional cut of her suit, but no one touched it, touched her, or talked about wanting to tap that. Not in her presence or anyone else’s.

“
Maybe I might oughtta go talk to her about some parts I need.” His wide grin dug deep dimples into his cheeks.

I thought about warning Nicky but decided against it. I could use some entertainment. Bringing Leelee in front of me, I looped my arms around her
waist and set my chin on her shoulder as he ambled off.

“
What’s that all about?” she asked.

“
That
is a woman who is exactly Nicky’s type. Hair color, her figure, none of that matters. He likes a challenge, and he ain’t had one of them in as long as I can remember.” I kissed the pulse on the side of her neck. She shivered in my arms. “And that is Nicky about to get his ass handed to him.”

Sure enough, no sooner had he said hello to Ray
—managing to get the dude to return to the building—Nicky exchanged a few words with Catarina. Her shoulders turned tighter than her features. He lifted his hand, presumably to twirl his fingers around a loosened strand of her hair, and said something else, his arrogant smile firmly in place.

The second his fingers made contact with her hair,
Catarina grabbed his wrist in one hand and sent a crack across his face with the other.

I snorted at his stunned look and muttered,
“Ouch.”

Leelee elbowed me.

We stood to the side as Catarina roared from the parking lot, barely jerking her chin at me through the windshield of her car.

A little less full of himself, although not much, Nicky
strolled over.

“
What’d you say to her?”

He stretched his jaw back and forth with a wince.
“I called her Wildcat, you know, because of her name.”

“
Oooh, burned. Hurt much?” I stared at the handprint spreading across his cheek.

Leelee stifled
her laughter while Nicky glared at me. “Just tell me she treats all the guys like this.”

I towed Leelee over to the passenger side of the Bronco.
“’Fraid not. I’ve never even seen her crack a smile, let alone get so riled up she lost her shit. She’s all about business, that’s why I like dealing with her.”

“
Shit.” A grin slid across Nicky’s lips. “Looks like I hit a nerve.”

****

“Oh, Josh, it’s beautiful!” Leelee stood on the walkway in front of my house. White picket fence, two-story Victorian with black plantation shutters, wrap-around porch, decent-sized yards front and back . . . the whole shebang.

I took her elbow as we went up the stairs and through the front door. Letting her wander around at her leisure, I hurried back to collect her luggage. I dropped the bags inside, tracked her down in the kitchen, and sandwiched her between the worktop island and my body.

Her eyes glowed. “What?”

Tracing the outline of her lips with my thumb, I frowned.
“What is this? I mean, we love each other, yeah, but Louisiana, South Carolina?” My fingers slid up to cup her face. “I don’t want the kid conflicted and I’m not thrilled about you being out of sight, let alone four states away.”

“
What do you want?”

Dangerous question.
Basically everything, with her. “I want you to stay.”

“
For how long though?”

I snorted.
“Yeah, about that. I was thinking maybe . . . forever?”

Her head shook until she rested it in the crook of my neck, but her smile had been soft.
“I’d love to stay, Josh. I don’t want to mess you or JJ around.” Her voice turned into a whisper. “I didn’t book a return flight.”

I pushed her back so I could look at her.
“Really?”

“
Yes, but I think—since there’s that little thing of only knowin’ each other a week, and all the kerfuffle . . .”

“
Kerfuffle?” One of my eyebrows lifted as well as a corner of my mouth.

“
You, Nicky, gay, not gay . . . seduction . . . dancing.” She ended with a sigh.

“
Hmm
.” I tangled my hands in her hair and went for her neck with a kiss that slid to her ear. “I like dancin’ with you, Leelee.”

I waltzed her around the kitchen, enjoying the feel of her in my arms and the enormous possibilities of her staying with me.

“So, I’ll stay for a couple weeks, and then we can figure out if it works.” Her voice melted against my skin.

“
Oh ye of little faith. It’ll work.” I dipped her, my lips finding the hollow of her shoulder, sucking lightly. “JJ will be home soon. Let’s get you settled.”

I grabbed her things and propelled her up the stairs into my room. Our room. Clean and tidy, fresh and bright, I couldn
’t wait to see what sort of mayhem she made out of it. I emptied drawers—not that she’d use them as she seemed to prefer her belongings strewn all over the furniture—but the idea of her underthings in my dresser gave me a frigging thrill. I shoved my stuff to one side of the large closet and turned around to find Leelee staring at me with her hands on her hips.

“
Are you sure you want to put me in your bedroom, sug? What about JJ and confusion?”

I swaggered to her and pulled her into my arms.
“This—you and me together—isn’t confusing. He’s gotta know where you fit in our lives.”

“
But you’ve never had anyone here before?”

Hell no. I
’d booted them out as soon as the sheets cooled. Jesus, I’d been a bastard. I’d never been like that with Leelee, never would be. “No, not while he was home.”

“
What if he hates me, Josh?”

“
Babe, the kid’s best friend is Nicky’s bitch pooch, a scary demon thing called Viper. He ain’t gonna hate sweet you.”

Her eyes twinkled and
her long eyelashes fluttered. “Are you sure?”

I swatted her ass.
“Yeah. Listen, I’m grubby as fuck so I’m gonna jump in the shower. You do your thing.” I glanced one last time at my spotless room. “And keep a watch out for my ma?”

“
Sure thing.” She pinched my butt in return.

Ma hadn
’t arrived by the time I’d done a cursory clean up. Neither had Leelee demolished the bedroom, yet. She unpacked, tossing whatever came to hand into various drawers with no rhyme or reason whatsoever while I lounged on the bed, grinning like a fool.

I saw the smile flirting around her lips and the glances she sent me.

Jesus, she was gorgeous.

I kissed the side of her neck and headed downstairs when I heard Ma
’s car. She sped off with a toot of her horn as soon as I collected JJ from the car seat and his stuff from the trunk, the soft top on her convertible sliding down at her push of a button. 

Suddenly m
y palms sweated. Shit, I was nervous. The two most important people in my life were about to meet.

On the porch,
I set down the kid’s knapsack and blankie, plus a bag of possible contraband sugary items. I crouched at his level. “Did Jamma say anything new to you today?”

His face scrunched up.
“Um, she said she got the burn in her heart after we ate us some chili dogs at Cosmic Dogs, and dat the traffic on seven’een so bad she might well crawl us home.” He scratched his tummy. “I think that it, Daddy.”

I hugged him to me. Goddamn killed me every time.
Bad grammar and all. “Well, we’ve got someone visiting for a while.”
Maybe forever, hopefully forever.
“Her name’s Leelee. I love her, son.”

Fidgeting from my arms, he sat cross-legged in front of me, cheek in his hand, guileless green-gray eyes blinking.
“I wuv everyone you wuv, Daddy.” He held up all five fingers of one hand. “Jamma, Wicky, Viper,”
ha!
, “I wuv Gerald and Way, Harvey . . .”

I laughed every damn time he called Javier Harvey.

He held up his other hand for more fingers to count. “I even wuv Momma. She didn’t wuv me back.”

My chest heaved several times and my throat tightened. I mashed him against me becau
se I didn’t want him to see me
weaking
again. “Momma loved you, kid. Your momma loved you, she loves you, okay? Sometimes people, they just don’t fit.” With my hand engulfing his entire head, I rocked him with me. “How could anyone not love you?”

“
Will Weewee wuv me?”

Holy shit. If I hadn
’t been crying, I’d have fallen over laughing. We needed to work on his enunciation. “I bet she already does, baby boy. Are you okay with this?”

“
Does she sing Disney songs too?” Wide-eyed, he wondered.

Well, shit, I didn
’t know. It hadn’t been on my to-do list when I’d thought about winning Leelee back into my life. “Maybe we oughtta go find out.”

I walked him inside. He only came up to my knees and his fingers curled
around mine, reminding me of the way he’d latched onto my thumb the first time I’d held him. Newborn, and sweet smelling, and the most fragile piece of bliss I’d ever known.

Another slice of the
promised land waited beyond the doors. Leelee was all smiles and a few tears she blinked away as we entered the house. I couldn’t speak. I opened my arm, inviting her into my family. I looked at Leelee pressed against one side of me, JJ on the other. They both peered up at me, and I had to swallow past the hard knot in my throat.

“
JJ, this is Leelee.” I patted her waist and squeezed his hand. Leelee’s fingers dug into my chest, all of our emotions centered there. “Leelee, this is my baby boy.” Love and hope so massive in that moment, they were etched in my soul and on my heart. “He wants to know if you sing Disney songs.”

She slipped free of me, kneeling down
to shrink herself to my son’s height. “I sure do. But I’m a girl so I like the princesses better. That Flynn Rider has a lot to answer for.”

B
reath exploded from my chest when JJ nodded so very seriously at her. In fact, my goddamn heart reached up to my throat and stayed there while I watched the two of them meet, eye-to-eye.

Leelee gathered his free hand between hers.
“Now, I do like me some
Little Mermaid
. What about you?”

“
Ursuwa the sea witch kinda scares me.” The kid shivered all over his body, and his hand slipped from mine.

“
Me too.” Leelee’s eyes popped wide. “No one likes a witch, do they?”

“
Nuh uh. Can I show you my new fairy stowybook? It’s in my woom. Daddy don’t care, do you?” He didn’t wait one way or the other. JJ pulled her hand and she scampered to her feet.

“’
Course you can, didn’t you know I love fairytales, darlin’?” She toed off her high heels and padded to the stairs.

The kid hung back for a second, their hands connected, the both of them
linked to me, to my heart. 

“
Daddy, she wooks wike Ariel!” And he was a goner, toddling off beside her.

My throat was dry, my eyes wet
as I watched my son and my woman walk up the stairs, sharing secrets, hand-in-hand.

Stone: At Her Service

A WEEK AND A half later, the kid and I took up residence in the kitchen, making a total mess of the place. We fried up fresh catfish and I tried my hand at making jalapeno hushpuppies because Leelee had ordered them when we went to Red’s Ice House. Friday night at home, I was happy to stay put instead of scoring on the bar scene. I laughed when the kid held up gooey, fish-battered fingers, trying to smear them on my face from where he perched on the counter.

Leelee looked over at us, a smile on her lips with a pen pushed behind her ear. She was in the living room, writing, visible through the open archway, and still here. She liked to move around the house at different times of the day, following sunlight like a sunflower opening, blossoming. The porches, the kitchen, and if she was really on a roll, she lugged her laptop
upstairs later at night to the cozy office we shared while I scratched through paperwork. The writer’s block was gone. The professional fears caused by LaForge and the anxiety to write faster and faster vanished. And just like her, the second story in her trilogy bloomed.

Sometimes she read to me from her day
’s work. The hot passages dripping from her low-toned voice made me harder than a plank, and made for good sex long into the night, but so did basically anything she did. Leelee laughing, her wet from a shower or pink from a bath, her tousled head pillowed on my shoulder as she woke in the morning. Lazy as a feline, stretching on top of me.

The flirting, the occasional fighting because she would never be less than feisty as hell, this thing about making a life—a home—to
gether, got me right in the gut. It pushed up to my heart and filled it until I thought it would explode with happiness.

Fuck me. I
’m turnin’ into a Hallmark card.

I
went back to helping JJ form misshapen balls that pretended to be hushpuppies. I kept sneaking glances at Leelee though. She stretched out on the floor, legs spread wide, leaning over onto her elbows as she tapped across the keyboard of her laptop. In faded sweats, her hair in a ponytail, wearing one of my threadbare T-shirts, she walked a fine line between relaxed innocence and getting her bones jumped. Jesus. I certainly couldn’t go after her, not with the kid around. Some things wouldn’t do even though he was used to our hand-holding, hugging, and even our kisses, because I wasn’t going to hide my love for her. Touching Leelee was as vital as breathing. And he’d taken to her like she was the next best thing since chicken nuggets chased with a hot fudge sundae.

Starting
up the fryer with JJ coloring at the table and possibly all over it, I realized I was almost one hundred percent domesticated and loving every fucking minute of it.

I pressed the timer on the range and sat across from
the kid. “Whatcha drawing, baby boy?”

He shoved the piece of paper at me and kept doodling, on his hand.
“Guess!”

Crap, I hated this game. I mean, how the
hell was I supposed to know what a tentacle-mass of red waves and a tent-shape with purple flowers was supposed to be?

I ran a fingertip over the scribbles.
“Gimme a hint?”

“
Dat a pitcher of someone I like.”

Squinting, I saw it then, in a surreal way. I dropped my voice.
“Leelee?”

“
Good, Daddy! She’s wearin’ dat dress from the day I met her!” He squealed, all semblance of being secretive off the table. Climbing off his chair and into my lap, he turned down the volume to whisper, “Can we keep her?”

Oh my hell, like she was a pet. Leelee and I
had discussed it. We’d made it barely a week before both our minds were made up. We worked,
this
worked, the three of us together. Spending more time apart meant unnecessary pain.

She was staying.
“I can write anywhere, but there’s only one Stone’s, Josh. This is your home, and I want it to be mine too,” she’d said.

And it was
. High heels, mountains of dresses, cosmetics, files, folders, books and all, strewn around our bedroom, bathroom, and the office. Fuck if I even wanted to change a thing. Leelee was a hurricane-level storm that upended my life, made it chaotic and crazy, and more complete than I’d ever thought possible.

“
Yeah, kid, we can keep her.” We fell into hair-ruffling, tummy-tickling awesomeness.

Walking into the living room after tucking JJ in at the table with a full-body bib, I hunched before Leelee. She blinked up at me, pulling out of the writing daze that captured her for hours.

I slid my fingers down her neck. “Hey, babe. Dinner’s on.”

C
urving her arms above her head as she stretched and did that feline thing I liked, she said, “You know, you two are so cute, Josh.”

Cute. My grin grew dangerous. The atmosphere charged as her eyes strayed to my mouth and stayed there. Her breath deepened, her cheeks heated.

She’d eat those words later, with my cock in her mouth.

And she did. Not long after the kid had passed out cold for the night, she found me in the living room.
“Still got that hat, Stone?”

“
Why? You got plans for me, babe?” My hard-on formed in anticipation as I sat on the couch.

Leelee lifted off her
T-shirt, slipped out of the sweats, and let her hair down. Completely utterly fuckably naked, she stood several steps away, moving her hips in a suggestive dance. “I think I wanna go for a ride.”

“
Hat’s in the hall closet,” I croaked.

“
Don’t move.”

I watched her ass swish-sway away, in complete agony as my cock lengthened down the inseam of my jeans.

On her return, she wore my fedora at a sexy angle. She leaned over me so I could take long hard draws on her nipples while she slowly pulled my erection out of my jeans.

My aching length
pumped in her enclosed fist. “Fuuuck, Leelee.”

She put the hat on my head, lowering to her
knees between my spread thighs. Her mouth engulfed me in one swift, wet move. All the muscles in my body screamed with pressure.

Her mouth worked me to
the breaking point, her fingers ripping at the buttons of my shirt and pulling it open. I shrugged it off, one hand guiding the back of her head up and down.

Rigid, slick, shiny swollen, my cock slapped my stomach when she released it.

I pulled her onto my lap and thrust into her hot sheath without warning. I swallowed her yell with my mouth and grunted, “Josh Stone. At your service, babe.”

****

The following week, coming up on mid-July, Leelee and I headed out of town. We’d pick up a U-Haul in Shreveport, tow my car, and drive her belongings back to South Carolina. She planned to put the condo up for sale in hopes of making enough profit to cover the mortgage Patrick Fuckstick had saddled her with. It hurt like hell to leave the kid—only my second time—but we needed this time together. We craved it.

He gave his blessing
with a book he’d stapled together complete with hacked-off edges from safety scissors that didn’t even fit my fingers. The pages opened to gaudy, blobby drawings of castles and, well, I couldn’t make out much of the rest until the end. The final page showed a picture of three people holding hands. The red hair was a dead giveaway for Leelee. The bright blue cape on the smallest figure was his. And between them both was a giant—shit, had he made me a Cyclops?—linking them all together. A lopsided heart surrounding us.

I tucked the book under the visor of
my muscle car. Gripping Leelee’s hand, I drove away, trying not to look back or turn the car around.

The
’69 Camaro, on the road, with my woman: life couldn’t get much better. She proved to be more entertaining company than Nicky’s waxed ass by far. We took our time, doing the tourist thing through Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi, staying at inns instead of dime-a-dozen hotels. Every night was a new romantic pit stop.

Roman
tic may have been stretching it. Once we left Mt. Pleasant, we were all over each other every chance we got. The domesticated animal gave way to pure male greed. Leelee was right there with me, as hungry for the clothes-tearing, hair-grabbing, wet, loud, horny sex as me.

By the time we
arrived at her apartment to pack it up in the four days we’d allotted, my Camaro resembled the cracked-up state of her hotel room in Atlanta. It’d all started with one innocent straw wrapper from a Sonic Cherry Limeade and had grown to out-of-control proportions. I swore, she had a hundred changes of clothes stowed beneath the seats alone.

It wa
s one thing to mess up my house. I could always hire a maid. It was another to annihilate the Camaro. On that last day of driving, I’d had to change a flat—no biggie—but that was work shit I didn’t want to drag into our vacation. I hadn’t been able to reach the kid all day, and I was in a
fine snit
when I finally parked outside her place.

It was sweltering outside, late at night. We had a couple hours to start clearing before falling asleep exhausted and meeting her folks for brunch
the next morning. I needed a shower for myself as well as an excavator for the car to be able to see the floor mats again.

I slammed
my door, stomping over to open Leelee’s before she found the handle, probably because it was hidden under her usual debris.

My shoulders stiff, I formally bowed.
“At your service, it seems.”

Her l
ong legs flashed out of the car. “You got a problem all of a sudden,
Stone
?”

She did not
wanna pick that fight with me.

I pressed her against the hood, hot as the surface of the sun after driving
four hours straight. “Yeah, maybe I do. When are you gonna start pickin’ up after yourself?”

“
You weren’t complaining about how sloppy I was last night when I sucked your balls until you shouted my name so loud the manager called our room.”

Her reminder made my anger over stupid shit morph
straight into lust. Zero to sixty, three seconds flat.

“
Maybe what you need is a homemaker
à
la
Father Knows Best
instead of me. That would suit your old school, macho image.” She sneered.

Parting her thighs, I stood inside them, rigid against her.
“You’re asking for it, Leelee.”

“
Look, I don’t know what crawled up your ass, Mr. Pissy Pants, but you’re not the boss of—”

“
You might wanna rethink saying
you’re not the boss of me
, babe.” I pushed in tight. “I ain’t your boss, don’t wanna be. But I am your man.”

“
You arrogant pig!”

“
Wrong words, woman.” I lunged inside her mouth with a kiss so full of force and passion, I groaned with the way she gave it up, clinging to me, pulling me down.

She held me with one hand
around my neck. She tried to drive me back with a palm to my chest. I smirked before attaching my mouth to the shivery point on her collarbone.

“
Oh God, Josh, you’re not gonna—” She gasped when I slipped two fingers under her panties, finding the warm, silky opening and her clit.

“
I’m gonna fuck you right here, on top of my car.” One handed, I unzipped. I stroked my cock, watching the way she draped on the hood, one knee raised. Sure she wanted it, positive she was ready, I slammed inside. “We’re about to wake the neighbors.”

Frustration, fury, fatigue boiled down to this hardcore, raw fucking. I powered inside of
her. I wanted to be in her skin. The next best thing was Leelee supporting herself on one hand, her head dropped back, her hips pumping up.

Her pussy rippled around me, blanking everything from my mind but
the pure ecstasy that burst inside of me—mind, body, sight, muscles tautened until I roared.

She burned against me, around me, shaking from her le
gs to her tits. I held the back of her head, protecting her from the unforgivable metal of the car.

When she slumped, I did too. Her fingers
combed through my hair. “You been thinkin’ about doing that for a while?”

“
Maybe.” I could fall asleep right there, her satisfied purr better than any engine I’d ever worked on.

“
It’s probably a good thing I’m moving out.” Leelee dragged herself back together as lights came on from inside a couple apartments.

I lifted her against me, one arm beneath her knees and the other
around her back. “I reckon.”

A messy car to deal with in exchange for one incredible woman who turned my world upside down, inside out, and perfectly right?
Worth it.

The next morning t
he prospect of meeting her folks shot my nerves to shit. I compounded the frazzled edge by downing two cups of black coffee. On the drive over, I couldn’t sit still. I was turning into the kid.