Tough Luck Hero (21 page)

“No? Who does get to say things like that to you, Lydia? Do you have anyone who gives you honesty? Or do you hold everybody at a distance?”

“Again, none of your business.”

“Have you only been with two men because you're discerning, or is it because you don't like to let people close to you?”

She sputtered, dumping the handful of pamphlets she had back into the box they had come out of. “I can't imagine why I don't pursue more relationships. Because this one is so much fun.”

“You were having fun a few minutes ago.”

She whirled around to face him, her expression furious. “Colton, I like you best with your zipper down and your mouth shut.”

Her words hit him like a flame, burning over his skin. “That can be arranged.”

“No,” she said, picking up the box of pamphlets, leaving the rest on the floor. “It can't be.”

“You think you can resist me?”

He had no idea what he was saying. He had never attempted to seduce a woman before. He'd never had...this. Whatever this was. It was some kind of insanity that he had never known existed inside of him. Some kind of ridiculous drive that he would have said he was above.

Impulsiveness, recklessness, that was his brother Gage's MO. Colton had never been that; he had never done those things. He had never had the luxury.

You have it now. With her.

It was true. In a weird way, it kind of made sense. They were married, which gave whatever this was more legitimacy than any other relationship he'd ever been in. And sure, it was fake. And they both knew it. But no one else did. They could have this. This pure, hot, sexual thing, and no one would ever know. They could both lose control, in a very controlled way.

It was irresistible as far as he was concerned. He could tell that his potential partner in crime was not similarly convinced. Risky behavior for the risk averse.

“I
know
I can resist you,” she said. She began to walk through the living room, heading toward the front door.

“Like you did just now?”

“Like I did in Las Vegas, asshole.” She opened the front door, then slammed it behind her, leaving him standing in her living room.

He charged after her, flinging the door wide-open again. “Are you just going to leave me in your house? Because I don't have a key. I can't lock up or anything.”

“I was going to come back,” she shouted, opening up her car and putting her box in the trunk. “Darling,” she added for good measure, in case the neighbors were listening, clearly. Because what couple didn't scream endearments to each other from the driveway?

“Well, I would be happy to do whatever you need me to do, peaches,” he retorted.

“You're always thinking of me.”

“I always make sure you come first,” he said, speaking heavily of the orgasm that he'd treated her to a few moments before. And obviously, Lydia picked up on that. Not that hard, since it was as subtle as a drunken Vegas wedding.

She growled, walking up the steps, her posture so divergent from what he usually saw, from Lydia, the staid and steady politician, that he could have laughed. She looked a whole lot more like a recalcitrant teenager.

She went back inside for a moment, then reappeared with her purse. Then she closed the door, locking it behind them. “The lights are on a timer,” she said.

“Never let it be said that you aren't efficient.”

“It would never be said, Colton. Because it would be a lie.”

She walked back down the steps and got into her car, starting the engine and slamming the driver-side door shut behind her. He walked over to the window and tapped the glass. She narrowed her eyes, evil intent glittering in them. He didn't really care. He was past the point of common sense. He was past the point of control. He was at least ten miles past Colton West, and he had no idea who the hell he was right now.

“You didn't give me a kiss goodbye,” he said as she rolled the window down.

“How silly of me,” she said, clearly reluctant to tell him where he could shove his kiss, just in case. The picket fences had ears in this part of the world.

She looked around, probably aware there were likely people sitting on their front porches, or any manner of small-town nonsense. Walking their dogs, watering the rhododendrons late.

Then she looked back at him. “I'm waiting,” she said. The challenge in her eyes spurred him on.

But it wasn't only the challenge in her eyes. It was just the fact that he wanted to kiss her again.

He leaned in, closing the short distance between them and claiming her mouth with his. It was hot, it was fast, it touched him all the way down deep. Grabbed hold of his cock and squeezed tight. He would have her again now. Right now. If she would have him.

He could tell by the flush in her cheeks that she would. It was only her pride that wouldn't let her admit it.

“Good night,” he said, turning away from her and heading back to his truck.

She wasn't going to resist him; that much he knew. And he was determined. If he was going to be trapped in a marriage, then he was going to have his cake and eat it too.

He wasn't the kind of man who did things like this. At least, he hadn't been.

As far as he was concerned, for the next couple of months, all bets were off.

* * *

L
YDIA
SLUNK
INTO
her bedroom, box of pamphlets in her arms, hoping that she could handily avoid Colton for the rest of the evening.

What had she done? Her head was spinning; she didn't know how to process anything. Didn't know how she felt about the fact that they hadn't had sex in Vegas, and that they
had
had sex on her living room floor. Or rather, half on the living room floor, half on her campaign materials.

She groaned, crawling into bed and feeling a spike of humiliation when she realized that she was wearing her thermals.

What the hell was wrong with her? She had retreated like a terrified rodent after they'd made love, then she had appeared in what had to be her most embarrassing pajamas. She should have just brazened it out. Walked into the living room naked and grabbed her clothes. It could not have been more embarrassing than prancing around in this.

Or maybe it could have been. But really, she was kind of at max capacity with humiliation, so did it even matter at this point? Fatal was fatal. And this was definitely fatal.

One just might have killed her slightly quicker.

She grabbed hold of her cell phone, tapping the screen, debating whether or not she should make a phone call. She could just marinate in her humiliation alone. She wasn't used to having humiliation, so she didn't really know what to do with it. There really was no standard operating procedure for ill-advised sex. Not in her life.

But she knew someone who would know. That just meant confiding. It meant doing an actual, intimate friend thing.

She let out an exasperated breath and dialed Sadie's number. The phone rang twice before she picked up.

“Lydia? Is everything okay? It's kind of late.”

Lydia groaned. It was late. And she was a self-centered ass. “I'm sorry. I didn't think to check the time.”

“That's okay. I'm not normally in bed this early. But I'm kind of wiped out.”

“Is everything okay?” Lydia asked.

“Yes,” Sadie said, “everything's fine. I thought maybe Colton might have told you, since my loose-lipped husband let me know that he told Colton at the dinner last night.”

“He didn't tell me anything,” Lydia said. Mostly because she'd done her very best not to talk to him at all, and even when they'd been together this evening, talking had been minimal. “What's going on?”

“I'm pregnant.”

“What?” Lydia nearly shrieked into the phone. “That's great!”

On the heels of the initial euphoria came a strange kind of weight. That was what happened now when people she knew were pregnant. Or engaged. Because she was thirty. Because, even though a large portion of her wasn't entirely certain she wanted those things for herself, there were parts of her that ached for them either way.

“Yes, it's pretty exciting. I'm not very far along, so we weren't really going to tell people yet. But the chatty sheriff can't seem to keep a secret. So the information is leaking out in strange and disorganized ways. I wanted to tell you myself. And, I wanted to tell you
not
at ten-thirty when you were clearly calling about something else, but I couldn't wait. And now I feel like I've co-opted whatever's happening with you.”

“Co-opt away. A baby is a lot nicer of a topic than what I'm calling about.”

“What's wrong?” Sadie asked. “Now you're freaking me out a little bit.”

“There's no reason to be freaked out. I'm not dying or anything.”

“Did you slip in the polls? Did all of the money that we raised get stolen? Are you running away to join a rock band?”

“You're ridiculous. And no. It's just...I slept with Colton again.”

“You slept with him like you two had a slumber party, or is this euphemistic?”

“It's euphemistic,” she whispered. “There was no sleeping at all.”

“Excellent!” Sadie chirped in her ear.

“Nothing is excellent about this. It was a terrible decision. Colton and I are... We are nothing, with a marriage license. I have an election to worry about and I can't afford to be dealing with whatever this is.”

“Was the sex good?”

“It was amazing, but I fail to see what that has to do with anything.”

Sadie made a scoffing sound. “That has everything to do with
everything
. If the sex sucked then I can see you being disappointed. Of course, if the sex was terrible I guess you wouldn't be conflicted about it.” There was a slight pause. “But I'm not really sure why you're conflicted about good sex.”

“Sadie, I have been very celibate. I think you can figure out with that little bit of information that I'm not really the kind of person who does
just
sex.”

“While I was not...inactive in my day, I was more one for relationships myself,” Sadie said, “but I hear just sex works.”

“When does it work? What does it work for?”

“Orgasms.”

Lydia's face flamed and she turned over onto her stomach, nuzzling her pillow. “Well, yes, there was that,” she said, her words muffled.

“Then why are you so distressed? Recently orgasmed women should not sound so distressed.”

“Because! This just isn't the kind of thing that I usually do.”

“Why?”

“Because. I don't... I like control. And this is kind of the opposite of that. Also, it's potentially messy.”

“So let me get this straight. You've found a guy who makes you,
you
, Lydia Carpenter, feel out of control, when I'm pretty sure driving your car through a patch of black ice won't do that. And somehow this is a bad thing?”

“Yes. It is my version of crawling into a cage with tigers.”

“I think you should embrace it,” Sadie said.

“Why do you think I should embrace it, Sadie?” Lydia asked, even while realizing this was basically the sole reason she had called Sadie in the first place. Because Sadie would support the decision to have sex with Colton again. Unless it was a really, really terrible idea, Sadie would definitely fall into the
have fun
camp.

And that was obviously what Lydia was looking for. Someone to validate what she couldn't find it in herself to validate.

You didn't want advice. You wanted Sadie to be your shoulder devil.

She couldn't even let herself get away with sneaky behavior. She was internally calling herself out for it already.

“Because embracing a hot guy while having doubts is more fun than embracing your pillow and feeling horny?”

Lydia pushed herself up and brushed her hair out of her face. “You know this how?”

“I'm not a saint, Lydia, as mentioned.”

“Yes, but you said you were a relationship person.”

“Yes,” Sadie said slowly.

“So this...the sex-only thing was you and Eli.”

Sadie all but hooted into her ear. It was not the most genuine hoot. “Can you imagine? Can you imagine Eli...doing only sex. Just sex and no...promise ring or whatever? Ha.”

“That was not convincing.” She and Sadie hadn't been friends when Sadie and Eli got together, and then, Lydia imagined out of concern for her feelings, Sadie had never really talked much about the circumstances of them getting together.

But Lydia was post-Eli and had been for a while, so it really didn't matter to her. And her friend was being conniving.

“You know how he is,” Sadie said.

“A man.”

Sadie made a tsk-tsking sound. “Okay. Fine. So he was my one attempt at a sex-only relationship.”

“Sadie!” Lydia scolded. “You can't advise me based on the fact that you think I'm going to marry Colton for real if we start having just sex.”

“But you're so cute together.”

“We're not cute. He calls me peaches. And I think he's the most annoying man ever.”

“Because you like him. Because this kind of thing makes you eleven again and sticks you right back onto the playground. Of love. Chasing each other around and him trying to pull your pigtails.”

“There is no playground of love, Sadie,” Lydia said fiercely. “This is a terrifying parking lot carnival of lust. Full of danger and bad decisions. The Ferris wheel is being run by a guy with a neck tattoo and, sure, you might make it all the way to the top, but also the whole basket could fall and burst into flame and that's how you die. In a mall parking lot in a ball of fire.”

She flopped onto her back and threw her arm over her eyes.

Sadie sighed heavily into Lydia's ear. “Okay,” she said. “Do you want to know what I think?”