Authors: Lorelei James
Tags: #Romance, #Contemporary, #Adult, #Western, #Red Hots!, #Contemporary Romance
All Jacked Up (22 page)
“The hell of it was after we all compared stories, we realized as well as Keely knew all of us, we didn’t know her as an adult at all. That’s what hurt her the worst.”
“I imagine it did.” Jack knocked back the other shot, struggling to control his emotions, mostly his admiration for the woman who acted out of love with no expectation but to be loved in return. It was damn humbling to realize he’d never had that deep connection with any one person, let alone the sheer number of 130
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people Keely connected with on a daily basis. The sheer number of people who benefited just from having Keely McKay in their lives.
What would it be like to be on the receiving end of such devotion? Or to have the balls to give it back in return without fear?
“Jack?” Carter prompted. “What’s wrong?”
Everything
. “Nothing. Just trying to wrap my head around all this about Keely. AJ didn’t know what she was up to? What about Chassie? Or Ramona?”
“My guess is Ramona knew what Keely was doing. AJ and Chassie are wrapped up in husbands and kids, whereas Ramona is single and probably understands Keely’s drive.”
“So what happened afterward?”
“We groveled. Big time.”
Jack laughed softly. Even when his heart broke a little for the woman who gave so much.
“She cried a lot and called us names, but she forgave us because she’s just that way. Girl’s got a heart as big as Wyoming.” Carter rubbed his chin. “My point is, you are more like her than you realize, Jack.
You both work hard to keep your personal and professional lives separate. I figure she’s entitled to be out every night of the week if it makes up for all the years she didn’t get to have fun.”
“Fun? Weren’t you the one who told me she was such a wild child?”
“In high school,” Carter scoffed. “That was a decade ago. She might’ve mixed it up a little when she first went off to college in Denver, or cut loose when she came home, but her life changed after Cam was injured.”
That made sense. But why hadn’t Keely shared any of this? Didn’t she trust him? Especially after he’d opened up to her about his family issues? He took a deep breath, trying to relieve the tension distorting his muscles. “I appreciate you telling me.”
But Carter wasn’t paying attention to him. His focus was beyond Jack’s shoulder. He muttered,
“Fuck.”
“What?”
“Nothin’. I’m getting tired. Now that we’re done with business we oughta hit the road.”
Jack squinted at the clock. “It’s ten. You don’t have the wife and kids here. I’m not all in for getting shitfaced, but why are you so eager to leave?”
“No reason. Just tired.”
Then Jack knew. Keely was here. The question was: who was she here with? “Where is she?”
“On the dance floor.”
He wished he had another goddamn shot to suck down. “Alone?”
Carter shook his head.
Jack snarled.
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Before he bolted, Carter grabbed his forearm. “It’s just her friend Michael. Don’t go after him.”
“It’s not Michael I’m going after.”
“Jack—”
“Don’t wait around.” He tore his arm from Carter’s grip and exited the booth.
Jack didn’t barrel up and pull Keely off the dance floor. He watched from the shadows, planning to ambush her. If she fought, he’d drag her out of the damn bar by her hair.
When had he started giving into his caveman mentality?
The fast song ended. Some crap with too much slide steel guitar and a mournful fiddle started. His ears threatened to bleed. He hated country music. But he wouldn’t stand by and let another man hold his woman.
Jack stalked to the dance floor. The guy with his hands on Keely leapt back.
“Keely and I are just friends. We were just dancin’.”
Keely whirled around. “Jack? What are you doin’ here?”
“Surprised to see me, buttercup?” He gave Michael a feral smile. “Get lost.”
The guy left skid marks he dashed off so fast.
“Oh. My. God. You did not just—”
Jack grabbed her, plastering their bodies together. He put his mouth on her ear. “I warned you. The only man allowed to touch you is me. That includes dancing. So make nice or I will make the rest of your night a living hell.”
“You don’t scare me.”
He chuckled. “Oh, cowgirl, that was the wrong thing to say.” He spun them and in the process slipped his thigh between her legs. Every time he moved, he ground the hard muscle into her pussy.
She hissed, “Stop it.”
“Why? You aren’t scared of me, remember? You aren’t scared if I keep this up I’ll make you come right out here on the dance floor?”
“Don’t.”
“You want it. Your body is quivering.” Jack nuzzled her cheek. “I feel your nipples poking into my chest. You’re excited. If I wiggled my hand into your jeans right now, would I find you wet?”
“Why are you doin’ this?” she demanded.
“Because I can. And you’ll be goddamn lucky if making you come out here is all I do to you tonight.”
In a fit of pique, Keely attempted to turn her head away.
Jack was having none of it. He forced her chin up and sealed his mouth to hers. She reacted as he expected: she fought him for five seconds and kissed him back with equal abandon.
Throughout the kiss and the slow dance he kept grinding his thigh into her clit. Rubbing back and forth the way that set her off. Her sex was fire hot riding his leg. His heart pounded as hard as hers.
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Keely clenched her shaking thighs around his, a signal she was close to exploding.
He slid his leg away, allowing his lips to cling to hers for several heartbeats before he broke his mouth free.
“Jack. Please.”
“I will let you come on one condition.”
“What?”
“You will follow me as soon as this song is finished. No questions asked. No saying goodbye to your friends. Just you and me, Keely, settling this
my
way, however
I
see fit.”
“Yes.”
“Right answer.” Jack shoved his thigh back to where she most needed it. “Close your eyes. Feel the friction of the fabric on your clit. Is your pussy hot and throbbing? Wishing my cock was riding you instead of you riding my leg? Do you know how hard my dick is right now? You do that to me. Make me so fucking hard I can’t see straight.” Jack’s mouth returned to her ear. “Come on me. I want you so wet and hot that you soak through your jeans and leave a wet spot on mine.”
She started to come and he swallowed her cry in another hungry kiss.
As Jack felt the pulsing and tightening of her cunt around his thigh, he clenched his quad harder, increasing the pressure. He stroked her hair. To anyone watching, they appeared to be a couple lost in a sweet moment.
Keely finally unlocked his leg, dropping her forehead to his chest as she tried to level her breathing.
The song ended. Jack led her off the dance floor, past the bar and down a deserted hallway. He checked both ways and dragged her into the men’s room. Better bet than the always-busy ladies room.
Inside, he flipped the lock.
Panic flitted through Keely’s eyes. “Jack—”
“Not a word.” He faced her body toward the door. In no time he unhooked her rhinestone belt and unzipped her jeans. Flattening his palm on her abdomen, he followed her damp mound until his fingers met creamy wetness. Fuck she was hot. He jerked her jeans out of his way. “Hands above your head.”
Jack loosened his pants and yanked his boxers to his knees. Pressing his left hand over her pussy, he angled her pelvis and aligned his cock. Her warm, wet heat beckoned him. He flexed his hips and impaled her.
“Oh God.”
“Fast and dirty, cowgirl.” Jack plunged in and out, gritting his teeth against coming immediately. The incessant pleasure of fucking her was almost too much. “I wanted to ream your sassy little ass. But I’ll save that for when I have you bound, at my mercy.”
She whimpered.
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Jack hammered into her without pause. Sweat dripping into his eyes. Snaking down his spine. His primal side urged him to use his teeth to mark her. On her shoulder. Her neck. So when she saw the symbol of his passion she’d remember who had the right to touch her. To pleasure her. He rotated his hand and stroked her clit with his middle finger.
“Yes. Don’t stop. Faster.”
She was so wet keeping hold of that slippery nubbin proved difficult. He curled his fingers and pinched her clit with his knuckles. Squeezing as his cock rammed into her.
Blessed release teased him. His muscles tightened from the base of his neck clear down between his legs, yanking his testicles up. He shot like a rocket. “Jesus, fucking Christ.”
Keely’s pussy convulsed around his cock, every rhythmic pull brought him deeper into her slick feminine heat. He couldn’t stop pumping his pelvis because her climax triggered a second one for him.
Holy fuck. That’d never happened before. He let his head fall back as he rode out another set of hot pulses.
His mind blanked. Finally the
drip drip drip
of the faucet and the
tick
tick tick
of the heater roused him, the sounds mingled with their broken breaths.
Jack eased out and Keely’s legs buckled. He wrapped his arms around her waist, holding her upright.
“I’ve got you.” He stroked her hair, soothing her. Petting her until she found her equilibrium. “You okay to get dressed now?”
“Um. Yeah.”
As Jack righted his own clothes, he considered apologizing to her for his obsession with needing to nail her, right fucking now, in a bathroom of a honky-tonk. But Keely didn’t appear to have any regrets.
God knew he didn’t. He kissed the back of her head and whispered, “You need help?”
“I don’t know. I just…” Her body shook. “Jack. We’re gonna kill each other if we keep this up.”
That was putting it mildly. “I know.”
“It freaks me the hell out.”
“Me too. Come on, let’s go home.”
134
Keely gazed at the vast nothingness. Dirt in shades of orange, tan and dusty gray. Scraggly trees. An endless horizon with mountains too far away to trust the vista would improve.
And people thought Wyoming was ugly? Had they ever been outside Milford, Utah?
“I heard that sigh.” Jack rubbed his rough thumb across her knuckle. “You okay?”
No. As strange as it was to be heading into Jack’s territory, so to speak, convincing his clients they were madly in love, it was stranger yet to be holding Jack’s hand. Just because they both wanted to. Or maybe they needed to.
After the “bathroom incident” Jack had started acting proprietary all the times, not just in public. Part of her believed his response was in preparation for this event. Another part understood Jack had staked an invisible claim on her. A claim he wasn’t ready to verbally own up to even when he’d physically left his mark on her.
Keely had no clue how to feel about that.
After she’d returned home from the bar that night, Jack whisked her off to bed. His solicitous caresses lulled her to sleep.
Then last night, he’d picked up dinner and they’d detailed the Milford trip. Afterward, he coaxed her into wearing a hat as she rode him cowgirl style on the couch. The sexy, fun romp had shown a playful side of Jack. When they’d tucked themselves in for the night, Jack insisted on twining his body around hers.
It was enough to make a girl think he loved her.
It was enough to make a girl fall completely in love with him.
Only a foolish girl would believe this situation is more than a business arrangement. Once you both
have what you want, the Jack and Keely show will be over forever.
Keely didn’t consider herself a foolish girl, but she’d never been so confused about love before, mainly because she’d never been in love like this. It scared her to death.
“We’re about twenty miles out,” Jack said.
“Please tell me the topography improves.”
“Not even slightly. They set a town in the middle of this because there’s water nearby and the railroad goes through.”
“I know why my great-great grandfather landed in Wyoming territory. Being tied to the land for generations is an incentive to stay. But what would make someone move to Milford now?”
Lorelei James
“Why do people move to Sundance?” he countered.
“Not many do. They’ve got more money than God and can afford the outrageous land prices, and don’t have to rely on earning a living locally.”
“That’s a harsh assessment for your beloved hometown.”
She shrugged. “It’s true. We are reverse snobs. Any of those ‘new-age’ types who try and gain a foothold in the community have a hard time. Most don’t stick around long. We don’t like change. We like our guns, we like our beef, we like the money from coal and oil. We like to challenge anyone who tries to take it away from us. If you don’t embrace all that is our western way of life…well, we ain’t got time for ya.”
Jack tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. “So when Henry asks where we’re going to live after we’re married, you’ll say…?”
“We’ll split our time between Colorado and Wyoming for now, but after we start having babies, we’ll settle in Sundance because it’s a good place to raise kids and I have lots of family around the area.”
He shot her a sideways glance. “That sounded a little rote.”
“That’s because it’s what you want me to say.”
“It’s not what you’d say?”
“Nope.”
“What would you say?”
“I’d say it didn’t matter where we lived because anywhere you are is my home.”
Jack sent her another look, a softer one. “Keely—”
“Don’t worry, I won’t be morbidly sappy and embarrass you.” She pulled her hand from his, needing to distance herself. “Thanks for not making me listen to that jazz crap for the last two hours.”
“Same might be said for you saving my ears from the noise pollution that passes for country music.”
