Blood & Rust (Lock & Key #4) (47 page)

“I was in Denver for a seminar this week. I took a quick flight into Rapid City and rented a car to come out here and see you.”

My mouth fell open. That was a lot of effort and planning. “Did something happen?”

“No.” He leaned against the bar, rubbing a hand across his jaw. “Everything’s great.”

“Is Celia okay?”

“Celia’s fine.”

“Oh. All right. You’ve lost me.”

“Tania! I came all this way to see you, and you’re puzzled as to why?”

I shifted my weight under his sour scrutiny. It hung over me like a familiar bad smell.

“Those people over there are your friends?” he asked.

“Yes,
those people
are my friends.”

“They look like a bunch of wayward thugs and their molls.”

“They are not thugs. They are my friends. Most of them own their own businesses and run charities for their community. Please don’t start with your white-trash, blue-collar bullshit.”

“I’m just making an observation.”

“Well, it’s an insulting narrow-minded observation,” I shot back.

If the Jacks were wearing their club colors tonight, Kyle would’ve had a field day, going on about biker gangs. But Dead Ringer’s was a colors-free zone to keep the peace among the many different bike clubs who partied here.

What a shame it isn’t Bike Night.

Kyle’s glare softened. “I didn’t come all the way out here to fight. I wanted to say I’m sorry about how we left things the last time we saw each other at home. We shouldn’t let go of our marriage over a few piled up misunderstandings. We owe it to ourselves to keep trying. We really should. Come home with me.”

I was so done with
shoulds
. They’d exhausted me. Kyle had been trying to delay the divorce with little legal tactics here and there all these months.

“Kyle, both of us have been drifting in this marriage for a long time now. We owe it to ourselves to put an end to it and get on with our lives. Have you ever looked at it that way? It’s never too late. Plus, I have my own business in Meager now. You know that.”

He glanced back at my table. “You’re fucking that big one, aren’t you?”

“Excuse me?”

“That’s it, isn’t it? I mean, you’re mad at me for what I did, and now you’re acting like some teenager, getting drunk, hanging with the town bad boys, having your good time.”

“Fuck you!”

“Excuse me?”

“Look, Mr. Officially Separated—even if I were sleeping with someone now—and I’m not—A, that’s my business, and, B, why the hell not? I could use it.”

“Here we go.”

“It’s true! I really can’t believe you’re here, you know that? And I really don’t think it has anything to do with me or with us. I think it’s your ego that can’t accept the idea that you failed at something, at marriage yet again, at being the perfect husband. News flash, Kyle, none of us is perfect, and we all fail at one thing or another at some point in our lives, often more than once. You don’t have to hang on to us just because your parents got divorced, and then your first marriage ended the same way. Maybe you feel like you’re a part of some sort of failed chain of destiny. We tried, and it didn’t work between us. We grew apart over the years, into different people. And you know what? That’s okay.”

Kyle’s face hardened, his gaze darting back at my table once again.

I touched his arm, and his attention returned to me. “I don’t want to fix it, really. I’m sorry, but I don’t. Let it go. You can do that, you know. It’s all right. Let it go, and get on with your life in Chicago. I appreciate that you came all the way out here. I do. You surprised me.”

“See? I can still surprise you, Tania. So, why don’t—”

“Please, Kyle. I can’t. I don’t want to. Essentially, this is about me.
Me
.” I took in a quick breath. “And I have feelings for someone else now.”

He visibly flinched, his eyes creasing. “So, you lied to me before—about not fucking someone?”

I winced. Kyle didn’t usually use the F word unless he was really angry and extremely bitter.

“No, I didn’t lie. It’s not Travis, the big guy. It’s someone else. The point is, these feelings are there, and they’re real. I just haven’t acted on them yet. I can’t ignore them though. I won’t.”

Just. Just. Just.

“It’s one of them, right? Who is it? Which one?”

“Kyle, you should go.”

His eyes searched mine, and the silence strained between us in the midst of a bouncy Miranda Lambert song.

“This is really what you want?” he asked, his face grim.

“Yes.”

This was it—that feeling of letting go of a piece of yourself. Something twisted my insides and
whooshed
through me like a hot wind.

“The divorce will be final next week,” he said, his voice tight.

“I know.”

He cleared his throat and glanced at the floor, his hands smoothing down his shirt. “I’m going to go then. My flight back to Denver is first thing in the morning. I’m staying at a hotel in Rapid City, at the—”

“Kyle.”

He only nodded, looking away, his lips pressed into a firm line.

“Good-bye,” I murmured.

“Good-bye, Tania.” He planted a kiss on my forehead, a hand touching my upper arm.

The faint fragrance of his favorite fabric softener and the scent of his expensive Italian cologne rose between us, and my heart squeezed. Kyle was no longer my wretched present. Now, he was my resolved past.

Two young cowboys jostled past me and joined Butler’s Kandace and her friends at the bar.

I turned toward our table. Lock and Grace danced a few feet away. Boner had Jill in his lap, his arms around her, as she sipped on a margarita. Both of them along with Alicia and Ronny laughed at something Mary Lynn, was telling them. Travis stood stiffly, his eyes following Kyle out the main door of the saloon.

Butler stared at me from his seat at the table, the lines of his face relaxed, the edges of his lips turned up.

I sucked in a breath.

I want
you
, goddamn it. The rest is nothing. Nothing but smoke and lights.

Butler rose from his seat, his jaw set, and he strode toward me. My fingers flexed at my sides as he snaked his way through the crowd, through the clink of beer bottles and the hooting, shuffling through the peanut shells on the floor, his intense gaze never leaving mine. His agile body prowled toward me, closer and closer. My breathing accelerated. He was the moon, and I was being pulled in his tide. A force of physics.

Butler stopped in front of me, looming over me. His hand reached out and took mine, and without a word, he yanked me toward the dance floor.

“Hey—”

He pulled me into his hard chest.

Oomph!

Eric Clapton’s guitar opened “Help Me Up.”

Shit, a favorite song.

Our eyes met, and my breath stuttered.

Cigarette smoke and that fresh forest and crisp citrus scent of his inflamed my senses. His hand splayed across my back and slid down toward my rear, sending a shiver shimmying up my spine.

“The ex get his reality check?”

“Uh-huh,” I managed.

“You seeing Travis?”

“No.”

“You like Travis?”

“He’s very nice. Very good dancer. Certainly not hard on the eyes.”

Butler’s fingers tightened around my hand, his other hand burning through my waist, as we moved to the driving beat of the music. “Have you fucked him?”

Shit, that question is very popular tonight!

He leaned in closer. “Answer me.”

“No, I haven’t.”

“You want him in your bed?”

“Well, I certainly wouldn’t kick him out of my bed if he—”

A hand clenched my ass, and the breath swooshed from my chest. The icy blue of his eyes sharpened, puncturing mine.

“Do you want him? Truth.”

“No,” I exhaled the only answer there was. “I want you
.”

The shining truth.

Butler’s lips curled into a grin as we danced, his grip easing on me. I nestled closer into him, hoping all this
truth
was a good sign.

His chest rumbled against me. Was that a laugh? I glanced up at him, and my heart skipped a beat at the wicked smile on those chiseled lips of his.

“You want to flirt with other men, Tania?” His deep voice drilled straight into my belly. “You go ahead.”

“What?”

He chuckled softly. “You know why?”

“Do I
want
to know why?” My back stiffened under his touch as his lips hovered over mine. I fought his wall of heat overwhelming my sense of logic, any sense of outrage, but it was no use. My body was on fire.

“Because it makes you more turned on for me.”

I pushed against him. “You’re unbelievable!”

“Tell me it didn’t.”

“It pissed me off.”

“Why?”

“I should be attracted to a man like Travis.”

His hold on me tightened, his lips at my ear. “Say his name one more time, and we’re going to have a problem.”

My nipples hardened at the deep timbre of his voice, the press of his hard body against mine.

“I should be attracted to a guy like
him,”
I said. “He’s got the whole package—hot looks, engaging sense of humor, captivating charm. But am I attracted to him?”

Butler raised an eyebrow, waiting for my reply.

“No.” I dug my fingers into Butler’s hair, my nails scratching the back of his neck. “Instead, I have to go the hard way. Instead, I want you. I want you smiling at me, you dancing with me, you touching me.”

He made a noise in the back of his throat and tugged me off the dance floor and down a narrow corridor to the side of the stage.

“Butler? Where are we going?”

We came to a sudden stop in front of a heavy metal door. A loud click of a bolt. He shoved at the door and pulled me inside a small dark room. He pushed me against a brick wall, and our breaths grew heavy, ragged. My back ached against the rough texture, but it didn’t matter. His hand seared a path up my chest, my throat, across the line of my jaw, and I turned to jelly. My lips fell open, a whimper escaping. I was pinned to the wall by the hurricane force of our anticipation.

He cradled my face in his hands, our lips breaths apart. There was nothing I wanted more than to feel their pressure, their heat, to lose myself in—

“Tania…” he whispered roughly.

I arched against him, as if our bodies were magnets not to be denied the force between them, and he let out a hiss of air. There was awe, excitement, arousal in that hiss.

His mouth crushed mine, and a thousand particles of light blew up inside me. I surged to my toes and met his demanding tongue with demands of my own.

I broke away from his kiss before I completely turned to mush. “Why didn’t you say anything when Kyle showed up?”

He grunted, his thumb tugging on my lower lip. “Did you want me to?”

“I don’t know!”

He kissed me again, his tongue exploring my mouth fully.

He was relentless. Brutal. Hungry. And so was I.

I knew it would be like this. I knew it.

His fingers threaded in my hair, pulling my head back, and my scalp stung. His blue eyes reflected the shard of light coming through the half-open door, softly illuminating one side of his face. He took my breath away. Butler the Nordic deity whose otherworldly glare had cast a spell over me through the arctic mists.

“I knew you could handle him, and you had to do it yourself. You don’t need me to fight your fights, Tania. I know you’re strong enough to do it yourself. I know this. I’ve seen it before, and I like it. Tonight, watching you be strong, be free, be smart—Fucking. Turned. Me. On.”

He nipped at my lips, and I let out a cry.

“Always does, Scarlett.”

My heart stuttered, and I pressed my hips into his. “Turn me on some more then.”

His hands went to my ass and squeezed as he ground against me, adjusting me against his erection. My eyelids fluttered at the precise friction, at the promise of his hard length.

“What did that fuck want anyway?” His lips nuzzled my jaw, my throat.

“Di-divorce is final next week. He wanted to make sure it was what I really wanted.”

“A last pitch?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Impressive. And is a divorce still what you want?” His hand found a breast, and he rubbed my already hard nipple through my thin blouse and bra between his thumb and forefinger.

I let out a tiny gasp, squirming against him. “Unequivocally.”

He laughed as he bent his head and kissed the other side of my throat, his mouth tickling it with the wet heat of his tongue, his scruff scratching my skin.

I was being drained and given a transfusion all at once. “Kiss me, damn you. I need you to—”

His mouth took mine in a searching, toe-curling deep quest. He pulled back and studied my reaction, that arrogant gleam I knew so well in his eyes.

“God, I like you,” I said. “A lot. I—”

He shut me up with another savage kiss, his hands cradling my face.

“Wh-what if…what if I’d gone home with you-know-who tonight?” I asked in between lip sucks and nibbles.

His one hand closed over my throat. “What?”

“Would you have stopped me? Or would you have let me go?”

“That question is null and void,” he whispered.

“Why?”

“You wouldn’t have gone home with him or anybody else but me, and you know it. You want me to fuck you so bad; I could smell it all the way across the goddamn saloon tonight.”

My mouth fell open.

“Again, I’ve made her speechless.” He let out a soft chuckle. “When you want something, Scarlett, you’re a single-minded vixen.” His husky voice bit down on the consonants and dragged through the word, making everything between my legs pulse.

“I’m a
what
?”

“Vixen.”

I wanted to taste that word on his lips, and I kissed him again. His incredible mouth tore away from mine and nuzzled the delicate skin of my throat, the sweet spot behind my ear, sending a dizzying coil springing through me.

“I love your determination, Tan. I count on it. You want me? I’m waiting. Break that door down, baby. I’m ready.”

My heart pounded wildly. I never expected to hear this from a man, especially not a man like Butler. Yet, here it was, a declaration of passion, of honesty, of many, many orgasms in my very near future.