Linebacker's Second Chance (Bad Boy Ballers) (30 page)

“Come on city girl!” I shout up the stairs. For a second, I marvel at how comfortable I feel with this woman. We shouldn’t be, not after so short a time—but it feels like we’ve known each other for a long time. Not only a handful of days. “Come on, woman! I’m the guy throwing this thing. We probably shouldn’t be late. Or am I wrong?” I pause for a moment and wait to hear Cadence’s voice, that lovely, rich sound, deeper than Joanna’s voice by far, and miles more sensual.
 

“It’s just not fashionable! Not even when you’re throwing the party.” I hear her from the second floor, still inside of the blue guest room, still getting ready after two hours of being locked in there. She’s assured me she’s a low-maintenance woman, but after painting all damn day, her hands and arms were caked with paint, purple and green specks of it in her hair. Cadence had rolled on into this house after driving the Range Rover for the very first time, frazzled and anxious, babbling about how she’d never get the paint off her skin and nails in time for the party. There was even a speck of pink paint right in the tiny, curved nook between her bottom lip and chin. I had the instinct to pull her into my arms and kiss her right there, graze my lip over the splatter of paint. But I didn’t. Instead I watched her as she ran up the stairs, arms glued to my sides. Now, I stand right at the bottom of the stairs, waiting. Waiting and wondering just what we mean to each other.
 

“It’s not exactly fashionable to be late when there’s only a hundred guests and you live in the middle of nowhere and you’re the man begging all these people to be a part of your—”

Well. Hot damn.
 

The woman that walks from out of the shadows of the hallway isn’t one I’ve seen before. Or, not quite. This woman is elegant and refined, nails painted a dark blue to match her dress, and her hair and skin bewitched with that magic that only women seem to know how to create. When she walks to the top of the stairs, she puts her hand to her chest just above the top of the blue dress, and her smile fades like she’s self-conscious or concerned.
 

I must be staring. Stop. Stop staring.
 

But I don’t stop, even though I know that’s the reason she must look the way she does, that expression of excitement and confusion all rolled up into one on her face. It strikes me then that she looks looser, freer, more
real
somehow than she did when she first arrived. That hint of sweet sadness is still there behind her eyes, but it’s overpowered by everything else. And that everything else is beautiful.

No, sexy. Perfection in the form of a human woman standing right in front of me. Warmth spreads through me, sparks of energy making their way to every cell and every fiber of my body. Half of me wants to take her into my arms and kiss her, smooth back the curl from her forehead and touch her warm skin. The rest of me—the man who sees those round breasts and that high, firm ass swaying under the blue dress as pretty as the picture in her room—wants to throw her over my shoulder like a caveman and skip the whole damn fundraiser altogether.

But it’s not exactly becoming for a man to do that to a woman. Or at least that’s what I hear. I’ve spied a few of the romance novels lying around on Cadence’s night stand, and those men are ripping some bodices and throwing caution to the wind. One of the covers even said it was a “bad boy alpha male romance,” whatever the hell that means.
 

I couldn’t help it. The thought of Cadence reading about that sort of thing has made my cock rise more than once in the darkness of my bedroom across the hall.
 

And even though the guest house is all fixed up and ready for a woman to take up residence, she says she prefers the blue room, that she likes getting up and finding Eliza at her door. She says it makes her feel less lonely, a little more like she’s back at home in her apartment building. She said that maybe she’ll go out there this week, but she thinks it might be too damn quiet to think.
 

So many excuses. And she’s skirting around the way she looks at me sometimes, the stare she gives me that makes me want to keep her right here and never let her drive over the mountains into Ruidoso.

That there is a country girl at heart. I swear it. She’s got that look to her, like she could be here forever, wake up happy to eat breakfast with her man and walk out toward the mountains at first light...

Maybe that’s a fantasy. But I can’t help staring. The dark, rich brown of her skin stands out against the delicate blue of the dress. And that dress, by God, it shows what a real woman looks like in her own beautiful skin--just like it was made for her. I don’t know much about any of that shit, but I know a knockout when I see her, and I can’t stop staring.
 

“What are you looking at?”

“A beautiful woman walking down my staircase. One who’s going to make every other bachelor jealous.” She smiles, and brightness fills her eyes. The quickness of her response is unabashed and totally natural, and she even puts her delicate fingers to her chest.
 

“Stop it,” she says as she walks down the last few steps, hanging her head a bit like she’s remembering to be embarrassed. “They’ll just wonder what you’re doing with the girl from out of town.”
 

“Well Star and her husband already know you. And a lot of the parents do too. As for the investors, they’ll warm right up to you. Trust me--I don’t pick out people who I don’t like to work with. Stuck up bullshitters aren’t really my sort.”

“I guess not. They wouldn’t be, would they?” Her voice is soft, and I hear desire hidden there. But instead of throwing her over my shoulder, I offer my arm. To my surprise, she takes it, not casually like when we walked together through the Coming Home Foundation--but more like she’s decided this really is a date.
 

Or like she’s play-acting it is.
 

Either way, I don’t give a shit. The most beautiful woman in possibly the entire state at this given time is letting me walk her out to my Range Rover, and I’ll be damned if I don’t feel like the luckiest man alive.
 

“You’re immature, Rowan. You’ve been with a hundred women, but you act like a geeky high school boy when you ask me out. For a man with so much money, you shouldn’t be acting quite like that...”

Joanna had said that shit with a smile on her face when I first took her out. Back then, I didn’t take in the significance of her words. I didn’t see the red flag for what it was.
 

I look next to me and see the woman sitting beside me, really
see
her. She’s sitting there, craning her neck out of the open window to see the stars, completely without pretense, clutching her scarf so it won’t fly out of the window. The air is cold and bitter, swirling around both of us, but I don’t give a damn.

“The stars are amazing out here,” she shouts and looks over at me, her eyes bright. We roll down a steep hill and she clutches at the seat, but she’s still smiling. “I can’t quite get the color right on the mural, so we’re adding a bunch of different colors and mixing them together.” She looks out the window again and back up at the stars. “But I think we can afford to add more purple. That’s what it really needs. More. Purple.”

“It’s looking damn good. I’ll be sad when you’re done with it.”

“Why? Don’t you want to see what it looks like?”
 

“Hell yes, woman. But I’m not keen on seeing you go back to that damn city.” The words are out before I know what I’m saying, and Cadence rolls up the window and looks at me. I keep my eyes on the road. The lights of Ruidoso are spreading out before us, and soon we’ll be pulling into the Coming Home Foundation.

Cadence turns her eyes back to the road and pretends to ignore what I’ve just said. I can feel her thinking beside me, thinking instead of saying what’s on her mind. I clear my throat and drive on, but the pressure inside of the car makes me feel a little like I’m going to explode. Cadence isn’t saying anything, and the ten minutes remaining for our drive to Ruidoso seems like it’s dragging on into eternity.

“There are a lot of men in the world who think it makes them a pansy to say something like that to a woman. But to me, that means they aren’t real men. They don’t know what they want, but I do.”
 

I hear her sniff and move around in the silken dress like she’s thinking about what to say. “I’m not quite sure what you mean.”

Dammit woman, how do I get through to you?
 

Not for the first time, I think about that sad distance I see sometimes in her eyes. This is a woman who moves between confidence and doubt on a daily basis. But it seems to me like the confident woman is the
real
Cadence. It could be that I don’t know her all that well, but hell, I got a good feeling about that woman the moment I saw her, and I’ll be damned if I let the night go by without telling her what’s what.

“You’re beautiful, Cadence--“
 

“No.” The word is soft and futile as it slips out of her mouth. That distance is taking her over again, and I’m not sure what to think, except that I’m mad at whatever part of her past is haunting her, making her think that she’s not worth anyone’s time. “Or--thank you, I think.” I feel her eyes on me again. “But hell, Rowan, this isn’t the kind of relationship we entered into. I’m happy to go with you to this thing tonight--“

“Good, because we’re already over the mountain, city girl, and we’re pulling into the Foundation in less than five minutes now.” She laughs, and the sound of it breaks the tension in the car, even if only for a moment. “And I’m going to roll in there with the most beautiful woman in the state of New Mexico on my arm, and I’m going to tell everyone what a talented artist you are. And if anyone asks me if you’re my date, I’ll tell them that hell yes you are, even if you think you didn’t have a choice about the whole damn matter.”

“Rowan, you don’t even know me--“

“I know you enough. I know you’re hardworking, and you’ve got ideas that knock me to the ground about art. I know that you like good food, and you wake up and walk around the front of the house each morning, watching the sun rise. And I know that you laugh at my jokes, and you’re a fucking knockout. And that’s all I need to know, Cadence. The other stuff can come later--“

“There won’t be a later. I live in New York. My life is there.”
 

“I’ve got a plane, and I’ve been known to drive across the country for the hell of it. Even if it’s just for a date, I’d do it to sit across from you and share good conversation.”

“That’s... excessive.” She laughs just a little bit, even though I know what she’s saying is true. But hell, I don’t mind being an excessive man. Not if it means I get a chance with a woman like her.

“Well, darling, the thing about being an oil billionaire is that it doesn’t matter one damn bit if I’m excessive. I can do what I want, when I want. And if I want to date a woman in New York--“

“No one said anything about dating!”

“I just did, sweetheart. This right here is our first date. And I hope it won’t be the last. Snow’s starting tomorrow morning, so we won’t even be able to get into Ruidoso for a few days. I hear it’s going to drop a couple of feet on us before it’s all over with. Not real common this time of year, but it’s good for sitting around by the fire and getting to know a woman.”
 

“Snow! I didn’t even know it snowed in New Mexico. Oh dear God, I should have gotten out to that guest house. Should I—can I—oh God, Rowan. This is all a mess. If only you knew what a mess I am.”

“That’s damn good, because I don’t like a woman who’s neat and tidy and has everything all figured out.” I pull into a parking space by the Foundation and turn off the car. The cool air already starts to seep in, despite the solid doors of the Range Rover. It’s that chill that seeps into everything, that chill that makes me want to take this warm, real woman in my arms and remind her that there’s a beauty in her so deep that she should never forget it, not for one moment.
 

“I’m not that, not that at all.”

“Good, then. I like a woman with messy hair and paint under her fingernails. Maybe I didn’t know I liked that before, but I do now.”

She laughs again. “You got me pegged, then. I am that girl, to a tee. And I don’t have a damn thing to get my hair under control--“

“I like it that way. Like to see you wild and gorgeous and painting in those big grand gestures that you use. It’s fucking sexy.” I look to her with those last words and then get out of the car and walk over to let her out. When she gets out, she looks up at me, her eyes curious and searching. I brush one of the curly locks away from her forehead, but it springs back--a far cry from the straightened out style she had when she first arrived.
 

“Rowan, this can’t go anywhere serious. I like you too, but—”

“You like me too? Well, hot damn, woman, why didn’t you say so?” My twang starts to come out in full force, and I take Cadence by the shoulders, feeling her skin as goosebumps rise and she starts to shiver. “As for the serious thing, let’s hold off on deciding that for a little while, Cadence. This can go any way we want it to. And maybe we can figure that out after our first date. Or the third, you know, whatever.”
 

She smiles, big and bright. Acting on impulse, I pull her towards me and hold her tight, tilting her head up and kissing her on the lips.