Personal Assets (Texas Nights) (29 page)

He gave her a look that could’ve peeled the paint off one of his cars, burning and wild. Then his mouth was on her breast, surrounding, sucking, taking all of her inside his mouth. The tugging sensation shot from her chest down to where he filled her. She wound her fingers through his unruly hair and held him to her while she ground against him, seeking the powerful release she knew hovered just beyond reach.

Tearing his mouth away from her, he panted and braced his hand behind his hips on the bed. “Look at me when you come.”

Cameron wrapped one rough hand around her hip and surged to meet her as she rocked against his body. The strokes were short and hard, their bodies frantic and straining. Her brain and body chanted
now
,
now
,
now.

A noise Allie had never heard before welled from deep inside and poured from her throat. It was a primitive groan of need, connection, satisfaction.

Cameron shuddered. “Ah, Jesus, I love...the way you feel around me. I want to see you come. Now.”

He reached between them and touched her. Everything inside Allie tightened and then shattered, the shards tinkling around her like suddenly frozen raindrops.

Her body suddenly weighed a million pounds, but Cameron gripped her hips and pulled her to him in quick, short thrusts. He surged into her one last time and held her so tight that Allie felt the contraction of his abs and the scalding pulses that seemed to go on forever. His climax triggered another small storm of flurries inside her.

The power of what she felt for this, for him, exploded inside her chest, and words tumbled from her mouth. “I love you, Cameron.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

When Allie woke the next morning, Cameron wasn’t in the bed with her. She checked her watch. Yikes, they’d slept until after ten. Well,
she’d
slept until then.

She pawed through the sheets, found a crumpled note.
Have business to take care of this morning.
I’ll call you later.
C
—

When she’d blurted out she loved him last night, their bodies had exploded and they’d melted into a jumble of skin and sweat and breath.

He’d pulled her in to spoon around her and said, “Allie, about—”

She’d burrowed into his arms and whispered, “Later.” Between the day’s emotional ups and downs, softball practice with a bunch of high-energy boys and then intense lovemaking with Cameron, sleep had pulled Allie under immediately.

Oh, Lord, what if she’d scared him with her declaration last night? Or frustrated him that she’d reneged on the rules they’d set when they began this relationship? She knew Cameron had feelings for her. What man would offer to bail out a woman he didn’t care for? But was it the soul-deep kind of emotion that would allow him to understand why she couldn’t take money from him? If she did, their relationship would never be balanced, equal. And she’d had enough one-up, one-down situations with her dad to last her a lifetime.

She gathered her clothes and dressed. Lord, she had to get out of here if she planned to talk with Jamie today. Surely, after his conversation with Roxanne last night, he would agree to Allie’s proposal. The alternatives weren’t pretty, either let down her clients by allowing Personal Assets to go belly-up or renege on her decision not to accept money from Cameron.

It was early afternoon by the time she rang Emmalee’s doorbell.

Emmalee answered the door with a smile. “Allie, this is a pleasant surprise. C’mon in, I have brownies.”

“Actually, I’m here to see Jamie. Is he around?”

Emmalee’s forehead creased, but she nodded. She led Allie down a hallway with four doors leading off it. Warmth and contentment emanated from the home with its scuffed wood floors, comfortable furniture and family pictures lining the hallway. Allie paused at the grade-school portraits of Cameron and Jamie. Her favorite was a picture of them, arms slung around each other’s shoulders, both sporting black eyes. It wasn’t hard to figure out where they’d gotten those shiners.

“The boys call this the Hall of Shame.”

Allie hoped she and Cameron might have one of these in their own home one day. Maybe they’d feature that velvet jackass picture propped against his living room wall.

Emmalee knocked on the second door to the left. “Jamie, you have a visitor.”

Jamie swung open the door, his chest bare and his hair looking as close to Cameron’s as she’d ever seen it, sticking up here and there like dark devil’s horns. “Allie. I guess you want to talk about the partnership thing. Give me a sec to grab a shirt and we can sit in the backyard.”

Good Lord, this man should play professional poker because he had a real talent for keeping his thoughts and intentions hidden.

He motioned her into a room a fourteen-year-old would feel comfortable in. A twin bed was tucked into a corner, and papers were spread over a small wooden desk wedged under the window. Allie wandered over to the bookshelves flanking the desk. Three Little League trophies all inscribed with
Best Effort
, his high school diploma framed in cherrywood with a valedictorian designation, and fistfuls of medals hanging from blue and red ribbons. She flipped one over to check the engraving on the back.

“Academic Decathlon.” Jamie grabbed a T-shirt from the closet and pulled it over his head. “The others are for Math Olympiad. Now, if you want to see some impressive trophies, I’ll show you Cameron’s old room. He’s got one I swear is three feet tall from when his high school baseball team won the state tournament.”

“How did you two end up so different?” She picked up an old hot rod magazine, its cover featuring a busty girl in short shorts leaning over a bright purple car. Wow, she could’ve operated the stick shift with that cleavage. “Yet so much the same?”

“Don’t let what you think you see fool you. I may look like the success story from the outside. But on the inside, where it counts, my brother is the best man I know.” Jamie underestimated himself and some woman would show him just how much one of these days, but he was completely on target about Cameron.

When they walked through the house, Emmalee was in the kitchen and she waved them out the back door. “I’ll bring out lemonade.”

Emmalee’s backyard could’ve been featured in an issue of
Southern Living.
St. Augustine grass lay like a plush emerald rug under the sheltering branches of live oaks old enough to whisper the secrets of generations past. The flower beds scattered around the half-acre lot exploded with reds and pinks and yellows and purples. Daylilies, old roses and lantana mingled together with an accessible, eclectic beauty. Nothing too fancy or pretentious for Emmalee.

“Your mom is amazing.”

“You know, I happened to run into my amazing mom at Red Light when I was in town earlier this week.”

“I’ll tell you like I told your brother.” Allie swung around, braced her hands on her hips. “If your mom wants to date and have sex, she can. You two need to grow up.”

Jamie held up his hands. “Hey, I’m not knocking it. You’ve been good for her. She’s seemed happier in the past few months than I’ve seen her in a long time, maybe ever. So thanks for whatever part you’ve played in that happiness.”

“I hope she’s beginning to value herself and realize her life can be as beautiful, as fruitful as her gardens.”

“If my mom’s benefited from your work, there are plenty of other women who will too.”

“Does that mean you’re agreeing to my proposal?”

“With a few caveats.”

Relief streamed through her, but something Roxanne told her last night stuck like a thorn in her brain. “Why?”

Jamie took a step back, looked at her like she’d suddenly poofed into a creature he’d never seen before. “Wait a minute, aren’t you the one who came to me, asking me for help? Haven’t you heard you’re not supposed to look a gift horse in the mouth?”

“You may not think so, but you and your brother are a lot alike. What I need is a business partner. Cameron has some knight-in-shining-armor thing going on. Well, I’m not really a princess and I need to get myself out of my own darn tower. I want to be sure you’re agreeing to a partnership because you think it’s a good investment, that Roxanne and I are smart businesswomen, not because you want to pay your brother back or rescue me.”

He studied her long enough that she shifted from one foot to another. “You’re tough. And determined. And caring. Allie, you’re just what he needs.”

She wanted to be what Cameron needed, but she didn’t want him to need her to need him. And that was what made her feel uncertain, vulnerable, scared. She closed her eyes, breathed in the grass-scented air, opened them again.

“I’m in,” Jamie said, “and for the record, I’m not trying to treat you like some damsel tied to the railroad tracks, but if part of my motivation is repaying Cameron for all he’s done for me, that’s my own deal. I wouldn’t invest money in something I thought was a sucker’s bet. I’m thankful, but I’m not stupid.”

“Fine.” Allie held out her hand. “By the way, all partners can buy Red Light merchandise for cost.”

He took her hand, smacked a kiss on it instead of shaking it. “Why didn’t you tell me that from the beginning?”

* * *

Cameron checked BB over one more time. She was perfect. New bumper, trunk and taillights. All new paint job. It was a damn good thing he’d repaired BB in between working on Charlie’s GTO. Because now he needed her to perform better than she ever had before.

He ran his palm over her door, patted her back quarter panel like a woman’s rear end. When footsteps shuffled against concrete, he reluctantly pulled his hand away.

Charlie strolled into the garage, and when he caught sight of BB, his eyes widened. “Holy Jesus, Cameron, she’s a beauty. I’d heard talk around town but the gossip didn’t do her justice.”

“Since you brought me the GTO, I wanted you to have first shot at her.” Cameron focused on Charlie instead of the car, but caught the gleam of chrome from the corner of his eye.

“I’d love to take her for a spin.”

“I’m not talking about a joyride. I’m selling her.”

Charlie goggled, no other way to describe his bug-eyed, openmouthed stare. “You are shitting me.”

“No, sir.”

“Why?” Charlie took a step back. “You in some kind of trouble? Does your mama know?”

Did being in love and wanting to protect the woman he loved qualify as trouble?

“Because if you’ve got some kinda money problems, I can spot you a loan. You obviously do good work and I sure would hate to see your business go under before you can even get it off the ground.”

“Don’t worry about me. I’ve got a little put back.”

“Then why in the world would you sell something you obviously love like you love this car?”

Cameron grabbed Charlie’s hand and dropped BB’s keys into his palm. “Because I love someone else even more.”

Chapter Twenty-Six

The July Fourth picnic was in full swing when Allie arrived at Pearson Park, just across Main Street from the courthouse. Somehow, Eden had talked the refreshments committee into serving grilled pizzas instead of the normal barbecue, potato salad and Jell-O cakes. Folks in Shelbyville had come a long way from tortilla chips and cheese dip since Eden arrived in town. That being said, Allie was pretty sure she’d spied a bowl of Watergate salad on the dessert table. It was hard to talk people out of marshmallows.

A handful of vendor booths formed a half circle behind the main gazebo. In front, traditional picnic tables were topped with red-and-white-striped fabric and upside-down Uncle Sam hats overflowing with beads, star-shaped bubbles, candy and other goodies that had all the kids stuffing their hands inside to pull out a treat.

Emmalee’s massive birthday cake dominated another table. Allie hurried over and circled the table. Eden had knocked herself out on the intricate white frosting and tiny marzipan cookies and cupcakes dotting the double-stacked square cake.

What a blessing to be able to celebrate Emmalee, such an amazing, strong woman. The woman who’d raised the amazing, strong man Allie was in love with.

She hoped her own life would be this rich and decorated with friendship thirty years from now. She couldn’t imagine a life without Roxanne and Eden. And somehow in a few short weeks, Cameron had become just as essential to her future. She imagined him three decades from now—same tough body, with a few more lines around his eyes and a little gray in his perpetually messy hair. Him pulling her down on his lap and whispering naughty suggestions in her ear. She wanted to break the rules they’d set. She wanted to come home in the evening and share stories from the day. Sip a glass of wine on the back porch. Give comfort when things went wrong. Make love with the windows open. Build something real together.

She turned and there Cameron was, under the covered pavilion, manning one of three grills. Beck and Jamie were on pizza duty at the other two. People surrounded them, but for the grilled pizzas or the three sexy chefs sliding crispy, cheese-topped crusts onto plates? Hard to tell.

When the rush was over, she joined the line for Cameron’s station. Her attention was drawn to the flex and play of muscle under his red cotton shirt as he opened and closed the barbecue grill, talking with each person as he cooked their pizza. And oh, when he smiled and laughed, it zinged through her and lit up her heart. When the person in front of her walked away, Cameron’s attention centered on her with the single-mindedness of a surface-to-surface missile. He drew her to his side of the grill. “Where have you been?”

He wasn’t just asking about today. He’d called a couple times yesterday, but she’d let them go to voice mail. She wanted to sit with him and explain Jamie’s partnership with her and Roxanne when she wasn’t pressed for time and they didn’t have half the town of Shelbyville milling around them.

“Had some things to do to get ready for today’s game.”

“We’re gonna beat Beck’s pants off this afternoon.”

“That’s more than I want to see of our chief deputy.”

“Damn straight it is.” Spatula in one hand and a plate in the other, Cameron leaned down and kissed her. And it wasn’t a friendly here’s-your-pizza peck. It was a full mouth you-won’t-believe-what-I’m-gonna-do-to-you-later kiss. When they broke apart, the people waiting in his line applauded and whistled. “I want a few minutes alone with you. Meet me at the dugout thirty minutes before the game, okay?”