The Wild One (13 page)

But in this new version, after Roxxy scratched him, she felt his weight lift off of her. Suddenly she was free to move, and when she came back to herself…

…There was Andrew, holding his face, which she’d scratched bloody, and looking at her like she was an alien.

“I’m sorry,” she croaked, barely able to get the words past the lump in her throat. “I didn’t mean to—“

She couldn’t finish the sentence. Instead, she scrambled out of bed and ran out of the room and into her own, locking the door behind her.

It took a good, long time curled up in a fetal ball with her back to the door for her to calm down enough to crawl into bed. And even after she did, she continued crying so hard, she thought she might choke on her own tears.

Why couldn’t she just be normal? Like the real Layla? Like every other woman in the world who could handle something as mundane as the missionary position—especially after the having the orgasm of her life with the sexiest man she had ever known.

She fell asleep sobbing and wishing she were anyone under the sun but her own miserable self.

CHAPTER 16

PART
of what made Andrew a natural born leader was, unlike his brother, he knew how to talk to people and was good at figuring out solutions all parties involved could work with. That’s why he’d been appointed the head of Global Initiatives at Sinclair Industries, and that’s why he’d been able to put a nearly bankrupt dude ranch into the black in under year, not to mention gather enough capital to buy the town it was housed in.

That afternoon, he met with the owner of the Ride ‘Em Cowboy and presented him with plans to renovate the motel in ways that just might help everyone forget a dead body had been found there less than a day ago. He set rolling grand opening dates for five new guest ranches. And he even got through a bit of the paperwork for the camp he was planning for underprivileged kids.

However, Andrew “Big Idea” Sinclair had no idea how to handle the ex-girlfriend who had unexpectedly come back into his life. It was so bad that when his phone had erupted later in the afternoon with another call from Nathan, he’d been tempted to answer it, if only to question his brother about what had happened to Layla.

But then he’d sent the call to voicemail at the last minute, thinking about that morning. When he’d gone to her door and heard her ragged crying on the other side, like her heart was breaking, he’d wanted nothing more than to gather her up in his arms and reassure her everything would be all right.

But it was more than obvious the last thing she needed was any more attention from him. He’d never had a girl freak out on him like that. For a moment, it had been hard to believe this was Layla he was dealing with. She had morphed into a crazed animal so quickly. One minute she had been begging him for more and the next, she’d scratched up his face.

He’d decided to let her cool off in her room. He ate breakfast and then went into his office to work. But when he came out, he found her door open and Layla gone from the house, as if she’d been waiting for him to turn his back just long enough for her to sneak out.

She didn’t come home for lunch either, and when he tried to catch her at the staff table during dinner hours, he was told she’d already come through, grabbed some food, and left.

This was how he came to find himself waiting in the dark hay barn for a woman who obviously didn’t want to see him. She came through the barn door just fifteen minutes after the bonfire ended, which meant she had come straight there, with no plans to attempt to face him back at the house.

In fact, she came to a stuttering stop when her flashlight landed on him standing next to the haystack where they’d slept two nights ago.

“Andrew!” she said.

“You sound more surprised to see me than I am to see you,” he said.

She lowered the flashlight. “I thought it would be better if we spent tonight apart.”

“Better for who?” he asked her. “Because I recollect telling you clearly last night you’d be sleeping in my bed from now on.”

The moon wasn’t very bright that night, so he could no longer see her in the dark barn. But he heard the way her voice trembled when she said, “I didn’t think you’d want me there. After what happened this morning.”

And his anger melted like a stick of butter. “Listen, Layla,” he said, coming to stand close to her, though he was careful not to touch her because it was obvious she was still pretty spooked. “Let me make this clear to you right now. I’ll always want you in my bed. The only reason I didn’t keep you there this morning was because you ran. Now, c’mon.”

He resisted the urge to grab her hand. Andrew had been chasing after Layla for a long time, first in college, then right before she chose his brother over him, and now he’d been forced to all but hunt her down for the third night in the row. But at that moment, with the two of them standing there face to face, he knew it had to be her decision to step out of the dark barn with him.

He let out an inward sigh of relief when she took his hand and walked with him out to the dirt road that led back to his house.

But this time he only let about five minutes pass in silence before he said, “You swear to me Nathan didn’t hurt you like that?”

She shook her head frantically. “No, this is something that happened a long time ago.”

“Before you met me?” he asked.

“When I was sixteen.” She kept her eyes on the dirt road in front of her.

“And that’s the real reason you didn’t want us to have sex when we were going out in college, because of what happened when you were sixteen?”

She looked away from him and mumbled. “Yeah, something like that. It’s stupid and it was a long time ago. And as you saw before I went crazy on you, it doesn’t have to be a big deal when it comes to sex, but missionary sort of triggers it, especially when a guy is lying on top of me.”

“Has Nathan ever triggered it?”

She shook her head. “No. I’ve been pretty good at sticking with positions that are safe for me. I tell guys missionary’s too boring for me, and they usually believe me. Most of them think it’s kind of sexy.”

Andrew’s mouth thinned at the idea of other guys, especially ones like Nathan, too dim to see through Layla’s act in bed. “I’m not most guys,” he said.

“I know you aren’t,” she answered. “I’ve never lost control the way I did this morning, even when I’ve had too much to drink. Usually I don’t even close my eyes, because I know what could happen if a guy flips me on my back.”

They arrived at the house then, and she waited until they’d walked up the steps of the wrap-around porch and Andrew had let them in before finishing with “I’m really sorry, Andrew.”

“No,” he said, suddenly pressing her into the nearest wall and claiming her lips with a kiss. “Don’t apologize. Don’t ever apologize to me again for that. It’s not your fault. It’s nobody’s fault but the bastard who raped you when you were sixteen. I don’t suppose you want to tell me his name.”

She shook her head sadly. “It wouldn’t matter if I did. He died of cancer two years ago, so it’s too late for any kind of revenge.”

Andrew went quiet at that reveal. Disappointment coursed through him, as at that moment he wanted nothing more than to find the man who had done this to his Layla and beat him to a bloody pulp.

Misreading the look on his face, she laid a hand on his shoulder. “But please don’t worry, okay? I’m not ever going to let myself freak out like that again. I’ll make sure to keep my issues out of the bedroom from now on.”

The look in her eyes was pleading with him to let the uncomfortable subject drop, but he shook his head.

“No.”

“No?” she said, confusion in her voice.

“No,” he repeated. “I already told you. I’m not like most guys. I’m not going to force you to have sex with your eyes open all the time just to make sure I don’t accidentally trigger you. And sweetheart, you drive me out of my mind with lust, so I can’t guarantee I won’t forget again.”

“I don’t understand,” she said. “That’s the only way I can have sex with any kind of guarantee I won’t freak out. If you’re trying to say that’s not good enough for you…”

“I’m not trying to say that’s not good enough for me. I’m telling you straight out plain it’s not. I was in a dishonest marriage for years, I’m not going to start out with you like that.”

“But we’re not married.”

He gave her a sharp look, but then decided not to say the word that immediately popped into his mind: “yet.” It had been less than a week, and she was already spooked enough.

Instead he held out his hand to her again. “C’mon Layla.”

This time she took it without hesitation, but she did ask, “Where are we going?”

Andrew actually managed to smile at her despite the tension, thick in the air between them. “To bed.”

CHAPTER 17

ROXXY
had been through a lot over the last week: finding Mabel’s body, discovering Dexter’s betrayal, letting herself get triggered by Andrew. But somehow nothing that had happened to her so far seemed as scary as following Andrew up to his bedroom.

He was moving, yes, but in a way that reminded her of a marble statue, like he was made of resolve instead of flesh.

When they got to his room, she wasn’t quite sure what to do with herself until he said, “Get naked and sit down on the bed.”

So she did. Then to her consternation, he sat down right beside her.

“That day in the truck, you were nervous because I was sitting so close. This is how it started out with him, right?”

“Funny, I thought I did a pretty good job of covering how nervous I was on the ride,” she said.

He gave her that sad smile again. “No, it’s not funny, Layla, and I need you to tell me what happened.”

She swallowed, trying to get some moisture down her dry throat. “Yeah,” she admitted. “He sat next me, just like you’re doing. That’s how it started. Then he put his hand on my knee.”

To her surprise he placed his hand on her bare knee. “Like this? Whoa, sweetheart, relax,” he said, when she seized up with fear. “We’re going to sit here like this for a little while. I want you to look at my hand and realize it belongs to me, a man who cares deeply about you, not to your attacker.”

She shook her head, unable to speak she was so frightened.

“Breathe,” he said. “Breathe and say to yourself, ‘that hand on my knee belongs to Andrew.’ Say it out loud.”

It took several tries, before she finally managed to squeeze out, “That hand on my knee belongs to Andrew.” Several breaths then she tried it again. “That hand on my knee belongs to Andrew.” More breaths, and another: “That hand on my knee belongs to Andrew.”

She felt the muscles in her body begin to untighten a little. She kept staring at the hand on her knee, and it lost the four rings the executive had worn on his hammy fingers. Eventually, it morphed back into what it really was, Andrew’s large hand with its long elegant fingers under which she could feel calluses from all the physical ranch work he insisted on doing, even though he had hired hands for that.

Soon her breathing calmed and she relaxed. At least she did until he said, “Now tell me what happened next.”

“Then he, um…he, umm…kissed me. Not nice but ugly, just enough to take me by surprise, so he could get me under him.”

“Like this.” Andrew didn’t waste time. He pressed his lips against hers and had her pinned under him in what felt like zero seconds flat.

And it took half that time for her to completely freak out.

“No! No!” she said, flashing back against her will.

Except this time when she tried to scratch him, he grabbed both her hands and pinned them above her head without having to be told that was what the music exec did. And this caused her to freak out even more.

She screamed now, thrashing underneath his weight, trying with all her might to get away. It felt like she’d been dropped down a black hole, like the misery of that night was closing in on her. But then she heard a voice…

“Layla, Layla, it’s me, Andrew. I need you to come back. I need you to open your eyes and look at me now, so you can understand it’s me on top of you, not that bastard who raped you.”

She blinked, opening her tear-filled eyes to see the blurry image of Andrew. He was pinning her down, yes, but he was looking at her with such compassion, it was impossible to super-impose the label head’s face on top of his.

“You know who I am, and you know I won’t come inside you without an invitation,” he told her. “We’re going to just lie like this for however long you need it to be. I don’t care if it takes all night. I can wait for my invitation.”

She didn’t believe him. Some animal part of her brain told her he’d either fuck her without permission or get sick of lying on top of her like this, and just give up on her.

But then an hour passed and they were still laid out in the weird tableau.

“My arms are starting to hurt,” she said.

He brought them down, repositioning them between their bodies, so she was still pinned but no longer forced to lie with her arms above her head. If he was uncomfortable keeping her pinned but still making it so she didn’t have to support all of his weight on top of her, he didn’t say one word about it.

And soon another hour passed.

She was dry as a bone down there, and she was thinking it would take several more hours of silence before Andrew gave up on this venture of his, but then he said, “You know I don’t talk to anybody else in bed like I talk to you.”

Her eyes widened with mock surprise. “You mean I’m the first girl you’ve pinned down like this?”

“Yes, and I also mean you’re the first girl I’ve ever cursed in front of, the first girl I’ve ever dirty talked to in any way. I was raised to be a gentleman, but you’ve probably noticed I have problems being a gentleman with you.”

Roxxy shook her head. “If we’re being honest, I had no idea you were raised to be anything close to a gentleman.”

He gave her a wry smile. “You’re wondering why I was so cold to you those first few days after you came to the ranch.”

“I thought you were angry with me for coming here when you had a girlfriend.”