True Divide (7 page)

Nope. Jake Holt had to roll into town looking so good it makes my eyes itch.

“I'll come up there and toss your ass in here. I've done it before.” Jake takes another step, and I scramble off the boulder.

“Don't even think about it.”

“Then take a swig of that tequila and get in.”

I slump my shoulders and let my head fall back. Jake says my name, using a singsong voice that means he's testing me. Letting out a heavy sigh, I follow it with a growl. “Turn around. I'm not built like I was ten years ago.”

“That's for damn sure.”

Cringing, I let the fury stoke up for a split second. Wherever he's been, he didn't pick up any mad skills in the help-a-girl-feel-some-acceptance-of-her-body department. I itemize my wins from earlier in the night, hoping that will help.

Jake follows the insult with a strange-sounding groan. “You went and got yourself some fucking sexy curves in the last ten years, honey.”

I clench my jaw and take a deep breath.

Curves.

Read: chubby.

Snorting, I curl my hands into fists and return my head to an upright position. Jake must note the indignation in my body language and knits up his forehead. “What?”

“I'm well aware of what ‘curves' really means in man-speak. Just a hint: if you want a woman to take her clothes off, don't call her chubby in a roundabout way.”

“Whoa, there. Don't tell me what I
mean.
I said what I mean. That you have curves, which is an accurate fucking description. The last time I saw you, you were a teenage girl, and now you're a grown woman. Frankly, it would be weird if you looked the way you did in high school. But if you don't like the word ‘curves' as a descriptor, let me try something else.”

He pauses but doesn't shift his gaze from mine. “You've got unbelievable tits and ass now.
For days.
I almost choked on my own tongue when I saw you stomping your way out of the waiting room with that ass wrapped in those crazy-tight little jeans you were wearing.” He tips his head and waits a beat. “Better?”

I swallow tightly. That
was
better. Crude, but it's enough to change my mind and I like the way those words about my body sounded coming out of his mouth. I nod at him and swirl my finger in the air so he will turn around.

Once he's turned away, I lower my voice. “You look good, too.” Lifting up my skirt, I find the edge of my wool tights and start to strip them off. I mumble an addendum. “Really good.”

Jake chuckles and cranes his head over his shoulder in my direction. “ ‘Really good,' huh? Thanks.” I've settled on the boulder again, removing the wellies and pulling the tights off my legs, when I catch his stare. Stopping, I raise my brows and he turns away slowly.

“Hurry up, Lacey. And bring the tequila in with you.”

From the sound of his voice, the slight trepidation there, I like to think he knows as well as I do that this night could go a few different ways. And, he's just as intrigued and confused about the whole wacky thing as I am.

Leaving all my clothes safely on the boulder, I swipe the bottle off the ground and swallow just enough to take the edge off my nerves. The heat of the liquid salve down my throat seems to help as I tiptoe into the water and wade forward until my feet still nestle in the sandy bottom but the water covers to just above my breasts.

“You can turn around now.”

Jake spins toward me, dragging his hands to sluice through the water around him. Once he is facing me, he thrusts a hand forward and I pass off the tequila. When he swallows, he shakes his head in a mock shiver.

Jake moves a few steps closer. “Hi.”

“Hi.”

That exchange, so small, so pointless and perfunctory, still feels oddly like a smutty preamble to me wrapping my legs around his waist and begging him to remind me exactly how good he was at wrecking my reality when we were younger. I step back to avoid such a calamity.

Jake looks over my shoulder at nothing. “Fate's a real bitch, huh, Lace? Me, here. You, here. All because Kate bagged a rock star. Not sure how those two happened, but seems like they're stupid happy and in love.”

“That they are,” I say. Jake doesn't know the half of it; for each evidence of adoration that he's been privy to, I have a thousand more.

Jake moves his hands through the water once more, and the proximity of our bodies now means his outstretched arms come so close that if I simply wobbled forward an inch, his fingers would graze my skin. The bare skin just above my breasts, perhaps. Whether I move or he adjusts, I don't know, but that doesn't happen. Only the push of water rolling toward me in the wake of his movements.

“Trevor's cool. I've done a handful of flights with him the past few years and for being such a big deal he's not an asshole, which is rare, trust me. I've crossed paths with enough seven- and eight-figure-net-worth types to know. I think yesterday was the first time he's ever tried to throw his weight around, at least that I've seen.”

“He said that he and Devon nearly hijacked some CEO off his jet.”

Jake laughs and thrusts the tequila bottle back toward me. “Yeah, Simon and I had to talk a little sense into them before the cops got called. And, Devon, holy hell. She's her own unique weather pattern, that's for sure.”

“As a red-blooded guy, I'm sure you didn't mind watching it play out.”

Despite having zero justification for jealousy at anything or anyone Jake might enjoy watching, it's there. Mixing my liquors is a terrible idea, but I take another swig, just to see if that might smother out the irrationality of it all.

“She's hilarious and totally hot, don't get me wrong, but she's a little much for my taste. Christ, the mouth on that woman. She's like a sailor on leave . . . who moonlights as a truck driver . . . who also just happened to tunnel out of a maximum-security prison, like, yesterday.”

When I sputter a giggle, tequila spills onto my lips and I wipe it with the back of my hand. Jake shakes his head.

“I'm guessing Simon is about the only man alive who can handle her. Anyway, I've always had a thing for girls with a little modesty. The kind that don't mind my foul mouth, but keep theirs a little cleaner. It's the urge to debase them that I love.” One eyebrow rises up and Jake takes a long look at me, as if he's enjoying an inventory of every memory that ever transpired between the two of us.

Before Jake, I had fumbled around with other guys, but Dusty was the only one who had gotten any further than dry humping and crappy kissing. But not much further. And, Dusty, not once, ever acted as if my body was some kind of spectacular nirvana that made him beyond crazy, the way Jake did. Dusty only pushed and shoved his hands around until I stopped him, then sighed dramatically and took me home in a silent reprimand.

When my eyes drift away from Jake's, saving us both from what feels like an impending midnight confessional ending with us wrapped around each other, he crouches a little so the water covers his shoulders.

“So, what have you been up to, Lace? Give me the highlight reel on your life over the last ten years.”

Well, this should be easy. I can sum up my life in fewer words than it takes to order a pizza.

“Not much. Langston for a little while, then I came back, been here ever since.”

“Marriages? Divorces? Babies?”

“Nope.”

“Dusty never made the cut? You two looked pretty cozy at Lonigan's.”

“No. And you weren't seeing cozy. What you saw was Dusty invading my space when he shouldn't.”

A sliver of a grin works across his features at my answer, but he does his best to stifle it and merely nods before laying out his next question. “No Vegas elopements, ill-fated sex tapes, or prison sentences since I saw you last?”

“Nope. You?”

Jake shakes his head and does a languid swim across the hot spring, speaking as he drifts away. “I ended up in Portland first. Seattle for a split second. Alaska for a few years working on a fishing boat, up to the Northwest Territories, where I started flying bush planes, then back to Alaska. Couple of years ago, I came back to the lower forty-eight, and I've been in Santa Monica since I started this private charter gig.”

Perfect. Just perfect. He's practically traversed the continent while all I've done is twiddle my thumbs and rearrange nail polish displays.

When he turns back, the distance between us becomes too much. Probably because there are a hundred thousand gaps in the few sentences that he just uttered and I want to know all the millions of little experiences that would color in the narrative of how he became the grown-up Jake. I take a series of bobbing steps toward him across the heated water, probably a terrible idea to close the gap—because of the tequila and rum, and the freaking
moonlight
—but standing this far apart feels weird now. Jake watches my approach, curiosity in his eyes until his gaze drifts lower, then a sparkle and smirk follow. Looking down, I realize that my water aerobics jog just offered up my breasts to him in a lewd jiggle I hadn't intended.

Shoving my palms against his chest, I dip my head so he can't see any of the flush that is heating my face and neck. “Honestly.”

“Christ, I'm a man, honey. Those”—he waves his hand pointedly toward my breasts—“seem way bigger than I remember, and you just displayed them on a buoyant little platter for my amusement. I couldn't help it.”

He offers another grin and a goofy wiggle of his brows. I take a turn and decide to head back toward a safe zone because even a playful commentary about my breasts sounds too enticing coming from him. For an instant, I can imagine him saying something equally as teasing when he's deep, working valiantly to make a woman lose her mind while also getting a laugh. As odd as it sounds, I think the combination might garner a lucky woman the best night of her life.

Immediately after I start to wade away, the sound of Jake following ends with his hands tugging at my hips to stop me. He presses his chin to rest against the side of my head and drops his voice into a near whisper.

“Come on, don't run off. Stay close and I'll be good. Promise.”

I freeze in place. He's careful to keep the length of his body away from the back of mine, hips clearly tipped away, only his hands on me until even those fall away. Once he's dropped his touch completely, I let my shoulders relax and take a deep breath to find a shred of sanity before giving him my face again. If I don't, he will see every speck of desire and confusion in my expression right now. All I have to do is take inventory of the reasons this is a bad idea.

One: I'm not looking for anything or anyone right now. Not even a one-night stand.

Two: Exes spell trouble. Even those who live far away from Crowell and likely won't pop up again for another ten years.

Three: Something about self-sufficiency. Or . . . I don't know, because before I can remember the specifics, Jake's hand returns, drawing my hair back over one shoulder, fingers dragging across my shoulder blade and lingering until I roll my neck over to one side. Whether I've done it to encourage him toward me or to send a silent message to back off, I don't even know. Good luck to him on interpreting it.

His fingers drop away and the splash of his hand hitting the water softly tells me exactly what I wanted to have happen. Wild guess here, but his hand leaving my skin was not it. I sink my body into the water to stave off the sudden chill on my skin.

Then the entire mood changes, a shift in the energy between us that turns the surrounding air into something cloying and heavy. I'm sure it's just all the obvious things colluding: liquor, no dinner, the intensity of being touched by him and wanting more, but instead of ending this night with more easygoing banter and a few innocent come-ons, it's possible we're about to get
intense
with each other. Or serious. Or somberly honest. And, frankly, I'd take decent sex with a regret-laden morning after over any of that.

Jake slips around until we come face-to-face again.

“Tell me something, sweetheart.”

I take a deep breath and consider telling him to stop calling me “sweetheart” or “honey” because he's only trying to soften me up before the inevitable press of something too weighty comes out of his mouth and effectively ruins my buzz.

Jake pushes a strand of hair behind my ear and lets his eyes search across mine. “Did you stay here because you wanted to, or because you didn't know how to leave?”

I close my eyes. He has always been too good at this: asking questions that are hard to answer and making quiet observations that reveal more than you ever wanted anyone to know.

I give him the only answer that makes sense.

“Both.”

An hour later, I show Jake my pruney fingers and we agree that staying any longer means risking complete liquefaction from the sulfur. Thankfully, his earlier overly serious inquiry was immediately followed by him staring at me earnestly for a moment after I answered, then nodding somberly.