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either.”
Jack was quiet for a moment, as though accepting her inner turmoil and respecting
the boundaries she clearly had around this topic.
Several moments passed before he said, “His loss.” Then he stood and reached in
his back pocket for his wallet.
Liza stared up at him, an unexpected smile touching her lips because, really, the
mere sight of Jack Wade made her deliriously happy. “Peter would never see it that
way, but thanks.”
“Peter?” He smirked. “Well, there you go, darlin’. I just can’t picture you with a guy named Peter.”
She laughed. “Yeah, that makes two of us.”
How he managed to change her moods so easily was beyond her. But she
appreciated how well he distracted her from her dismal thoughts.
Jack pulled a ten from his wallet for his lunch and dropped it on the table. He then
added a couple ones to the pile to cover the tip on Liza’s freebie. Then he stuffed the folded black leather back in his pocket and reached for her hand. She let him help her out of the booth and they left the restaurant with his palm pressed to the small of her back where she liked it.
“We’ll see you tomorrow, right?” Ruby called out to them.
Jack laughed. “Something tells me yes.”
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Chapter Eight
When they reached the truck, Jack brought her around to the passenger side. But
rather than open the door for her, he pulled Liza into his arms. He kissed her without preamble and she practically melted in her Manolo Blahniks.
As his arms slid around her waist and he held her tight, she wound her fingers
through his hair. Her new custom. She’d never been with a man who had such thick,
lush hair and loved the feel of it against her skin. Plus, she liked the end result—the way her fingers mussed the strands, making Jack look even more devilish. As if he’d
just rolled out of bed and had done nothing more than run a hand through his hair. It was damn sexy.
His hands moved up to her bare back and she didn’t even care about the dewiness
of her skin. It was inevitable in this heat. Besides, Jack didn’t seem to mind…or maybe he didn’t even notice. His thick thigh pressed between her parted legs and really all she could think of was having him inside her again.
When his lips left hers, but still hovered close, Liza didn’t open her eyes. Just
savored the moment.
“Mm, nice,” she whispered.
He groaned. “I was shooting for sizzling hot. I suppose nice will have to do.”
“Maybe you should try again.”
He did, kissing her a little more intensely. Until her toes curled and her pussy
throbbed. The trembling of her body made her pull away.
“What?” he asked, his eyes narrowing against the bright sun.
“Nothing. I was just thinking that maybe we shouldn’t be out in public when you
do earth-shattering things to me.”
“Earth-shattering, huh?”
“Yeah,” she said with a sheepish smile.
Way to give away the farm, girlfriend.
Jack laughed, full and hearty, making Liza’s body hum with excitement. “Well,
didn’t you say something about working off calories when we were at lunch?”
“I did,” she said, totally unable to be coy. But then another thought occurred to her.
“When do you have to be at the saloon?”
“Not ‘til four-thirty or five. And we close early tonight.”
She remembered Ruby saying something similar. “Why’s that?”
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Jack stepped away from her, that earlier tension returning full force. He pulled the
keys from his front pocket and unlocked the truck with the remote. Then he reached for the door handle. “Every business is closed by ten on Saturday nights.”
Didn’t take a genius IQ to see he was none too happy about that fact. Liza let him
help her into the cab and shut her door, biting her tongue until he climbed into the
driver’s seat.
“So what’s that all about?” she asked. “I mean, it’s Saturday night. Why would a
saloon be closed at ten o’clock? And you were closed before midnight last night.”
Jack shoved the key in the ignition and turned it. Without even looking at her, he
said, “The reverend doesn’t want his congregation drunk or hung over come Sunday
morning.”
She stared at him, dumbfounded. When she finally found her voice, she said,
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” She latched her belt as she shook her head. “Are you
seriously telling me that you shut down early so that people can make it to church?”
Okay, maybe country life wasn’t quite as easy-breezy as she’d anticipated.
As Jack backed out of the parking space, he said, “Bain convinced the City Council
a while back to impose a curfew on Saturday nights. Claimed it was for everyone’s
good—a ‘spiritual awakening’, I think he called it.”
“I take it service attendance was waning.”
“Something like that,” Jack muttered. He turned the truck toward the entrance to
the parking lot and was just pulling out when he yelled, “Hold on!” and suddenly
slammed on the brakes. His powerful arm shot out and pinned Liza to the seat as
another car rammed them on the driver’s side.
Her hand clutched the bar above the window at Jack’s warning. That and his quick
reflexes kept her fully intact, but she still felt jolted to the core of her being.
“Holy shit,” she said, her heart leaping into her throat.
“You okay?” he asked, shooting her a quick look.
“Yeah,” she said, trying to sound calm. “Fine.”
Relief flashed in his eyes. After unhooking his belt, he pushed open the door and
got out of the truck. Liza followed suit.
As she was rounding the vehicle, Jack was approaching the driver’s side of the
sedan that had pulled out of a parallel parking space along the street. The driver
obviously had not looked for oncoming traffic and hit them. The car had dented the
front corner of Jack’s truck and broken the headlight. Other than that, the major damage was not related to Jack’s vehicle.
“Jesus, Lydia,” he said as he opened the door of the car, which was an older model
without airbags. “Are you all right?”
“I didn’t see you,” Liza heard the woman say. “I was looking at that dress rack
across the street. Oh, Jack, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking!”
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“That’s not what I asked,” he said, his tone dropping a notch, becoming more