So Toxic(Bad Boy Next Door Book 4)(307)

Some things are too harsh to purposefully dredge up from those little boxes tucked inside where I keep my demons. Because, unfortunately, one demon holds hands with the next, and the next, and the next. An endless line of bad memories, spilling out of the barrel like evil monkeys, ready to take hold and tear out your soul.

No. Not today. Not ever.




I wipe the dust from my hands. “Now all we have to do is install the new flooring.”

Aunt Delores nods, her face dirty, sweat trickling down one cheek. “Thank you, Sweet Girl. Don’t you need to get ready for work?”

I pull my phone from my back pocket. Six-fifty-eight. “Yeah, I guess I should.”

I press the screen to read the text waiting for me.

-I’m sneaking away. Meet me at the fort @ 7:30. Bring a blanket.-

I hop into the shower and scrub away the other bathroom floor’s dirt and grime. I spent the day prying up the old linoleum tiles so we can fix the problem with the mushy subflooring.

I shave everything that needs it, including my coochie—Aunt Delores’s word for it cracks me up. I grin as I rub strawberry body butter over the smooth-as-silk skin. I pat dry and pull my sundress over my head, adjusting my tits in the halter-style bodice.

No bra. No panties. No point. I won’t have them on long enough to warrant the effort.

I nab the quilt off the end of my bed and sneak out the back door. I take my car around to Old Farm Drive, the road that runs along the backside of the Buckners’ property. A secondary trail leads from here to the old fort Buck and I played in when we were kids. It was a favorite place for us to hang out—or hide, as the case sometimes was for me—all through our childhood.

I hate deceiving Aunt Delores, but it’s a must. If she knew how I really paid for the new laminate flooring for her bathroom, she’d have a fucking stroke, but not before she cussed out Buck and me for our folly.

As I tramp through the tall weeds toward my destination, the sun plays hide and seek behind the rolling clouds. I could almost imagine it isn’t the height of summer in Louisiana. There’s a cooler breeze today. It blows up my skirt, teasing my pussy lips.

A thread of anticipation runs through me as Buck comes into view. He leans against a tree, shorts hanging low on his hips, arms crossed over his bare chest. I pull in a trembling breath.

I repeat in my head the same talk I’ve given myself the last two times we’ve met. It’s just sex—no different than any other guy I’ve been with. I didn’t want emotional entanglements then, I don’t want them now. Especially with Buck. He’s heartbreak on a stick. The first time liked to have taken me down.

Sex doesn’t mean love. It doesn’t now, and it won’t.

If I tell this to myself enough, I’ll eventually believe it. I just hope that happens before he leaves again.

He pushes away from the tree and holds out his hand as I get close enough to take it. Lifting my knuckles to his lips, he brushes my skin like a feather. Then he turns my hand to give me a warm kiss on the inside of my wrist, leaving a trail of goosebumps as he works his way to the crook of my elbow. He sucks in the slightest bit of skin before making a path further up my arm to my shoulder.

He loosens the bow tied at my nape. “You really should just show up naked when we get together.”

My breath quickens as he pulls the fabric holding my breasts to my waist. My nipples bead and pucker. Buck turns me so his cock pushes against my ass. His arms circle me as he lays kisses across my back from one shoulder to the other.

“Fuck. You smell good, Lou.” He takes the blanket from me and spreads it on the ground, in a place that’s been cleared of fallen branches and pinecones.

“Looks like you got here early.”

It doesn’t mean a thing that he spent some time preparing a place for us to make lo—have sex. He just doesn’t want a pinecone stuck up his butt when I climb on and we go at it.

He nods to a basket parked at the base of the cedar tree we used to decorate with paper ornaments during Christmas. “I thought you might like a snack. Sustenance for strength; you’re gonna need it.”

A giggle escapes before I can call it back. “You sure think a lot of your stamina, don’t you, Bucky Boy?”

He grabs his chest as though he’s been shot. “Oh. You wound me, Lou.”

“Wound you, my ass. Your ego’s so over inflated, there’s no way one little jab could inflict any harm.”

He tugs on the bodice of my sundress. “Strip.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. Strip. It’s National Naked Picnic Day.”

“You’ve got to be shitting me. National Naked Picnic Day?”