“Thanks for this, Smitty. I mean it.”
“Anytime, darlin’.” He took her hand, holding it gently in his. “Now let’s talk about us.”
“Okay.”
“I’ve been thinking long and hard on this.” Christ, again with the thinking! “And I know what I need to do.”
“And that is?” she asked, her heart pounding in her chest, praying he’d figured it out. Praying he’d get it right.
“Court ya proper.”
And there went her heart, plummeting to earth, through the floor of his truck, and into hell.
“Court me?”
“Yeah, proper Smith courtin’. It’s just what you deserve. Proper dates, an official announcement about us to all the Smiths. We’ll just take this slow and easy until we both know it’s the right time.”
“You... you... bastard!” Jess snatched her hand away.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“That’s what I deserve? That? You know what? The biggest mistake I ever made was falling in love with your hick ass.”
“Jessie Ann—”
“No, we’re done. I’m done. Done, done, done. I’m cutting you out of my heart. Because you don’t deserve me.”
“Now you’re making me angry.”
“Really? That’s fascinating.”
“If you’d just talk to me—”
“I’m done talking.”
“Jessie... ” he warned through gritted teeth.
She stared straight ahead, the book gripped tightly in her hands. “Unless you want me to shift right here, and start pissing all over this lovely interior, including the dashboard, you’ll... stop... talking.”
Both hands tight on the wheel, Smitty focused back on the road. She’d made him mad but, as always, not nearly mad enough. And if she couldn’t make that happen, they had no business being together in the first place.
CHAPTER 28
Smitty barely stopped himself from snatching the keycards from the poor woman at the front desk. He had no idea what he looked like, but after three minutes, her hand started to shake and she couldn’t get him through the check-in process fast enough. He stormed away from the desk and toward the elevators, brushing past his sister and Ronnie Lee as he stalked toward the elevators.
“Bobby Ray, wait.”
“Leave me be, Sissy.”
He slammed his fist against the elevator button and the doors smoothly slid open. He walked inside and his sister’s hand slapped against the frame. “There’s something I need to—”
He barked and snapped at her fingers, almost taking them off, and his sister jumped back about ten feet. The doors closed and he hit the button for his floor.
He couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe her. What the hell did she want from him anyway? He’d offered her a proper Smith courting. He risked abuse at every family reunion for that, but he was willing to do it. For her! And what does she do? She throws it back in his face like it meant nothing.She also had the nerve to be angry at him. She won’t tell him what’s wrong. Won’t tell him why she’s so mad. And doesn’t want him to mark her. But while she’s fighting him, in the same goddamn conversation, she admits she loves him.
“That’s it,” he snarled to himself. “That is goddamn it.” He’d throw his crap into his room; then he’d find that little gal and he’d find out exactly what the hell was going on. He’d hit the end of his leash, and she’d damn well know it.
Smitty opened the door to the hotel room he’d gotten himself so he could be near the crazy woman he loved while his team secured the wild-dog’s den and tossed his bags and jacket inside.
Busy kicking the sleeve of his jacket away from the door so he could close it and go search out Jessie, for the first time in his entire life, Smitty never saw it coming. Didn’t scent it. Didn’t hear it.
He just never saw it—or him—coming.
“Boy.”
At the gruff words, Smitty froze.
“So your sister called and said you’re fucking up your life again. And why does this not surprise me? You were always a little bit dumber than the others.”
Smitty closed his eyes and thought of all the wonderful ways he’d eviscerate his baby sister, before turning to face Bubba Ray Smith. His daddy.
Jess stood on the corner on the far side of the hotel and seethed. She didn’t even need her coat she was so goddamn mad. Courting her? And what? Dinners? Dancing? Dates? What in all holy hell led him to believe she wanted to be courted?
She needed to score some chocolate. She needed it so goddamn bad she might actually shut down a Godiva store at this point.
She looked up the street. There has to be a goddamn chocolate store somewhere on this street. Or maybe inside. But Bobby Ray was inside. No, she’d have to go find it down the street or freeze to death trying.
But before Jess could take a step, before she could hope to make a run for it, a voice behind her froze her in her tracks.
“Well, well, well. Jessie Ann Ward. As I live and breathe.”
Jess closed her eyes. No, no, no. Anyone but this. Smitty. Sissy Mae. Even Big-Boned Bertha. But not her.
“I’m not gonna bite, suga. You can turn around.”
She did—and faced Smitty’s momma. Janie Mae Lewis, originally of the Lewis Pack out of Smithville, North Carolina. Built like a first-string linebacker for the Dallas Cowboys and quite beautiful, the female smoked a rolled cigarette and stared at Jess through the smoke. Smitty had gotten his mother’s eyes. Only hers were harder. Colder. Even Sissy’s eyes weren’t that cold.
“Miss Janie... I... uh... ”
“Lord, stop your stuttering, girl.” She smiled... sort of. “I always did make you nervous. The dog in you just wants to run away, don’t it?”
She was right. Where Jess ran from the other She-pups because they’d outnumbered her and she’d gotten tired of getting her ass kicked, she outright avoided Miss Janie. Even though the female had never been anything but polite and somewhat kind, there’d always been something about her—that lone lioness separated from the Pride because she threatened the others’ cubs.
“My, my. Jessie Ann Ward. Look at you.” She took a long drag on her dwindling cigarette. “You’ve always been adorable but now... ” She smiled... sort of. “I wasn’t surprised to hear my youngest boy locked on to you. He’d always had a mighty hunger for little Jessie. Went out of his way to protect you, course it always backfired. Set some of them girls against you somethin’ fierce knowin’ he wanted you and not them. At least he didn’t want them for the long haul. Just a quick fuck in the back of that old pickup truck he used to drive. But you were special. He wanted to give you much more than that.”
Oh, God. Please make her stop. But she knew Miss Janie wouldn’t stop until Miss Janie was damn good and ready.
“Daddy.”
“Boy.”
Must he continue to call him that? The older four at least had adequate nicknames—“Stupid,” “Idiot,” “Fuckhead,” and Smitty’s personal favorite, “Shit for Brains.” But Smitty always remained “Boy.”
“So is it true?” his daddy grumbled.
“Is what true?”
“That you’re too much of a pussy to take your woman? To take what’s yours?”
The old man had been saying that to him since the day Smitty had graciously—at least he’d thought it gracious—let Rory Reed take his Big Wheel. He knew he’d get it back, but he didn’t see a point in dragging the boy off it and beating him to death for spending more than five minutes on the damn thing. But his daddy had a fit. Calling him weak and telling him, “What? You’re too scared to take it, you big pussy?” Yes. Every seven-year-old boy should be called “pussy.”
Smitty didn’t “take it” because the Reeds were like family. Especially with Sissy Mae and Ronnie Lee being thick as thieves. But reason and logic meant nothing to Bubba Smith. Never had, never will.
“Exactly how do you think you’ll grow this Pack when you don’t even have the guts to claim your woman? Do you think them Reed boys will let you lead when they know they can take it from you at any time?”
Smitty had two options here: tear his father’s throat out and do twenty-five to life in a state-run prison like his Uncle Eustice, or spend the rest of the day arguing with the man for no reason.
As Smitty wondered how tough Sing Sing prison could really be, it suddenly occurred to him that he did have a third option. An option he’d never tried before.
“I don’t have to explain a damn thing to you.”
His father stared at him blandly. “What?”
“You heard me. I don’t have to explain anything to you. I don’t answer to you. Or anyone. This is my Pack. My woman. I can handle this any damn way I please. So you need to move your fat ass out of my way.”
Smitty didn’t wait for his father to do that; instead, he calmly walked around him, heading toward the elevators. Even as he felt rage, he also felt like he’d turned a corner. Like now everything in his life was different.
He needed to find Jessie Ann. He needed to find her now.
“You know, boy,” his father said behind him and Smitty didn’t stop to hear the old coot out, “it’s about time you figured that out. I guess the Navy smarted you up some, huh?”Smitty didn’t turn around until he got on the elevator. His father still stood there, watching him. Then, the old wolf grinned at him and winked before ambling away.