Shawn had never been in control of her emotions. It was why she was so willing to dive into stupid situations.
“I bet you were a sassy little girl,” Rhett said, draining his second beer.
“I was the kind of kid who got into a lot of scrapes. Climbing trees, crawling in drainpipes, trapping snakes. Yeah, that was me. Eve and I were a force to be reckoned with on the junior racing circuit.” The memory made her smile. “Picture two dusty little tomboys talking smack, and that was us.”
“I have no problem picturing that. But Eve is more the smack talker than you. I bet you got your way with your charm.”
She snorted. “What charm? Though after I heard Eve had kissed Junior Spaulding behind the grandstand at the county fair the summer we were thirteen, I decided my life wouldn’t be complete until I got Ty McCordle to do the same with me. So I carefully laid the foundation with clumsy flirting all week at the track.” She shook her head, remembering all the hair flipping and lip gloss that had gone into that summer. She had walked around looking like she’d dipped her lips in the fry oil.
“So what happened? He kiss you?”
“Of course,” she told him. Hey, she may be thirty-two, but she wasn’t above a little bragging still. “Though it didn’t go off without a hitch. He was chewing gum and it ended up in my hair. I had to use peanut butter to get it out, and for days I smelled like a peanut butter cup.”
Rhett laughed. “Smooth, McCordle. I wish I knew him better so I could give him shit about that.”
“Well, the peanut butter seemed to make me instantly desirable. Boys were crawling out of the woodwork the rest of the summer because I smelled like a candy bar.”
“Or maybe because you were the thirteen-year-old version of hot.”
“Or because they heard I was up for tonsil tango.” Shawn grinned at the thought of that summer. She had been skinny, flat as a board, and sporting braces. Probably not every teenage boy’s fantasy. Then again, she hadn’t looked much different from the other girls. “I was taller than most of the boys my age that year. They needed serious motivation to overcome the embarrassment of coming up to my chin.”
“I bet. That’s a scary thing for a guy.” He gave her a look, the one that usually meant she was about to be sorry she had taken that bet. “Did you wear cowboy boots? I always had a thing for girls who wore cowboy boots.”
“I might have.” She’d had three pairs that she had rotated on a regular basis. She’d been particularly fond of a red pair, but he didn’t need to know all her secrets. “I bet you were a father’s nightmare in high school when you came sniffing around his daughter.”
He didn’t deny it. “I was harmless. For the most part. Like now.”
Harmless as a rattlesnake. If you didn’t get too close you wouldn’t get bit. Otherwise, you were dead. “Uh-huh,” she said noncommittally.
Rhett stood up. “Can I get you more wine?” He collected her plate and took it with his to the sink, where he rinsed them and loaded them into the dishwasher. For a second, Shawn thought she might have an orgasm just watching that. A man who cleaned up without being told? Without bitching about it?
“No, I’m fine, thanks.” Shawn stood up quickly, wanting to do . . . something. The truth was, she wanted to be near him. How utterly lame was that? His presence was so powerful that when he moved away, the air seemed colder.
And she was clearly drunk.
But that didn’t change the fact that the dishes still needed to be washed. She’d left the detritus of the broiler pans on the oven and several mixing bowls in the sink. Edging him aside with her hip, she rapidly pumped soap onto a sponge. And actually, she wasn’t drunk at all, she was just acting like she was. She only wished she could legit use it as an excuse.
She started scrubbing like a madwoman, wanting the heinous chore over and done with. This was the downside of cooking a decent meal. It also didn’t help that Rhett was still next to her and he had suddenly decided it made sense to run his tongue along her bare shoulder. His tongue. On her shoulder.
“What are you doing?” she asked shrilly.
He didn’t bother to answer.
Of course he didn’t answer. He didn’t seem to think being polite was necessary when it came to sexual advances. Yet he cleaned up plates, opened her car door, and treated her with respect. How in the hell was a woman supposed to respond to that?
Well, Shawn’s response was to let out a little involuntary moan. She didn’t mean to. But that licking was so suggestive, so intimate, as his tongue traced the path of her clavicle bone up to her neck where he nuzzled into her flesh. How could she stay immune to that? Only a robot could remain unaffected, and hell, even a robot might short-circuit it was that hot.
Then he stepped back. “Here, I’ll rinse, and then we can watch a movie.”
On. Off. On. Off. He was killing her.
“Sure. Great idea.” Mr. Suckity-Suck. He was doing this on purpose, she was convinced. He would rev her engine, then stay in park. He wanted her to cave, to beg him to have sex with her. That was not going to happen, no matter what her lady parts had to say about it.
So she held strong as they sat on her sofa together, perilously close, his hand stroking across her thigh. He chose a thriller to watch, but it also had several steamy sex scenes in it, with lots of moaning and dewy skin, and arching backs as the hero of the movie pumped hard into his love interest. The woman was clearly enjoying it, given her pronounced moans and bouncing br**sts, but Shawn wasn’t feeling it.
Or rather, she was feeling it too much.
It was almost impossible to sit still next to Rhett, where she could hear him breathing, could feel his thigh touching hers, and watch a couple having way more fun than she was. Shawn bounced her foot rapidly. Bit her nails. Cleared her throat. And finally jumped up.
“I need a glass of water. Can I get you anything?”
His smile was slow and suggestive, and while he didn’t say anything, his expression told her exactly what he was thinking.
“No,” she told him sourly.
He laughed.
He didn’t protest, but when she sat back down, his hand started at her knee and ended up under her dress dangerously close to the end zone.
Shawn pushed it back down as something exploded on the TV screen. Or maybe that was her resolve going up in flames.
He switched tactics. He shifted sideways and pulled her against his chest, so that she was resting between his legs, her butt nestled on his crotch. Yeah, that wasn’t helping. Because he either had a hair spray can down his jeans or he was happy to see her.