Casey struggles for all of two seconds, and then her arms are wrapped around my neck and she's kissing me back.
Desperately.
Her soft body melts into mine, and lust shoots down to my dick when she moans softly into my mouth.
Only three seconds away from pushing her up against her Jeep and fucking her in the parking lot, I pull away. Her chest is rapidly rising and falling and her eyes are filled with confusion. I bring a hand to the side of her face and cup it, running my thumb over the modelesque swell of her cheekbone.
"I mean it," she says in warning, her eyes looking like a caged animal again. "I won't talk about him."
"We don't have to," I assure her with a reassuring smile. "But let's get out of here... go get a cup of coffee or something. We can talk about something else."
"Like what?" she asks suspiciously.
Leaning in, I kiss her on the forehead and don't miss the subtle sigh that yields from her. Sensing her need for something normal to ground her, I grab Casey's hand and start pulling her toward my motorcycle. "It's a nice night. We can talk about the weather if you want to."
I sip at my coffee and look around the diner. It's nearly empty, and the sign on the front says they close at nine PM. Plenty of time for us to sit for a bit and talk.
"Me and my girlfriends do breakfast here every Monday," Casey says out of the blue, and my gaze slides back to her. It's the first thing she's said since we left the bar.
"Oh, yeah? What are they like?"
Tenderness morphs Casey's face and her eyes go soft, telling me what I've suspected from the start... that she has a big heart. "Well... there's my best friend since I was a kid.... Gabby. She's engaged to my brother, Hunter."
"He's the one that owns The Last Call, right?"
"Yup. And then there's Alyssa. She's engaged to my brother Brody, who is Hunter's twin."
"And he's the one that spent some time in prison?" I ask.
Casey's eyebrows rise in question, so I supply her before she can ask. "Kyle told me. I guess Andrea filled him in on the whole group."
"Did she tell him that Brody went away for a crime he didn't commit?"
Now it's my turn for my eyebrows to rise. "No. Guess she didn't tell him that piece of info."
Casey shrugs her shoulders. "It's not something that people know outside of our family and small group of friends. Andrea probably thought that was too personal to share."
I don't tell her that Andrea apparently shared a bit of personal information about Casey... like her penchant for wealthy men. It's not like Andrea told Kyle anything sordid... just that Casey only dated the rich elite, that she was surprised she agreed to have dinner with me, and that she never had a long-term relationship, seeming to just bounce from guy to guy. I sort of drew my own conclusions from that.
"Then there's Savannah, who used to be my roommate, who is with Gavin, who is this really big-time author, and well, you know Andrea. That's my group of girls," Casey says vaguely.
I want to ask her more about Brody, and I definitely want to hear more about her friends because I'd bet my Harley they're nothing like Casey since they're all in committed relationships. But I don't, because I want to ask her about something else. I promised not to ask her anything more about Jeff, but I'm insanely curious about why she targets just rich men.
And I know that the best way to get information is to share information.
"I have a daughter," I tell her abruptly.
I'm completely blown away when Casey's eyes soften even further, and she gets the sweetest smile on her face that pops out two dimples. "You do?" she asks with delighted surprise.
I grin and nod. "Her name's Zoey and she just turned fourteen. Her mom--my ex-wife--relocated to Raleigh a few months ago. That's the reason I rode out here with Kyle... to see Zoey."
Casey snickers and picks up her coffee cup. She takes a sip and looks at me over the rim with sparkling eyes.
"What?" I ask, curious as to what has amused her so much.
She chuckles and sets the cup down. Leaning her crossed forearms on the table, she says, "It's just... you and I have been very intimate with each other and I don't know anything other than your name and that you're from Wyoming, and now, of course, that you have a daughter named Zoey."
I lean back in the booth and stretch my legs out, caging Casey's legs between my own. Spreading my arms wide, I say, "I'm an open book. What do you want to know?"
"Well, for starters... how old are you? I mean, you have a fourteen-year-old daughter."
"Thirty-three," I tell her. "Had Zoey when I was nineteen."
"And what do you do for a living?"
"Currently, I'm a motorcycle mechanic in between jobs. Prior to that, I was in the Marine Corps and prior to that, I worked on a cattle ranch."
"Wow," Casey says with surprise. "A biker, a Marine, and a cowboy. You like have all the hot guy tropes covered."
Chuckling, I move my legs in closer together so I'm touching hers. It's not much, but for some unexplained reason, I want the physical connection with her. "I think you're romanticizing it just a bit. As a mechanic, I perpetually have grease under my fingernails, as a Marine in the desert, I sometimes went days without showering, and as a ranch hand, I smelled like cow shit at the end of the day."
"Yeah," she huffs, "but you like have all those tattoos and muscles. I could definitely overlook the other stuff."
We both laugh, and I can see most of the tension has lifted from her shoulders. We enjoy a moment of comfortable silence, sipping at our coffees.
"What about you?" I finally ask. "What's your story?"
Casey shrugs her shoulders and lowers her gaze. "Not much to tell. I just turned twenty-six, born and raised here in the Outer Banks. I tried to make a living as a real estate agent but I pretty much suck at that, so now I bartend. Oh, and I flunked out of college after a year, which still pains my mother."
"I don't buy it," I tell her with a shake of my head.
"Buy what?"
"You flunked out of college. You're too smart."
She nods in understanding with her lips quirked. "Let me clarify... I flunked out of college because I was rebelling. Too much partying and not enough studying."
"Rebelling? You?" I ask sarcastically.
Casey laughs, dips her face, and traces the edge of her coffee cup with her finger. When she raises her head, her eyes are sad and serious. "I had a rough senior year in high school... with Brody getting sent to prison and... well, just some other stuff. I sort of went a little crazy when I got out of this town. It was my chance to be someone different. To act without consequences."
"To bury your troubles in alcohol," I guess.
She nods with a sheepish grin. "And pot. Lots and lots of pot."
"Hey... most kids that age go a little crazy. Who you are today isn't who you were back then."
Casey's lips flatten as if I said something distasteful, but she nods her head in agreement. "That's for sure."
The waitress comes to our table with a pot and tops off our coffees. While Casey doctors hers up with a ton of cream and sugar, I take the opportunity to satisfy my curiosity.
"Kyle mentioned something interesting to me," I edge into the conversation. "He said that Andrea was surprised you showed interest in me. Am I so different than other men you've gone out with?"
Casey's eyes snap to mine. She stares at me shrewdly for a minute, and then narrows her eyes. "I'm guessing if Andrea told Kyle that, who in turn passed that on to you, then she also told Kyle about the type of man I normally go out with, right?"
Fuck. Busted.
Before I can even open my mouth to admit that, she continues. "I know Andrea must have said something because of what you said to me earlier. You said I used men and tossed them away like yesterday's garbage."
I groan internally, because I really had not meant to say it that way. I was still pissed that she was able to walk away so easily after that incredible night we shared.
"
Casey, Andrea didn't--"
She holds a hand up and waves my words away impatiently. "I love Andrea. She's my friend. I know she never would have said anything that cast me in a derogatory light. So what I'm guessing is she told Kyle the truth. That I don't do relationships. I casually date, and I only date wealthy men. And of those men that I keep around for more than a few dates, I only do so because they understand my boundaries. Now, whether that is what Kyle in turn relayed to you is another matter, but there you have it... I don't go out with men like you. Period. End of story."
I stare at Casey a moment, trying to figure out if she's pissed that she's been the subject of conversation or if she's just matter-of-factly telling me the way things are. Regardless, I ask her instead, "What do you mean 'men like me'?"
She smirks and waves her hand toward me. "You know... men like you."
"No, I don't know what that means," I tell her as I straighten up in the booth and pull my legs back. Leaning forward on my elbows, I murmur, "Enlighten me."
"Dangerous," she says simply. "You're dangerous."
"I'm a teddy bear," I tell her.
"You're real," she counters. "You're real, down to earth, and there isn't a pretentious bone in your body. That makes you dangerous."
I shake my head in confusion. "I don't understand."
Casey smiles at me almost piteously, and I'm surprised she doesn't give me a condescending pat on my head. "I know on the face it looks like I just seek out rich men, and maybe you think that's so because I like to live a glamorous life and I like pretty things. But the truth is... I seek out men that are vain, narcissistic, or self-absorbed. It just so happens that many of those types of men are that way because of what money has done to them. It makes them entitled and it corrupts. It controls their lives and makes them feel more important that what they really are. It gives them the power to hurt people... to destroy. It takes away their capacity to truly care."
"And these are the men you seek out?" I ask dumbly.
"Yes," is all she says, and she waits to see if I get it. When I don't, she continues on, "It's self-preservation at its simplest form."
And then I get it.
I nod, my eyes wide with understanding. "It's easier to keep yourself closed off from those types of people. You aren't in any danger of getting hurt, because you know exactly what you're dealing with. And because these men really aren't of any true interest to you... at least no more than a nice diversion... you aren't ever in any danger of breaking your own boundaries. You're not in danger of falling for them."
Casey grins and stabs her index finger in the air at me. "Bingo. You got it."
Shaking my head, I pick up my coffee cup. Just before taking a sip, I mutter, "You are one complex woman, Goldie."
Casey's voice is whisper soft, full of emotion. "And you are dangerous, Tenn Jennings, because you are exactly the type of man that could crumble all of those boundaries."
The honesty of her words and the fact they are said with such resignation about slays me.
My hand drops to my stomach and I rub it gingerly, because those words and the sad quality of her voice just rendered a deep punch to my gut. I want to slide from the booth, pull her out of her seat, and wrap her in my arms. I want to kiss her and tell her she's far more worthy than she gives herself credit for, but I can't do any of those things.
Those are exactly the types of things that would send Casey scurrying away from me. Those are the types of things that make me dangerous in her mind.
So instead, I ask, "What do your friends all think of this philosophy you have? Why you only seek out those types of men?"
Casey scoffs and rolls her eyes. "Tenn... what I just told you? My reasons for doing what I do? They don't know any of that. They just think Casey wants to drink champagne and the only way to do it on her Coca Cola budget is to target the hotties with the money. I mean... look at me. I don't mean that in any vain sense, but seriously... I can get anyone I want. At least... any man who is so self-absorbed and narcissistic, they don't give a rat's ass that I set boundaries with them. That's all my friends really know... all they need to know. The only reason I told you is because you're fleeting. Just here for a visit."
While I'm not about to disabuse her of the notion that I'm just visiting--since I'm thinking of relocating--I am floored that she's shared something with me that even her closest friends don't know. Which really pisses me off because whatever it is that drives Casey to do the things she does, it comes at the sacrifice of her insulating her friends from whatever pain she's suffered. She doesn't share with them not because she doesn't trust them. She doesn't share with them because she doesn't want them to hurt for her.
Leaning further over the table, I reach out and take one of Casey's hands in my own. I rub my thumb over the peaks and valleys of her knuckles. "You know what your problem is, Goldie?"
She shakes her head, her eyes seeking almost desperately for some truth that she hasn't figured out on her own.
"The men you've been with? They merely stir you and you don't need to be gently stirred," I tell her simply.
One eyebrow drops while the other one rises in skepticism. "I don't need stirred?"
"It's like this. You're not a woman that needs to be treated with kid gloves. You don't need to be coddled or unnecessarily flattered. You're too sharp and savvy for that. In fact, you're almost too sharp and savvy for that. It's made you wary and shielded, which has in turn made you stagnant. You're stuck in a rut of your own making... maybe for self-preservation, maybe not... but your boundaries have stunted the woman you're meant to be. It's like the cocktails you make when you bartend. You need to be shaken, not stirred."
Casey just stares at me as understanding of what I just said starts to take root. Her eyes flare round and her mouth parts slightly. Just as I think she's getting ready to tell me that I am the wisest of all creatures she's ever encountered, she leans over to the side and slaps her free hand on the tabletop while she lets out a bark of a laugh. She peals out uncontrollable chuckles and then wheezes. When she finally sucks in a deep breath of air, she wipes her eyes and says, "That is the biggest crock of shit I've ever heard in my life, Tenn."
I smirk at her as I release her hand and slide out of the booth. After fishing a twenty out to cover the coffee and an extremely generous tip, which I throw down on the table, I hold my hand out to her. Still snickering, she places her hand in mine and looks up at me with amusement.
"Come on, Goldie," I tell her as I pull her from the booth. "You can laugh all you want, but I'm right about that. I'm going to prove it to you."
"Oh yeah?" she asks with a giggle as we start to walk out of the diner hand in hand. "How are you going to prove it to me?"
"I'm going to take you back to my hotel room and I'm going to fuck you hard into submission," I growl at her in a low voice so as not to distress the waitress who waves goodbye to us.
"Mmmmm," Casey moans dramatically as we hit the parking lot. "That sounds nice."
"You'll be walking funny tomorrow," I warn her ominously.
"Even better," she chirps and starts pulling me faster through the lot to my bike. When we get there, I reach out for her helmet to put it on her, but she grabs ahold of my wrists. "But I have a better idea."
"Oh yeah... what's that?"
"You come to my house instead," she says quietly, and my body goes still.
This, I know, is huge. Given the boundaries that Casey sets with men... the fact that she doesn't let them in personally at all... there's no way in hell she opens her house up to them.
"Am I the first?" I ask her gruffly.
She nods her head as she nibbles on her lower lip.
Pleasure and an odd sense of accomplishment rushes through me. Actually, it's euphoric.
I jerk Casey into my body and crush my mouth down on to hers, showing her how much I appreciate the tiny bit of trust she's placed in me. I know this is a monumental moment for her, and I want her to see how special it is to me.
<
br /> Christ... I feel like she just awarded me her virginity or something.
Chapter 9
Casey
Oh, boy... this was not a good idea. What was I thinking inviting Tenn into my home?
Stupid stupid, stupid.
I opened the door to my house and metaphorically opened up a boundary that had been sealed tight.
Wringing my hands, I nervously walk through my small living room. "Um... not much to it. Just a small living room and kitchen. Two bedrooms and two baths."
"It's nice," Tenn says as he looks around and then walks to the back sliding glass door. "Cozy in fact."
I watch as he opens the door and steps out onto my minuscule deck. My tiny beach house sits two streets off the ocean, so most of my view is of other beach houses with just a tiny glimpse of the Atlantic. My house faces south so from the back deck, you can actually see not only a little bit of the ocean to the east but also a tiny bit of the sound to the west. It's all I could afford as beachfront is definitely not within the budget of a down-and-out realtor turned bartender.
Tenn puts his hands on the deck railing and leans over it, craning his neck slightly to the left to look toward the ocean. A soft breeze filters in through the door, but my skin feels chilled.
I kind of thought Tenn would jump on me the minute we walked in. I didn't expect him to ask me questions or look around with interest. I certainly didn't expect him to mosey on out to the deck and check out the scenery by moonlight.
This is not good. This is all too friendly and intimate. It's all just too much, especially after the way I prattled on to him at the diner... letting him in on a secret not one other person knows about me.
I feel itchy and tense and fuck... now my palms are sweating. I rub them furiously on the hem of my shorts and realize that I need to get this turned around. Quickly trotting over to my stereo, I put on some music and completely luck out with R. Kelly's Bump N' Grind.
Straightening up, I turn toward the back door and see Tenn standing just inside of it. I get a sinful pull of his lips upward as he gives a nod of his head toward the stereo. Sliding the door shut behind him, he says, "That's some pretty sexy music you got on there, Goldie."