Lead Me On

At least Leigh had told her last night that her note was a perfect prologue to her basket. Very old-school. And, hey, what guy wouldn’t be interested in that kind of message?

Margot cracked the curtains, squinting at the sunlight. She smiled when she saw the wide tomato fields and the pine trees lining the nearby open road.

Unfortunately, her gaze then went to the parking lot, where she saw Clint Barrows’s faded blue Dodge truck lounging next to her little Prius.

Why did it seem as if even his pickup was ready to devour her car?

Rubbing her arms, she wandered to the bathroom, turning on the shower, stripping off her long nightshirt. The second the heated mist whispered over her skin, she tightened with goose bumps, imagining that she heard a voice, soft and low, whispering quiet apologies to her.

Clint Barrows’s apologies.

Just hear me out, he’d said last night in the parking lot, when she’d known he meant so much more.

She stepped into the shower, hoping the water would wash her into a sane place. But as it sluiced over her, she imagined his hand on her hip, just like last night when he’d been bold enough to touch her.

Yet, now, there were no clothes between them, and as she closed her eyes, the uninterrupted flutter of water against her became his fingers, and she felt them ease to her belly, a fleeting butterfly touch.

You’re being real difficult about this when it should be so easy....

She leaned forward, bracing her hands against the tile wall. The water gently ran down her body, slipping over her thighs, in between her legs.

Wantonly, she opened them a little, loving the sensation as it skimmed over her clit.

The water became his fingers again, finding just the right spot, her breath quickening right along with her heartbeat.

You used to be a risk taker, she heard him tell her, as if they were talking again. The butterfly wings on her body traveled inward, beating in her belly, electric and tickling, making her bite her lip.

So why’re you set on safe, boring Brad?

Why not go for this new direction?

She took her hand from the wall, trailed it between her breasts, down her stomach to her pulsing center. Sliding her fingers through her cleft, she massaged herself, thinking of Clint.

At least, with Brad, they’d had a summer together. And when they’d returned to college, after the bloom had faded off their little affair, they had floated away from each other, going different ways.

It’d all been perfectly safe with Brad, just as it could be this weekend. No deception, no videos.

But, as she touched herself, the water caressing her, the mere thought of that unpredictability sent a jolt through her, making her breath catch.

Wet. Excited. And every time she circled her clit with her thumb, imagining that it was Clint touching her, her temperature rose. The heat pushed her up, up, tighter and tighter, until a tiny series of impending explosions quivered in her.

She fought the first one, pressing herself forward against the wall....

Then the second, as it rolled through her, shake by contained shake....

But the third—

She started to give in to it for the first time in months, slipping down the wall as blasts of sensation seized her, making her gasp just before she let go with one long, hard inhale...then...

As the water ran over her—just water now—she groaned, aching.

Still aching.

And hardly knowing just what it was anymore that she really wanted.

4

AFTER THE PREGAME party and the homecoming football match itself, the reunion moved to Main Street, to the back room of Dani’s favorite hangout in Avila Grande.

Desperado’s was one of those country joints that was marked by the smell of hops and fried food every time you walked through its swinging doors and hit the planked floor. On the walls above the bar were deer antlers, a buffalo head and a menu that showcased Rocky Mountain Oysters—a dish that Dani didn’t have the stomach for once Leigh and Margot had told her that the name was actually a euphemism for bull-calf testicles.

Ah, yes, good old Desperado’s, where the Valley’s farm and ranch kids had hung out, where music had always been 100 percent country, the beer cheap and the food rugged and, as it turned out, disgusting.

But the moment Dani had strolled in with Riley tonight, greeted by the thud of hip-hop and the sight of undergrads doing everything but the two-step on the small dance floor, it was obvious things had changed.

“So it’s come to this,” Dani said as she and Riley left the main room and made their way through the slim lantern-lit corridor toward the back, where the auction was scheduled to start in an hour. “Desperado’s is now pure evil.”

“Evil?” Riley rested a hand on the back of her neck, cupping it. “Strong word, Dan.”

“Okay, maybe not evil, then. It’s just...” She motioned toward the dance floor and almost flinched at the loud music, which was making them raise their voices. “I miss how it used to be.”

He guided her to the side of the corridor. No one else was there right now—they were early. And when he leaned back against the wall, putting his hands on her jeaned hips, pulling her to him, her heart jittered. But it was always that way when she looked into Riley’s deep blue eyes.

“I don’t like it, either,” he said. “But things never stay the same. Not anywhere.”

“I guess I’m just getting old and cranky.” She’d also felt that way before the game, while walking around campus. Dressed in her old Cal-U sweatshirt against the fall chill in the air, she’d felt like a grandma next to all the students running around, their lives ahead of them as they dreamed of success. “Everything just seems so...corporate. Cal-U used to be small, homier. Now it’s—”

“Trendier than hell. I noticed.”

He bent forward, kissing her forehead, and they stayed like that for a few seconds, his breath stirring her hair, infiltrating her, just as it had ever since she’d glanced up one day on a sorority/fraternity reunion cruise five years ago that neither Leigh nor Margot had signed up for. That’s when she’d seen Riley giving her that look—one she’d never noticed before. It was the look of a friend who had apparently been thinking some extremely more-than-buddies thoughts without her even knowing it until that moment.

It had changed her world, changed her mind.

But it hadn’t changed either of them.

Or so she’d believed. It hadn’t occurred to her that change was everywhere except in her until last night, when Margot and Leigh had sprung this auction on her.

She held on to Riley, her hands wrapped in the bottom of his long, untucked shirt, cocooned there. After last night, she’d started wondering just how people perceived her—had always perceived her.

Was she someone in need of rescuing? A pitiful dreamy princess who’d been defined all her life by one goal and one goal only?

To be the ultimate bridezilla?

Just...wow. And, the thing was, Dani feared that her friends were right. What had she done with herself all these years besides get a job as lead caterer for someone else’s company? What true ambitions had she possessed?

She’d always looked up to Margot—and who hadn’t? Margot led the pack, getting them into trouble while watching over them at the same time. Dani loved her friend’s independence, her go-get-’em approach to life. And the same went for Leigh, who had overcome a tragic childhood filled with sadness after the accidental drowning of her sister. Leigh had also struggled with her weight when she was younger, but now she was as svelte as Margot and just as successful a businesswoman. And what was Dani?

Down the corridor, she heard a door close, and she caught a peek of Margot, dressed as stunningly as ever in what looked to be an Ann Taylor leather jacket, a pencil skirt and high boots as she made a beeline for the back room. She was carrying an iPad, probably to keep track of the baskets that had already been dropped off, and she didn’t see Dani and Riley as she disappeared.