“Maybe I am crazy,” he said, “but nothing’s going to happen between us until you find the guts to take the same risk I’m willing to take. I go, you go. We jump together.”
“I don’t understand this,” she protested.
He bent and picked up her bra and blouse from where he’d tossed them on the floor and handed them back to her. “Then I’ll make it easy. If you can’t care about me, I don’t want anything to do with you. Now get dressed, and I’ll drive you home.”
OF ALL THE dirty rotten things Josh had done, Rebecca thought this one was the worst. If you can’t care about me… As if he cared about her! As if he wasn’t practically engaged to Mary Thornton! As if he’d ever want more from her than a quick tumble!
Except that he could’ve had his tumble, and he hadn’t taken it.
Not that she cared. She didn’t really want him anyway.
A pang in her chest told her she’d like nothing more, but she ignored it and continued to stare out the car window as he drove her home, wondering where she’d gone wrong. At the Honky Tonk, she’d had him eating out of her hand. She’d known he’d ask her to dance, and he did. She’d known he’d take her home, and he did. When they’d reached his place, events had taken an even better turn. So how had he ended up in charge?
She couldn’t say exactly. It was somewhere between the time he removed her blouse and the time he started asking her to tell him things she couldn’t say. Which meant she’d denied him first, right? But somehow that didn’t matter. Any way she looked at it, he’d won this little skirmish. No doubt about it.
Damn him! She’d never been able to best him. Not really.
He pulled to the side of the road in front of Granny Hatfield’s and let her out without saying a word. After she slammed his door, he drove off, and a minute later she was watching his taillights disappear around the corner.
“Jerk!” she muttered, cutting across the wide front lawn to let herself in.
Booker was sleeping under a quilt on the couch, the television on, as she tried to slip through the living room. Before she could escape to her room, however, he stirred and called her name.
“Beck? That you?”
She hesitated at the foot of the stairs, afraid he might guess where she’d been. He seemed to have a sixth sense where she and Josh were concerned.
“Beck?”
“Yeah, it’s me.”
“Where’ve you been?”
“The Honky Tonk,” she said, having to invest some real effort in making her voice sound happy enough.
“After I brought Granny home, I went by the Honky Tonk.”
Rebecca’s heart dropped to her knees. “Oh. Was Delaney still there?”
“No, but Bobby was. He said you went home with Josh.”
“Josh left a few minutes before I did.”
“Yeah, well, nice try. But it didn’t fool anybody.” He flipped off the television and rose up on one elbow. “So was it everything you thought it’d be?”
“No.”
“That’s too bad.”
“Why?”
“Because everyone’s blaming you for why he broke up with Mary. I was hoping you’d at least get something out of it.”
Chills suddenly cascaded through Rebecca’s entire body. “Josh broke up with Mary?”
“That’s what I heard.”
“When did he do that?”
“Tonight, I guess. Just before closing she came to the Honky Tonk looking for him. And she was mad as hell.” Yawning, he rolled over. “I guess he didn’t mention it.”
“No,” she said. “He didn’t.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“HOW’D IT GO last night?”
Rebecca blinked and sat up, wondering how she’d managed to answer the telephone in her sleep. “Delaney?”
“Your powers of perception are improving.”
“What time is it?”
“Eight.”
“Eight?” Rebecca shoved a hand through her hair and grimaced at her bleary-eyed reflection in the mirror above her dresser. “You woke me up at eight on a Saturday morning?”
“You have to work today.”
“Not until eleven.”
“Okay, I couldn’t wait any longer to hear how things went with you and Josh last night.”
Rebecca could have waited until much later to fill Delaney in. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“That bad, huh?”
That good. Almost. “He’s not…realistic,” she said, knowing her complaint sounded weak. But it was difficult to come up with anything worse. Josh had been loving and attentive and sexy as hell. Everything had been perfect until he’d suddenly changed direction.
“Really?” Delaney was obviously not convinced. “I’ve gotten to know him a little bit through Conner and this whole resort business, and he seems pretty realistic to me. He seems nice, too. I was actually hoping you two could find some common ground for once.”
“He’s not what he seems. It’s an act,” Rebecca said, even though she knew it wasn’t true.
“Right.” Delaney chuckled. “So, did you two—”
Rebecca cut her off before she could get any more specific. “No.”
“Sure seemed like things were drifting that direction when you were plastered to him on the dance floor last night.”
Plastered to him on the dance floor? Rebecca rolled her eyes toward the ceiling. How many other people saw it that way? “I wasn’t exactly plastered to him,” she said.
“Any closer and you would’ve been inside his clothes.”
Cursing her own stupidity, Rebecca flopped back onto her pillows. “That’s probably what Mary heard when she arrived, then.”
“How do you know Mary arrived?”
“Booker told me she came to the Honky Tonk around midnight, looking for Josh.”
“Uh-oh. Did she ever find him?”
“Not while I was with him.”
“Thank God for small favors. I don’t know exactly what their situation is, but I know she feels pretty possessive. How long were you at his place?”
Not long enough. Rebecca pulled her covers over her head to shut out the light, wishing she could close off the memory of Josh and what had happened just as easily. “About half an hour.”
“That’s it? What went wrong? You’re really making me curious, you know that?”