Busted

She stiffened, then forced herself to relax. “What do you want to know, honey?” Then, mentally, she wanted to kick herself. She had secrets, so many that she didn’t ever want to share. Some of them weren’t even hers, and some of the ones that were still made her look back at the years behind her and wonder what she’d been thinking.

He must have read something on her face and she gave him a wide, easy smile. “I’m an open book,” she said, the lie falling too easily from her lips.

A smile lit his face. “An open book. No woman is. That’s why you drive men crazy . . . and why we love you.”

She pursed her lips as she considered that. “I think I like that.” Then she shrugged. “There’s no reason for you to know that much about me. Or for me to know that much about you. We just met not that long ago.”

“True.” His voice was soft. “And yet I find myself thinking about you all too often. In the morning. Halfway through the day. At night. And that was before we met back up because of those two. I never was able to stop thinking about you, even when I told myself there wasn’t going to be anything more for us.”

“Did you want more?”

She looked away from the pool to meet his gaze.

He was staring at her and the intensity of his gaze sent her heart into overdrive.

“I wanted more pretty much from the first moment I laid eyes on you.” Then he shrugged and looked back at the kids. “But life kept getting in the way.”

“It’s got a way of doing that.”

*   *   *

Trey didn’t know if he’d ever noticed a woman’s eyelashes until he’d met Ressa Bliss.

He’d certainly never had quite this fascination with a woman’s mouth. She had this way of sucking her lower lip in, biting it ever so lightly and then letting it go . . . it made him think about biting her lip, her neck, her . . . lots of things.

But then her words co

What do you want to know . . . I’m an open book.

No, she wasn’t. Trey was pretty good at picking up on stories and he’d seen the story in her eyes before she gave him that wide, easy smile.

“You know, we’ve all got shadows, Ressa,” he said softly. “We all have secrets behind us.”

A squeal, cut short, had them both looking at the pool and then Trey swore, moving off the stool with a muttered apology.

“Clayton, watch the roughhousing in the pool,” he said as he strode past her. “Neeci isn’t me or one of your uncles.”

“But she—” Clayton started, a scowl forming on his face as Neeci surfaced, her hair dripping, a look promising retribution on her little face.

“Did you hear me?”

Clayton’s face folded into mutinous lines, but he nodded and then turned to the steps. “I don’t want to play no more.”

“Anymore,” Trey corrected.

“That either!” Clay shouted. That was the last thing he got out before Neeci took him under.

“Neeci!” Ressa snapped.

“He did it to me first, Ressie!”

“Oh, boy.” Ressa shoved past Trey. “That line doesn’t fly for me. You know that. Out of the pool.”

Neeci’s eyes widened. “What . . . you—” She gulped. “You’re not making us leave, are you?”

Clayton came rushing to her defense. “I did it to her first. I don’t want her to go. It’s my fault.”

“I think both of you need to get out for a while,” Trey said, moving to Ressa’s side. “Maybe it’s time for them to eat. You think?”

“Yeah.” A smile quivered at the corner of her mouth, but she kept her face straight as they all but slumped in relief—not exactly the best thing to do in the pool. “Both of you can settle down a little while. Besides, I’m getting hungry. Come on out, guys.”

“I’ll help them dry off and get them moving inside.”

At Travis’s voice, Trey looked up. His brother had left the far side of the pool and approached without him even noticing. He looked a little less haggard and he’d torn through more than half the food Trey had made that morning. He still looked like he needed to put on a good ten or fifteen pounds, but maybe in another week or two, he wouldn’t look like he was getting ready to put in for a casting call for The Walking Dead.

Trey glanced at Ressa. She shrugged in response. “We’ll be in in a few minutes.”

After the door had closed, she looked over at him, that familiar, teasing smile curving her lips up. “I don’t think she’s ever been so worried about consequences before.”

Trey backed her up against the low-lying brick wall, his hands coming up on either side of her hips to cage her in. “Sometimes the consequences are a bitch.” Then he leaned in and nuzzled her neck. “And then sometimes, the ride’s worth it.”

“Trey . . .” She curled her hands around his waist, her fingers stroking the feathers of the raven that just barely reached his side. “I get the feeling you’re talking about something entirely different.”

“Am I?” he asked, moving to rub his mouth against hers. He could taste her and it went straight to his head.

Before he had a chance to deepen the kiss, though, she pulled away. “Even on the drive back, I already missed you. It’s crazy. I watched you, wanted you for months before I even knew your name,” she said, staring up at him. “Then we had a weekend. One night, really . . . crazy, amazing sex and a few hours together where it was just us. Not much in the scheme of things, but it felt like I was missing some vital part of me when it ended.”

His heart did the weirdest little spin inside his chest—it couldn’t be healthy for a body organ to do that, Trey was almost certain of it. But it felt so right, staring into her eyes. Cupping her face in his hands, he bent his head, pressed his brow to hers. “It didn’t end, though. Just a time-out. Now we just gotta figure out where this is going. Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She closed her hands around his wrists and smiled. “Yeah.”

*   *   *

They talked her into the pool.

She did it only after they promised not to splash her, and that held for all of ten minutes and then Clayton and Neeci gleefully pounced on her and she gamely let them take her under.

Since she was already soaked, she took off after both of them as they swam away and she caught Neeci, tossing her into the air and watching as she landed with a giant splash. Neeci came back out of the water, laughing and squealing for her to do it again. Clayton took a wide-eyed look at her and then swam for his dad.

“Don’t expect me to save you,” Trey said, laughing and moving out the way. “She told you not to splash her. I think you’re in for it.”

From the side of the pool, his legs in the water from the knees down, Travis watched all of it, an amused look on his face.

Realizing he wasn’t going to find any help from his dad, Clayton took off for the next best bet. He climbed out of the pool and ran around the brick surface to hide behind Travis. “Don’t let her get me,” he begged.

Travis snorted. “You trying to put me in the middle of this?” He sighed and shook his head. “Clay, kid.”

“You’re stronger than she is! Besides, you don’t want to kiss her and Dad does.”

Travis shot Trey an amused look. “I’m pretty sure your dad and kissing has nothing to do with any of this. But . . . here. I’ll make it easy, cuz your dad doesn’t want to kiss me.” He hooked his arm around Clayton’s waist and flipped him in.

Clayton hit the water with a giant splash and surfaced with a dark glare for Travis. “That’s not fair!” There was a grin on his face as he started to swim for his dad. “I’ll make Dad dunk you. You’re too big for me.”

“I’ll dunk him later, Clay. Your uncle looks like a puppy could kick his butt right now.” Trey slid him a look across the pool. “Makes it too easy. He’s not dressed for the pool anyway.”