Roughing It With Ryan Read online

  8

  ONCE AGAIN Ryan stood in his shower, trying to relieve some tension. This time it was sexual tension.

  It had been over a week since he’d first set eyes on Suzanne. He had no idea how long a guy could walk around with an erection without having his parts fall off, but he was thinking it couldn’t be too much longer.

  Damn, his brothers had bad timing, getting the electricity back on just as he’d gotten his hands inside Suzanne’s panties, and a glorious breast in his mouth.

  Just one more minute, one more, and he’d have been buried deep in her sweet, hot body.

  Instead, the lights had blared on, jarring them both. Suzanne had jerked, staring at him wide-and wild-eyed.

  Wanting to soothe, wanting to get back to that mindless pleasure they’d shared, Ryan had leaned in, only to have her slap a hand to his chest and shake her head.

  Dress bunched around her waist and tugged off her shoulders, she’d dragged in a shuddering breath. Her nipples had been tight, and wet from his mouth. Her panties, stretched over her mound and bared to him by her opened legs, had been wet, too, and just thinking about it made him hard all over again.

  “Ryan?” Angel pounded on his bathroom door.

  In typical brotherly fashion, he cranked the hot water back up and ignored her.

  “I’ve got dinner cooking for you, okay?”

  Ah, hell. He turned off the water.

  “And don’t forget, that woman Rafe set you up with? The…‘hot chick’ I think he said? Anyway, she called just now to say she’d pick you up. Gotta run now, late for class. Bye!”

  “What? Wait!” Wrapping a towel around his hips he opened the bathroom door just in time to hear the front door slam. “Angel?”

  Of course she didn’t come back, it was her mission in life to screw with his.

  But…what woman? Vaguely he remembered Rafe telling him he’d met someone who’d be “perfect” for him, but having heard that too many times to count, he’d just nodded and ignored him.

  It was his job as big brother to ignore his siblings when they talked too much.

  But now he had a bad feeling he’d ignored something important. If he had some hot date, he’d like to know about it.

  But good, bad or “perfect,” no woman came to his door that night.

  LATE THE NEXT AFTERNOON, Suzanne sat on the front steps of Taylor’s building, watching life go by, pretending not to stare at Ryan, once again shirtless and hard at work.

  He was nearly finished with the trees.

  Soon he’d go off to the next job, wherever that might be, and she was fine with that. More than fine.

  So why, then, did her heart squeeze just watching him work?

  Simple, pure, unadulterated physical reaction to a gorgeous man, she decided, a man intense and sweaty and hard at work. There was nothing sexier than that.

  But she was becoming deathly afraid that much of it had nothing to do with sex, or even lust.

  With a sigh, she straightened the newspaper in her hands with a little shake and buried her nose in the want ads. A catering job here and there wasn’t good enough. She needed her regimentation.

  Just ask her mother.

  With another sigh, she circled a chef position at a restaurant only a few blocks over, then looked up as a shadow fell over her.

  “Hey,” said the voice that never failed to make her stomach flip-flop. Ryan’s long, hard body stood right in front of her, so that her head was perfectly level with the juncture at the top of his thighs, and the most fascinating spot between them—

  “Whatcha doing?”

  She jerked her gaze back to the paper. “Reading.”

  “The want ads?”

  “Funny thing, how attracted I am to having a positive balance in my bank account.”

  A finger hooked into the paper, pulled it down, exposing a curious, interested, gorgeously rumpled Ryan. What was it about a sweaty man?

  “What about the catering gig?” he asked.

  She was careful to keep her gaze averted. “It’s just a hobby.”

  “It’s more than that.”

  “No, really it’s just a hobby. Sure I’ve had more contacts and jobs lately, but I’m not into my own business.” A tad too much regimentation there. “It’s a good hobby.” She circled another chef ad. The only other one in the paper.

  “Just don’t give up,” he said with a fierceness that surprised her into looking up past his long, long legs and what lay between, all the way up to his deeply passionate expression.

  “I won’t,” she said with some surprise. Funny how the thought of not doing her catering didn’t sit well. “I wouldn’t.”

  “Good.” He pulled on his shirt. Uncapping a water bottle, he sat at her side, leaned back on one elbow and tipped back his head to drink.

  His Adam’s apple, such an utterly male thing, bobbed with each swallow. His light blue T-shirt clung to his damp, overworked body. His powerful denim-clad legs were stretched out in front of him, his booted feet crossed in utter relaxation.

  A long sigh escaped him as he finished off the water, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “That’s good.”

  What was good was how he looked. She wanted to lick the last drop off his bottom lip. Down, girl. “You’re done for the day?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Nearly done period. Just a couple of hours tomorrow and that’s it.”

  Yeah, that’s about what she figured. “What about the trees in the back?”

  “Why?” He turned his head to face her. “You going to miss me?”

  Only every living second. “Of course not.”

  “Right.” He turned forward again, his face unreadable. “And we trimmed those already.”

  “Oh. You’re…um, good at what you do.”

  He looked at her from beneath half-closed, sleepy, sexy eyes, and she realized how her words had sounded. “I meant, the trees,” she said quickly. “You’re good at the trees.”

  His expression was silent and searching, his big body so close the yearning nearly overtook her.

  “I’ve been doing it for a long time,” he finally said. “That’s all.”

  There was a weariness in his voice now that made her hesitate.

  Don’t ask.

  Don’t dig.

  It doesn’t concern you. He doesn’t concern you. “Is something the matter?”

  He looked surprised at the question, and that tugged at her, too. He was surrounded by people, she knew that now. People who depended on him. His brothers. His sister. His laborers.

  But who did he depend on?

  “I’m just tired of trees,” he admitted, letting out that melting crooked smile while he stretched his long body and groaned. “My body is tired of trees. I’ll be glad when…”

  Though she waited, he didn’t finish. He just closed his mouth, put his sunglasses back over his eyes and tilted up his face to the sinking sun.

  “Ryan? You’ll be glad when…what?”

  A honk from the street startled them both. At the curb sat a bright red Miata. A woman got out, a brunette with legs from here to New York.

  Ryan knew this because she wore a leather mini-skirt that showed them off, topped by heels that screamed do me! Her top was leather too, but didn’t quite meet the skirt, exhibiting a sparkling stud in her quite exposed belly button.

  But what confused Ryan was the way she beelined right toward him, her very red lips in a welcoming smile that he didn’t understand.

  Him? She was smiling at him?

  He craned his neck and checked behind him to make sure, but the only people on the steps were himself and Suzanne.

  “Ryan?” Long Legs held out her slim hand, which he automatically took. “I’m Allene.” She smiled expectantly, as if waiting for him to slap his forehead and say, “Of course. Allene.”

  Allene. Allene. Who the hell was Allene and why was she looking at him like that, as if she’d like to gobble him up in one bite? He looked at Suzanne, who was still looking