Perfectly Saucy

In that instant she knew—she hadn’t come here to apologize. She didn’t want him to forgive her. She’d come here hoping…Hoping what?

That he wanted her as much as she wanted him?

That the kiss they’d shared yesterday had been more than just a kiss?

That it had kept him up all night—hot and wanting—as it had her?

Yes, yes and yes. What she’d really wanted was for him to touch her again. After a lifetime of being coddled and cosseted by men with soft hands, she wanted this rough man—these hands—to touch her. Just once she wanted to know how that felt.

Too bad he didn’t seem to want the same thing.

Okay, maybe he was a little interested. After all, that kiss in the kitchen had been pretty hot. But she wanted more. She wanted the kind of passion he couldn’t walk away from.

She never again wanted to settle for less than that.

ALEX WATCHED HER as she scooted off the bench and stood. She made it about three steps down the driveway toward her car before he stopped her. He didn’t know why, but he didn’t want her to leave like this.

“Wait, Jessica.”

She swung back to face him, her spine unnaturally stiff, her chin a notch higher. Outwardly she seemed so together. Cool and in control. But there was vulnerability there, too. That was what he couldn’t walk away from.

“Why me? When you decided you wanted to have a passionate fling, why’d you pick me?”

He was an idiot for asking. But he wanted to spend more time with her almost as much as he wanted to take her to bed and do all kinds of sinful things to her body.

Jessica didn’t answer right away. For a long moment she just studied him, her head tilted at an angle that let a lock of her hair fall across her cheek. Her expression was cautious, as if she were trying to decide whether or not to tell him the truth.

Finally she said, “I had a crush on you in high school. I was a junior, and you were a senior. It all started one day when—” Her gaze darted away from his and the barest hint of a blush crept into her cheeks. “You probably don’t even remember it.”

“Try me.”

But he did remember. He knew exactly which day she meant.

“I was walking home from school alone one day. A couple of boys cornered me by the old Dawson house, where I used to cut across the creek. One of them was that Morse boy. Ronald, I think. His brother had been picked up for drunk driving. This was back when my father was still a judge and he’d just sentenced Ronald’s brother. He was a repeat offender. My father had no choice. But Ronald was looking for someone to blame. I guess I was an easy target.”

The way she said it—so simply, with no resentment or anger in her voice—made him wonder how often that kind of thing had happened. How many of her fellow students had resented her, hated her even, because of the power her father yielded?

“So there I was, all alone with these three guys, when you came along and—”

“Saved you.” He finished the sentence for her because he couldn’t stand to hear the hero worship in her voice.

Her gaze snapped back to his. “You do remember.”

As if it were yesterday. In vivid detail. And he remembered all the things she was leaving out and skimming over. Her “a couple of boys” had been three huge guys. Football players, if he remembered right. Big, dumb and just looking for an excuse to pin Jessica Sumners up against a tree.

Which was exactly where they’d had her when he’d come along. She must have been terrified, but there hadn’t even been a glimmer of emotion in her eyes. She hadn’t begged or cried out or even fought them, as if she’d instinctively known that would only incite their rage. Instead she’d stood there, her gaze as calm and steady as her voice as she’d talked to Ronald.

Her tone so soft, Alex hadn’t caught much of what she’d said. Something about how this would be for the best. How his brother could get the help he needed.

Alex had stood there, half hidden by the fence, his blood pounding, waiting to see what would happen. Unable to leave her to fend for herself, if the guys didn’t walk away, he’d have to do something. But jeez, they were huge. And he’d been in enough fights to know he hadn’t stood a chance, not against all three.

“It all happened so fast,” she mused. “One minute I was all alone, the next I was surrounded.” She looked up now, her eyes finding his. “And then you were there.”

When he’d seen Morse lean in toward her, he’d acted instinctively. He’d called out her name. Not Jessica. Not Sumners, which was what Morse had been calling her. But “Jess.”

“You called out to me,” she said, still studying him with that pensive expression that made him so uncomfortable. “It must have surprised them, because they all three turned around and I was able to get away.”

She’d run straight to his side. Without thinking, he’d put his arm around her shoulder. Together, they’d walked through the Dawson’s yard to the street. At the sidewalk, he’d dropped his arm, but kept walking beside her, not wanting to let her out of his sight. Especially when he’d glanced over his shoulder to see all three guys standing in front of the Dawson house, watching them.

After they’d turned the corner and were out of sight of the football players, she’d slipped her hand into his. He’d felt her palm damp against his and her fingers trembling, and only then had he known how scared she’d been.

When they’d reached her block, he’d stopped and tried to pull his hand away, but she’d held tight. All he could think at the time was that he’d never imagined he’d ever find himself holding Jessica Sumners’s hand. And he sure as hell had never imagined it would feel that good.

Then she’d looked up at him, her eyes bluer than any he’d ever seen, her expression so serious. Not distant and reserved, as it had been the few times their eyes had met while passing in the halls, but warm and filled with emotion. Gratitude, sure, but something else, as well.

An awareness of him. As if she was seeing him for the very first time. Hell, maybe she was. Girls like Jessica—good girls—didn’t notice him. And for all he knew, she’d never really looked at him until that moment.

She’d stood so close to him that when the breeze picked up, a long strand of her hair fluttered close to his face and he’d caught the scent of her. She’d even smelled rich. Clean and fresh. Not like strong perfume, the way his sisters did.

In that instant he’d been distinctly aware of two things. First, he’d wanted to kiss her. Desperately. He’d wanted to press his lips to hers to see if she tasted as rich as she smelled.

Second, he shouldn’t even be touching her.

Jessica Sumners was perfect. She never got into trouble, she never got her hands dirty, and she sure as hell never kissed guys like him. Not in darkened cars late at night when no one could see her and certainly not in the middle of the day forty feet from her front door.

Less than a month before, he had stood in her father’s courtroom and been ordered by Judge Sumners to “keep his nose clean and stay out of trouble.”

He’d suspected making out with the judge’s daughter would get him into a great deal of trouble.

Despite that—or maybe because of it—he’d pulled his hand from hers and shoved it into his pocket. It had been one of the hardest things he’d ever done.

When she’d opened her mouth to say something, he’d interrupted her. “I’ll stay here and watch until you’re inside.” She’d nodded. “Don’t walk home alone again. Wait to walk home in a group. The bigger the better.”

“I’ll have our maid pick me up at school until this blows over.”

Of course. Her maid. Why hadn’t he thought of that? “Good idea.”

She’d seemed to want to say something else as she’d watched him with those huge blue eyes. Eyes that seemed full of something perilously close to hero worship. Hell, that had been the last thing he’d needed. Jessica Sumners getting a crush on him.

Damn, that’d screw up his life but good.

“Go on.” He’d nodded toward her house. Keeping his tone bored, he’d added, “I got things to do.”

Her gaze had flickered as she’d turned and hurried toward the imposing mansion. She hadn’t looked back. Hadn’t seen that he’d stood on the corner, watching her house for nearly thirty minutes, belying his comment about having things to do.

Now, all these years later, as Jessica stood in his driveway, he thought again about how nothing had changed. She was as out of his reach now as she had been on that long-ago spring afternoon. And she still seemed unaware of how much he wanted her.

“I looked for you the next day at school,” she said. “I guess I wanted—” She shrugged. “I don’t know.”

She may not have known what she’d wanted all those years ago, but he had. She’d wanted to recapture that connection they’d both felt standing on that street corner, her hand in his and the rush of adrenaline still pounding through their veins.

She looked at him now, her expression unguarded. When she looked at him like that, he felt like a hero. Ironic, given the very unheroic things his libido was urging him to do.

“So that’s why you came to me? Because I saved you from some bullies?”

She frowned, looking very unsure of herself. “Not exactly.”

“Then what?” When she didn’t answer, he leaned forward. “I didn’t do anything anyone else wouldn’t have done.”

Now her eyes met his with a flash of annoyance. As if it irritated her to hear him belittle his actions.

He sighed. “Look, Jess, it sounds to me like all these years you’ve been walking around thinking I’m some kind of a hero. But that’s just not true. I didn’t rescue you. I wasn’t a hero. To tell the truth, I wasn’t even a very nice guy.”

“I don’t believe you,” she snapped. “What you did might not have meant anything to you, but it did to me.”

“A momentary lapse in judgment.”

Shaking her head, she exhaled loudly. “Would it really be so bad?”

“What?”

“Would it really be so bad to let people know that under your rebellious, tough-guy exterior, deep down inside you’re actually a nice, decent human being?”

His heart swelled at her words—but it only reminded him of another body part that tended to swell around her. Not sure how much more hero worship he could take, he purposely lightened the mood.

He reached over and chucked her gently on the chin. “That’s where you’re wrong, Jess. Deep down inside, I’m just like I am on the outside.”

She stiffened. “I don’t believe you. You wanted people to think you’re despicable, but you weren’t.”

“Despicable?” He laughed. “Honey, villains with big mustaches in old silent movies are despicable.”

The irritation flashed in her eyes again but quickly disappeared. However, it wasn’t as easy to hide the blush his teasing had brought to her cheeks. She pressed her lips into a thin line. “Okay. So not despicable.”

Sensing he was close to having her exactly where he wanted her, he pressed his advantage. “No. Not despicable.” And because he just couldn’t resist touching her, he reached for her hand. Instead of taking it in his, he flipped it over, exposing her palm to his touch. “I’m much worse than despicable. You know what I was thinking about the whole way home?” She shook her head. “I was thinking about how I wanted to kiss you.”

“But—”

He didn’t let her finish. “There you were thinking I was some kind of a hero and all I could think about was how to get in your pants.” He didn’t look at her, didn’t take his eyes away from her palm, which he couldn’t seem to stop touching. It was so incredibly soft and warm under his fingertips. “I would have nailed you in a minute if you’d given me the chance.”

She pulled her hand away. “I don’t believe you.”

This time he couldn’t stop himself from meeting her gaze. He studied her face, but for once found it almost impossible to read her expression.

“As you pointed out,” she said. “There I was, thinking you were a hero. If all you’d wanted was to—”

When she hesitated, he supplied the words for her. “Nail you.”

She nodded. “If that was really what you wanted from me, you could have had it then.”

At her near-whispered words, blood surged through his groin, nearly destroying the last of his control. But her calm and steady gaze assured him of her seriousness. He laughed ruefully. “It’s probably a good thing I didn’t know that then.”

Now she was the one to laugh, clearly embarrassed. “And here all this time, I assumed you did know and just weren’t interested.” He shot her a questioning look and she shrugged sheepishly. “I looked for you all that next week at school, but every time I saw you, you were with friends. Or that girlfriend of yours. What was her name?”

Alex had to search his memory. Funny, he’d dated “that girlfriend of his” for months, but he could barely remember her name, let alone picture her. Yet he still remembered the expression on Jessica’s face when she’d put her hand into his. And the color of the shirt she’d been wearing. And the way she’d smelled. And—

“Sandra,” he finally supplied.

“Right. Sandra. Every time I saw you that week, you were with her. At first, I thought you were avoiding me on purpose.”

“I was. It wouldn’t have been in either of our best interests if people thought there was something going on between us.”

He’d known even then how impossible a relationship with her would be. Even a friendship would have caused problems. She was the a straight-A student and the daughter of the county judge. He was the son of a migrant farm worker, already a grade behind in school, in and out of more trouble than she could imagine, his police record already burgeoning. None of that had kept him from wanting her, but it had damn well kept him from acting on it.

He’d avoided her so effectively that she’d eventually resorted to slipping a note in his locker. Three simple lines thanking him for coming to her rescue, in neat, cursive writing on pale pink paper.

“I thought that you knew I’d developed a crush on you and were trying to discourage me,” she said now.

“I was.”

Her gaze darted to his, her eyes a vivid blue that he seemed to have no defenses against. “Then why did you write me back?”

Because he’d just plain been unable to resist.

He shrugged. “I don’t know.”

His response, slipped through the vent of her locker during fifth period, had started a flurry of notes. She wrote him every day, often more than once, about things both wonderful and absurdly out of the realm of his experience—a low score on a chemistry exam, the shoes her mother had had dyed to match for some party dress, the fight she’d had with her parents over whether or not she’d go to tennis camp over the summer.

He’d written her less often, but with almost unbearable attention to detail. He’d penned his notes to her in the library, hunched over the dictionary, carefully checking his spelling, scouring the thesaurus for words he thought would make him look smart. Words like “supposition” and “eradicate.”

Those three weeks that they’d exchanged notes had been some of the happiest of his young life. Then one day he’d received a note from her asking if he wanted to take her to the prom.

He’d known he couldn’t do it, but God how he’d wanted to. And he hadn’t had the heart to say no. So he’d just stopped writing to her.

“I know you thought I was just some annoying kid,” she said now. “But I loved getting those notes from you. I’d pretend, just for a little while, that I was your girlfriend, instead of Sandra.” She paused for a heartbeat, lost in some long-ago memory. “It was like you couldn’t keep your hands off her. Did you know, I even saw you kissing her once?”

He did know. He remembered the moment vividly. He’d been avoiding Jessica all week, but she hadn’t taken the hint when he’d stopped answering her notes. Every time he’d turned around, there she’d be. His patience and his willpower had started to wear thin. She hadn’t ever caught him alone, but he’d been sure she eventually would. He’d been sure she’d look up at him with those impossibly blue eyes and that when she did he wouldn’t be able to resist doing something incredibly stupid, like kiss her.

So he’d done something he was sure would scare her off. He’d kissed Sandra in front of her. Not an innocent little peck on the mouth, either, but a full-bodied, open-mouthed, I-can’t-wait-to-get-your-body-naked kiss.

“I’d never seen anyone kiss like that,” Jessica admitted with a little laugh. “Not in real life anyway. That kiss…it was like something out of movie. And I remember thinking, ‘So that’s passion.’ I’d never been kissed like that.” She laughed nervously, the pink returning to her cheeks. “I still haven’t.”

“Jess—”

Her hands were clasped tightly together and she was staring pointedly down at them. “All my life and I’ve never been kissed like that. Never felt that kind of passion. Or had anyone feel that kind of passion about me.”

The sheer yearning in her voice finally wore him down and he reached out and put his hand over hers. “Jess,” he said again.

This time she looked up at him. Her eyes held none of the emotion he’d expected to see. Just a glimmer of resignation. Nothing more.

But she pulled her hand out from under his. Then she turned, hitching her purse strap up on her shoulder as she made to leave. “Don’t feel sorry for me.”

“I don’t,” he protested. “But if you think no man’s ever felt passion for you, I think you may be seriously underestimating the effect you have on men.”

Her gaze narrowed and she shook her head dismissively “I don’t need your pity. And I certainly don’t need you to massage my ego. I only brought it up because I didn’t want you to think that yesterday was just—what was that phrase you used?—me wanting to screw around with the hired help. I don’t think of you that way. I never have.”

She continued down his driveway toward the street, but only made it a few feet before he stopped her. “Then what was it?”

“I guess I just wanted someone to feel that kind of passion for me.” This time, when she turned to leave, he just let her go.

Because if she stayed any longer, he might break down and tell her the truth. That he did feel that way about her. That he’d wanted her badly even back then. That, apparently, he still wanted her now.

And that she had inspired the kind of passion she’d spoken of.

That day back in high school, when she’d seen him kiss Sandra, it wasn’t Sandra he’d been kissing. Oh, it had been Sandra’s body pressed to his and Sandra’s mouth under his lips. But when he’d closed his eyes, it had been Jessica’s face he’d seen. And Jessica’s scent he’d smelled. It had been Jessica he’d wanted to kiss.

He’d known then he couldn’t have her, but that hadn’t kept him from wanting her. And it didn’t now.

3

“SO WHAT YOU and I need to do,” Patricia said as she pulled Jessica through her front door a week later, “is find you another man to have a wild fling with.”

As she was dragged toward Patricia’s bedroom, Jessica tried to protest. “I don’t want to find another guy.”

Patricia paused to prop her hands on her hips like a drill sergeant. “You want to do all the things on The List, don’t you?”

“Yes, but—”

“There’s no ‘yes, but’ about it. If you want to complete the list, you need another guy. Which is why you and I are going clubbing.”

“Clubbing?” She narrowed her gaze suspiciously. “I thought you said we were just going to hang out.”

“We are just going to hang out. At a club.”

“Do we have to?”

“Yes, we have to. If we don’t go out, you can’t meet men.” Patricia ticked off her points on her fingers as she spoke. “If you don’t meet men, you’ll never be able to do all the things on that list.” Her voice dropped to a low growl. “You’re not giving up on The List are you? Are you?”

Feeling even more like a young recruit at boot camp, Jessica snapped to attention. “Sir, no, sir!”

Patricia eyed her shrewdly for a second before cracking a smile. “That’s more like it.” She clapped her hands together. “Now we just have to find something for you to wear.”

Jessica looked down at her clothes. “I can’t wear this?”

“Um…no. You look like you’re going to an English tea party.”

“But—”

“Trust me when I tell you that where we’re going, you’ll look out of place.” With that, Patricia disappeared into her closet. A few minutes later she peered around the door. “Do you trust me?”

Uh, oh. This didn’t sound good.

Jessica hesitated, but then she thought of The List and nodded firmly. “I trust you.”

“Great!” Patricia emerged, her arms laden with clothes, the fingers of one hand clutching a pair of knee-high, black patent-leather boots. They looked like something a superhero would wear along with a bright red spandex outfit.

Jessica eyed the boots warily. “Seriously?”

“You trust me, right?” Patricia’s lips curved in a mischievous smile. “You said you did.”

“Maybe.”

“The boots go with the outfit.” Patricia tossed the boots onto the bed and began sorting through the clothes. “You’re not weird about wearing other people’s shoes, are you?”

Other people’s shoes? Maybe a little weird. Other people’s superhero boots? That was a whole ’nother bag of Skittles.

“I’m not sure we wear the same size,” she pointed out.

Patricia planted her foot on the floor beside Jessica’s. “Close enough. Besides, they’re big on me. They should be perfect on you.”

Eyeing the boots with trepidation, she murmured, “Great.”

Patricia snorted with laughter. “Here, put this on.”

She tossed a tank top at Jessica, who caught it automatically then let it dangle by the straps from her fingers. “This? You want me to wear this?” She was a good four inches taller than Patricia. “This won’t fit me.”

“Yes, it will. It’s stretchy.”

“That’s not reassuring.”

Next, she tossed Jessica a skirt. A very tiny skirt.

“No. No way.”

“You said you trusted me.”

“I lied.”

“You’ll look hot. Besides, it’s leather.”

“So?”

“Wasn’t one of the things on The List something about wearing leather?”

Yes, but Jessica chose to ignore the question. “I can’t wear this. I’ll look ridiculous.”

Patricia thrust out her hand in a I-don’t-want-to-hear-it gesture. “When was the last time you went to a club?”

“Last weekend.”

“Not the country club. An actual club.”

“College,” she admitted.

“Okay, so you haven’t been to a club in ten years—”

“Seven.”

“Whatever.” Patricia waved her hand in exasperation, then rolled her eyes, in case the hand-waving wasn’t enough. “Think about why you’re doing the things on this list. You don’t want to settle for being plain, boring ol’ Jessica Sumners anymore, right? You want to be saucy. Like the magazine. Then be Saucy.”

“Okay. Be Saucy,” she repeated resolutely as she tugged on the clothes. The tank top fit better than she would have thought. The neck draped loosely, skimming the tops of her breasts. The hem just reached the low-slung skirt, teasing but not revealing.

She picked up one of the boots and studied it speculatively. “With a miniskirt? Really?”

“You’ll look hot.”

Still doubtful, but determined to be saucy, she tugged on the boots before standing and looking down at her outfit. The skirt was a good ten inches shorter than anything she’d ever worn. The tank top exposed glimpses of her midriff every time she moved. And the boots…Well, let’s just say, if her mother ever saw her wearing them, she’d faint dead away into her martini glass.

Patricia sighed. “Alex would be on his knees begging if he could see you now.”

“That would be nice,” she said with a chuckle.

Patricia came to stand beside her. Shoulder to shoulder, they stared at their reflections in the mirror.

“Well, forget about Alex,” Patricia said. “You look so good you’ll have to pry men off you with a paint scraper! And I say, we don’t leave that club alone. We’ll definitely find you the perfect guy for your fling.”