CHAPTER 9
Olivia
M y head is swirling in the passenger seat of Asher’s pickup truck after he yanked me away from that cowboy, then threatened to spank me.
He’s right about me normally not drinking this much. But over the last few weeks, it’s been either drink or cry whenever I feel like the proverbial rug has been pulled out from under me. And I’m damn sick of crying.
I lean my head against the seat, knowing I can’t run from this reality any longer.
I have to channel my inner Lynn Sutton and find the positive in these situations.
The people I have in my life are one in a million and I will have my house back thanks in part to this pissed-off bartender driving me home.
I close my eyes, listening to Ty Myers sing “Ends of the Earth” as I breathe in the fresh clean scent of Asher’s truck.
The rustic, sultry sound of this song doesn’t deter me from imagining just what that spanking would feel like, and how the thought sends a thrill through my body.
Hell, I need to get it together. I’m almost thirty, and the time to play around with the town bad boy and live like I’m in college having one-night stands is over.
Asher clears his throat and turns up the song as he focuses on the road, and he leans back in his seat. The hum of the road seems to relax him as he drives, and I wonder just what is going on inside that head of his.
“You like this song?” I ask, turning my body toward his, tugging at my seatbelt to make some space.
“Yes,” he answers.
“But it’s about a man who’s so in love with a woman he can’t stand to be away from her,” I push. “How he’d follow her to the ends of the earth.”
His strong features flex. “And?”
“And you don’t believe in love.”
“You don’t have to believe in love to appreciate the way others believe in it.” Asher side-eyes me. “And you’re welcome to get to know me better, Liv, when you’re more … clear-headed.”
His voice has an icy edge and he keeps his eyes focused on the road.
But it hits me all the same as I watch him push his hair off his forehead with one large, inked hand.
Asher Reed is gorgeous—a dripping with masculinity, rugged competence, and surety kind of gorgeous.
My eyes drift over his angled cheekbones, the perfectly imperfect black hair, and his beard, thick but trimmed close over his wide jaw.
It makes me imagine what his face would feel like drifting slowly over my stomach, then up between the valley of my breasts.
The scruff counteracting his soft, full lips as they skate across my flesh.
His arm is lined with veins as he grips the wheel tight, and from this position I get a closer look at the ink that spans his tanned skin.
There’s a crown with roses woven throughout the sleeve design, a clock stuck on one-twenty-five, numbers and writing in a language I don’t know.
I look away when my core starts to heat just from studying him.
“For the record, it’s easier for me to ask about you with a few drinks under my … dress?” I say with a grin. “You’re not always approachable.”
Asher turns his dark eyes on mine for a split second. “That’s your assumption of me.”
I snort. “That’s everyone’s assumption of you.”
“Aye, but you judged me the moment you met me.”
I hum in admission.
“And what did you assume?” he asks, tapping his heavy thumb on the wheel.
“I assumed you were the same as the last man I knew like you,” I blurt out.
“Assumptive, discriminatory bullshit? Surprising for you, Livi.”
Livi? That’s the second time he’s called me that.
“Not discriminatory. Just similar. He was big like you. Well, not quite as big. He wasn’t bearlike. Maybe more of a baby bear …” What the hell am I saying? “Lots of tattoos, always wearing a semi-scowl.” I take a deep breath. “He was my boyfriend. We met the summer before college. WKU.”
Normally, the warning voice in my head would appear and tell me to shut the fuck up, but she’s sleeping off her sangria so I keep talking.
“Nathan Stokes. Nate. He was on the wrestling team, ran with a rough crowd, partied a lot.” I watch Asher’s gaze intensify on the road ahead as he grips the wheel tighter. “He was older than me, drove an Indian motorcycle, a Scout.”
Asher scoffs. “So he’s a wanker.”
“Oh?” I laugh. “So you’re a bike snob?”
“You wouldn’t catch me dead on anything but a Harley, so your ‘he was like you’ shit doesn’t fly.”
“So, you are a snob,” I reiterate before resuming my story. “Anyway, everyone told me he was bad news. He was a total flirt, dabbled in a lot of drinking and sometimes drugs. I couldn’t stay away from him. He was gorgeous—”
“Aye. So maybe a little like me then.”
A smirk plays on Asher’s lips, which I try to ignore. Along with the sangria swirling in my stomach. Or is that butter-flies?
“We had fun, for a while. But after Christmas break, I came back to my dorm early and found him in bed with my roommate, Tania. She had become a really good friend.”
I glance out the window as a vivid memory pushes into my brain: his hands on her, kissing her, both of them naked.
“He didn’t even stop fucking her. He just looked up at me, then back to her, and kept right on going like I meant nothing to him.
I had to live with her for the next three months as they dated.
I had to be there when he came over every day.
It was … terrible. And completely humiliating.
” My voice trails off. “I knew then I was done with bad boys.”
“Cheating makes weak men feel strong.” He turns to look pointedly at me and my stomach somersaults again. “This Stokes? He’s nothing like the man I am.”
A rolling heat hits my core as I turn my gaze to the window.
“Well, he taught me a lesson. The man I marry will be kind, he’ll come from a good hardworking family, maybe he’ll be a businessman, he’ll be home every night like my dad was, and he’ll be a real family man who wants all the same things I do. ”
“Which are?” Asher’s jaw tics as he turns onto the Silver Pines drive.
“All the notes in my journal.” I shrug.
“A journal about your made-up future husband?”
“Yes, a journal. I’ve had one since I was eleven.
It’s always made me feel more in control to put my goals in writing.
I want a man who wants a family with me and our family will be more important to him than anything else in this world.
A man who puts me first. Do you think that’s too much to wait for? ”
He pulls up to my cabin and cuts the engine. I’m reminded when his gray eyes fix to mine that I’m with Asher. Talking to him like I would CeCe or Ginger.
“Whatever you want from any man is never too much.” He pauses and I see that pinch of his brow as he considers his next words. “And whatever he gives you in return, it still won’t be enough.”
I’m speechless, but Asher doesn’t give me a chance to respond as he gets out of his side of the truck and makes his way over to mine.
He’s right. Everything I think I know about him is an assumption.
But he is mysterious, quiet, always seems to speak in riddles, and he definitely has an aura of danger.
Which means I can’t be that far off. To the world, Asher Reed is the epitome of bad boy.
“I shouldn’t have compared you to Nate. But it does seem as though you have a past. At least, that’s what I thought the first time I saw you,” I offer as he opens my door.
“You don’t want to know about my past, Olivia.” It isn’t something he’s saying as a reflex. It’s a warning.
“Did some girl do a number on you? Is that why you hate love now?” I ask as I step out to feel the earth rock under my feet. I’m dizzy with both the curiosity I feel about who he really is and all the alcohol in my system.
“Christ,” he mutters under his breath as he scoops me up into his strong arms. I’m helpless to stop him when he looks down at me. “I don’t hate love. I just don’t believe in it.”
He cradles me tight and I rest a hand to his hard chest as he carries me up the steps to my cabin. I try not to enjoy this, but I nuzzle my face against him and breathe him in. Maybe just for one night …
“Don’t even fucking think about it,” he remarks, as if he’s reading my mind. My cabin is unlocked—there’s no place at Silver Pines that isn’t safe—and Asher makes his way in to set me down.
“You don’t know what I’m thinking,” I fire back, smoothing my dress over my hips.
Asher tosses my purse down on the bench in the entry of the cabin and flicks on the lamp. Jo was definitely here today; there are new magazines on the table, candles, and throw pillows on the sofa.
“I know when a woman is getting comfortable in my arms. I’m not your drunken cowboy hookup, Olivia.” He moves closer to me, the angry way he says my name sending a shiver up my spine.
“And whoever you assume I am, wherever you assume I come from, I can assure you that you’re wrong. ” His voice is even lower now. “If getting comfortable in my arms is something you want, that’s something you can tell me when you’re sober. Do you understand?”
The weight of his eyes and the strange feeling that he sees me, what I might really want, makes the room spin even more, and suddenly I feel like I’m about to throw up.
I cover my hand with my mouth and make a run for the bathroom, barely getting to the safety of the toilet before I empty my stomach.
Fucking sangria Sundays.