Nuts (Hudson Valley, #1)(77)

An opportunity to work with the Bryant Mountain House? The place was legendary, iconic!

I nonchalantly told him yes, I’d be interested in talking about it, trying to keep from squealing. It was also hard to keep from squealing as Archie was incredibly cute. Wavy auburn hair, dancing blue eyes, and a quick smile made him easy to squeal over.

But beyond the squealing, I also had to keep from swooning, as Leo was behind me, announcing his presence with a very specific and very hard part of him pressing into my backside.

Fighting a blush, I thanked Archie for his interest and promised to go see him sometime.

Leo was good at this. I’d go left, and he was right next to me with the hand brand on my back. I’d go right and, you guessed it, he fell right into step with me. And no one was the wiser that he was rocking a silo in his pants while he was shaking hands and laughing at jokes.

This all should have annoyed me. I waited for the prickly sensation at my neck or between my shoulders when he’d run a finger down my spine . . . but it didn’t come. Only a deep desire to have him naked and underneath me at the earliest possible moment. And yeah, there was a part of me that liked being claimed so publicly too.

Feeling hot, almost feverish, I finally separated from Mr. Happy Hands to visit the ladies’ room, which was designated by chalkboard saying No Dicks Allowed. Cooling the back of my neck with a wet towel, I looked at myself in the mirror. Flushed and wild-eyed—oh, Lord, I had it bad.

And when I exited the bathroom, I stepped right into my own John Hughes movie.

There stood Leo, leaning against the wall across from me, one leg bent at the knee. His head was down, and he did a slow, knee-bucklingly sexy look up to see me. Then he kicked off from the wall and walked—no, stalked toward me like the sexiest predator you’ve ever seen.

He pinned me to the wall. To the wall! His body covered all of mine, his hips positively owning me. Just around the corner, the rest of the party was just a canapé away from finding us up against a wall and out of our minds. But with this much Leo pressed against me, it stayed on the edge of my mind. Lost in a fog of hormones and pure carnal need, I focused on Leo’s lips running up my neck as he whispered the filthiest promises I’d ever heard. Lick. Suck. Bite. Lift. Spin. Turn. Spank. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

A glass dropping startled us both and we turned our heads at the sound, the tinkling of glass followed by a muffled giggle. It was enough to snap us out of it, and we peeled ourselves off the wall and headed back to the party, where everyone seemed to know exactly what we’d been doing.

“I need a drink. You need a drink?” I asked, flustered. I needed a moment without the intoxicating Mr. Maxwell so close and under my skin. And very nearly under my dress.

He licked his lips, grinned at me, and headed into the fray to get our drinks, smiling and chatting like a pro.

Then I heard a voice that had haunted my high school days.

“Well, well, look whose back in town and turning all the heads.” Krissy Jacobson—Class President, Prom Queen, and Most Likely to Succeed at Being a Bitch for the Rest of Her Life—clicked over to me. Behind her trailed her faithful four lemmings. How many years since high school, and they still followed her like baby ducks?

I braced myself for the catty quips and jabs about High School Roxie and the backward mess that I was.

“Hi, Roxie!” Maureen chirped. She was always the friendliest of the bunch.

Loren pulled me into a hug. “It’s so great to see you!” she cheered, kissing me on the cheek before passing me on to Paula, who repeated the embrace before passing me on to Lece.

They oohed and aahed over my dress and my hair and my “sun-kissed” glow, which I’m pretty sure they all knew came from making out with Leo, not the sun. None of them had left Bailey Falls, choosing to raise their 2.5 kids here, and my head swam as they told me about their families, husbands, and kiddos.

Then they riddled me with questions about California. Did I go to the beach every day? Did the Kardashians go to my gym? Did I cook for any famous people?

I never ever cook and tell, but these were the girls who made life miserable for me back then. So I might have showed them the picture of me and Jack Hamilton, his arms around me in his kitchen, his hands full of my pound cakes. They all squealed, staring at my phone.

“And Leo . . .” Krissy let his name float out there for me to catch it.

“Yes, Leo,” I replied, sipping my drink and avoiding eye contact.

“You’re so lucky,” Lece said. “Women have been trying to snag him for years!”

I nodded, taking it all in. How invested he was in the community, how cute he was with Polly.

“Nothing is sexier than a doting father,” Maureen said, throwing back a shot.

“You’re the talk of the town, being Leo’s girl,” Paula said.

Smiling politely, I chewed on Leo’s Girl while they moved on to Oscar the Dairy Hunk.

For as long as I could remember, everyone saw me as Trudy’s Girl.

Now I was Leo’s Girl.

What did it take for me to just be Roxie?

California.

I kibitzed with the girls for a few more minutes, sucking on olives with Lece, doing a shot with Maureen, then another shot with Maureen, then finally a third shot with Maureen. I confessed to Krissy that I’d been the one to sabotage her strawberry shortcake in home ec class by switching her sugar for salt—as you do. And then there was one more shot with Maureen.