Wicked Burn(75)

“Well, they’re not the kind of needs I discuss in an open forum,” Niall defended herself hotly. She blinked as she realized that was exactly what she was doing.

Meg sank back into her seat and sighed regretfully. Niall wondered if she was thinking it had been a big mistake to invite Niall to the farm.

“I’m sorry, Niall,” she muttered after a moment. “I just can’t stand to sit by and watch while you two make such a mess of things.”

Niall felt her eyes begin to sting. It was like salt being poured on a wound to hear a good friend say such a thing right after she’d seen the man she loved in the act of practically having sex with another woman if it weren’t for the flimsy barrier of their clothing. Now Meg was telling her it was all her fault that Vic Savian was mauling some strange woman in a sleazy bar’s parking lot because she wasn’t seeing to his sexual needs!

As if she could when he wouldn’t come within ten feet of her.

“Let me out, Tim,” Niall demanded abruptly. “I’ll walk the rest of the way home.”

“No, you won’t,” both Tim and Meg said at once.

“Yes, I will. It’s my car.” She clicked off her seat belt, forcing Tim to slow and finally stop at the side of the rural road.

“Niall, I’m sorry,” Meg apologized rapidly as Niall clambered to open the door. “It’s just that—”

“It’s okay,” Niall said. “I just need to get out right now.”

She averted her eyes from Meg’s distressed expression and Tim’s concerned one before she slammed the door and started walking down the blacktop road. What she’d said was true. She felt like she was going to have a panic attack if she remained in the confined space of her car. Images of Vic pressed so tightly against that woman played in graphic, haunting detail in her mind’s eye. Volatile emotions bubbled like a wicked brew in her chest—fury, jealousy, anguish . . . desire.

Yes, desire.

It made her nauseous to realize it, but sexual arousal had simmered in her lower belly, hot and tingling, when she’d seen Vic in such a blatantly erotic tableau. Memories and sensations of what it had felt like to have him make love to her with his characteristic intensity and passion had smacked into her awareness with the equivalent of a physical blow.

And Meg had accused her of not having any needs. What a joke.

After Tim and Meg had passed out of sight, Niall stopped on the side of the road and let out a sob of pure misery. She didn’t know how long she stood like that, bawling her eyes out with only thousands and thousands of foot-high corn stalks as her witness, but it was twilight by the time she started walking down the road again. Unfortunately, her cry had done her no good. The graphic memory of Vic kissing that woman kept her right in the center of her emotional storm.

It took her a minute to realize that the low heels of her sandals were sinking slightly into the heated blacktop. She hissed a furious curse when she lifted a foot and saw that the tarlike substance stuck to her shoes. She’d never get the damn stuff off!

When she heard a car coming down the road behind her, she moved off to the side. The gravel at the periphery of the road adhered to her sticky sandals. Tears of sheer frustration slipped down her flushed cheeks.

It took her a few seconds to realize that the vehicle had slowed and stopped next to her. She glanced to her right warily. Vic was staring down at her from the cab of his dark blue pickup truck.

“What’re you doing?” he asked in equal parts irritation and puzzlement.

Niall gritted her teeth as she swiped at her wet cheeks. Great, this was just great. “Leave me alone. I’m taking a walk.”

He grunted incredulously. “It’s ninety degrees plus, and it’s getting dark. You’re wearing high heels.”

“So?” Niall asked furiously. Why the hell did everyone have to keep mentioning her shoes? She paused to try and pry off the widening patch of gummy gravel on her left heel with her right toe. The clod came off her heel and stuck on her other sandal. She kicked her foot in mounting irritation.

“Get in the truck. I’ll take you back to the farm.”

“No,” Niall stated emphatically, refusing to look at him as he stared down at her.

“Get in the goddamned truck, Niall,” Vic growled when she sprinted forward several steps, trying to ignore the fact that it felt like she was walking through glue.

Without pause she suddenly did an about-face and circled around the back of Vic’s truck. What the hell? Why should she care if Vic saw her at her emotional worst? He was the one who was responsible for it, after all.

Her tears cooled when they came into contact with the frigid interior of Vic’s air-conditioned cab. Before she shut the door, she sat sideways in her seat and removed her ruined sandals. She glared at him after she resoundingly slammed her door shut, glad to see that he looked as angry as she was. Her rage required an outlet and a calm, reasonable man wouldn’t have supplied it.

“Where’s your girlfriend?” she asked sourly as she jerked her seat belt with unnecessary force.

Vic leaned forward, his forearms on the wheel, and studied her. His face looked dark and ominous in the shadows of the truck, reminding Niall of a storm that was about to break.

“I don’t owe you any explanations.”

“Then what are you doing here?” she demanded hotly. Tears continued to course down her face, but she could have given a good goddamn at this point. “Why aren’t you carrying on with your parking lot romance?”