Braydon(67)

He opened the driver’s door and took a step back. “For tonight, I want you in the middle.”

Jessie looked up into the truck, then back at Braydon. The middle, huh?

She wasn’t opposed to the idea, so she just nodded her head.

Doing her best to climb into the jacked-up truck as gracefully as possible—not an easy feat, mind you—not wanting her lightweight dress to fly up and reveal that she, in fact, didn’t have on panties, Jessie finally managed to get in.

Braydon was right behind her, and after he buckled his seat belt and put the truck in gear, he placed his right hand on her thigh.

Jessie stared at his big hand on her leg. He wasn’t doing anything inappropriate, but her mind immediately drifted to all sorts of lascivious thoughts right then and there. He squeezed gently, as though reading her mind, and Jessie tore her eyes off his hand and looked up at him.

“Did you find a movie?”

Crap. She knew she was supposed to do something.

Braydon chuckled as though he had known she wouldn’t be able to think clearly after what had transpired between them in the truck. “No worries. I found one. A couple actually. Your choice. Chick flick or action?”

“Depends,” she said, clearing her throat.

“On?”

“Which one you want to see more.”

“It doesn’t matter what I want.”

“Oh, yes it does,” she said, taking a deep breath as his hand slid a little higher on her thigh.

“Why is that?” he asked, glancing over at her from the corner of his eye.

“Because if you’re gonna be focused on an action movie, I’d rather see a chick flick.”

Braydon’s eyebrows dipped in confusion.

“I kinda like the idea of being able to distract you.”

Braydon’s deep inhale told her that he understood her meaning. That made her smile.

And when his hand inched up even farther on her thigh, Jessie knew just how this night was going to go.





chapter SIXTEEN

Foreplay.

Braydon swallowed a laugh as the word popped into his head. Again. Just last night he’d been thinking about it, too. Oh, hell, who was he kidding? He had probably been thinking about foreplay at least once an hour since he was old enough to know what it was.

But today’s brand of foreplay was decidedly different from what Braydon was used to.

It would appear that they were going to make up for all the foreplay that last night lacked during this particular date.

Not that he had a problem with that.

Quite the opposite, actually.

It took incredible concentration to keep his focus on driving and not the smooth, warm skin of Jessie’s thigh beneath his hand. He could feel a slight tremble in her leg, and every time he glanced down, he noticed her hands were balled into fists, her knuckles white.

Yep, she was affected by his nearness.

Who the hell knows what made him so bold all of a sudden. Not that it was a new development for him, but he was pretty astute at keeping his thoughts to himself most of the time. That wasn’t the case when he had informed Jessie that he would’ve f*cked her right there in the cab of his truck. When her eyes had lit up, he knew he’d hit a hot button for her. Worse, the temptation had been so damn great, he had almost thrown all caution to the wind and done just that.

The way she’d looked at him, a potent mixture of lust and eagerness in her gaze . . . It had nearly been too much to ignore.

Before the night was out, he hoped to hit plenty more of her hot buttons.

And he wasn’t going to wait until they were back in the privacy of Jessie’s house, either. After her little remark about distracting him, Braydon was thinking of plenty of things he intended to do to her tonight. Especially in the shadowy movie theater.

“So, which is it going to be?” Jessie asked, her hand coming down firmly on his and halting his upward progress. He’d been teasing her, trying to see just how far she’d let him go.

Now he knew.

“Honestly, I don’t give a damn which one we see. I won’t be paying attention to anything other than the fact that you don’t have panties on.”

“How do you know I don’t?” she asked, and for a brief moment, he almost believed that she did. But he knew Jessie. She liked a challenge.

“Move your hand and I’ll find out for myself,” he told her.

“Not a chance,” she teased, her hand squeezing his tightly. “Where are we going anyway?”

“A theater in Austin,” he told her.

“Why so far?”

“This is one of those fancy ones. The kind where you can order food if you want.”

“So it’s dinner and a movie all in one?”

“Yep. The quintessential first date no-no. Since we’re past that particular milestone, I figured I’d pull out all the stops.” He kinda liked the idea. Seeing as they could get back home and get to the naked part of their evening sooner, he was all for consolidating.

The theater was a solid half hour from Coyote Ridge, mainly because it took so long just to get to the main highways. But once they hit the toll road, it was smooth sailing. Jessie questioned some of the landmarks as they passed, and Braydon did his best to give her the knowledge that he had. He’d grown up in the Austin area his entire life, but truth be told, he didn’t venture into the city all that often. He was a small-town boy to his soul, and he preferred his rural stomping grounds to Austin’s big-city heartbeat.