Intent(35)

“You can hold me to it all night.” I wink and her whole face burns bright red. She wears it so beautifully. “You’re right, I did promise you a night of pure sugar, thrilling rides, and prize farm animals. So when we’re finished here, we can top the night off with a trip to the county fairgrounds.”

Her responding laugh is music to my ears. Her eyes sparkle and dance with mirth, her smile covers her face, and her skin glows radiantly. So many things about her take my breath away when I look at her and make me forget why I was ever so intent to keep her at arm’s length.

“That was a good one, Ace.” She wipes a tear of laughter from the corner of her eye. “It feels so good to laugh like that. You always keep me on my toes.”

“Layne, there’s something about me I think you should know,” I say with all seriousness. “One of my many skills is being able to take anything you say and completely change the meaning to one that I like better.”

“Like?” She scrunches her brow and slightly tilts her head, deep in thought, and I nearly burst out laughing. But I manage to maintain my composure and finish explaining.

My lascivious grin will no doubt give me away. “Like, when you said I keep you on your toes. My mind automatically went to you touching your toes, which means I pictured you bent—”

“Okay, okay. I got it,” she interrupts with a laugh. “No need to elaborate further.”

“I was just going to say you were bent over tying your shoes,” I fib. “What did you think I meant? Wait a minute. Did you think…? Now listen here, I’m not that kind of man. You’ll have to work harder for this—” I quickly gesture up and down my body with my hand “—than that. Get your mind out of the gutter already.”

Before I’m finished with my mock tirade, she’s in the middle of another laughing fit. The more she tries to stop, the harder the laughs. She takes a deep breath and avoids making eye contact with me, trying to get herself under control. As soon as our eyes meet, I smile again and she starts again. There’s no denying that I thoroughly enjoy how much I affect her.

“Can we go to the fair now? Without you making a sex object out of me all night?” I ask, adding a mockingly offended inflection to my voice.

“You’re right, Ace,” she says as she wipes her eyes again. “I’ve been so inconsiderate of your feelings. I’ll try to control myself for the next hour or so.”

“Thank you,” I reply curtly. “I appreciate the effort.”

“It’ll be really hard, though.”

Her muffled snickers are my first clue before her choice of words really sinks in. “You. Little. Jezebel.”

She draws her lips inward, between her teeth, to avoid smiling or laughing. But her eyes are a dead giveaway. “Why, Ace, that’s not very nice of you. I thought Southern men were supposed to be gentlemanly.”

I slowly lift one eyebrow as I pin her with the most seductive gaze I can muster. “We are. But some women test our willpower more than others.”

I step closer to her and run my hand up her neck, lightly gripping her just below her jawline. My lips hover on hers, barely touching, and I inhale her sweet, summery perfume. “And just being around you tests my willpower to the extreme limits. So we’d better get out of here now before I lock the door and keep you here.”

Being this close to her lips and not sealing the deal is too much to ask of any man, especially of me. A centimeter closer and my lips cover hers. A slow flick of my tongue across the part in her lips automatically gives me full access. And I take it like I own it and can’t get enough of her taste. Like a madman who’s wandered the desert for years and suddenly found a paradise oasis.

“What were my choices again?” she asks when I pull away.

My promise was a night out and I intend to keep it. “We’re going to the fair now. We’ll ride a few rides, eat a bunch of food that’s bad for us, and pet some smelly farm animals. All while the whole town watches us from a safe distance and makes up their own stories about our relationship. That’s how it works around here.”

“Well then, we’ll just have to make sure we give everyone enough conflicting information so no two stories match. It’ll be more fun that way.”

“Let’s go, you troublemaker.”



* * *



The fairgrounds are packed with more people than I’ve ever seen here. The county went all out this year and persuaded a local Georgia band that made it big in Nashville to perform on the main stage. I’d say their idea was a huge success because people from several neighboring counties are here, freely spending their money.

Layne looks up at me with the smile of a kid in a candy store. “What do you want to do first?”

“I’m with you. We’ll do whatever you want to do.” I take her hand in mine and lace our fingers together.

“The Ferris wheel?”

“We can’t come to the fair and not ride that,” I reply. “Let’s get a bunch of ride tickets and go have some fun.”

She bounces up and down on her toes excitedly.

“Is that what you meant when you said I keep you on your toes?” I chuckle.

“For tonight, that’s what it means,” she retorts. “After tonight, it’ll mean something completely different. It’ll be your job to figure it out.”