Sizzle (Bad Boy Rockers) (Volume 1)(25)

Perhaps if I made an effort we would hopefully get the kind of friendship back that we had before we arrived at his family’s home.

“Oh, you’re back. I wasn’t expecting to see you both until dinner,” Stephanie commented walking out from the kitchen.

“Yeah, Thalia doesn’t like the water.”

I smiled, but felt like punching him. Stephanie glanced at me, as though it was unheard of.

Changing the subject, I said, “We thought we’d go on a picnic by the river.”

“Make sure you wear bug repellant, Liam. You don’t want to get bitten again.”

I hid a grin and turned to Liam, “Do you mind if I go upstairs for ten minutes, I need to return Callie’s call?”

“No,” he replied.

“Thalia, please don’t feel like you have to ask. While you’re here, please treat this as your home,” Stephanie informed me, which took me by surprise.

“Oh, okay. Thank you.”

With that out of the way, I turned and headed up the stairs.

“Wait up,” Liam shouted, and then he looked to his mom. “We’ll see you later.”

As I was entering my bedroom, Liam caught my hand and tugged on it to get my attention. “Give me an hour and we’ll go and raid the kitchen to have our picnic, okay?”

“Okay.”

“It’s a peace offering. I was a bastard earlier and I’m sorry. We need to have some fun.” My eyes widened and he burst out laughing. “Go rest.”

I opened my door and walked through turning around to look at him. “I’ll accept, providing you don’t chuck me in the river.” He chuckled and walked off to his room shaking his head.

With my door shut, I dropped my purse on the floor, retrieved my phone from my back pocket and then made a dive on to the bed, sprawling out on my stomach while I dialed Callie.

She answered on the second ring. “Hey girlfriend,” I said in response to her distracted ‘yeah’.

When she realized it was me, she screamed and dropped her phone.

“Thalia, you still there?”

“I sure am.”

“How’s it going with Liam?”

“Not too bad, although he was an ass out on the lake, earlier.”

She sighed down the phone. “You can’t swim”

“Yeah, I know. It was pretty scary, especially when Liam rocked the boat.” I inhaled and let my breath out slowly, knowing when I mentioned, Jack, I’d get bombarded with questions. “His brother, Jack, pulled me out and looked ready to murder Liam. I left them to it and ran off to cry.”

“That bastard, he made you cry – hang on – Jack – who’s Jack?”

I smiled thinking about Jack. “He’s Liam’s brother and so damn hot.”

“Please tell me you aren’t getting up to no good with his brother?”

“It depends what you call ‘any good’.” She stayed silent. “He came after me and held me in his arms. He felt good – hard and solid against me – he’s getting married.”

“Oh f*ck!”

“Lovely language, for a lady.”

Callie snorted in response.

“He’s lonely Callie. Even though he’s always done what his parents wanted him to do, even, if I’m not mistaken, marry this woman; they still treat him like shit. The fact that he’s good looking, doesn’t help my attraction to him.”

“You are in trouble. Perhaps, I should visit. To check him out.”

“No, you won’t.”

Shit. She started to laugh – rather loudly. “You’re in way over your head. What does Liam have to say about all this?”

I sighed. “I can’t figure him out. He said he wants me to ‘pretend’ to be his girlfriend and that he knows we aren’t going anywhere. He just wants to be friends, which is more than fine with me. He also said that Jack will get married, no matter what. Basically, he warned me away from his brother.”

“How does he know you have the hot’s for Jack and how old is he?”

“Apparently, Jack has never acted with anyone the way he does with me. The episode on the lake was to prove to me that Jack would come to my rescue, and he did... Oh, and he’s twenty-five.”

“What are you going to do? It sounds like he has the hots for you as well.”

“Oh Callie, he pulls at me. When I see him all I want to do is hold him. Wrap him up in my arms and never let go.” I laughed, embarrassed. “I only met him less than twenty-four hours ago and can’t get him out of my head.”

“Thalia, he’ll break your heart. Promise me, you’ll stay away from him, no matter how hard it is. Make sure Liam is always with you around the house so you don’t get caught on your own with him.”

I didn’t think it wise telling her I was sharing a bathroom with him.

“Anyway, enough about me. How’s Texas?” She giggled. I moved the phone away from my ear and looked at it, thinking I’d heard wrong. She never giggled. “Did you just giggle at me?”

“Maybe.”

“Callie.”

“We have a new ranch hand – he’s hot. He’s a sexy cowboy, Thalia....”

Shit. “That is so not fair – I bet Jack would look hot in denim, boots, and open shirt.” I could dream and probably would.