So, I got what he was saying. I also got that he was wrong and he knew it. I was gonna do more than fill McKinskey’s shoes. I was going take them all the way to Lord Stanley this year.
Mike held out his hand and I shook it.
“I’m impressed,” he said with a wink.
“Thanks, I’ll do my best to deliver.”
He yelled out to his guys and then I was alone.
I thought of the phone call earlier and moved toward the trees, my thoughts not so easy anymore.
The barn was quiet, the far corner lit up with these big ass lights Georgia had brought in. Canvases were piled up along the wall to my left, some empty, most of them filled with dark images. She was good, but I wasn’t exactly into the stuff she was painting. It was too dark. Too raw and it fucking confused me.
How could someone so light and beautiful produce these images of abstract faces with slashed eyes, some covered as if they were prisoners, some not, and mouths open in silent screams?
Hell, I didn’t know anything about art though even my untrained eye knew they were good. But they were creepy.
The thing of it was, I’d hang one up in my front hall if she asked me too. I’d hang one of those fuckers up in every single room in my house if she asked me to. I’d put one above my bed, or over the mirror in my bathroom. Hell, I’d hang one on the front door if she would just explain them to me.
They meant something, I just didn’t know what, but considering they scared the shit out of me, I had a feeling it wasn’t anything good.
Tense, I shook out my hands and watched her.
The canvas was on an angle and I couldn’t see what she was working on, but her nose was wrinkled up something fierce, her hair a mad pile on top of her head. Smudges of dark color slashed across her cheeks, and the white tank top she wore had ridden up so that her belly button peeked out.
Her cut off shorts were damn sexy and I think I might have growled like an animal—a fucking dog—because suddenly she glanced up and my body went still at the look in her eyes.
“Don’t come closer.” She shook her head slowly and put down her brush. “I don’t want you to see this. It’s a surprise.” The smile that fell across her face was one I would keep in my head forever. It was unguarded. Pure.
And at the moment it was all for me.
“Hey,” I managed to say.
“Hey yourself,” she replied with a soft giggle and then she ran toward me and didn’t stop until she was in my arms with her legs wrapped around my waist.
The girl was covered in paint and still smelled like summer. How the hell was that possible?
She kissed me, her mouth hot, her tongue insistent and all coherent thought flew out of my head. It was gone. Everything was gone except Georgia. I was so hot for this girl that she could reduce me to a pile of aching need in seconds.
My hands splayed across her ass and I held for as long as I could, our mouths taking from each other as if we hadn’t kissed in days. Or weeks.
I managed to break contact and tried to speak. I think I might have said something like, babe, we gotta go—or not—because she slid down my body, her hands gripping my shorts and pulling them with her as she went.
That was all it took. It was game on and I was more than ready.
Her cheeks were flushed, her hair had fallen out of the clip thing on top of her head and she was reaching for the edge of her tank top as I stepped out of my shorts and moved toward her. I didn’t give her time to completely undress. The sight of her perfect, round tits was enough to make me come apart and I yanked open her shorts and pushed them down enough for me to get a glimpse of her.
She was fucking commando. Again. Jesus Christ, this girl was killing me.
“Condoms,” I said roughly, my hand between her legs, my fingers already inside her.
She stared up at me, breasts heaving, and groaned as my fingers found her spot—the one that made her tremble—and it was the hottest sound ever. I gotta tell you, there’s nothing better for a guy than knowing you could make your girl sound as if she was losing her mind when your hands were on her.
“Front pocket…shorts,” she managed to say on a gasp.
For the past two weeks we’d been going at it like sex was new. Like we were never going to see each other again and we had condoms stashed all over the place. My bedroom. The kitchen. The bathroom. The deck. The barn.