Page 31 of Forever Finds Us (Wisper Dreams #7)

Chapter Twenty-Three

Brand

Instantly, Roxanne deflated.

That was unacceptable. She sat, still on the couch but now looking defenseless and defeated after she’d just stood up for herself. For us.

It wouldn’t do. She deserved better than to feel belittled on our date.

She could already tell something was bothering me, and I hadn’t said a word about Dixon’s phone call. No one else could tell. Not Gina standing five feet away, not my family. Roxanne already knew me better than all of them combined.

I held my hand out to her, and she looked up at me, uncertain and insecure, the lines around her smile tight, her beautiful brown eyes careful.

My family gawked, all of them looking back and forth between my ex and Roxanne.

With the exception of Bea, they’d never met Gina before, had no idea we’d dated, but the coy smile on Gina’s face and the way she ate me up with her eyes told them all they needed to know.

Roxanne took my hand. I tugged her up and to my side, and she relaxed a fraction as I tucked her beneath my arm, like a weapon.

“Gina. Nice to see you again,” I said. “Why are you here?”

She had dressed to kill in a short, black skirt and a soft, pink top that accentuated her tan complexion. The deep neckline showed hints of her breasts and black-lace bra, and she’d worn expensive, high, black heels, which were utterly ridiculous on a ranch.

“Brand,” Merv admonished. “Don’t be rude.

Gina came to see the new the cabins you built.

She was thinkin’ of rentin’ one, and she knocked on my door earlier to introduce herself.

” Merv looked at Roxanne, confusion clouding her blue eyes.

“But you didn’t tell me your friend would be stoppin’ by, and you failed to mention you’d be bringin’ someone tonight. ”

I had to stop myself from snorting out loud. Gina in a cabin alone, treating herself to a rugged getaway? Right . “That’s because I didn’t know.”

“Oh.” Merv seemed completely befuddled now, her excitement at surprising me quickly waning.

“Didn’t I mention it?” Gina said. “I’m sure I brought it up when Brand took me to dinner the other night.” She let out a breezy laugh, but I knew her game.

“When you met me for a work dinner, Gina, to go over the plans for the new contract.”

Fixing her eyes on Roxanne, Gina waved her hand in front of her. “That’s what I meant.”

When I lowered my arm and wrapped it around Roxanne’s hip, Gina’s eyes followed.

“I feel like I’m missin’ somethin’,” Merv said.

“Mama, Gina, say hello to Roxanne, my girlfriend .”

Roxanne and I hadn’t discussed the label, but I felt her confidence rising as I said it, so I knew it was okay. I wanted her to be my girlfriend. If I was being honest with myself, she was fast becoming my everything.

Gina flashed a smile. It appeared genuine, but I knew better. The rigid set of her jaw gave away her true feelings about seeing me with Roxanne. She wasn’t pleased. Roxanne had become the fly in Gina’s ointment tonight.

“Deputy,” Mama said, nodding at Roxanne, but then she turned back toward Gina. “But I thought?—”

“Who’s hungry?” Bax interrupted loudly. “It’s such a nice evenin’. We set up the table outside on the fantastic patio my wife just built for us. We can eat and watch the sunset by the fire.”

A knock on the kitchen door startled everyone, and then I heard Tab’s voice. “Hello? Bea, Abey, are you in there?” She squinted through the mesh screen. “Y’all said seven for dinner, right?”

Bea grabbed my arm and pulled me to a stop around the side of my brother’s house as everyone followed Bax out back. Abey had taken Roxanne and Tab by their hands and dragged them away from me.

“What’s Gina doin’ here?” Bea asked in a whisper. “I thought you broke that off a long time ago.”

Bea and Gina had only met a few times up in Sheridan, but Bea probably remembered Gina stomping around my office, rearranging everything and tapping her high heel impatiently while I hurried to finish whatever I’d been working on so we could get to the important things in life, like eating at expensive restaurants, but only if they were Michelin-starred, which posed a problem since there weren’t any in Sheridan.

None existed in the whole state of Wyoming, which led me to charter a helicopter to Montana twice in the beginning of our relationship, when I’d still been in the wooing phase. It died quickly, not surprisingly.

“I did,” I whispered back. “She’s here ’cause she’s the lead architect on the project we’re startin’ in the spring, but she’s here ”—I looked around my brother’s back yard and at the big cedar table in the middle of the brick patio Bea had just finished—“because she saw an opportunity.”

Bea glared at me. If there was one thing she hated, it was disingenuousness. She didn’t play games and didn’t suffer others who did.

“So how do you and my son know each other?” Merv asked Gina as everyone sat and Abey poured red wine in a glass in front of Gina and one for Tab. Everybody else drank beer or water. Bea kept her eyes on Gina, ready to claw the woman’s eyes out if she tried to cause a scene.

“Oh, we go way back,” Gina said, smiling. “Don’t we, Brand?” Of course she’d chosen the seat directly across from me that would give her the best view of Roxanne. She wouldn’t risk losing our attention.

Tab answered for me. “Gina and Brand worked together up in Sheridan,” she said. “Gina’s an architect, and she’s been the lead on a few of the projects Lee Construction has built for Wy Not Homes. Oh, and they dated a few times.”

Gina huffed a laugh “‘A few times’? We were practically living together.”

Roxanne hadn’t said a word, and now she pulled her hand from mine and dropped it into her lap, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw her fingers begin their tapping.

“No,” I said, lifting Roxanne’s hand again, yanking it from her lap and into mine, where it belonged. “We weren’t.”

“I mean, basically,” Gina said with an awkward laugh. She’d never known me to be argumentative. “Anyway, now we’re working together again on Brand’s new project here in Wisper, so you’ll be seeing a lot of me.”

Merv must have picked up on the tension between Gina and me. She was side-eyeing Gina. She probably didn’t like that I’d brought a date to dinner, but if you fucked with her sons, Merv would break kneecaps for that offense.

It looked like Merv had been about to question Gina, but then we heard a deep voice coming from the front of the house.

“Hello? Anybody home? Sorry I’m late.”

How many fucking people had been invited to this family dinner?

But I’d been lucky to find Clay Marveaux last year, and he was one of my favorite foremen.

He appeared around the side of the house and dabbed at the drops of sweat on his face with an old-fashioned, white, cloth handkerchief when he saw the big group of us all sitting around the table.

“Oh. There y’all are.”

Merv’s face turned beet red, and she stared daggers at Bea, who was turning out to be just as meddlesome as her mother-in-law.

Bea stood and smiled widely at Clay. “Clay, so glad you could make it. Grab a chair. You’re not late. We just sat down.”

Clay looked uncomfortable, but he grabbed the only open seat left, the one next to Merv. He gripped the chairback, pulled it out, and sat, smiling at my mama like a love-struck idiot.

Bax and Athena served dinner—Caesar salad, garlic bread, and lasagna, but only salad and grilled chicken breast for Merv—while Gina watched Roxanne and me, studying the dynamic between us, and Clay watched Merv.

Tab chattered away with Abey and Devo, thanking them again for inviting her because she had been feeling a little homesick, something she’d failed to mention to me. I would’ve invited her if I hadn’t been so wrapped up in Roxanne.

Bea jumped headfirst into the awkwardness.

“You know, Merv, Clay here organized a walkin’ club through the community center.

I hope he won’t mind me sayin’ so, but Clay has heart issues, too, so he wanted to do somethin’ to better his own health and offer a friendly face for people who wanna exercise but don’t know where to start. Isn’t that nice?”

And now I was sure Bax and Bea had somehow planned for the only available seat to be next to Merv’s. I watched Clay nodding and smiling at Merv, and I realized he had stars in his eyes for my mama.

“That’s nice,” Merv said, and she glanced at Clay, but her eyes dropped quickly back to her plate.

She seemed a little nervous, but we’d had several conversations about how she could get started on an exercise routine.

I’d offered to buy her a treadmill or an elliptical machine, or both, but she’d balked at the expense.

Clay’s walking club was the perfect alternative.

He said the small group hiked easy trails around the area or downtown, and in the winter, the community center offered the use of its meager gym and two treadmills.

If she agreed to join Clay, I was already planning on donating more exercise equipment to the center.

Shit, if she’d use it, I’d build an entire fitness center inside Ace’s House for Merv.

Devo would be giddy since she worked as the community center’s assistant director and was a staunch advocate for her community.

“That’s a great idea, Bea,” Devo said. “Merv, you should join Clay and the others. They walk four times a week.”

“Oh, I dunno,” Merv mumbled. “I’m not much for big groups.”

“It’s not big, Mrs. Lee,” Clay offered. “There’s only three of us. If you join us, you’d make four. We’d love to have you.”

Truth be told, Merv was probably shy. She didn’t really have friends, and she hated relying on people for anything. Except for my little sister.

Maybe it was because Abey was a woman, but Merv had no problem expecting Abey’s help with whatever she needed: a ride, someone to go grocery shopping with, someone to accompany her to a doctor appointment.

It was unusual for her to depend on one of her sons, though, lately that seemed to be changing.

But secretly, I knew Abey loved it. Despite their differences, she and Merv had a closeness Bax and I didn’t have with Merv, but now that she and Devo were married, Abey couldn’t always come running when Merv called.

It was right that Bax and I picked up the slack.

“I’m not a Mrs. anymore,” Merv mumbled to Clay. “Call me Mervella.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, blushing. “Mervella.”

“So, Deputy,” Gina interrupted, and she pegged my date with her hard stare. “You work for Brand’s sister?” She smiled at Abey at the end of the table, but then almost scowled at Roxanne.

Roxanne replied simply, “Yep,” popping the “p” at the end of the word.

Abey seemed confused by Roxanne’s short reply.

“Don’t be modest, Rox.” To Gina, Abey explained, “Roxi’s a fantastic investigator.

We don’t get a lot of cases needing investigation around here, but when we do, she always comes through, and the community loves her.

They’ve taken her in like she’s lived here her whole life. ”

Roxanne didn’t reply. She smiled uneasily, and that was the last straw.

Beneath the table, I squeezed her hand hard, even felt her bones strain in my grip. “Please excuse us for a few minutes,” I said, and then I hauled Roxanne out of her chair. Even before we made it into the shade of the house, I spun her in front of me, lifted her, and slung her over my shoulder.

She yelped, and I smacked her ass. She smacked mine in retaliation, which made my hands grip her bare thighs harder under her dress. I hoped my fingerprints would leave marks on her skin.

No one said a word, but I heard my brother laugh, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Gina’s scowl.

Good. I wanted her to witness the passion between Roxanne and me.

Maybe then she’d respect my choice and my date.

I had never been possessive with Gina. She’d never inspired that in me.

Not once. If another man had tried to take Gina from me, I probably would’ve let him.

If he came for Roxanne, I’d take him out.

I carried Roxanne to the big balsam tree by the barn, dropped her to her feet, and pushed her up against its trunk, facing away from the house.

“Tell me what you need,” I said, my eyes steady on hers.

“What? What do you mean ‘what do I need’? I can’t believe you just did that in front of your whole family and your employees!”

“Why can’t you believe it? Because I smacked your ass in public, or because it was your ass and not Gina Scott’s?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Both.”

“Tell me what you need from me, Roxanne. What will it take for you to feel confident that I want you and only you? Shall I tell you how beautiful you are tonight? That the settin’ sun on your skin makes you glow, and I can’t stop starin’ at you?

Do you need to hear me say that yours is the only body I want to be inside of?

That it’s all I can think about, gettin’ you alone, strappin’ you to your bed and fuckin’ you till we can’t see straight? ”

Her eyes dropped to the dirt beneath our feet. “Maybe.” Insecurity raged inside her. It pulsed around her body like a second skin.

Lifting the skirt of her dress with my fingertips, I leaned closer. When she looked up at me, I slid my hand inside her thong.

“Brand! Not here. What if they see?”

“Let ’em. I don’t give a shit. They’ll see how much I want you.”

Taking her mouth with mine, I cut off her reply, and I slipped two fingers between her pussy lips, intending to rub her till she was wet enough to take me. I planned to fuck her right here, up against the tree.

She groaned, instantly forgetting embarrassment, and ground herself against my hand.

“Good girl,” I breathed into her mouth.

She whimpered into mine, and her whole body went slack when I slid my fingers inside her.

“I’m sorry she’s here,” I murmured against her lips, leaning into her body, my hand pumping, my eyes open and watching her face as I worked her.

“I didn’t know she would be, but if you want me to, I’ll tell her to leave.

I’d fuck you on the dinner table if it’s what you want. If it’s what you need.”

She moaned.

“Tell me what you want, and when we get home, you can take whatever you need from me.”

“I don’t want you to be rude to her,” she said, her breath speeding as she climbed higher and closer to release.

I added another finger and pounded the heel of my hand against her pubic bone. “Liar.”

Her eyes opened wide. “And my house is not home. I’m embarrassed by it. You’re used to much nicer things. Gina wouldn’t be caught dead in my run-down duplex.”