Page 31 of Texas Hold Em’ (The Devil’s Luck MC #3)

JAMESON

A ir rushed into my lungs. Everything burned. A white-hot poker ran through my chest and made it impossible to exhale. Someone slapped my cheek. Hard.

“Jameson!”

Somehow, I was cold and hot all at once. Everything hurt. It was so fucking dark. Where the hell was I?

“Tex!” A woman’s voice. “We’re here. We’ve got you. You’re all right.”

All right?

Fuck.

I sure as shit didn’t feel all right.

I groaned.

Gentle hands on my face moved up into my hair as the struggle between hot and cold ended and cold won out.

Finally, I managed to open my eyes and found myself blinking up at a beautiful face and blue eyes.

She smiled at me as tears rolled down her cheeks, where there was a red splatter of blood.

Was that my blood? It couldn’t be hers, could it?

I reached for her. She caught my hand in hers and held it fiercely as my memories started sliding back into place .

“Sorry, brother,” a familiar male voice muttered from somewhere close by. “You didn’t make this easy on us. I think I cracked a rib while I was working on you.”

Cracked a rib? That was all? It felt like he’d broken my entire ribcage. And my skull. My head was killing me.

“Can you speak?” she asked.

Carrie. Brody. All the puzzle pieces of pain assembled themselves in my mind. We’d failed with the defibrillator but still pulled it off. I hadn’t expected to come back.

And yet there I was, blinking up at the woman I loved.

“That sucked,” I managed to say.

Carrie laughed with relief and leaned over me to press wet kisses to my lips.

Brody sat back on his heels and wiped sweat from his brow while Carrie helped me sit up.

She wrapped her arms around my neck and held my head to her chest for a fierce hug, not realizing she was practically smothering me.

Brody chuckled and she took off into the kitchen, saying she was going to get me some water.

“She cares about you,” Brody said. “She was a rock star tonight. And a good actress. Although I think her genuine fear is what made the whole thing so convincing. Caroline bought it hook, line, and sinker. We’re on for tomorrow night.”

I rubbed at my throat and tried to sound more enthusiastic than I felt. The last thing I wanted was another fight. “Great.”

“You should consider sitting it out. Tonight… tonight was fucked up,” Brody said.

“I’ll have plenty of time to sit around after Bates is dead.”

“Fair enough.”

Carrie returned with a glass of water and both Brody and I fell quiet. She knelt beside me and rubbed her hands on her thighs. “So how did you guys pull it off?”

Neither Brody nor I looked at each other.

She frowned. “Guys? Are you seriously not going to tell me?”

Brody pushed to his feet. “I’m going to crash on the couch in case you need me tonight, Tex. We should wrap those ribs of yours first and then you should rest.”

Carrie looked back and forth between us as he helped me to my feet. I was unsteady but only for a few short seconds until I got my bearings and the dizziness passed. My cracked rib hurt like hell, but the pain in my head already seemed to be getting better.

Brody announced that he was going to grab his first-aid kit from his truck, and when he left, I had Carrie help me out into the kitchen, where she opened the door to the pit and watched me skeptically while I lit a cigarette.

“You have a serious problem,” she said. “You just died. Like, literally, you were dead, and now you’re going to fill your lungs with that shit?”

I blew smoke. “Yep.”

“Tex.”

“Carrie.”

The corner of her mouth twitched and her eyes sparkled. She was hiding a smile. “You’re impossible.”

“And here I thought opposites were supposed to attract.”

“I’m not nearly as stubborn as you are.”

I took a drag. “If you say so.”

She smiled in earnest and stepped in close, letting me drape an arm over her shoulders. I no longer needed to lean on her. My head was on straight and the pain in my ribs was tolerable.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” she whispered.

With her holding on to me like this, so was I. It would have been a terrible shame to miss this.

“Me too.” She held me tighter. I rested my head on her cheek. “Do you think we have time to shower, or will Brody have my head?”

She looked at all the blood on us. “I think we can swing it. Maybe I can even talk him into changing the sheets on the bed for us.”

“You do that, and I’ll start the shower.”

She stretched to the tips of her toes to give me a kiss after I put out my cigarette.

I closed the door to the pit behind us once inside, and I moved down the hall to the bathroom while she went to Brody, who was unpacking his first-aid kit on my coffee table.

Their voices were muted by the shower once I turned it on, and I gingerly stripped out of my boxers, minding my aching rib.

When I passed in front of the mirror to get into the shower, my own reflection made me do a double take.

I was covered in blood. The fake shit was convincing, I had to admit.

It looked real. Clumps of it had begun to dry on my chest, right where Carrie had made the wound with her makeup products.

I reached up and smeared my hand through it, not liking how real it looked.

It reminded me of the night William died.

The makeup wiped away and left a red smear across my skin.

I started to itch. I needed to get this shit off.

The shower was so hot it nearly scalded my skin, but it made me feel closer to being clean. I stood under the water with my eyes closed and let it hit my face. I hung my head and let it run off my nose as I filled my lungs with air.

How many minutes had I been gone for?

Why had I woken up on the floor, not in the bed?

How desperate had Brody felt as he worked to revive me?

Could he ever forgive me for asking him to go through with the plan, despite the defibrillator not working?

Carrie closed the bathroom door behind her and moved like a goddess through the steam already making the air thick. She stripped out of her clothes and came into the shower with me.

“Brody is making the bed,” she said softly. “He said you should avoid twisting motions and suggested I help you wash.”

“God bless Brody.”

She giggled and reached past me for the soap and sponge.

Carrie was gentle as she washed me. Her hands on my body lulled me into a state of calm and I fought to keep my eyes open, especially when she massaged shampoo into my scalp while humming a sweet song I didn’t recognize under her breath.

She rinsed me before washing herself, and I watched her work, running the sponge over her thighs, hips, stomach, and breasts.

In that moment, fear couldn’t reach her.

She ran her hands over her breasts and through the suds before stepping backward into the water and tilting her head back.

It kissed her cheeks and slicked her hair back before running slowly down the length of her body, chasing away the bubbles and suds and leaving nothing but perfection in its wake.

Her skin seemed to glow and glimmer in the water, and I couldn’t help myself but reach out to her.

She pulled her head out from under the water and opened her eyes as I cupped her breasts in my hands and moved in close enough the water sprayed up into my face.

“What are you doing?” she whispered.

Holding something I thought I never might again.

“We shouldn’t,” she said. “You’re hurt.”

“I’m alive.”

She smiled. “Yes, but you’re still hurt, and you should rest.”

“One of these days, you’re going to have to stop telling me what to do.”

She giggled softly but let me run my hands down her sides to her hips. “I wouldn’t count on it.”

I kissed her.

She moaned softly against my lips. “Tex.”

I pulled her fiercely against me. Her breasts crushed against my chest, and even though my ribs hurt, her softness made it a little better.

I ran my hands all over her body—up her spine, over her shoulders, along her waist, down her stomach, until I’d explored all of her but what waited for me between her thighs.

She spread her legs for me when my touch wandered lower, and I cupped her with one hand as water streamed down my forearm.

She cooed softly, backed up until she was leaning against the wall, and took me in one hand. “Two can play at this game.”

I pressed a finger inside her. She moaned my name. I gave her another. She pulsed around me and thrummed with life. I pushed in deeper as she panted for breath.

Suddenly Brody knocked on the bathroom door. We froze.

“The bed’s made,” he called. “Now, I’m more than willing to play housemaid, but if you’re getting your cock sucked in there while I flip your fucking mattress and put on a goddamn fitted sheet, you owe me.”

Carrie clamped a hand over her mouth to stifle laughter.

“You’re a good man,” I hollered.

Carrie, with a devilish look in her eye, slid down the shower wall and crouched in front of me.

Oh hell yes.

“Would you like me to make you some hot cocoa, too?” Brody asked, his voice thick with sarcasm.

Carrie took me in her mouth. I braced myself with a hand on the shower frame and gritted my teeth. Fuck.

“Welcome back to the land of the living, I guess,” Brody called with a chuckle.

Carrie smiled with my cock in her mouth and worked her way down, filling her throat. I hung my head back and thanked the universe for letting me come back to her sweet, wicked, torturous tongue.