The Hookup by Kristen Ashley

I’d told him where I worked over margaritas at Home.

  “I work at Milo-Corp Data Security and Management. I thought I told you that at Home.”

  “You did. Are you a lawyer for them?”

  “No, I’m Director of the Data Management Department.”

  His lips hitched. “That explains it.”

  I was wearing tailored black trousers, which were simple and classic. At the waistband though, I had a trim, shiny gold belt that I found at a vintage clothing store that cost close to nothing but looked like a million bucks.

  I was also wearing a black blouse with a slit that fell sideways at the neck but tied in a big bow at the side collar, which even I had to agree was fabulous because it was, but also because I got it on sale (the only way I purchased clothes) but still paid a mint for it.

  I further had on a pair of simple, stylish black pumps with a suede upper and a sleek, glossy, slim, tall heel. Shoes that cost a fortune (also on sale) but I took care of them better than many women would take care of their children.

  In my life I had to have three wardrobes: casual every day, work around the house and stables, and business attire. I spent as little as possible on all of them even if I worked hard finding pieces that would last and make me feel cute. Or, when it came to work, last, be stylish, and make me look professional and serious even though I was cute as well as young for someone in my position.

  I took one step up, murmuring, “I’m sorry I’m late.”

  “Iz, your place is only half a notch down from the mill on the scale of sheer awesomeness, so it was no hardship sittin’ here soakin’ all this in,” he told me. “Except I felt bad for your dogs seeing as they’ve been going crazy I ’spect since my truck pulled up.”

  I loved it that he thought the same about my house as I did (though his mill was fabulous I’d disagree that my place was half a notch down, they occupied the same notch with maybe my acres being slightly higher).

  But on that reminder, I said a swear word under my breath and hurried to the door.

  I opened the screen, used my key then opened the door.

  Dempsey and Swirl bounded out it a flurry of furry glee that Mom was home.

  I did not worry about Johnny being there. Both my dogs had no issues with strangers unless I had an issue with a stranger, and usually they just acted protective and alert until I gave them the vibe they could be friendly.

  This, obviously, didn’t include Kent who they hated, but they were allowed to do that for obvious reasons.

  That said, neither of them had been overtly friendly with him even before he showed his psycho side (this included Dempsey when he was still a puppy, but definitely when he became a full-grown dog), but I’d already made a mental note to assess my dogs’ reaction to anyone in order to make better choices about who I allowed to spend time with me . . . and them.

  Thus they shuffled around me, panting, licking and wagging with their violently moving tails, and seeing company they shuffled around Johnny, adding sniffing to their panting, licking and wagging.

  Apparently, Johnny got the stamp of approval.

  “Friendly,” Johnny muttered, bending to them to grab as many head rubs and ear scratches as their excitement would allow.

  “The mountain dog is Swirl, the boxer, Dempsey.”

  “Hey, boys,” he rumbled, low and rough and sweet.

  He didn’t have pets.

  But he liked dogs.

  That tingle again slid down my spine.

  It became clear to Johnny at the same time it did to me that the dogs were ignoring the call of nature in order to get pets from a stranger back and forth with saying hi to Mom, loathe to go off and take care of business when all this goodness was on the porch.

  So before I got to it, Johnny lifted an arm, snapped his fingers, pointed down the steps and commanded, “Go.”

  They looked up at him, ears perked then they went dashing down the stairs, and it was noses to the ground as they looked for the perfect spots to take care of business.

  “Let’s get inside,” I said, bending to grab the handle of one of the six packs.

  “Babe, do not even think about it.”

  Half bent at the waist, I twisted to look at him.

  “Sorry?”

  That got me a full, white smile before he said, “Leave them. I’ll get ’em. Just get your ass inside.”

  I nodded, straightened and went inside.

  My cool, dim foyer closed around me as Johnny entered behind me and I threw my keys and purse on the table at the side.

  I also spied Kelly, my fat, fluffy ginger cat, sauntering across the foyer.

  She stopped, took me in, dismissed me entirely, took in Johnny, then walked to him, slid the side of her body across the leg of his jeans, then showed him her backside.

  “That’s Kelly. She’s a flirt. Jill and Sabrina are around here somewhere. Sabrina’s the sleek gray. Jill’s the scraggly, long-haired gray and black tiger with a white chest. She’s tiny and she’s shy. You probably won’t meet her.”

  Unless he came again. Jill got bolder the more a scent filtered into her sphere.

  I felt his regard, so I looked from Kelly, who was not too pleased he was ignoring her invitation to scratch her booty, then again she didn’t understand the concept of him carrying two six packs, to him to see him staring at me.

  “You named your cats after Charlie’s Angels?” he asked.

  “They don’t fight crime. They mostly just shed, eat, nap and make me feel inferior. But they’re still beautiful.”

  The white flashed through his beard again as he slowly shook his head.

  I turned toward the hall, ordering, “Follow me. We’ll get those beers in the fridge and I’ll get the Crock-Pot sorted. Then I’m sorry, but I have to change, go out and get the horses in. But after I do that, I’ll get down to the guacamole so we’ll have something to snack on while we wait for dinner to finish up.”

  “I can get your horses in.”

  I was at the kitchen counter, opening a drawer to get some forks out, but I stopped to look at him where he was, closing the fridge door on his beer.

  “That’s sweet, Johnny, and Amaretto is a love, but he’s also protective of Serengeti, who’s a diva. And she sometimes doesn’t feel like behaving. So if she doesn’t, he’ll stick with her. That means it can be a pain to get them in.”

  “Grew up with horses, Izzy. We had them with Dad. Granddad had them too. Dad’s last died six weeks after he did, a week before I sold Dad’s place, or she’d have come to the mill with me. I’ll be able to handle it, and if I can’t, I’ll just come back and get you.”

  Being good with keeping it just as having some company and sex with Johnny Gamble seemed easy when I was talking to Deanna.

  It was a lot harder when I was actually with Johnny. Especially when I just kept learning more and more how wonderful he was.

  I mean, he wouldn’t even let me carry in a six pack of beer.

  “That’d be great. And that’d mean we can get to the guac faster. My chicken enchiladas are relatively famous in my circle. My guac is revered.”

  He gave me his uneven grin and muttered, “Lookin’ forward to that.” His attention went to the back door, came again to me, and he said, “I’ll be back.”

  I watched him disappear before I went to the Crock-Pot and took the top off.

  But I didn’t immediately dig in to separate the meat.

  I looked out the window and watched Johnny saunter in his faded jeans, which fit somewhat loose just hinting at all the goodness they covered, and dusty boots, but he’d put on a denim shirt, which was a nice touch. It said he was coming over to a woman’s house for dinner and he made the kind of effort the kind of man Johnny Gamble was would make, but he wasn’t going to show in a T-shirt.

  I also watched when he stopped to welcome both dogs with firm rubdowns when they found him, and I kept watching as he carried on his way, the dogs dancing beside him, toward the stables.

  I did this
thinking it took me from probably fifteen to thirty minutes to get the horses inside and settled in for the night, depending on how cooperative Serengeti felt like being.

  So I did this thinking that if there was a Johnny-type figure in my life, it would be really nice.

  I loved my horses and never thought a second about the time it took to take care of them.

  But having someone help would be lovely.

  I’d never lived with Kent. Perhaps subconsciously knowing something wasn’t right about him, and Charlie stating about two months into the relationship, “Sorry, Iz, there’s just something off about that guy,” made me cautious. But even though we’d been together for over a year, we never took it to that place.

  I’d never taken it to that place with any guy, not Kent, not the two longish-term boyfriends I’d had before him.

  Maybe I’d find someone like Johnny who knew how to deal with horses.

  Maybe I’d find someone who wouldn’t mind throwing in a load of laundry too.

  And maybe I’d find someone who also wouldn’t mind throwing it in the dryer and folding it after.

  Or someone who didn’t mind vacuuming the floors.

  Whatever it was, even before I struck out on my own, with Mom working all the time and my sister a crazy person, from before the time I really should have been taking it on, I took on the bulk of the responsibilities of running a house with people and animals in it.

  It would be pretty amazing to have someone help shoulder the chores.

  Johnny and the dogs had disappeared into the stables when I realized ruminating on this wasn’t getting the chicken separated.

  Fortunately, it fell apart easily like it always did after cooking all day.

  And fortunately, I had the corn tortillas already cut, the real English cheddar already grated and the olives already drained so I could toss them in, stir them up, sprinkle more cheese and olives on top and then put the lid back on for it to finish its magic.

  I got the black beans out, opened them up and poured them in a pot on the stove, ready to heat up before I dashed out of the kitchen and up the stairs to change clothes so I didn’t have to do that when Johnny was around.

  He could chat with me while I made guacamole. But after he’d waited for me to arrive, I didn’t want to make him hang alone while I changed clothes.

  I’d mentally planned my outfit so it took no time at all to get rid of the trousers, blouse and pumps and put on a pair of crop boyfriend jeans with wide cuffs and the green printed blouse with its cute, ruffle, barely-there sleeves.

  I took off my gold bangles, my slim watch, left in my gold studs, and went barefoot down the stairs, lifting my hair in order to fashion a band around it in a big messy topknot.

  I hit the kitchen and looked out the window, not seeing Johnny. I considered going out to check on him but instead decided to give him time and I grabbed the avocados.

  I started on the dip, my eyes straying to the window often, so I saw it when, not five minutes later, Johnny and my dogs ambled out of the stables.

  It was then I realized I liked the way he walked. There was a confident, masculine grace to it. He just was who he was. He looked the way he looked. He moved the way he moved. The fact that all of that was amazing didn’t factor to him.

  It was just . . .

  Him.

  I’d scooped out the avocados and thrown in some salt and was mincing the onion along with the cilantro and chilies when Johnny and the dogs walked in.

  “Serengeti felt like being a diva,” I guessed, looking over my shoulder at him and in the process of mincing, so I just swayed my legs against their bodies to say hi to my dogs when they came to say hi to me.

  “Your dogs like strangers. Your palomino, not so much,” he answered.

  “No, she does, when she feels like doing it. She just felt like being a diva tonight.”

  He gave me an amused look and headed to the fridge. “You want a beer?”

  “I don’t drink beer. But there’s an open bottle of white in there. If you could pour me some of that. Wineglasses are over there.” I jerked my head to the opposite wall.

  “Gotcha,” he muttered.

  “This won’t take long, and then we’ll sit out on the back porch and munch while the enchiladas finish up.”

  “You gonna make me eat vegetables?” he asked.

  I smiled at him. “You’re a big boy, not sure I can make you do anything, but I am making a big salad. If you don’t want any of it, I won’t be offended.”

  “We’ll test it and see if my body will accept something healthy fed to it.”

  I laughed softly, decided against chiding him because I knew intimately that somehow he took care of that body or it wouldn’t be the body it was, and went back to my guac.

  I was squirting the lime juice in in preparation for mixing when Johnny remarked from behind me, “Sweet kitchen.”

  I looked over my shoulder at him to see him leaning in a hand on my island, a beer bottle in his other hand, his attention to me.

  “Luckily it mostly came this way. I put the farm sink in, got a deal on the marble countertops because some lady ordered them and then decided she didn’t want them. Other than that, I just painted, put some new handles on and voilà.”

  “It’s sweet. It’s cute. It’s you. But I feel my balls shrinking just standing here.”

  My body jolted and I burst out laughing, doing it looking at the cream painted cupboards, the green glass handles and knobs, knowing below the sink was a fabric curtain of roses and leaves against a cream background. There was a narrow flowery print over the window that was above the sink. There were shelves around the sink with the green milk glass pieces I’d inherited from Mom (who inherited them from her mom) with others I’d been picking up for years, intermingled with pink. Even my KitchenAid mixer was mint green. All the rest was cream or elaborate wire. And definitely every inch of it was feminine.

  “I’ll be done in a second and we’ll get you out of the danger zone and on the back porch.”

  “Babe, your back porch looks more comfortable than my living room. There are more pillows on that loveseat out there than on my bed. You even got a lamp out there.”

  “I like to be comfy,” I told the guacamole.

  “I’d hazard a guess you succeeded in fulfilling this desire.”

  I again laughed softly then moved to the cupboard to pull down my chips and salsa bowl.

  “You can go on out,” I told him. “I’ll dish this up and pour out the chips, and I’ll be out in two seconds.”

  “Got your wine,” he replied.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  I dealt with the dip and chips then, to mess with him, I searched for the pink paper napkins I’d found at an antique shop that had a frilly corner, like a doily. I’d been saving them up for a special occasion, a party or something, but decided now was the perfect time to use them.

  I located them and took a bunch out with the bowl.

  Johnny was in my loveseat, both dogs roaming around the screened-in porch, deciding where to settle as I settled myself beside him, throwing down the napkins and placing the white chip and salsa bowl on the table in front of us.

  “Jesus,” he muttered, eyes to the napkins.

  I giggled.

  Dempsey came up and stared hopefully at the chips.

  “No, baby,” I murmured.

  He gave me an adorable look then Swirl came up and stared hopefully at the chips.

  “No to you too, handsome,” I told him.

  He gave a whine then rounded the table to slide with a groan to his belly by my feet.

  Dempsey picked Johnny, partly because with Swirl where he was there was no more room on my side. But mostly because Swirl was older, he’d learned a long time ago my no categorically meant no. Johnny was an unknown entity, and he might be a pushover with the chips.

  “They get treats later, not chips now,” I told Johnny.

  “Right,” Johnny replied, leaning forward to l
oad a chip with guac and doing it looking at Dempsey, muttering, “Sorry, buddy.”

  Dempsey looked sad.

  Johnny sat back and I leaned forward to do the same thing he did.

  It was then he touched me for the first time that night.

  He did this by putting a warm hand on the small of my back, the heat of it melting into my flesh, traveling up my spine and down over my bottom.

  “Christ, Iz, this is the best guac I’ve ever had,” he stated.

  I was glad.

  I was also glad for the reminder of who we were with his touch at my back.

  I hadn’t thought about it, but he hadn’t given me a kiss when we met on my steps. He hadn’t touched me or even came close to me. He also hadn’t gotten close in my kitchen. Even as small as it was, he stood removed at the island. Indeed, there were no touches, pecks on the cheek, brushes of lips on my neck.

  There was no intimate or even familiar affection at all.

  We were going to have food now. Sex later.

  He might not even spend the night.

  That was where we were. Who we were. What was happening here.

  And Johnny getting the horses in and teasing me in my kitchen didn’t change any of that.

  I sat back to eat my chip and lost his hand as he immediately leaned forward again and got more.

  After I swallowed, I said, “Glad you like it.”

  “Need this recipe,” he told me.

  “Sorry. I’m only giving it to my daughters, but only after they vow to give it to no one but their daughters.”

  Johnny turned his head to the side and gave me a look from sparkling eyes.

  Then he went back to the guac.

  I leaned forward and grabbed my wine.

  When he finally nabbed his beer and sat back, I shifted into the corner, crooking a leg to the seat, which meant my knee was pressed to his thigh, something he didn’t react to at all, but that was where we were.

  And now it was time to get some things out of the way.

  “Can I talk to you about something that might be awkward?”

  Dempsey was sitting by him, leaning against his side of the seat, and Johnny’s attention went from scratching Dempsey’s head to me.

  He looked guarded but said, “Sure.”