He hadn’t seen any photographers around when they walked to the pond, but if they were lingering beyond the trees, then he guessed Jolene was about to get her wish of having the media think they were back together because he couldn’t resist the urge to kiss her. Hell, he’d gotten what he’d asked for—her naked—so he couldn’t begrudge her request. In fact, he’d welcome it. He wanted those photographers and the relentless online haters to know that he thought Jolene was beautiful, that he preferred her with the extra couple of pounds. He felt like he could really sink into her body without getting jabbed by a hip bone. It was a softer look that matched her personality more. She wasn’t a woman who lived her life with cunning and razor-sharp discipline, no matter what she said. She was a hard worker, willing to put in the hours, and that was different than a backstabbing rung-climber. Totally different.
Nashville and reality felt blissfully far away. He’d only briefly looked at the news online. He hadn’t even checked his email, and he’d ignored the increasingly pissed text messages from Ginny.
It was all good. He was Joe Ordinary out in the woods with his girl.
He was going to kiss her and that would be his statement to the world, his response to the trash talkers.
“What’s wrong with wanting to look at you?” he asked. “You’re breathtaking. I always knew that, but I’m not sure how often I said it to you when we were dating.”
“I’m not sure we said enough of anything,” she murmured. “We were too busy feeling.”
He could have made a crack about what each of them had felt and taken it right back to sex, but for once he didn’t want to shy away from genuine emotion. He just nodded. “That is true, darlin’. We talked about having our songs go through the phases of a breakup. So that means anger, defiance, sadness, loneliness, then nostalgia, peace, reconnection. Am I missing any steps?”
Jolene didn’t speak for a heartbeat. “You forgot sex for old times’ sake.”
He laughed softly, tugging on his pole a little. Nothing was biting. “I’m not sure where that fits in the list.”
“Right between nostalgia and loneliness.”
“Is that where we are?”
“I would say so, since we’re both acting like our dog died, and last I glanced over my shoulder, she was lying there snoring like a freight train.”
“I don’t feel sad.” He didn’t. “Do I sound sad? I am actually pretty fucking content right now. The sun is shining, I am in private with you, and I’ve got my dog. What could be wrong?”
“Maybe you’ve jogged on down the path ahead of me. You’ve reached nostalgia and I’m still hanging around the bar in Lonelyville.”
That made Chance’s chest tighten. He didn’t want to think about Jolene being lonely or hurt. It shocked him to think that he’d never considered how she might have been upset by their breakup and his behavior. He’d been too wrapped up in his own feelings, and it had been easier to think of her as angry and not acknowledge that he might have hurt her.
Time to make that right. Both so he and Jolene could work together without tension and because it was the right thing to do.
“Well, you just told me what’s between lonely and nostalgia,” he said, spreading his legs so his knee bumped hers. “Let’s go back on in the house, and I can make the lonely go away.”
She shot him an amused look. “Did you learn that line from your father? Good Lord, Rivers.”
She might have a point. “Hey. I’m trying to seduce you here. The least you can do is cooperate.”
Jolene started laughing. “Forget it! You’ll just have to keep trying until you find something that works.”
He knew precisely what would work. That was the beauty of knowing every inch of Jolene and what were her hot buttons, literally. Shifting his fishing pole to his right hand, he used the left to lightly trace a path from her knee up to her inner thigh and back again, coming close to where her shorts gapped but not sliding under them. At the same time, he tilted his head and pressed his lips on her neck, where she was warm and pulsed with life. Her response was a subtle shiver, rolling through her shoulders.
“Better?”
“I’m not telling. Figure it out yourself.”
Fine, then. “I will.” He lifted her hair off her shoulder and kissed her lightly, up and down from ear to shoulder, drawing another little shiver from her. “Does that tickle?”
“Yes.”
He was leaning, pressing against her, pole going slack in his hands. “I can’t reach your lips,” he murmured.
“Not my problem.”
So he set his own pole down between two slats in the decking, then took hers and did the same. She gave him an amused look. “What, are you going to nail me on the dock?”
“Isn’t that how the song goes? Sitting on some dock? Wasting time?”
“I don’t think that was about sex.”
“Everything is about sex.” Okay, so that wasn’t true, but at the moment it was all he could seem to think about.
Jolene leaned back on her palms and tossed her hair back. It made her breasts jut forward in an incredibly enticing manner. If she wasn’t doing it on purpose, exactly, she sure in the hell knew what it would look like. Jolene was fully aware of the power her breasts had over him. It was definitely a cause and effect. Breasts out equaled Chance hard. Every time. He couldn’t help it. He was a man.
He gave her no warning. He just wrapped one arm around her lower back, the other around her waist, and pulled her over to him. As she shrieked, he went down on his back and settled her flat on his chest. And everywhere else from neck to knee. Now that felt amazing. Her skin was warm, her breasts soft. Her hair tickled his cheek.
“What are you doing?” she asked, staring down at him. But she looked more entertained than pissed.
“Those poles were getting between us.”