Page 78 of Then You Happened
“Who thought alcohol and axes were a good mix?” I ask as he stands beside me to try to show me the best technique to throw one.
“No clue, but if you don’t correct your shoulders, you’re going to give that man next to you a Mohawk.” I gasp in horror, but then he steps up behind me to give me more direction.
My breath catches when he places his hands on my shoulders and presses the heat of his body to my back.
If he is trying to make me concentrate harder, this is not the way to go about it. Every brush of his body against mine, each whisper of touch from him, has me reliving his body on mine—in mine—last night and throwing an axe is the last thing I’m thinking of.
“Like this,” he murmurs, his hands and arms shadowing mine as he mimics a throw so I understand what he means.
“Yes. Okay. Sure. I’ve got it.” I try to step forward, to gain some distance, but he stays put.
“Do you always ramble, Knox, or is it only reserved for me?”
I glance over my shoulder, hating and loving that he makes me feel like this. Flustered. Seen. Heard. Admired.
“I’m not. This is just . . . unnerving.”
“Unnerving?”
“More like distracting, and if I’m distracted, I’m going to be looking your way and accidentally throw it so . . .” I eye the empty space behind him for him to step into and give me distance. “There are certain parts of your body that I’m sure you’re overly fond of.”
“I didn’t hear you complain about those parts,” he says coyly, the grin on his lips telling me he’s not complaining either. The way his eyes drink me in tells me his mind is there too.
Aware that people are most likely eavesdropping on our conversation, I stand there, axe over my head ready to throw and question how to answer that question. I’m his boss and we had sex but I don’t know what, if anything, that means. I’ve never done this. The sex before a relationship thing, so how exactly is one to act?
When we’re at the ranch, it’s one thing. But here, in public . . . I‘m not sure.
And I think Jack sees the panic in my eyes because he just stares at me above the rim of his beer as he takes a drink and redirects the conversation away from everything that is in my expression. “Point the axe that way, Knox.” A wink. A lean of his hip against the wall to the side of me. “Throw it. I promise it’s therapeutic.”
“But what if I accidentally throw it too late and it hits my leg and cuts it off?”
“Christ, woman.” He chuckles with a shake of his head. “Then you’d be a peg-leg pirate, and that isn’t a good look for a rancher, so I suggest you don’t do that.” I laugh. “Try it.”
With a deep breath and a little yelp of fear, I let the axe fly.
It hits the wood with a thump and falls to the floor with a thud. “Shit.” I reach back to grab another one. “I want to try again.”
And this time, when the axe hits the outer edge of the target and sticks, I let out a whoop of satisfaction.
25
JACK
“Wasn’t it therapeutic?”
Tate stares at me above the rim of her wine glass, eyes alive, and cheeks flushed as she nods. “It was.”
She looks back over to where there is some kind of competition going on. Who knew there were axe-throwing leagues? When I follow her gaze, I catch sight of the two jackasses who’ve been sitting in the corner paying more attention to us than anything else in here, but pay them no mind.
It’s her I’m drawn to.
It’s the smile that widens on her lips and the wisps of hair that’ve fallen out of her ponytail. It’s the tension that has eased from the set of her shoulders, and the way she’s had enough to drink that she’s stopped caring about what everyone else in this bar thinks of her.
Even with all of that, the only thing I keep thinking about is last night and how fucking bad I want to have her again.
Only in a bed instead of on the table.
This time I want to taste her pussy.
