THE TROUBLEMAKER BRIDE Read online

  Maddie paused. Mrs. Quackenbush appeared nearly twice Joshua's age and probably weighed the same as he did. "Okay, maybe not any woman, but—"

  "You're right," he said, his gaze wrapping around her. "Not any woman. You."

  Her heart stopped. She missed a step, and for once in her life, Maddie was speechless. She half wondered if he was going to kiss her right there on the dance floor, but he didn't. He just held her and looked at her and let his words sink in.

  The song ended, and another teenager strutted up for a dance. Maddie clung to Joshua a few seconds longer before she realized what she was doing. She blinked, releasing him. "Thank you," she murmured to Joshua, and watched him walk to the back of the room. Still staring after him, she automatically began to move when the music started again.

  She wasn't used to this kind of attention from a man. Her longtime pseudo fiancé had been fairly casual about his desire for Maddie. She had been more of a stabilizing force in his life than his great passion. His great passion had been his music, and though his absences had left her feeling lonely at times, she had adjusted.

  Maddie had told herself she didn't need to be anyone's great passion. Enduring friendship, companionship and respect were more important. She felt a pang at the memory of Clyde. The last time he'd gone back to Los Angeles, he'd promised to bring back a ring next time. It had always been "next time." She missed him, but for some reason he'd never been around when she'd truly needed him, so she'd learned to get along without him.

  Joshua didn't strike her as the kind of man to cut out when the going got tough. The notion that he wanted her, not just any woman, rocked her little no-man's land. She couldn't remember being wanted with that kind of intensity. It stole into her heart and roused all kinds of secret, foolish wishes.

  Two hours later Maddie and Joshua left the dance.

  "Where's Patrick?" she asked as they approached Joshua's truck.

  "He's coming home late tonight. Going to a fast-food place with some friends." He opened the passenger door. "So it's just you and me since your brother is watching David."

  Maddie climbed into the seat. "So it is," she murmured.

  He entered from his side and headed for his house where Maddie had left her car. Acutely conscious of his closeness, she rolled down the window to create the illusion of space, even though it was early spring, and the temperature was a little cool.

  "Too warm?" he asked.

  "Not really. I like the breeze."

  Silence. It seemed to wrap around them and bind them closer together. Maddie couldn't stand it. "On a scale of one to ten, what would you say was the torture quotient for this evening?"

  He glanced at her, then back at the road. "The evening's not over yet."

  Her stomach dipped. "Then for the dance?"

  He shrugged. "I give it a four with ten as the worst. I didn't have to dance with Mrs. Quackenbush, and Patrick finally got around to dancing with Amy."

  Maddie nodded. "It took him a while, but when he finally got around to it, he didn't have any trouble."

  "Bet you thought that since his father is a recluse—"

  "I didn't call you a recluse," she protested.

  "A social outcast," Joshua continued. "A modern-day monk—"

  "I didn't say any of those."

  "Nope," he said agreeably. "But you thought them."

  She opened her mouth to protest, then hesitated and snapped it shut.

  "I may be a recluse and a social outcast, but I'm no modern-day monk."

  "I never said that," she repeated. "To be perfectly honest, I never even thought that one."

  "Okay. What words did you choose?"

  Maddie looked out the window and grimaced. How did she get herself in these predicaments? She went with his positive attributes and hoped that would be enough. "Solid, dependable, serious."

  "And?"

  She grimaced again. "Cranky and a stick-in-the-mud," she muttered in a low voice.

  He gave a rough chuckle as he pulled into his drive. "Can't be all bad. It made you give me a pity kiss."

  She felt her cheeks heat. "I thought we'd already discussed this." She frowned when she noticed he drove past the house. "Where are you going?"

  "To the top of a hill. You'll like it. It's a clear night, and you can see the stars."

  He wound around on a curvy dirt road, then pulled to a stop at the top of a hill. "C'mon out," he urged, and was at her door within seconds.

  "Nice manners," she said as he helped her. "How did that happen?"

  "Automatic response. My father isn't the most educated man, but he demanded respect and politeness from his kids."

  "You see him much now?"

  "Nope. I was the oldest and was offered a baseball scholarship to college, but since Patrick came I couldn't go. They were disappointed and then disappointed again when I moved here from Kentucky."

  Maddie sighed, feeling a connection with him. "Disappointment's hard to live with sometimes."

  "Yeah. I guess I was always too busy to worry about it much. It bothered me until I realized that maybe we both let each other down. I didn't do what they wanted. They weren't there for me when I needed them."

  She looked at him in surprise. "That's pretty impressive."

  He gave a half smile. "For a stick-in-the-mud social outcast?"

  "Yes. My mother's not speaking to me right now. She thinks I should have given David up for adoption." She breathed in the cool air and looked at the stars. They looked like a million diamonds on a blue-black blanket.

  "Has she seen him?"

  "Pictures. My brother showed her some pictures."

  "Her loss."

  Maddie shook her head. "Everyone loses in this situation."

  "Yeah, but she loses more. She doesn't get to hold her grandson, and," he said, moving closer to her, "she's missing out on you."

  "I hadn't thought of it that way."

  "Nope. You're too busy feeling ashamed."

  She shook her head in surprise again. "For a humorless social outcast, you sure know a lot."

  "Oh. We've added humorless."

  She covered her mouth. "Oops. Who said that?"

  "You're cold," he said, noticing her slight shudder. "Time to get back in the car."

  Reluctant to leave, but growing cooler, she returned to her seat. "If I lived someplace like this, I'd probably climb this hill every night to look at the stars."

  "Not when it rains."

  "But I bet it's pretty when it snows," she told him, and craned her neck to look out the front window. "It's so quiet, peaceful."

  "It is."

  The deep tone of his voice got under her skin. Looking at Joshua, Maddie sighed and leaned back in her seat. "Thank you for bringing me here."

  He cocked his head to one side, studying her, and his mouth tilted with a hint of a grin. "No thank-you gestures?"

  Maddie's heart tightened at the dangerous expression on his face. "You mean kisses?"

  "Uh-huh." He leaned closer.

  It was amazing how sexy he could make uh-huh sound. She smiled because nothing was going to happen. She was certain. "Joshua, you're not the kind to be kissing women in your car."

  "Is that so?" He lifted his hand to her hair.

  Her confidence dipped a little. "Yes, it's so. You're practical and dependable and—"

  "And I want you."

  Maddie's breath stopped. "Somebody must have spiked the punch," she said breathlessly. "How much did you drink, anyway?"

  Joshua shook his head and leaned still closer. "This isn't whiskey talk, Maddie. It's me, and you're wrong. I am the kind to be kissing you in my car."

  She was all set to point out that she'd said women in a general sense, not specific, but his mouth covered hers. She felt his fingers slide beneath her hair to the nape of her neck.

  Warm and inviting, he swept the tip of his tongue over the seam of her lips. Her stomach fluttered at the gentle pressure. She inhaled his scent and felt dizzy. It was so easy to respon
d, to rub her lips against his and learn the taste and texture of his mouth. When he gave a nearly inaudible groan, it was so easy to open her lips and test his tongue with hers.

  He continued his gentle, sensual massage on her neck, but his mouth grew more avid, and suddenly the temperature in the truck jumped several degrees. Leaning into him, Maddie opened her mouth wider to accommodate his probing tongue.

  Reeling from the sensation of falling, Maddie braced her hand on his chest. The kiss went on and on until Joshua pulled back, slightly, to take a breath.

  His eyes burned with desire, and he shook his head. "Lady, you are something else."

  He lifted his fingers to her lips, and she closed her lips around one. He closed his eyes briefly as if in pain, then opened them and watched as she took his index finger inside her mouth.

  It wouldn't go too far in a car, she told herself. Maddie suckled his finger, not wanting to stop.

  He swore. His gaze fell over her, lingering on her lips and throat, then her breasts.

  He hadn't touched them, but Maddie felt her nipples tighten. She would almost swear there was an electric current humming in the air. A bare electrical wire too close for safety.

  It sent off a warning bell in her system, but Joshua leaned close again, and all she could hear was the thumping of her heart. He pressed his open mouth against hers, rolling it from side to side, more sensual tease than kiss.

  He made her want more.

  He slid his finger down her throat to the top of her breasts, skimming his finger back and forth. "Every man at that dance," he said against her mouth, "was wondering what was under this little dress."

  Feeling as if she were turning to liquid, Maddie swallowed. "Just the regular things. Bra and under—"

  He gently bit her lip, and she sucked in a quick breath. He kept up the maddening skimming of his finger across the tops of her breasts. A restless sensation flicked at her nerve endings. She wanted him to touch her.

  Closer, he moved his finger and lured her tongue into his mouth. Closer again, and she arched toward him. Touch me. Touch me.

  His finger dipped beneath the satin cup of her bra and glanced her swollen nipple. A little moan bubbled up from her throat. The sound must have shredded another layer of his control. He stopped playing with her tongue and took her mouth in earnest. Within seconds her back zipper was released and the bodice of her dress was pushed down.

  He rubbed the tight, sensitive tip of her breast between his thumb and forefinger, and she felt a corresponding thrumming in her womb. She moaned again, clutching at his shoulders and kissing him back with equal intensity. She felt his heat beneath her fingers, sensed the deep, needy thud of arousal pounding through him.

  Everything he was doing, every move he made, tightened the tension inside her, and Maddie was so aroused she was spinning from it.

  Pulling his mouth from hers, he took another breath. His eyes reminded her of the sky during an electrical storm. "I want to touch you," he told her. "Everywhere." He pushed the cups of her bra down and looked at her bare breasts. "You're so beautiful."

  He cupped her, still taunting the tips with his thumbs.

  Maddie pushed against him, needing to quell the ache. He gently squeezed, then lowered his head and took her into his mouth.

  The sensation was so erotic she closed her eyes. For the last year her body had been devoted to growing and nurturing a baby. Joshua reminded her she was a woman, with needs, the need to touch and be touched, the need to want and be wanted.

  His features softened by moonlight, he suckled her nipple, and the ache inside her grew worse instead of better. "Ohhhh," she moaned.

  Tugging at his shirt, she fumbled but managed to loosen his buttons. She ran her hands over his chest, her fingers luxuriating in his defined muscles and silky hair.

  He made a rough sound of pleasure, then lifted his head. "This isn't enough." He pushed the seat back and pulled her onto his lap, then slid his hands up her thighs to where she was damp and needy. Through the panty hose, he rubbed her, making her wetter, making her ache more.

  Restless, Maddie shifted in his lap, feeling his hardness against her hip. She wanted to touch him there where he was swollen with wanting her. She wanted to bring him the pleasure of her hand. She wanted … him.

  She made a sound of frustration, and he squeezed her thigh.

  "What is it?"

  "I want— I need—" She closed her eyes. "Ohhhh!"

  "I hate panty hose," he told her. "You've got too many clothes on."

  Maddie tried to sit still, to make the havoc in her mind quiet. She tried to make the car stop spinning. "I'm wearing less than you at the moment."

  He was all concern, closing his arms around her. "Are you cold?"

  "Not exactly," she managed to say, feeling as if her skin was on fire. "Joshua, we are in a truck." She couldn't believe it.

  "Yep. It's a little restricted for what I want to do with you."

  He pulled her against his chest and nuzzled her hair. The gesture should have helped to calm her, but Maddie felt like a whirling dervish on the inside. Edgy, rattled, needy. She wanted to be with him in every sense of the word. Intimate with him.

  She bit her lip. "I thought we said we weren't going to do this anymore."

  "You said that. I didn't."

  She was going to scream if she didn't get some air. Sitting up, she pulled up her bra and dress. "Can you zip me, please?" It was the least he could do since he'd unzipped her.

  Joshua frowned. "Yeah, but—"

  Maddie made a strangled sound of frustration. "Please?"

  "Okay, okay." He zipped her, then eyed her warily as she scooted to her seat and pushed open the door. "What's with you?"

  "Have you ever heard the expression 'Hotter than a naked jalapeño pepper in June'?"

  "Can't say that I have."

  "Well, I feel like that jalepeño pepper right now!" Maddie jumped to the ground, slammed the door behind her and fanned her face.

  Joshua watched her in amazement. She looked as out of control as he felt. For Pete's sake, he'd wanted to devour the woman. He'd mentally done an inventory of his feed supplies to keep from tearing through her nylons and begging her to let him in. He was still hard, still wanted her.

  He had known he'd wanted her, but he'd had no clue how responsive she would be. He'd had no idea how her husky moan would feel like an intimate stroke. He'd had no idea she could possibly want him half as much as he wanted her.

  Swearing, he breathed in deeply. His body felt tight, primed. For Maddie. Based on her little stroll in the cool night air, his body was not going to get what it wanted.

  He squeezed the bridge of his nose. Hell, he was going to have to figure this out, but now was not the time. Right now, he had the brain power of a stud rearing to go. Which was zero.

  He sighed and pushed open the car door to join her outside. The night air hit him like a slap. "Who needs a cold shower after this?"

  Maddie pressed her lips together and gave a weak smile, but she didn't look at him. Her arms were crossed over her chest.

  "Cat got your tongue?"

  "No, you did."

  His body responded immediately to the thought of her mouth, despite the cool temperature. "And I'd like it again," he said, and put his arm behind her on the side of the truck.

  Maddie gave a soft groan and looked up at the stars. "I'm embarrassed."

  He jerked his head to stare at her. "Why?"

  "Because I lost it, just lost it. I was practically jumping you in your truck."

  "I wish," he muttered, then shook his head. "I think you're confused."

  "I won't argue with that."

  "You weren't jumping me. I was jumping you." She looked at him skeptically. "You look calmer than I feel."

  "I have to. If I showed you how much I want you, I'm afraid it might scare you."

  Her eyes widened, and she stared at him. "I've never been that out of control before. I don't think I like it."

&n
bsp; "I did," he said without missing a beat.

  She gave a shaky laugh, and the sound of it squeezed his heart. He took her chin in his hand and lowered his head. "Maddie, anytime you feel like losing control or jumping me, go right ahead."

  * * *

  Seven

  « ^ »

  "Bottle? What happened to—" Joshua's gaze dipped to her breasts as she sat on his sofa, and Maddie was struck with the memory of how he'd touched her last week.

  "I switched to formula when I went back to work. No problem, for you, Studmuffin, huh? You just want your food," she said to Davey, and watched him smile around the bottle nipple. She sighed. "He's so gorgeous. He'll have to beat the girls off with a stick."

  "Are you sure it won't be you beating the girls off with a stick?" Joshua asked with a lifted brow.

  "Not if they're nice," she said sweetly.

  Patrick patted Major, then walked up beside Joshua and crossed his arms over his chest. "He's not bad for a baby. He doesn't scream that much or anything."

  Maddie chuckled. "Thanks. I wish I could take credit for his temperament, but I think it's most likely related to a mature digestive system."

  "Oh, yeah?"

  "That means he burps after she feeds him," Joshua said.

  Patrick shrugged, and Maddie expected he might return to his room as he often did after dinner, but he stayed.

  "Would you like to feed him?" she asked.

  Patrick's face shifted to wariness. "I—uh—well—"

  "You don't have to. I didn't know if you'd ever held and fed a baby before."

  He shrugged again, his standard gesture. "Okay."

  "Why don't you sit down beside me?" Maddie asked, and positioned David in Patrick's arms. "It probably won't take long. He's like a little Hoover." She patted David and smiled at Patrick. "You look like you've been doing this for years."

  "He's fed some colts on occasion," Joshua said.

  "That must be it." She noticed Patrick kept glancing at her, then looking away, as if he wanted to say something. She took a stab at what might be on his mind. "Have you talked to Amy since the dance?"