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Steve lifted Roux’s hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles. It felt good to let a woman close to him again. It had been much too long since he’d opened his heart to the possibility of loving someone. And she was just so damned easy to love. How could he resist?
She was gazing out the window of the rental car at the extensive cornfield they were currently driving past. “Uh, Steve,” she said. “Not to complain, but BFE, Illinois, was not what I had in mind when you suggested we get away for the weekend.”
“This is just a short stop. The jet needs to refuel.”
Which obviously required them to rent a car and head out into the middle of nowhere. He hadn’t told her why they had stopped in flyover country. If he did, and she wasn’t keen to meet his family, he would have easily been persuaded to head due south, but he’d met her family already, and it only seemed fair that she should know where he came from as well. He loved his parents. They were good people. But it was his grandfather that Steve most wanted Roux to meet.
“You aren’t taking me to meet your family, are you?” she asked, turning her head and narrowing her eyes.
“Some of them,” he admitted with a shrug. He turned onto a familiar gravel road, nostalgia getting the better of him when they rumbled past the tree he’d planted on Earth Day over twenty-five years ago. What had once been a prickly twig in a paper cup was now a towering spruce.
“I planted that tree when I was in first grade,” he told Roux, feeling a bit odd about sharing something that lame with her. Like she gave two shits about some stupid tree.
“Wow,” she said, turning to watch the tree out the back window. “It’s huge. You must be at least eighty if you planted that sucker.”
He gave her a sideways glance of annoyance, but truly he enjoyed her teasing, even if it poked fun at his advanced age. “At least I’m old enough to legally drink.”
“I’m twenty-five, okay? Just ask if you want to know how old I am. And you are?” She tilted her chin down.
“Thirty-four.”
“Ancient.” She winked, grinning saucily.
“Brat.”
“I wouldn’t have ever guessed you were a farm boy,” she said, her attention turning to the big red barn in the distance. The house wouldn’t be visible until they crested the next hill.
“Oh, I’m not. Never was. These wide-open spaces make me feel small. And that’s why I headed to Los Angeles when I was sixteen. I met Zach my first week there.”
It had been a chance meeting of two homeless teenage drummers living in cars parked illegally side by side. They’d been inseparable ever since. Steve often wondered how different his life would have been if he and Zach had played different instruments. Surely they’d have ended up in the same band.
“You went all that way on your own?” Roux asked.
“No, I packed up the entire family and we headed west.” He chuckled at her wide-eyed expression. “Yes, I went on my own.”
“I guess dropping out of school didn’t hurt your career prospects.”
Steve scratched his jaw, which was starting to roughen with beard stubble. “Actually, I didn’t drop out,” he said. “I graduated when I was fifteen.”
She gaped at him.
“Not common knowledge,” he added.
“So, you were like super-smart?”
“Am.” He poked her in the side. “Don’t tell anyone.”
“Why didn’t you go to college? You could have—”
“Made something of myself?” He snorted. “You sound like my mother.”
“I was going to say gotten a scholarship. You’ve obviously made something of yourself. You’re a living legend.”
Steve smiled. He did enjoy a good ego stroke. “School was boring. I wouldn’t have been able to stomach another year of it. Music has always been far more mentally stimulating to me.”
They turned in at the gravel driveway of his grandparents’ huge, old—and from personal experience, drafty—white farmhouse. It was shaped like a giant two-story box. Its only outstanding architectural feature was a small sagging front porch.
“I get that. I was pretty good at school,” Roux said. “But I was great at the piano.”
“My grandmother always wanted me to play piano,” he said, “but I preferred banging a wooden spoon on every pot and pan in her kitchen.”
Roux laughed, her eyes lighting with delight. “The beginnings of a metal drummer genius.”
“Every living legend has to start somewhere,” he said with a wink.
He opened his door and hurried around the sedan to help Roux climb from the car. She hadn’t waited for him to open her door, but she didn’t protest when he took her clammy hand in his and helped her navigate the rocky surface of the driveway.
“When I was a kid, I used to walk on this gravel barefoot,” he said.
“Ow,” she said. “Did you do that while wearing overalls and chewing on wheat stalks?”
He rolled his eyes. “No. While smoking a corncob pipe, obviously.”
“I’m sorry. That was a bigoted thing for me to say. I’m not familiar with country life except for what they show on TV.”
Steve heard clanking coming from the long metal-sided garage near the house. That would be where they’d find his grandfather. Probably restoring some old tractor, which had always been Pops’s favorite hobby and which kept him busy now that Steve’s dad and younger sister had taken over farm operations. “I need to warn you that Pops is deafer than a newborn kitten but refuses to admit it.”
Roux chuckled. “Deafer than a newborn kitten? Is that country talk?”
“Yep. You’ll catch on faster than a rabbit with his tail on fire.”
She laughed again. “Y’all don’t really talk like that, do you?” she asked, trying and failing at a southern accent.
“No. We’re too far north for y’all.”
Steve squinted as they stepped into the dim interior of the garage, willing his eyes to adjust. Something heavy clattered to the ground with a metallic clank, and within seconds he was being squeezed in a tight hug.
“It’s not Christmas, is it?” Pops asked, patting Steve vigorously on the back. The man was uncommonly strong for an old guy. “What are you doing here?”
“I was in the neighborhood and thought I’d stop in for a minute,” he said loudly, directing his voice toward Pops’s left ear, which was better at picking up sounds than his right.
“You got a show in Chicago this week? I’m sure my nephews would have mentioned it.” His family—including third cousins—still came to Exodus End concerts when they were held within driving distance. And though Chicago was a full two hundred miles from home, it was close enough to warrant a road trip.
“I’m on a break, actually. Heading to Europe in a couple of weeks.”
“What do you mean? I’m wide awake.”
He had no idea what Pops had thought he’d said, but didn’t bother to repeat himself, because Pops had just noticed Roux standing behind him. The old man’s breath caught, and his glossy eyes lifted to Steve’s.
“Who’s this beauty?”
“This is Roux.”
“Who?”
“Roux!”
“Woo? I’d have wooed her back in the day!”
“No, Roux. With an R. Roux.”
“Was I rude? I apologize.”
Steve slapped his forehead. “Not rude. Roux. Rooooooooo.”
Roux grinned and squeezed Pops’s arm above his elbow. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “What are you working on here?” She extended a hand toward the ancient silver tractor with its unique three-wheel design.
Pops’s eyes brightened. “You like my tractor?”
“Sure,” Roux said, stepping closer to the rusty contraption.
“This here is a 1940 Silver King. I salvaged her from an abandoned barn down by Rolla.”
“That’s in southern Missouri,” Steve explained, doubting that an East Coast resident would have ever heard of the small city.
“I will not put it out of its misery,” Pops retorted. “I’ll have her running in no time.”
Roux pressed her tongue to her upper lip, her cheeks tight with suppressed laughter. She listened intently to Pops as he explained everything about his current project and held up various spare parts—most rusty—while he tried to remember which junkyard he’d found them in.
“Got this one on eBay,” he said, proudly holding up an ordinary-looking bolt.
“Oh, I know all about eBay,” Roux said. “I have a slight obsession with collecting coin purses.”
“Yeah, I don’t like paying shipping fees either. Lots of coin. You got that right.”
Steve sometimes wished he could be in on the conversation that Pops heard, but he loved the old guy so much, he didn’t bother to frustrate him by correcting him again. And Roux seemed slightly amused but not annoyed by the lack of communication. Steve was already glad he’d brought her.
“Go check out my Minneapolis Moline,” Pops said, waving toward the fully restored tractor along the far wall. Its red wheels and yellow body brightened up the dingy space. “Steven helped me rebuild that one before he ran off to California. It’s still my favorite.”
Pops slapped Steve on the back, and Steve knew the reason that tractor was his favorite was because the two of them had bonded while restoring it. Most thirteen-year-old boys don’t spend their free time tinkering with old tractors in their grandfather’s garage. And that was a damn shame.
Pops gave Roux a complete rundown on the restoration process, telling her countless embarrassing stories about Steve, which didn’t bother him, because they made her laugh. Anything that made her happy was cool by Steve. He couldn’t help but compare this visit to the few times Bianca had been willing to come with him. She’d spent the entire trip with her nose in the air and a stick up her ass. At the time, he’d made excuses for her behavior because he’d been blinded with love. How could he have been so stupid? He wasn’t that fool anymore, he told himself. He wouldn’t let emotion cloud his common sense ever again.
Realizing that time was getting away from them, and he still had a few things he wanted Roux to see before they headed to his favorite little island off the coast of Central America, Steve approached Roux from behind and placed a hand on her lower back.
“We should head to the house. I have something important to show you.”
“Do I get to meet your grandmother?”
The eagerness in her expression caused a lump to form in his throat.
“Sort of. Mams passed away several years ago.”
Roux’s face fell, and she took Steve’s hand and even squeezed Pops’s forearm. ”I’m so sorry to hear that. She must have been quite a woman to put up with this guy.”
She winked at Pops, who flushed and then howled with laughter.
“We’re going to the house, Pops. Are you coming?”
“I like your new wife a lot better than that stuck-up bitch from California.”
Roux bit her lip, and turned her face away, but not before Steve saw the mirth trying to escape her.
“We’re not married,” Steve said. He doubted he’d ever take a chance at that again. He’d learned his lesson with the stuck-up bitch from California.
“Yet,” Pops said with an ornery twinkle in his eye.
Steve took Roux’s hand and helped her navigate a pile of discarded tractor parts. They ducked under a low-hanging, partially open garage door and stepped out into the sunshine. The bright rays made Roux’s hair shimmer like fire. The woman was stunning. He had to take a deep breath to keep himself walking forward when every instinct told him to go completely still and just watch her move.
“Does he live here alone?” she asked quietly. “I’m worried about him being out here by himself.”
“He’s too damned stubborn to move to town. My folks live down the road about half a mile. And my sister checks on him a couple of times a day.”
“You have a sister?”
Those gold-rimmed green eyes of hers lit up again. Either she was going to have to stop doing that or he was going to have to start taking medication for an irregular heartbeat.
“She’s a pain in the ass,” he said with a chuckle. “But I’m sure you know that about sisters even more than I do.”
“I’m always looking for more sisters, and now that I’m your wife, I get to add one more to my collection.”
He knew she was teasing, but there suddenly wasn’t enough oxygen to refill his lungs, and he choked.
“Too soon for wife jokes?” she asked, and a part of him didn’t want it to be a joke. The stupid part of him that he quickly smashed down deep into the pit of his stomach.
“Yeah, well. You know my track record with wives. Ex-wives; two: Steve; zero.”
Roux’s eyes widened. “Two?”
“You don’t read that in the tabloids?”
She shook her head.
“I lost a bet in Vegas. Ended with an annulment.”
“Always a chance to win with the next one,” Pops commented.
Steve glanced over his shoulder, wondering how the mostly deaf codger had managed to hear any of their conversation, especially when their backs were to him. Maybe he just pretended to be deaf as a form of personal entertainment. Steve wouldn’t put it past the guy.
“What do you do for a living, Roux?” Pops asked, situating himself on her opposite side as they continued toward the house. “Besides being an absolute sweetheart.”
“I work at an animal shelter,” she said.
Steve smiled. Of course she did.
“Well, I used to,” she added. “I had to quit a few weeks ago. Now, I guess, I’m a musician.”
“Nothing wrong with being a beautician,” Pops said.
Steve didn’t bother to correct him. Because if Steve got his way, Pops would soon learn about her talent for himself. Steve had been listening to Baroquen’s music a lot over the past couple of weeks. Late at night, he’d lie in his tour bus bunk with his earbuds linking him to Roux, because all he heard when he listened was her amazing keyboard work and her sultry background vocals. And yeah, he was sort of a fanboy, not that he’d admit it to her.
“Have you eaten?” Pops asked. “I could go for one of your omelets right about now, Steven.” He rubbed his belly.
Roux raised an eyebrow. “You cook?”
“A little.” He actually enjoyed cooking. Another thing he wouldn’t be admitting. His notorious rock star reputation couldn’t take many more hits.
“I figured you’d have servants for that kind of thing.”
“You’re thinking of Dare,” he said with a twisted grin. “Dude has a damned butler, believe it or not.” He knew he was intentionally directing her attention from himself, but bringing her here had made him feel more vulnerable than he’d anticipated. She was sure to find a reason to brush him off at any moment. And he didn’t mean she’d brush off the guy in the mask that he showed the world. She’d be rejecting the real him.
“Dare has a butler?”
“Dare’s from Beverly Hills. Rich boy, born and bred.”
“Well, he’s not stuck-up at all. He’s awesome.”
And now that she was defending his friend, Steve wished he hadn’t brought Dare up. It was never a good idea to try to make himself look better by comparison to Dare. What the fuck was he thinking?
“About that omelet . . .” Pops said loudly.
“All right, Pops.” Steve slapped him on the back. “You got eggs?”
“You know where the coop is. Best grab some veggies from the garden as well. My fridge is pretty bare.”
Roux squirmed with excitement. “You have chickens? And a vegetable garden?”
“Over yonder.” Pops pointed toward the old barn they’d passed earlier.
She was half jogging as they altered their course. Pops stopped and waved them forward. “I need to let the dogs out,” he said.
“You have dogs?”
Pops laughed at her expression. “Have to. They keep the coyotes, coons, rabbits, and possums away.”
“You have wild animals around here too?” She glanced around as if hoping to spot a leopard or a giraffe or some creature far more exciting than a squirrel.
“If you like animals, the barn cat had a mess of kittens week before last,” Pops said. “Sure are cute little shits now that their eyes are open.”
Steve thought she might faint from elation.
“Have you ever been to the country?” he asked her.
“Not really. Am I embarrassing myself?”
“You’re perfect.” Even though showing her the adorable beef calves on his parents’ acreage might win him further points, he wasn’t going to introduce her to them or she’d probably attempt a rescue mission to save cattle from their fate as tasty steaks.
Pops headed for the house, and once his back was turned, Steve couldn’t resist pulling Roux close for a kiss. He’d brought her to the farm to give her a reason to push him away or to give himself a reason to be less obsessed with her, but damned if the trip hadn’t had the opposite effect. Her kiss was sweet and tender. They let it linger between them, and he felt its effects deep in the center of his chest.
I’m in trouble.
And he was glad. He never thought he’d feel this way about anyone again.
Roux hugged the chickens while he scooped eggs out of their nests. The way she cradled them and spoke to them in a soothing tone had the birds calm and clucking softly, and had Steve thinking what a great mother Roux would make, which . . . no. He had to stop thinking that way. He wasn’t the kind of guy who’d make a good role model for a child. Any child. Especially not his own. But maybe he was ready to settle down and stop filling the empty hours with women and booze and drugs and more women. Maybe all he needed was one woman. The right woman.
I’m in big trouble.
“You don’t eat these chickens, do you?” she asked, settling a red hen back on her now-empty nest. The bird turned its head jerkily as it viewed them with one eye and then the other.
“Not when they’re laying eggs.”
She watched several chickens pecking around in the fenced area surrounding the coop.
“I’m glad they don’t have to spend their entire lives in little cages,” she said.
He couldn’t stand her morose expression as she gazed at the hens. He figured they had pretty good lives for chickens. They were kept safe and well fed, but they were also tasty.
“Let’s go find those kittens,” he said, reaching for her hand and carrying the bucket of eggs in his other.
He carefully latched the gate behind them, and several juvenile half coonhound, half Labradors came loping up to sniff at them. They were all wags within seconds. Roux released his hand to squat down to pet them, laughing when they licked her face and nearly toppling over when they nudged her for more attention. One particularly floppy-eared pup began to bay in a hound’s distinctive bark.
“About six months ago, my granddad’s prize coonhound got into a bit of trouble with the neighbor’s Lab,” Steve said. “Pops decided to keep all the pups to remind her not to stray from the mate he chose for her, but I think he just likes the company.”
“Mutts make the best dogs,” Roux insisted, scratching a spotted one behind the ears. The pup gazed at her with understandable devotion.
Steve wished he knew the pups’ names. The mama was Trixie and the male coonhound was Jonas, but he had no idea what Jonas’s seven step-dogs were named. A pure black one was sticking his snout into Steve’s bucket, trying to steal an egg.
“Get out of there!”
The dog skittered backward with his tail between his legs and his ears back.
“I should probably wash my hands before I handle kittens,” Roux said, giving her fingers a hesitant sniff. “Not sure the mama cat will like the smell of dog on them.”
“And the smell of chickens,” Steve said.
“And of you,” she said softly, her lashes concealing her eyes.
Okay, they needed to finish this visit so they could spend some time alone together on a private beach as soon as fucking possible.
He lifted the handle of the red well pump, and Roux stared at it as if it were some miracle invention. After a moment it began to gurgle, and water rushed out.
“Oh! It’s a water pump.” She thrust her hands beneath the flow.
“Sucks water right out of the ground.”
“No fooling?”
He lifted a hand to the sky. “Hand to God.”
She laughed and dried her hands on the hem of her shirt. He ushered her toward the barn, careful to shut the overgrown pups out, and set the bucket of eggs on the dirt floor. Beams of sunlight found cracks between the old warped boards of the ancient structure, illuminating dust particles floating through the air.
“Shh,” Steve said, placing a finger to his lips and listening intently.
A faint mewing came from the hayloft above them. Roux laughed softly. “I hear them.”
“Up there,” he whispered, pointing to the ladder.
“Is it safe?” She frowned at the rickety-looking ladder.
“If you fall, I’ll catch you,” he promised.
“Then maybe I’ll fall on purpose.” A flirtatious grin teased her lush lips.
His breath caught, and he couldn’t behave himself for another second. He jerked her into his arms and filled his hands with her soft ass while he kissed her. She squeaked in surprise when he shifted her hip against the hard ridge of his rapidly engorging cock.
“God, I want you,” he murmured against her lips, unwilling to break contact even to speak.
“Again?”
“Always.”
He felt her smile against his lips as she looped both arms around his neck and pressed her soft breasts into his chest.
“Are you in the barn, Steven?”
His mother’s voice destroyed his good time.
With a frustrated groan, Steve released Roux, who dashed for the ladder and started to climb.
“Looking for kittens,” he called to his mom.
The barn door creaked open. “Pops said you brought a guest. You should have given us a little warning. I could have made a roast.”
“She’s a vegetarian.”
“Oh. Well, a salad, then.” Mom gave him a hearty squeeze. “You need a roast, though. You’re much too thin.”
“The word you’re looking for is cut. Shredded.” He tightened his muscles. “Maybe ripped.”
She caught his jaw in her hand and gave him the Mom-look that told him she wasn’t hearing any of his arguments. “Thin. It’s all those drugs you take.”
He couldn’t deny he enjoyed an occasional bump of cocaine, that pot kept life interesting several nights a week, and he liked his whiskey, but despite what his parents’ thought, he didn’t lie around all day with a needle in his arm and a crack pipe in his hand. “That’s so 1985, Mom.”
High above, Roux said softly, “Aww, aren’t you the sweetest things ever.”
“Is that her?” Mom whispered.
“Yeah. What did Pops tell you?”
“That you got married in Vegas.”
Steve snorted. “Pops is hearing things again. It’s nothing that serious.”
“But something special.”
He couldn’t deny that. “I’ll go up and get her.”
Steve shot up the ladder, leaving his mom on solid ground staring up at him.
He found Roux sitting cross-legged near a pile of scattered straw with the mama cat purring contentedly on her lap and six small and shaky gray and white fluff balls exploring the area around her. Filtered sunlight lit the area and made her fair skin glow.
“What’s her name?” Roux asked.
“Betty. Why don’t you come down and meet her?”
Roux grimaced slightly. “I meant the cat.”
“That’s Nightmare.”
“Nightmare?” She stroked the calico on her lap, and the cat shifted belly up in surrender. “This sweet girl is named Nightmare?”
“I don’t think the mice around here think she’s so sweet. Are you coming?”
“I’m not really prepared for this,” she said, lifting each kitten and nuzzling her nose into their fluff. They made squeaky meowing noises that their mother ignored as she looped a paw around Roux’s wrist to gain herself another stroke.
“If you don’t want to meet—”
“I do,” she said, and those two little words made his heart skip a beat. “It’s just . . . I’m not prepared.”
“It’s not like you need to write a speech. It’s just my mom.”
“First impressions are important.” Having nuzzled the final kitten, Roux set Nightmare aside and climbed to her feet, brushing dust off the seat of her pants. The cat immediately started to rub up against Roux’s leg, purring in earnest. Nightmare had gotten her name because she tended to attack people as often as she attacked mice, but apparently the holy terror had a new best friend.
“Hopefully you’ve gotten over your horrible first impression of me,” he said.
Roux grinned. “You did make a complete ass of yourself.”
No denying that fact. He kissed her softly, his hands moving to her ass as if drawn there by an incredible force. Four sharp claws dug into his ankle, and he winced. Nightmare did not share well.
“I’ll go down first,” he said. “Going down is a lot scarier than going up.”
“Going down is a little intimidating at first.” She glanced down at his crotch and lifted her eyebrows. “But I’ll give it a go if we ever get some alone time.”
He blew out a breath, wondering what he’d been thinking when he’d brought her to the farm instead of going directly to the island. Then again, her heart and soul were fully on display here, whereas if they’d started their time together on the island, he’d have focused all his attention on her body. He might have missed out on witnessing her true beauty, and right now in the dim light of a musty hayloft with a holy terror of a cat rubbing against her calf, her gentle soul was blindingly obvious to him. Though in all honesty, marathon sex was also likely to increase his admiration, considering the perpetually aroused condition he found himself in.
“Did you find Nightmare’s kittens?” Mom called from below the loft.
Steve snapped out of his musing, released his grip on Roux’s ass, and started down the ladder. “Six of them.”
“She always has the best little mousers. I’ll have to take a couple over to our place when they’re older.”
When he reached the bottom of the ladder, he held it steady while Roux slowly descended.
“It is a lot scarier going down,” she said.
Her knees were visibly shaking. He couldn’t help but notice the two man-sized dusty handprints on her butt. Mom must have noticed them too, because she giggled and then pressed her hand under her nose to hide her smirk.
“Don’t embarrass me,” Steve warned under his breath.
“That’s what moms are for,” she teased.
Once Roux’s feet were on solid ground, she turned to face them, a lovely smile of greeting on her lips and in her eyes. Every time she smiled, Steve found it hard to breathe, and this time was no exception.
“This is Roux. Roux Williams.”
“What an unusual and lovely name.” Mom reached out and squeezed Roux’s hand.
“It was my grandmother’s. She was French. And also a redhead.” Roux tugged at a strand of her silky hair.
“This is my mom, Elizabeth,” Steve said. “Betty.”
“Pleasure to meet you,” Roux said a bit woodenly.
“Likewise.” Mom turned her attention to Steve. “Pops says you’re going to make omelets for lunch. He sent Dana to town to get cheese.”
“So we have a few minutes,” Steve said. He took Roux’s hand, which had turned clammy since he’d last held it. “Let’s go pick veggies.”
He didn’t miss his mother’s scowl as her gaze landed on his and Roux’s entwined fingers. Mom had been against his marrying Bianca—his entire family had been, truth be told—so she was hypercritical of any woman who came near him. He’d spent several months hiding out here after his divorce, so no one knew better than his family how severely Bianca’s betrayal had destroyed him. But Steve knew Mom would warm up to Roux quickly. How could she not? The woman was everything that had been lacking in his life. And if he could recognize that within weeks of meeting her, surely his wise and wonderful mother would see it almost immediately.
“Pops says you cut hair,” Mom said to Roux as she grabbed the bucket of eggs and they all exited the barn, squinting as the brilliant late spring sunshine lit their faces.
Roux laughed. “No. He thought I said I was a beautician, but I’m really a musician.”
“Oh.” Mom grinned sideways. “I wish I could talk that man into getting a hearing aid. He doesn’t think he needs one. So do you sing?”
“No, I—”
“She does and beautifully so,” Steve said. “She just won’t admit it.”
Roux elbowed him for interrupting her, but he didn’t mind. He liked bragging about her.
“I sing backup, and I play the keyboard.”
“Maybe she’ll play us a song after lunch,” Steve said. It was the main reason he’d brought her there. “On grandma’s piano.”
Mom’s lips wobbled almost imperceptivity. “I think she’d like that.”
Roux’s brow crinkled, but Steve knew the she that Mom referred to was her departed mother. Mams had always wanted someone in the family to play her piano with the same love and attention she’d shown the antique instrument, but no one had ever taken to it like she had.
The pack of overgrown pups followed them to the vegetable garden and then darted off after a startled rabbit that had been nibbling on the lettuce.
“Wow,” Roux said. “This is amazing!”
As far as midwestern vegetable gardens went, it was perfectly ordinary. He tried seeing it through a city dweller’s eyes. And then a vegetarian city dweller’s eyes. He still failed to see it as amazing.
“We’ll need bell peppers, tomatoes, onions, a bit of spinach, and whatever else you’d like,” he said, setting her free to find the ripest specimens the garden had to offer.
“She’s adorable,” Mom commented with a grin as Roux exclaimed over an enormous tomato. He’d have thought it was coated in solid gold if he didn’t know better. “Where in the world did you find her?”
“In a limo,” Steve said. “Her band is joining ours on tour.”
“That will be nice,” Mom said. “If you can keep yourself out of trouble.”
“I only get into trouble when I’m bored,” he said. “And I haven’t been bored since I met her.”
Roux had spotted the strawberry patch and started picking and eating strawberries right off the plants. “You might want to wash those first,” he called out. And unable to watch from a distance any longer, he left his mother’s side to venture into the garden.
“I didn’t think. Are they covered in pesticides? I didn’t taste any.”
“No. Pops believes in organic gardening, free-range chickens, grass-fed beef. He doesn’t realize those are progressive, sustainable practices, so don’t tell him.” He crouched down beside her and winked.
“So I don’t need to wash them.” She found another ripe berry and plucked it from its stem before biting into it.
“They’re probably dirty.”
“A little dirt never hurt anyone.”
She was so unlike Bianca. Was that why he liked her so damned much? But Bianca had been his perfect woman, so how could one so different from her also be his perfect woman? He spied a particularly large and ripe strawberry and picked it, lifting it to her lips to offer her a bite. Her gaze held his as she bit into it, and a flood of desire heated his groin, stirred his senses into chaos.
“We need to get these omelets made so I can monopolize your time.” And discover all the ways I can make you climax, he added silently.
“I’ve got the onion,” Mom called from the other side of the garden. “Do you want me to dig up some potatoes too?”
“Sounds good, Mom!”
“You want to hear something weird?” Roux asked. When he nodded, she said, “I feel like I belong here. In this place. Surrounded by all this life. With you.” She lowered her gaze, a blush staining her cheeks. “I guess that was more stupid than weird.”
He touched her chin to encourage her eyes to meet his. “Not stupid or weird. You do belong.”
Her eyes went glossy with tears, and his heart panged with regret. He hadn’t meant to upset her.
“Shh,” he murmured, his thumb stroking her smooth cheek. “Please don’t cry.”
“I’m sorry.” She pressed the back of her hand to one eye, leaving a smudge of dirt on her brow. “It’s just . . . finding a place to belong is hard for an orphan. And when you find it, but you know you can’t have it, not really . . .” She shook her head and took a steadying breath, blowing it out slowly. “Let’s go to that island.”
But she could belong here, with his family, with him. He could give that to her. He just wasn’t sure if he was ready to offer it yet.
“Omelets first, then we’ll return to the airstrip.” He could always bring her back at a later date. He loved the way she looked in this space—sunlight making her hair glow like fire, the breeze blowing the strands to life; smudges of dirt on her face; life all around her. She was right, she did belong here. But he wasn’t sure he did. He’d always wanted to leave. Had grander plans for his life than a midwestern farm could offer. And he’d found what he’d been looking for in California, hadn’t he?
“Stevie!”
Dana’s exuberant cry broke Roux’s spell over him, and he shifted to glance over his shoulder. God, he hated being called Stevie, and his sister knew that.
Dana was all smiles as she hurried across the yard to the garden.
“My sister,” Steve said, rising to his feet and helping Roux to stand, but not before she plucked another ripe berry from an overburdened plant.
“Dana, this is Roux,” he said.
Dana nodded in Roux’s direction, but her attention was all on Steve. “You look good.” She slapped his arm. “But you always look good.”
“Not looking too bad yourself.”
She rolled her eyes. “Please. We both know who got the looks in this family.”
“You.”
She laughed but also blushed. “Stop. Since when do you bring women to the farm?”
Dana shot a quick glance at Roux. She was probably wondering if Roux would be as mean to her as Bianca had once been. Bianca had taken to calling Dana that hick sister of yours and commenting on Dana’s weight “problem.” What had he ever seen in that woman?
“A woman,” he said. “Just this one.”
Roux shifted awkwardly and asked, “Do you get to live out here all the time? It’s so peaceful.”
“Boring. Steve would call it boring.” Dana waved a hand at their surroundings. “But then he’s always been a partyer.”
“He does have partying down to a science,” Roux said.
Hey. The conversation was not supposed to turn to—or rather, turn against—him. “Roux is a rock star herself.”
Roux snorted. “Yeah. Huge rock star over here.” She raised her hand. “That no one has ever heard of.”
“That’s about to change,” Steve said.
“So you thought you’d corrupt her before someone else could claim that honor.”
“She’s incorruptible.”
“Boring,” Roux said. “Anyone would call me boring.”
“I’ve never been less bored in my entire life,” Steve said. He cringed when Dana burst out laughing.
“You’re so cute when you’re in love,” she said, poking him hard in the chest.
“Shut up. I’m not in love.” He was. God damn it, he knew he was. Fuck. How? Why? His gaze shifted uncomfortably to Roux, gauging her reaction to his sister’s claim, and the moment their eyes met, his heart skittered several beats. He knew how. Roux was perfection—inside and out. As to why . . . Why not? He wouldn’t mind settling down. Partying like a rock star was so last week.
“Did you get the cheese, Dana?” Mom asked when she joined their group. She held a pair of onions and several dirty potatoes in her hands.
“It’s in the house.”
“I’ll go find a bell pepper,” Roux said, retrieving the tomatoes she’d picked earlier and handing them to Steve.
“Good luck. It’s early in the season for peppers. I’ll see if the spinach is ready,” he said, wanting to get this task over with so he could find that alone time with Roux.
As soon as they went inside, Roux insisted the family farmhouse reminded her of the big brownstone in Boston. Though it wasn’t nearly as old or as opulent, it did have thick wooden doorframes and baseboards, a pocket door between the living and dining room, and the high ceilings of homes once heated with fireplaces and lacking air conditioning. In the kitchen, Roux helped him chop veggies while his family—sans Dad, who worked in a local factory during the day—settled around the kitchen island to talk loudly among each other. Every few minutes, Roux would glance at him, and he could practically feel the ache of longing coming from her.
“Do you have any siblings?” Dana asked Roux once she’d finished arguing with Pops about the superiority of John Deere tractors. Pops hated the John Deere brand, and Dana loved to get him riled up over it.
“Uh.” Roux licked her lips and concentrated on finely dicing an onion rather than meeting Dana’s curious gaze. “I have twelve foster sisters,” she said quietly.
“Twelve!”
Steve wasn’t sure whether Dana hadn’t heard or hadn’t understood the foster part of Roux’s answer, but he was glad she hadn’t fixated on it.
“There are four older than me,” Roux said. “Eight younger.”
“She and four of her sisters formed Baroquen—the band she’s in.”
“That’s fun,” Mom said.
“I had six brothers,” Pops said. “They’re all gone now except one.”
Roux reached across the counter and squeezed his wrist. “I’ve lost siblings,” she said. “It’s not something you ever get over.”
Change the subject, Steve thought, his mind reeling to find a safe—less emotionally devastating—topic.
“So which tour stop in Europe are you most looking forward to?” Steve asked Roux. “Have you been to Europe?” He didn’t know even that much about her.
“No.” There was an undercurrent of how in the hell could I afford that in her tone. “I think I’m most looking forward to Italy. Will we have time to do any sightseeing? Iona says we’ll be too busy working to enjoy our time there like a vacation.”
“I’ll take you sightseeing.” Why not? His plans to party across Europe with Zach had been completely obliterated. “Italians know how to party, but those Germans? Bring on the beer.” As soon as he spoke, he remembered that Roux didn’t drink. He shrugged. “If you’re into that kind of thing.”
“Italy is amazing,” Dana said. “But I had the most fun in Spain. Steve sent me to Europe with a few of my friends for my twenty-fifth birthday. Occasionally he can be nice and thoughtful.” She nudged Steve’s arm.
“Occasionally?” He circled the counter and nudged Dana back, hard enough to send her teetering on her stool.
“You hardly ever visit,” she said. “I’d rather have seen you than Europe, you moron.”
Steve rolled his eyes. “No need to lie to impress our guest.”
Dana rolled her eyes right back at him.
With two pans on the stove, and a very helpful sous chef in Roux, Steve was able to churn out five omelets and a mess of country fried potatoes in record time. Which was good, because as much as he loved his family, he was ready to leave.
After a brief argument over who should be allowed to sit on the remaining stool—Steve insisted the guest should sit, while Roux insisted the hard-working chef should sit—Roux settled onto the stool next to his mother and took her first bite. Steve was left standing but didn’t mind. He’d won.
“Mmm,” Roux murmured as she chewed and then swallowed. “Everything tastes so fresh.”
“Brings new meaning to farm-to-table,” Steve said. He leaned over his plate to scoop a bite into his mouth.
“The garden really takes off in July and August,” Dana said. “You’ll have to come back and visit us then. I make a mean ratatouille.”
“It’s about time to butcher a beef,” Pops declared. “I’m ready for Betty’s prime rib.”
Roux paled slightly but didn’t chastise or preach. Steve had just witnessed firsthand how much she loved animals. Normally he would have paired their omelets with a side of bacon or sausage, but not even Pops had complained about the lack of meat.
After brunch Steve left the dishes to Dana and gave Roux a quick tour of the house. She liked to touch things as he pointed them out. He hoped that meant she was a tactile lover. The only thing he enjoyed more than touching a woman was being touched by one.
In the back parlor, which was seldom used now that Mams had passed away, he showed her his grandmother’s cherished antique Steinway grand piano. Pops kept it dust free, and the mahogany gleamed from a recent polish.
“Oh,” Roux said with a moan of longing, “it’s absolutely gorgeous.”
“It would mean a lot to me if you’d play it,” Steve said.
“I couldn’t,” she said, but her fingers were already clenching and unclenching as if they were dying to press the keys.
“Jenny wouldn’t mind,” Pops said. “You go ahead and play her piano, sweet girl.”
Steve spun around to find his grandfather smiling sadly in the doorway. Mom was at his elbow, and Dana was right behind, drying her hands on a dish towel.
Roux turned a worshipful gaze to the hulking instrument. “If you’re sure,” she said hesitantly.
Steve had only seen one other person gaze at that piano with such adoration. Now that he was older, he wished that he hadn’t been so adamant about not allowing his grandmother to teach him to play anything more challenging than “Jingle Bells.” Maybe Roux would teach him now and allow him to lay that regret to rest.
With a deep breath, Roux settled onto the bench. Memories of Mams sitting in that exact spot haunted him, and he saw his mother reach for her dad’s hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
“What should I play?” Roux asked, flexing her fingers over the keyboard. “Something classical or more modern?”
“Do you read music?” Pops asked, hurrying over to a short bookshelf near a matching set of burgundy wingback chairs in the corner.
“Yes.”
He tugged a battered notebook from the shelf, but Steve didn’t know why.
“She wrote music her entire life,” Pops said.
She had? That was news to Steve.
“But was too uncertain to ever share it with anyone but the family.” Pops opened the notebook and set it on the music stand above the fallboard. “Seems a shame that no one but us ever got to hear it.”
“I’ll try to do it justice,” Roux said, her eyes scanning the page of neat, handwritten notes drawn across the staves. “Very nice,” she whispered to herself just before her fingers played the first note.
Steve couldn’t move as a familiar song filled the room. He’d always thought some masterful composer had written that song. He supposed one had. His Mams had obviously been talented; he’d just never recognized that until now. By the time Roux came to the end of the cheerful tune, Mom and Dana were fighting over the dish towel to dry their tears.
“That was truly lovely,” Roux said, flipping the page. “What else has she written?”
She’d played through half the notebook when Steve’s phone rang. He wanted to ignore it and stay suspended in this moment of remembrance for a while longer but decided the call might be important, especially when he recognized it was from Jordan. But would it be such a tragedy if they had to spend the entire weekend there? Steve’s libido cried out a resounding yes.
“We were supposed to be in the air an hour ago,” Jordan said, sounding as annoyed as she must feel. “Where in the bloody hell are you?”
“Sorry, time got away from us. We’re leaving now and will be right there.”
He hung up the phone and waited for Roux to finish playing an up-tempo jig before breaking the news.
“We have to leave now,” he said. “That was the pilot, and she’s pissed that we’ve kept her waiting.”
“Aw, do you have to?” Dana said, as if she’d suddenly turned into her twelve-year-old self. “I haven’t seen Pops this happy in months.”
The old guy did have a huge grin on his face.
“We can visit again,” Steve promised, because yes, he wanted Roux in his life for as long as she’d have him. He might have suspected it soon after meeting her, but now he was absolutely sure.