looked up at him as her heartbeat drummed loudly in her ears. Their gazes locked instantly.
“Well, I’ll be damned,” he said as he stared at her, his mouth slightly parted.
“Take a picture, Sheriff, it’ll last longer.”
“Sorry.” He apologized, but continued staring at her. “You remind me of a friend of mine. The two of you could be—”
“Twins,” Reve finished his sentence for him.
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
“Just a wild guess.” She pulled away from him and tried to walk up the steep embankment, but three-inch heels weren’t made for mountain climbing.
Sheriff Butler came up beside her, put his arm around her waist, and all but hauled her up the hill. How totally demoralizing, she thought. Up until this moment in time, she’d never had so much as a parking ticket. And here she was being dragged away from the scene of an auto accident she had caused by her reckless driving. Well, not reckless, just speedy.
When they reached the side of the road, the sheriff released her instantly, as if he had no more desire to touch her than she had for him to have his hands on her. There was something unnerving about the man, something about him that sent off warning signals in her brain. And what disturbed her the most was that her reaction to him—to his touch—wasn’t revulsion. No, it was something else. Something she couldn’t name.
“We’ll get a wrecker out here to bring your car up and take it to the garage,” he told her. “You’re lucky. It would have been a damn shame if your bad driving had totaled your little XKR. I guess that fancy sports car must have set you back at least eighty grand.”
She didn’t like his tone, didn’t like his condescending attitude. Hell, she didn’t like him! He was too bossy, too big, too masculine. “No big deal,” she replied. “The only thing that matters is that no one was injured, not even the deer.”
“Yeah, you’re lucky, all right.” He surveyed every inch of her, studying her closely as if he was memorizing her face and body. “Speeding the way you were doing often leads to serious accidents. Sometimes fatal.”
“I wasn’t driving that fast.”
“My guess is you were doing over seventy-five in a fifty-five speed zone.”
“You guess my car cost eighty grand. You guess I was doing over seventy-five.” Reve crossed her arms over her chest and glared at the sheriff, giving him her best I’m-important-and-you’re-not expression. “Do you know anything for certain, Sheriff, or do you just go through life making uneducated guesses?”
His gaze narrowed as he focused on her. She shivered. That stern, disapproving glare rattled her nerves.
“Get in the truck,” he told her as he headed toward his vehicle. “I’m taking you to my office where I’ll get all the information I need. Then, if I decide not to arrest you—”
“Arrest me!” Reve stormed around the hood of the truck, following him until she could grab his arm. “Now, you listen here to me, you big country hick Cochise wannabe, I’m not accustomed to being treated this way. I can easily contact the governor and—”
He turned around, grabbed her by the shoulders sternly but gently, and said, “Get your butt in the truck. Now. And if you want to call the governor when we get to my office, then you call him. Hell, call the president for all I care. The way I see it, you must have a screw loose to overreact to everything that’s happened the way you have.”
“Are you implying that I’m mentally incompetent?”
“Lady, I’m not implying anything. Now, get in the truck before I pick you up and put you in it.”
Reve jerked away from him and planted her hands on her hips. “Do you have any idea who I am?”
“Nope. I don’t have the foggiest idea of who you are, except that you’re the spitting image of a lady much nicer than you are, by the name of Jazzy Talbot. And I sure hope for Jazzy’s sake that you aren’t some long-lost cousin or something.”
“Is every man in Cherokee County a friend of Jazzy Talbot’s?” The minute the question left her lips, Reve wished it back. Damn, now this infuriating man would realize she knew who Jazzy was. So much for her escaping Cherokee Pointe and any complications from her inquiries about Jazzy.
He eyed he skeptically. “I thought you said you were just passing through.”
“I was. I am. And just as soon as we clear up this mess about my speeding and about the accident, I plan to be on my way. The sooner I see the last of Cherokee Pointe, Jazzy Talbot, and you, the better.”
“Then just shut up, get in the damn truck, and I’ll do my level best to see that you get what you want!”
She loved that he was rough with her, hurting her just enough to make it exciting, to make her heart pound faster and her pussy drip with moisture. He wasn’t like any lover she’d ever had and despite being only twenty—her next birthday in a few months—she’d already screwed at least two dozen guys, including her high school history teacher and a deacon in their church.
What she loved about Jamie was his sense of adventure, his willingness to take a risk. They were kindred souls. Why the hell he wanted to marry her sister she’d never figure out. She was a far better match for him. Laura would never dream of doing what she was doing. She’d never meet her sister’s fiancé at the stables in the middle of the morning, strip buck naked, and fuck the guy’s brains out in one of the empty stalls where anybody might come up on them. No, not sweet Laura. She was far too shy and sensitive, much too much of a Goody Two-shoes to ever be able to satisfy a man like Jamie Upton, who had all sorts of dirty, wicked desires.
It was that chance of discovery here in the stables that heightened the tension and gave her a climax only seconds after he first rammed himself inside her.
“Harder,” she demanded. “And faster.”
He lifted her hips and delved deeply, then withdrew. Just before he started jackhammering into her, he bit her shoulder. Bit her hard enough that she cried out in pain. But she loved the pain. She felt it in every fiber of her being. Every muscle. Every nerve. God, she wished he was bigger, wished every thrust brought the pleasurable pain that she craved. But he was big enough, hard enough, and wild enough to give her another orgasm. It was building now, her body tightening, the sensation increasing with each millisecond that passed. She bucked up against him, encouraging him to hold back nothing. She wanted to come again before he did—or at least by the time he did. She wanted it to be so fierce and hot that the top of her head would come off. It had been that way the first time they’d hidden in her closet at her parents’ house and tore at each other like a couple of animals.
“Damn, girl, you’re wild,” Jamie told her as he increased his movements to a frenetic pace.
When he groaned deep in his throat, she knew he was fixing to spew into her. Her pubic lips swelled even more and moisture gushed out of her. And the very second he burst inside her, she unwound like crazy. Screaming with release, she clawed at his back, still covered by his white tuxedo shirt. While the aftershocks rippled through them, he collapsed on top of her, then rolled over and onto his side. She purred like the satisfied kitten she was, then rose up over him just enough to lick a wet trail from his
