“Holy crawfish! The whole house smells like peaches. And out here, too.” Way to go, cowboy! Is that the best greeting you can come up with?
Charmaine almost tipped over her rocker as she jumped to her feet. “Rusty! What are you doing home so early? Oh, please, don’t tell me you brought your date back here for a little cowboy delight.”
“No, Amelie dropped me off at The Horny Bull an hour ago. Clarence and Linc brought me home. But really, sugar, cowboy delight!” He laughed, then went still. “What happened to your face?”
Charmaine put a hand to her face and shrieked, “You jerk! You cracked it.”
“I cracked what?” He quickly glanced about the porch floor to see if he’d stepped on something.
“My peach mud mask. You scared me, and my face moved. It took me a half hour to get it this hard, and now look.”
Oh, she means her face. I cracked her face. “I’ve been hard ever since you got here, and I haven’t cracked yet,” he murmured.
“What?”
Oops. Didn’t mean to say that out loud. “Nothing.” He leaned down and sniffed. Yep, her face smelted like peaches. In fact, all of her did. And, man, did he like peaches!
She shoved a half-empty bottle of beer into his hand and stomped past him into the house. Was there anything in the world cuter than cows swinging back and forth on Charmaine’s ass?
He followed Charmaine to the bathroom, where she left the door open. Leaning against the jamb, he watched as she looked into the mirror over the sink and began to peel off the mud gunk. Her hair was drawn back off her face with a stretchy headband. Little by little she pulled off all the crap, then rinsed her face over and over with handfuls of cold water.
“The things women do to get beautiful!” he remarked. And wasn’t it amazing how he could get turned on by a facial peel? But then he recalled one time observing to Linc in prison that he got turned on by Charmaine’s kneecaps, and the back of her neck, and the way she ate crawfish, and…
Linc had laughed and said, “In other words, everything about Charmaine turns you on.”
She shrugged, still staring at herself in the mirror. “What? The wonderful Am-el-ie has so much natural beauty she doesn’t need any help? Pfff!”
I wonder if she’s wearing anything under those jammies. “What does that stuff do anyway?”
“Cleanses the skin and tightens pores.”
“What’s wrong with soap?” Like I care. What I really want to know is whether every part of Charmaine smells like peaches, and what she would say if I asked to eat her.
“Too drying.”
Not if I… oh, she means the soap. Whew! That was a close one. “Yep, that’s what I think when I’m in the shower. Will my soap dry out my skin?”
She gave him a dirty look for making fun of her. Imagine the dirty look she’d give him if she knew what he was really thinking. “You should be concerned, being out in the sun as much as you are. I could give you a facial, if you’re willing.”
He scrunched up his nose with distaste.
“It would feel really good.”
“I’m sure it would, babe.” He actually gave her offer some consideration, that was how pitiful he was. The prospect of Charmaine laying her hands on him held great appeal, but, nah. When—or if—Charmaine ever put her hands on him again, he was holding out for something better than a slathering of mud. “Maybe some other time.” Then he said something really stupid as he sniffed the air some more, “I love peaches.”
She arched her eyebrows at him and smiled sardonically. “I know.”
“Remember the time we drank all those peach margaritas?” Dumb, dumb, dumb. Have you lost your mind, Lanier, bringing that up? He gave himself a mental thwap upside the head.
She studied him, as if questioning whether he was serious or not. “How could I forget? It was our honeymoon.”
“Our wonderful two-day honeymoon at the Holiday Inn.” That was all they’d been able to afford, and all the time they’d been able to take off from school.