Authors: Skye Jordan

Rebel (47 page)

Rubi had never been so angry in her life. She hated her father beyond measure. She wasn’t sure what Wes was doing yet, but it didn’t matter. If her father was involved, he was always the guilty party.

She flipped through the contract, skimming the details, and choked on the licensing percentage. The sound that came from her throat was part scoff, part laugh.

“You’re taking fifty percent?” She sneered at Courtney. “Like hell.”

Rubi knew her type even if she didn’t know the woman. Her father always hired the same type.

A waitress came, and Rubi stepped aside to let her set the food down.

“Can I get you something?” she asked Rubi.

“No, thanks,” she said without taking her eyes off the contract, her tone dry. “I’m here for the entertainment.” And this contract was pure bullshit entertainment.

She turned until she found the royalty rate and exhaled heavily. This was so typical of her father-taking advantage of naivety or desperation.

She lifted her gaze to Courtney. “How do you work for a man this greedy?”

“This is business.”

Rubi shook her head on a disgusted laugh. “You’re just another parrot. Don’t you realize his unscrupulous ways will come back around on you?”

Courtney grinned, snide and superior. “Thanks for the advice.”

“Fine.” Rubi shrugged. “Don’t listen to someone with decades of experience on how the man works. But neither one of you is getting your greedy little hands on Wes’s rig. Not with a contract this fucked up.”

She turned to the back of the papers, turning to the section where special provisions, if any existed, were outlined.

Wes stood and reached for the papers. Rubi didn’t move fast enough this time, and he caught hold of the top of the contract, but she didn’t let go. Their gazes clashed.

Courtney slipped from the booth. “That would be my cue to leave.” She hitched her bag on her shoulder. “Rubi, you’re everything your father said…and more.”

Fire flashed in Rubi’s chest. She cut her gaze to Courtney’s and smiled her very best wicked smile. “You have no idea. Stay away from me and mine or I’ll show you first hand.”

Courtney’s aloof veneer cracked. She turned and walked out.

Rubi turned back to Wes. Their gazes warred for a long moment.

“What don’t you want me to see?” she asked, voice soft.

He closed his eyes. Shook his head. And let go of the contract.

He dropped into his chair, pushed his plate aside, and planted his elbows on the table, then dropped his head into his hands. “Christ, what a clusterfuck.”

Frowning, Rubi glanced down at the provisions page. The first thing that caught her eye was her own address-or her soon to be previous address. A burn started in her gut and grew as she read. Her frown deepened as her mind searched for understanding. “What…?” She lifted her gaze to look at Wes, but his head was still down. “Why…?”

He sat back and dropped his hands hopelessly in his lap. “I just… I know the house is important to you. I didn’t realize how important, didn’t realize that it meant more to you than, just, you know, a nice house, until later when I thought about why you were so upset.”

She dropped her arms, and the paper crinkled. Her stomach went light, as if it were floating. “What?”

“I know I… I screwed up at my mom’s. I know I shouldn’t have gone to Melissa’s in the middle of our argument. I didn’t think-at the time-it would seem to you like I was walking out on you, because I’d never do that. But after, when I realized you were gone, I…”

She dropped into a chair and pressed her fingers to his lips. “Don’t. Please.”

He pulled her hand away and curled his fingers around hers. “Let me finish.” He lifted his gaze to hers. “Remember when you said you’d give up everything for a family like mine?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “That’s how I feel about the rig. I’d rather have you than anything the rig could bring me. And it was the only leverage I had to get you what you so desperately needed-the stability that house gives you. That’s what’s important to me-because that’s what’s important to you.

“I knew once you felt balanced again, things with us would work out, because…because I know we were meant to be together.”

She nodded, her throat to tight to speak. Waiting a moment, she swallowed. “I believe that too. Which is why I’m here. Because I know I shouldn’t have left Missouri the way you believe you shouldn’t have left your mom’s.”

Rubi’s belly flooded with a fluttering, panicked sensation that made her nauseated, but she breathed through it and went on. “I have problems, Wes. Issues that aren’t going to go away overnight. Honestly, I don’t know that they’ll ever go away. I know I let my fears from the past rule my actions, and I know that was a mistake. A huge mistake. I don’t want those problems to keep me from you anymore.”

She lifted her head to meet his eyes. Cupped his jaw. “I love you. And I want you. If you still want to live together…it scares the shit out of me, but…if we can just take things a day at a time…I still want to try. If you don’t…I under-”

“Yes.” He kissed her. “Absolutely.” He kissed her again, longer. “Fuck, I’ve missed you.” He gripped her waist and lifted her onto his lap.

Rubi straddled him right there in the restaurant, laughing against his mouth. She pulled away and stroked his cheek, her heart fuller than it had ever been. “Can we tear up this contract?”

“Anything you want.”

“Can we look for a better contract with someone else?”

“Anything you want.”

She took a deep breath. “Can we go look at a house today that my Realtor swears is perfect for me, but look at it for us?”

A slow smile lifted his mouth. “A house for us?”

This was right. The most perfectly right thing she’d ever done.

She nodded. “A house for us.”

“Can you let me pay for half-when I get the money from this rig?”

“As long as we’re together,” she said and kissed him gently, “anything you want.”

SNEEK PEEK OF:

FINDING THE RIGHT GIRL

by Violet Duke

(A Nice GUY to Love Spin-Off Novel)

BRIAN & TESSA’S STORY

Available Now

From the
New York Times
bestselling author who brought you the Nice Girl trilogy, comes a Nice GUY to Love spin-off…

Brian Sullivan has been in love twice in his lifetime. He lost his first love to early-onset Huntington’s, and he lost the other more recently…to his brother. And somehow, his heart has managed to heal itself after both. Amazingly, without therapy. That doesn’t mean he hasn’t gotten more wary along the way, however. In fact, he’s been thinking lately that maybe his brother’s now retired nothing-but-flings rule isn’t such a bad idea. Unfortunately, being the nice guy poster boy and all, Brian isn’t exactly versed in the fine art of flings. So he looks to the outrageously ‘unique,’ provokingly button-pushing Tessa Daniels for a crash course.

There’s absolutely no way he’s falling in love with this one…right?

Tessa has no idea what she was thinking telling Brian that she was some sort of fling expert. She’s never been flung before and she sure as heck doesn’t know where or how to begin flinging a guy like Brian. It was a temporary lapse in sanity, really-no doubt because of the can’t-help-but-fall-for-him brain fuzz that hits her whenever he’s around. Not only does the man have her being more herself than she’s ever been in her life, but he’s the only person she knows who seems to have as many demons and skeletons in the closet as she does. What’s more, he’s got her thinking of the one thing she stopped letting herself even hope for years ago.

A happily ever after.

EXCERPT FROM FINDING THE RIGHT GIRL

The door slammed shut behind him, cloaking them in darkness.

“You drive me crazy, you know that?”

God, his voice had dropped even lower, to a sexy thunder down under rumble.

“Crazy in a good way or a bad way?” Tessa managed to ask as her eyes adjusted to the lack of light.

“Both.” He circled slowly around her as if she were a dangerous animal…he was getting ready to pounce on. “You have no filter whatsoever. Not with what you do or say, and especially not with how you react.”

“That’s not my fault. You can just point that finger at yourself buddy,” she grumbled back before snapping her mouth shut.

Alright, so maybe he was right about the filter thing.

“What?”

Man, if looks could strip. She’d never felt this naked before, this out of control. Inwardly, she sighed. The guy just brought out the uncivilized in her.

Oh well, she came this far, may as well see where this ride ends. “You heard me.” Her chin came up defiantly. “I can’t think when you talk in that ridiculously sexy voice. Or when your biceps suddenly double in size in the middle of even the simplest of tasks, like lifting a coffee mug. And don’t get me started on your eyes. My god, I almost walked into a wall the last time you smiled and your eyes went from that soft ocean blue to deep turquoise. I mean who does that?!”

It was like she just couldn’t stop talking.

When he came to a standstill and stared at her like she’d lost her mind, she huffed, “It’s simply not reasonable to expect a girl to have a filter with all that steamy-eyed, bicep-bulging, talking-like-a-wet-dream-voice-over madness going on!”

Silence.

Huh, so where might one buy one of these filters, she wondered.

With a quiet curse, he stomped toward her and picked her by the waist, not even pausing in his stride as he kept right on walking to the bed. Well, if he going to take her for a ride…she speared her hands into his thick, tousled waves and nearly purred with pleasure.

“Stop being so damn open,” he rasped, sounding like a man about ready to do the unimaginable, his lips a whisper away from hers.

“Stop being so damn irresistible,” she threw back, digging her heels into the carpet until his body ran flush into hers and bulldozed her straight back, flat onto the bed.

The air wedged in her throat as she watched the outline of his granite-etched jaw clench and release. He was so beautiful. Oh to hell with it. She wrapped her arms around his neck and touched her lips to his throat. The quiet male hiss she heard shot her attention down to the fact that he was more than a little happy to see her. Impressively so. And her sigh of pleasure against his throat served as a live current of electricity that she felt run through him…everywhere.

[END OF EXCERPT]

Dear Reader,

I hope you enjoyed Wes’s and Rubi’s story. This was a very sexy and emotional book to write, and I loved working out a happily ever after for these deserving characters. I can’t wait to add more romance to the lives of these renegade stuntment. So stay tuned for more stories from the sexy adrenaline junkies of Renegades!

If you enjoyed
Rebel
, I would appreciate it if you would help others enjoy this book, too.

Lend it.
This e-book is lending-enabled, so please, share it with a friend.

Recommend it.
Please help other readers find this book by recommending it to friends, readers’ groups and discussion boards.

Review it.
Please tell other readers what you liked or didn’t like about this book by reviewing it at one of the major retailers, review sites or your blog.

Until next time,

Skye

About the Author

Joan Swan is a
New York Times
and
USA Today
bestselling author of passion, danger and suspense. She lives in magnificent wine country on the central coast of California with her husband and two daughters.

Visit her on the web in the following locations:

Joan also writes red-hot contemporary romance as New York Times bestselling author Skye Jordan.

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