Liz Talley - The Road to Bayou Bridge

“Renny,” he breathed, exhaling her name like a prayer. He didn’t want to want her with such intensity. But he did.

“Don’t,” she whispered, stepping back.

But he couldn’t help himself.

Old feelings had tumbled down, slamming into them both. He could see the same in her eyes—the want, the confusion, the desire.

He lowered his head and caught her lips as he’d done so many times before. Her slight intake of breath only invited him further.

Ah, sweet, sweet Renny.

“Darby,” she whispered, before closing her eyes and surrendering. He needed no further invitation. He slid his free arm around her waist, trapping her between him and the sink, and deepened the kiss.

Something slammed him for a second time. Raw desire. The kind with hooks that latched tight and refused any rational thought. Damn. She tasted so good. Like Louisiana spice. Like all things good, sweet and bitter. She tasted like home and he couldn’t get enough of her.

“Mmm,” he groaned as he slid his free hand up to cup her jaw, angling her head so he could draw in more of her essence, more of some elixir he couldn’t name but was so good it made him forget the man he’d become.

Renny’s hand fisted in his shirt and she gave as good as she got. He felt her hand relax and then the brush of her fingertips on his jaw and something more ignited in him. He wanted her beneath him, naked, open to him. He wanted—

She broke the kiss. “Stop. This is—”

Her eyes closed and she shook her head, sliding to the side, tugging her injured hand from his grasp. Her shallow breaths accompanied his as he inwardly shook himself.

What had he done?

Never should have gone down that path. Her taste had struck a match in him, undoing what years of repression had given him—some kind of closure or peace with how they’d left things.

All that had been destroyed with one little kiss.

Her eyes opened and her gaze met his. “We shouldn’t have done that.”

“No, we shouldn’t have,” he said, moving away from her, resting his backside against her oven range. “Guess old feelings came back and I got carried away. Won’t happen again.”

Something flickered in her eyes, but he didn’t want to acknowledge exactly what that was. He wasn’t living in the past. He was very much in the future with a new path set out before him. A path that included a prestigious law firm, rain-soaked Saturdays in out-of-the-way cafés, and a teacher with soft blond hair and a weakness for chocolate.

Not a golden-skinned biologist with hair the color of café au lait and kisses addictive as caramel candy. Not Louisiana with its curling bayous, graceful oaks and soulful vibrations wrapping around him like the roots hidden beneath the fertile soils. He was done with Renny and Louisiana.

Something he needed to remember before he went planting his lips where they didn’t belong.

“Good,” she said, dragging her wrist across her lips as if she could wipe the taste of him away. He didn’t fail to notice her hands trembled. She’d been more affected than she wanted to admit.

But so had he.

“So what do we do now?” Her words were cold water down his back.

“About the kiss?”

She shook her head. “No. This crazy marriage.”

“Oh,” he pushed off from the stove. “I’m working on that. Put in a call to Baton Rouge to check on the filing, and I’ve already talked to Sid Platt. He’ll draw up papers so we can proceed with a divorce and bring by the petition by the end of next week. It’ll be filed ASAP.”

She nodded. “Anything I need to do?”

“We haven’t lived together and neither one of us has any issues with division of community property since we’ve had none together. If you’re willing to waive papers being served, then we can shorten it even further.”

“So it should be cut-and-dried.”

“Should. Six months at tops.”

“I still can’t believe this.” She scooped up the cat that had started yowling in displeasure, opened the back door and deposited it on the back stoop—all with one hand.

“Yeah, it’s a little hard to wrap the mind around.”

Renny held up her injured finger. “I need to put something on this and grab a bandage. Are we through?”

He shook his head. “Not really.”

She cocked her head. “Is there something else left to say?”

Wasn’t there? Perhaps he should ignore the unanswered questions, but he’d wondered for so long why Renny had given up on them. “Maybe. Yeah. There are some things.”

Her mouth thinned. “You’re talking about the accident?”

“I’m talking about what happened after the accident. About why you wanted to skewer me when you first saw me this afternoon.”

Renny pushed back her hair. “Okay, but can I deal with my finger first? I don’t want blood all over my furniture. Make yourself useful—put on some coffee—and we’ll try to get that closure you seem to need.” She turned and disappeared.

“So you don’t need closure?” he called as he searched the white-tiled counters for the coffeepot.

“No. I got past us a long time ago,” she yelled from the back of the house.

“Yeah? Well, I don’t think so,” he muttered as he pulled out the carafe and walked to the sink. “You think you’re over me, but your body didn’t get the memo, sweetheart.”

And obviously neither had his.

Which could end up being a big problem if he wasn’t careful.

* * *

RENNY TRIED TO CONTROL her trembling hands as she pulled the backing off the bandage. Shaking was becoming a habit ever since Darby had stalked across that rice field and back into her life. Her body felt not her own. Obviously. She’d just about tossed her clothes to the floor of the kitchen and climbed on top of Darby moments ago. Yeah, control might be an issue.

Her words to her mother earlier that afternoon rang in her ears. Okay, she hadn’t actually jumped his bones upon first sight. Did second sight count?

“Coffee’s ready,” Darby called, his voice echoing through her bedroom into her restored turn-of-the-twentieth-century bathroom. She closed the mirrored cabinet and glanced at herself.

Good gravy. Her lips were swollen from his kiss. And her hair swirled around her wantonly, making her look like some sexed-up wild woman. She grabbed a ponytail holder and a brush. After taming her hair and tucking her T-shirt into her well-worn jeans, she felt stronger. She even shoved her bare feet into the sheepskin mules sitting beside her closet.

There.

Ready for closure.

She walked back into the living room and found Darby sitting on her pink sofa stroking Chauncey. Something about his very masculine hands stroking the back of her cat made her mouth grow dry.

“He was meowing, so I let him in,” he said, crossing his legs casually and picking up a steaming mug of coffee. “I fixed yours the way you like it. One sweetener and a dollop of cream.”

“I drink it black now.”

Darby gave her a smile that would make a less stable gal drop her panties. “Grown-up girl, aren’t you?”

“Mmm,” Renny said, scooping Chauncey up for the second time and carrying him toward the door. “He’s spoiled, but he’s going outside no matter how much he cries.”

“Not just grown-up, but tough.”

She turned around, closing the door with a definitive click. “You have no idea.”

He stared at her as she walked back, picking up the mug from the old trunk that served as her coffee table. For a few seconds, neither of them said anything.

“I didn’t leave you, you know.”

Renny averted her gaze and took a sip. Sweet and creamy. A cup of coffee for a naive girl—the girl she’d once been. “Well, I thought you had. When I woke up, you weren’t there. You were in Virginia.”