Oh yeah he liked shoes. He liked checking out her butt when she stepped into them and he especially liked it when she left them on, and rode him like a cowgirl.
“I bet you don’t,” the older man said with a hoot and departed.
“Are they…Louboutins?” Jess asked, gazing down at Viv’s black suede shoes with the exquisite stitch detailing and distinctive cherry-red soles.
“Yes, they are.”
They fit Viv’s feet like gloves and felt as if they were made from angel wings despite the three-inch heels. Viv was paid well and with the company taking care of most of her living expenses, she had a lot of disposable income. Which she spent on shoes.
The other woman sighed and poked her husband in his slight pot belly. “Why don’t you ever buy me shoes like that?”
“You never ask me,” he complained. “You want ’em, babe, you got ’em.” He glanced at Viv and asked, “How much do a pair of those go for?”
“Eight hundred dollars,” she said as Stephen took a swig of his beer.
He choked mid swallow and spluttered and Jess slapped him on the back a couple of times. “Maybe next year,” he told her when he’d recovered.
“It’s okay, babe…I didn’t marry you for your riches.”
“Yeah…” He waggled his brows at his wife. “I know you just married me because I’m good in bed.” And he gave her a smacker of a kiss.
Reuben rolled his eyes. “God…you two are grossing out not only me and your children but everyone else’s as well.”
“Dude,” Stephen said completely unabashed, “that’s one of the true joys of fatherhood.”
Viv laughed at the pained faces on several children then back at the couple in front of them, their arms around each other’s waist in an easy kind of affection that spoke of happiness and longevity and history. And damn if her chest didn’t ache a little watching their love for each other on obvious display.
“Anyway…enough of shoes,” Stephen dismissed as he turned his attention to Viv. “What I want to know is has this guy—” He poked Reuben in the chest with the hand that was holding his beer. “Told you that he lost—”
“Stephen.” Reuben’s voice was low with warning but also tinged with an exasperated kind of affection that told Viv he and Stephen enjoyed some smack talk. “Don’t you dare.”
Stephen was unperturbed as he continued with a grin. “His virginity in my parents’ barn?”
Viv tried not to laugh as Reuben sighed and shook his head and Jess did laugh. Stephen’s mother, however, was not impressed. “Stephen,” she scolded. “There are children around!”
But Stephen just laughed some more and Reuben shook his head. “I can’t believe you just told her that.”
To be honest, Viv couldn’t either but it was still funny as hell. She had the feeling Reuben’s cousin had pulled this one on him before and, in fact, enjoyed doing it at the most embarrassing time and Reuben had just become resigned.
“And how was that?” Viv asked as she looked at him, still trying to suppress her smile.
“Best ten seconds of his life,” Stephen joked.
“Bite me. It was at least twenty.” Which caused both Stephen and Jess to crack up.
Viv laughed, too, as she glanced at Reuben for an answer to her question. “It was scratchy.”
“Scratchy?”
“Hay loft. Country kid hazard.”
“Ah…”
Yeah, she wouldn’t know about that. But hell if she didn’t want to find out. Hell if she didn’t want to grab him by the hand and find the nearest hay loft and have her wicked way with him in her Louboutins.
For damn sure she’d make it last more than twenty seconds.
His gray-green eyes went all dark and intense as if he was reading her mind, his nostrils flared and his hand on her ass tightened. Viv’s nipples went hard as nickels. But then Jess changed the subject, asking Reuben how he was settling into the new office and he pulled his eyes off her.
Viv’s nipples, however, were going to need a longer recovery period.
As she listened absently to the cousin chatter her gaze wandered around the room. Spying Gaylene heading into the kitchen, Viv excused herself. She wanted to get the milk put on for the hot chocolates anyway and, if Gaylene was ducking in to start the cleanup, then Viv could give a hand with that as well.
When she finally reached the kitchen after being stopped twice by assorted relatives of Reuben’s, keen to tell her some childhood story about him, Gaylene’s hands were immersed in sudsy water in the sink.
“Hey,” Viv said, hovering in the doorway.
Gaylene looked over her shoulder clearly startled and there was a split second of something that looked like…anxiety?…before the smile slipped in place. “Oh hey. I’ve just put a huge pot of milk on for the hot chocolate stirrers you brought. Thank you so much for them—it was very kind of you.”
Viv shrugged. “My momma taught me never to go to anyone’s house empty-handed.”
The other woman laughed and it was nice to hear. “They’re popular in Marietta. Everyone is raving about them even if they don’t want to admit it too loudly.”
Viv smiled to herself as Gaylene’s face contorted into a mask of oops-shouldn’t-have-said-that. Like she’d revealed a state secret. “It’s fine, I know they’re popular because we can barely keep up with the demand. Can I—” She tipped her chin at the pile of dishes at her elbow. “Give you a hand with that?”
“Absolutely not.” Gaylene shook her head. “You’re our guest. Go back to Reuben and relax.”
But Viv was determined not to be fobbed off as she crossed the space and grabbed a dish towel from the clean stack on the bench beside the sink. “It’s no problem.” She smiled. “Many hands make light work and all that.”
Gaylene graciously acquiesced and the two women stood side by side at the sink making small talk about the weather and the lunch and the cousins and Viv was beginning to wonder if she’d got the whole thing wrong when she mentioned something about going to Missouri in the new year and Gaylene went all quiet.
“So…you’ll be moving on?”
Ah…so, here was the crux of it. Viv nodded slowly. “Yes. End of April.”
“I see. And, what about Reuben?”
There was no malice or bitterness in her voice but there was a whole lot of what sounded like mama bear protectiveness. “Reuben knows. He’s fine with it.”
Gaylene gave a soft snort, leaving Viv in little doubt what she thought about her son’s attitude to Viv’s departure as she attacked the turkey-roasting pan with gusto, scratching at all the baked-on bits with the tines of a fork.
“He’s moving on also,” Viv pointed out. Technically it was Reuben who was leaving first—not her.
“Reuben’s going to Bozeman. It’s a thirty-minute drive.” Gaylene looked at her reproachfully for a beat or two before returning her attention to her chore. “You’re going three states away.”
Viv reached for the big serving platter draining in the rack and slowly dried it as she stared out the window at the backyard, choosing her words carefully. She could see a love seat on the porch and, through the bare, gnarled branches of a tree, she could see the white peak of Copper Mountain in the distance.