Punk Rock Cowgirl Read online

  “Are you listening to me?” Her voice was stretched tight, thinning and ready to snap. “I want my farm back and I’m not your wife anymore.” Her voice shook with fury and her pale skin was turning red. Tough shit. He was pissed, too. At her. At this life she’d left him in alone years ago.

  “It’s only half your farm now, Kendall. And you’re still my wife and unless you plan on staying married to me I suggest you cut the attitude and stop acting like a petulant, wounded child. Obviously we have a lot to discuss.”

  “Funny, you sound just like your father,” she said and threw herself into her car and drove off without a glance back.

  *

  Kendall Kelly had finally come home.

  Damian Sloane watched the trail of billowing dust behind her rental car as it flew up the long gravel and dirt driveway toward the farmhouse. The darkening shadows and the setting sun made it too difficult to see the driver’s face, but he knew who it was. He pulled the tractor into the barn for the night and turned off the motor. The familiar smells of wood, mud, and hay surrounded him. Jumping from the seat he cursed to himself.

  He hadn’t known if she would come back here after their altercation in the parking lot. In fact, after a couple of hours of looking out for her car he figured she’d found a place to stay in town.

  Kendall. Wearer of rhinestones, singer of songs, and breaker of hearts. His being just the first of many a very long time ago.

  He pulled the heavy steel doors shut on the newly constructed barn and punched in the security code to lock it up. Gravel crunched under his work boots and acid churned in his gut as he slowly walked up the path to the dark house. Frogs croaked and bugs sang as night settled over the farm. Pops of light broke through the windows of the weary old farmhouse as she worked her way from room to room. Stepping up the creaky steps and over the porch he suddenly felt almost as old as the house itself, which had stood for nearly one hundred years on that same spot, supposedly built as a labor of love for Kendall’s great-grandmother by her great-grandfather when they’d bought the property years after emigrating from Ireland.

  He waited in the entry until she stomped downstairs again and stopped abruptly.

  “Damian.” Her voice was soft, with that smoky undertone that had made her a star. It was that same voice that kept him away during her previous visits because it chipped away at his resolve to forget their complicated past, to stay firm in his anger. The same voice that sucked the air from his lungs and made it impossible to breathe. Or speak, for that matter.

  “Kendall.” He pulled the hat off his head and held it in his hands as he willed the air back into his lungs. “I should have called you about your grandmother and the will,” Damian said.

  And he really should have. He’d meant to…even picked up his phone and punched in the number Sabre had texted him before she’d died. But then the numbness, the cold who-gives-a-fuck lack of emotion he’d attached to Kendall the Star would melt away and all his goddamn feelings would flood back. The ache and the longing would boil up to the top again and then the anger. The inferno in his belly would spread everywhere and take over every calm, rational thought.

  Kendall had turned her back on him and what was left of her family the night she’d snuck out of town and hitchhiked to Los Angeles. Sure, he knew she’d come back a handful of times to visit her grandmother, but she usually slipped in late at night when she knew he’d be tucked into the little cottage he’d called home since graduating from high school, and she was gone by morning. She came whenever the old woman had called, probably still holding out hope that her grandmother would show her some semblance of affection or familial love. She never stayed long enough to give him an explanation or even the middle finger. She just didn’t care enough about her old life to give up any part of her new one.

  For the first year, he’d written to her and called until she’d changed her number and his letters started coming back unopened. He’d even gone down to Los Angeles to try and find out what happened, bring her home if he could. But she’d been so bright and comfortable on the stage already that he knew it wasn’t his place to interfere with fate. Problem was he thought they had been destined to be together.

  So he tried to not give a shit. Tried to be callous and move on like she apparently had, but it had been nearly impossible. How did one move on from their first—their only—love? Lord knows he’d tried with other women. None of them stuck. None of them dug under his skin and stayed there. None of them even made it past the first, chaste date. Only one. Kendall. He’d learned to live with the bitter, grizzled version of himself he’d become. Soon enough it had stopped feeling achy and uncomfortable. Soon enough it began to wear on him, not in a bad way, but more like an old torn-up pair of boots. Worn in and expected. Almost easy.

  After he’d impulsively kissed her yesterday and put his hand on her knee for the entire service, he’d wondered if maybe one more time in his bed would finally work her out of his system, turn his bitterness to acceptance. Maybe he could prove she was the devious schemer he knew she was and he could finally move the hell on.

  He hung his hat on the dusty rack near the door and crossed his arms against his chest, holding his ground.

  She tapped her chipped glittery nail on her bracelet, a habit she’d always had even when she was just a cute little girl begging for a ride on his horse. “Now what?”

  “Well, sweetheart, you heard the lawyer. You move in or, if you want out, you buy me out. Should be a fairly simple transaction for a big star like yourself.”

  Her pale skin turned pink. Her short temper was a thing of beauty and his dark side yearned to set fire it to it again. “First off, you’re my husband in name only. You don’t deserve even one mud cake of this dirt pile. Second, this is not my home. It never was. You and everyone else have made that perfectly clear.” She kept her hands at her sides, but her fists were balls of creeping rage, white at the knuckles and rolled tight into her palms. But if he looked closely, and he always did look closely when it came to Kendall, he could see the hard points of her nipples through the material of her thin dress and what he knew must be a sheer lacy bra. “But…” she said slowly “…if you’d just agree to sell then we could both move on.”

  He took a step toward her. “Damian,” she warned and took a step backward toward the wall. “Please.” Her voice lowered; her expression was almost one of panic. From anger to fear to lust—that was Kendall. One big ball of passion.

  “I’m not selling.” He took another step bringing him to within inches of her body. The air around them vibrated with energy, something dark and volatile, yet familiar. Unused lightning in the storm they always seemed to create together. Her moist lips parted and he could hear her slight intake of breath. Good. She should suffer this ache as he had for the last four years.

  Hooded sparkling brown eyes looked up into his. “Why, Damian, why won’t you let us move on?” Her voice was hoarse, barely a whisper in the quiet evening of the darkening house, and barely recognizable from the husky drawl that had made her famous.

  “I’m trying.” And for a second, for some ridiculous reason he couldn’t fathom and really didn’t care to examine, he wanted to reach out and smooth his hand down her now pink-and-blonde-streaked hair, and it wasn’t because of the way she used to smile up at him when he’d do that. It wasn’t because of the weary stare behind her eyes that he hadn’t noticed earlier. It wasn’t even because he wanted to gather her full mop in his fist and tug it under his kiss. It wasn’t for any of those reasons. It was because no matter how selfish and heartless she was, he knew she was grieving—for her sister, for her grandma, for her career, and now for her family home. He knew this unfinished thing that sparked between them terrified her. And he knew she’d lost the only two remaining members in her family in under a year. He was a dick for messing with her. But he couldn’t help himself. It had been years since he’d had her this close and the opportunity was just too good.

  Kendall shook her head
in answer to all the unaddressed questions between them. Her eyes glistened with unshed tears and she took a visibly deep breath, gulping air down like she was starving for it. “You’re not. Just let me go. We both know you don’t want me. And I don’t want you.”

  But suddenly he knew that was a lie. The hitch in her breath, the pink tongue darting out to slide across her bottom lip, and the slight tremble of her body were her tells. Finally, he reached up and smoothed his hand over her hair, gathering the length of the braid in his hand and tugging her head back. “Liar,” he whispered and lowered his lips to hers. He’d intended to play with her. Kiss her dismissively like he had in the church. Instead, a plan began to form in his head. She would stay for a while and eventually he’d buy her out. Divorce her. Let her go like she said she wanted.

  But now, he’d take his fill. He devoured her, parting her lips with his tongue, reminding her that this time she’d leave knowing who she belonged to. This time she would leave with the image of his tongue in her mouth and his sex in hers. This time, he would screw her out of his system and he wouldn’t be left with his bleeding heart in his hands. When she left this time, it would truly be over between them.

  Chapter Two

  When Damian’s mouth crashed down onto hers the pointless thought that she should push him away and run from the old creaky house flitted through her mind. But his hand was wrapped in her hair and his other hand, fingers worn and calloused from years of hard work, had come up to caress her jaw and his body caged her in against the hall wall. He was so warm, and his kiss felt like home. What could it possibly hurt to let him hold her for a minute? He was still her husband after all.

  So instead of running away—which, let’s face it, was her modus operandi—she melted into his long body, feeling the pressure of his erection pressed into her belly through the denim of his jeans. She heard a low groan and quickly realized it came from her. Of course it did, everything Damian did was so controlled, so calculated. She longed to make him lose control like she once had, watch as his rigid demeanor peeled away from him like so much discarded clothing.

  Without thought, she yanked his T-shirt from his jeans. She nearly stopped breathing when her hands met with his hard, hot body underneath. She spread her fingers on his concrete back, noting every line and divot, like he was a map. A really sexy, really hard map. He was so much bigger, stronger than he had been before. Damian had always been ripped, but this was ridiculous. She ran her hands around to his front down his chest, finding a light smattering of rough hair under her hands that had grown thicker, and then down to his defined abs.

  God, this man’s body. It was so much…more than any other. Not that she had carnal knowledge of any other man or his body. Quite the opposite. She had tried. But despite celebrity news reports to the contrary, including the much-covered “relationship” gone wrong with her criminal of a business manager, no other man could make it past the first grope before she ended it. That and the endless work to succeed had never provided the adequate time or motivation to try for more with anyone.

  There was only Damian. There had only ever been him from the time she was a child until their wedding night when he’d kissed her so much differently than he was now. That night when she’d finally shared herself with him, and him with her. So long ago. A beautiful memory erased by so much betrayal, so much pain. And a giant lie.

  His hand left her hair and pushed aside part of her dress, exposing her black lace bra and her breast, her traitorous nipple tightening to an almost painful point. While his other hand slid up her body, tracing her curves until he cupped both her breasts. “God, your body. I missed your sweet, tight nipples,” he said, his voice thin like the admission hurt to say. He pinched one bud with his forefinger and thumb, much too hard but not hard enough, sending spikes of desire through her entire body while his other hand made the long trek back down her torso, slowly…achingly.

  Finally his hand peeked under the hem of her dress and crept up her thigh. Kendall should probably be embarrassed by the moisture slicking the inside of her legs, especially since this possessed man was not really her husband any longer, was not the man who’d gently taken her virginity as a gift on her wedding night. This man was clearly out to punish her with his lust, make her pay for leaving him. But she refused to feel anything but her own desire. Their love might be no more, but their sexual heat had clearly never burned away.

  Widening her legs, she felt two blunt, work-rough fingers stroke the outside of her panties. Again, too much and not quite enough. She leaned in to his hand, needing more, and heard his dark chuckle just before he tugged her thong aside and parted her folds. She felt her pulse beat frantically, battering her ribs, just as he bit down on that place that drove her crazy, that sensitive spot at the base of her neck. She hated him for being the only person in the world to know all her buttons, hated him for so much more.

  His calloused fingers breached her body and suddenly there was no air. It had been sucked out of the room, probably out of the damn house, by his heat. His fire must demand all the oxygen within a ten-mile radius in order to burn so fierce. And there was nothing else anywhere that mattered. Just Damian. And his command of her body.

  He wrapped his bulging arm around her waist and pushed her up against the wall, forcing her legs around his lean hips with his fingers still inside her body, his thumb circling her clit. In the back of her mind she knew he wasn’t her safe place. Hell, she didn’t believe in such things anymore, but for that moment she wanted to pretend he was. His warm breath caressed her as his fingers pistoned in and out of her and his thumb began to circle the tightened bundle of nerves of her clit.

  “Come for me, baby.” His harsh whisper was all it took for her to spiral into the abyss, shattered and ruined, where nothing else existed but him and her and this unquenchable fire they seemed to always create. Kendall finally took in a deep breath, followed by another, until she felt herself slowly float back. Behind her closed eyelids, lights still blazed bright and her pulse was ragged. A harsh, warm breath in her ear snapped her back to where she was. In the only real childhood home she knew. After burying the last member of her family.

  “This can’t happen. This didn’t happen.” Her voice, even to her, sounded strained, breathless.

  “It just did, sweetheart. Welcome home,” Damian said, bitterness bleeding from his words. “Figure your shit out. I’ll be back for you in two hours.” He pushed off the wall and away from her.

  Still gasping for air, she shoved her hand to her hip. “What does that even mean? Back for what?”

  He was already halfway out the front door with his hat in his hand when he turned and raked his gaze over her from head to toe.

  “I can’t stay here, Damian,” she said, disappointed at the pleading tone in her voice. “I want to sell this place and I want you to sign the divorce papers.” She didn’t add that it was more need than want that drove her. She needed to pay back the money her business manager had embezzled from her, the advance money the record label was demanding be repaid. Even though what she really wanted was to go back in time. To fix the past. But that wasn’t possible. He still would have chosen Blackberry Cove and she still would have had to leave.

  “Need and want are two different things, Kendall. This is your home.”

  “No, honey, this is just the place I’m from,” she snapped.

  He didn’t rise to the bait. Didn’t fight back or try to soothe her temper like he’d always done. Damian smiled, that enigmatic thing he did curving one side of his mouth that had panties dropping across three counties. “Like I said. Straighten your shit out. I’ll be back after my work is done and then we’re gonna talk.”

  The giant cinder block that had been sitting on her chest all day slipped down into her gut. She needed that money and she needed to get out of this town before she lost what little sanity she had left.

  “I’ll be gone by then. And I’ll be back with my lawyer.”

  He laughed, a deep hollow s
ound that unfurled something prickly and uncomfortable in her chest and set his black cowboy hat on his head. “No, you won’t,” he said, turning and leaving her standing in the dark entryway.

  Silently she slid down the wall, pulled her knees into her chest, and sobbed fat wet tears into her hands.

  *

  Damian glanced at the antique clock on his mantel again. Time to go hash it out with Kendall. At first, before he’d shoved her against the wall and coaxed an orgasm from her, he’d planned on figuring out how to buy her out and get her back on her merry, backstabbing way. But that was before. Before he’d touched her silky skin again, before he’d seen something float past her ironclad armor that looked a lot like regret, before he’d seen the tears leak from the corners of her eyes as he sent her over the edge.

  Before all that.

  He’d finished up the farm chores and consulted with his crew on their orders for the following week. Then he’d marched off to his little cabin in the tree grove, back behind the main house, and paced. Still, he had nothing. No idea what his plan was. Because now he wasn’t just angry and bitter—the two emotions that pushed him out of bed every morning before sunrise and kept him working until after dark—now he felt something else. And he couldn’t quite figure out just what the hell it was.

  And that made him even angrier. Which, of course, made no more sense than pushing her up against the wall and having his way with her.

  Maybe he wanted her to suffer a little, shake her up. She seemed so different from the old Kendall, the girl who displayed every emotion on her face like a neon sign. In the last few years, other than the one time he’d flown to Los Angeles to see her open for a big-name pop star, he’d only seen her in the media or the Internet. At first, she’d been so composed, so obviously trained by some public relations expert to act and talk a certain way. But in the last year she’d begun to publicly unravel. Stress lines around her mouth and eyes began to morph into reckless behavior played out for the world to watch, like a car wreck you couldn’t take your eyes from.