Her Sweet Complication Read online

  They arrived at the café and sat to enjoy some home-style food. Kelli filled in the unasked question.

  "We drove for half an hour yesterday to find this place. Liam said he wasn’t going to eat avocados and bean sprouts for dinner."

  Her eyes were sparkling and it was obvious she loved teasing her brother. Liam knew that no matter how many times he had pulled Kelli back between the lines of what was acceptable, she was a wonderful young woman and the whole family was proud of her.

  "Hmm, don’t know that I blame him, really. Avocado yes, bean sprouts are iffy and not either for dinner."

  Liam smiled and asked Jocelyn what she would like to order. She returned the smile and said, "Guess game is off the menu, so I’ll take a chicken enchilada plate with extra hot sauce and ice tea."

  Kelli giggled. "For real, you like game better than a regular hamburger?"

  "Don’t you? It is leaner and better for you and it has a fuller and more richly defined flavor, regular beef has no taste."

  "Liam, she is too much like you for me to deem myself free of my brother. Did you set this up?"

  Liam laughed and tousled her hair. "Nah, but now I won’t worry so much about you. Jocelyn will keep you on the straight and narrow, as much as that is possible."

  Liam looked over at Jocelyn and gave her a warm smile, his eyes communicated more than kidding around, it conveyed appreciation. They held gazes for an extended moment. Her blue-gray eyes seemed to have a life of their own and he watched her quickly look away. She was cute, innocent, out of his league and not his typical interest. Nonetheless, he was interested. He listened as Jocelyn chatted about her sister, Rachel, who was fifteen years old, and her parents. About her mom and dad, moving back to where her mom was from originally. And she talked about the importance of her native heritage in her world view.

  "Funny, I expected much darker skin and brown eyes or even black eyes, but yours aren’t," observed Kelli.

  "They appear mysterious and dark like fog over the ocean," Liam said.

  "Liam, when was the last time you saw fog over an ocean?" demanded Kelli.

  "Some things you can recall without having seen or done them for a while. But you are right, now that I think about it her eyes are more like smoke from a campfire or early forest fire."

  "Well, it all sounds so exciting and dangerous but I’m neither exciting nor dangerous. I am just a girl from North Dakota that decided she wanted to go to school somewhere else. My dad is French Canadian and my grandparents still live in Canada. They pronounce Charles as Sharles although I have rarely heard them speak French. I grew up in Minot and my parents only recently moved to Bismarck. My eyes are like my grandfather’s eyes and my skin is a blending between my dark mother and my light father. My hair is dark because both of my parents are dark headed," she spoke this information quietly.

  Liam could hear the hesitancy in her voice and the hint of sadness and he wondered what could have caused it. He wanted to ask but decided it was too personal for even him to bring up so he sat quietly for a while longer.

  "Mmm, I wish I had your skin coloring because mine is pale and sickly next to your golden skin," said Kelli.

  "I am slightly darker than my sister, but I worry about what it will darken to with this warm sun in California."

  Kelli and Jocelyn talked for a while, getting to know each other while Liam sat and listened retaining all of the information that Jocelyn was sharing and storing it to review later.

  "I am set up for a job interview at the campus library so tomorrow I may have a job. If I don’t get that one, I’ll get another one."

  Kelli, forgetting about the over protective brother seated to her left, quickly responded.

  "Working? You really want to go to work? What about parties, and hanging out, going to bed when you want to, doing what you want? That sounds like being too responsible for me. There will be plenty of time to be responsible. I am going to enjoy not having brothers to tell me what to do. Liam is nearly four years older than I am, then Shane is seventeen, Quinlan is sixteen, my sister Caoimhe is fifteen, Ciarán is fourteen and finally, Cián is twelve. So now, do you feel sorry for me? I need some freedom and space. I mean, it is not funny when your brothers mind your business more than you or your parents do."

  Jocelyn started to answer, but before she could, Liam said, "if you continue to talk about parties and doing what you want, I am going to pack you back up and take you home. You don’t sound old enough to live at the college or anywhere else without supervision."

  Kelli threw him a killing stare. "I know you did what you wanted when you went to college and now it is my turn. I intend to get my degree and learn to enjoy being an adult. So is Jocelyn, right Jos?"

  Jocelyn extended her hands as if to ward off evil. "If you don’t mind, could you leave me out of this? It is too early to make waves. I came to earn my degree. There is nothing more important than that right now." There was something odd in the vehemence of her declaration, thought Liam. "Mine will take five years because I am going for a master’s degree. What are you going to do, Kelli? Do you know what degree do you want?"

  "I don’t need to know right now, so I am just going to do my basic requirements and decide at that point."

  "Surely, you must know what you like, what you are interested in looking at," insisted Jocelyn.

  "Yeah, not so much. I was good on the debate team but that isn’t a degree and it is hard work, something I am not interested in right now. So, I’ll ride the wave and see what interests me."

  Liam listened while he ate and added a few comments but predominantly remained a quiet observer. Jocelyn was a young woman with a level head on her shoulders, but he could see she took risks she did not need to take. She apparently did not come from money because she needed to work and there was nothing wrong with that. His own father paid for his and now Kelli’s education but required that he have a part time job to pay for his own living expenses because it was good to learn how to do that. He had not sent Kelli with the same requirement but if she squandered her money, she would find herself also looking for a part time job.

  Liam would like to spend more time with Jocelyn and possibly find out what she wasn’t telling them tonight. He again thought about the fact that she had driven alone to college and he decided that being self-assured could be a good and bad thing. When they had spoken of her traffic stop, she had dismissed his concerns and irritation and embarked on a whole new line of conversation with no more effort than it took to inhale her next breath. Liam was not sure he liked hearing she was so independent she was reckless but was proud of the ability to stand on her own.

  The unbidden thought flashed that he wanted to paddle her bottom for risking it and then shocked that he even was giving this any contemplation at all. He didn’t even know who this person was outside of Kelli’s roommate, which should make it irrational for him to feel that way. She might not have taken her own safety into account as his sisters or girlfriends would have needed to do, but paddling a woman he just met was not his style. He had not considered that corrective activity with another female aside from his sisters. Well, not unless they were dating and it was consensual, that is. There was a rather obvious physical response to the thought that he might run his hand on that perky bottom. Whoa, boy, back it up and re-stable yourself.

  He announced that he had decided to stay through the next day. After dinner, they contemplated going to a movie but after a discussion it was agreed they were weary after the long day. Once it was decided to stay in for the night, Kelli tried to bargain a putt-putt golf game without success. She was rather loud about the lack of agreement for her idea. Liam advised her quietly, but not quietly enough for Jocelyn not to hear, that she needed to stop whining about staying in or he would be happy to give her a reason to whine. Ultimately, Kelli agreed they would de-stress well by playing a few hands of cards.

  Jocelyn wondered at the semi-private conversation that Liam and Kelli had engaged in earlier. Did he do what
it sounded like he did? She knew spanking was different than hitting, but did men really spank women outside of the bedroom? She was sure that is what it sounded like happened at the O’Connors. Jocelyn, having just dealt with the issues of her sister’s attack in the last year, she was not sure how she felt about the thought of spanking for discipline, but she was curious.

  Liam stated there were no male visitors allowed in the dorm rooms, relatives or not, so it was decided to go to Liam’s hotel room. The university was co-ed but not the dorm rooms. They spent the next few hours laughing, becoming comfortable and learning each other’s personalities. Jocelyn could see how Liam watched her mannerisms and paid attention to her responses, anticipating them when possible making physical contact whenever the opportunity presented itself. At nine o’clock, Jocelyn said she needed to get back to the dorm.

  "I want to put everything away before I go to bed tonight and that will take about an hour. I am going to that interview tomorrow morning at ten o’clock, remember."

  Liam laughed at Kelli who moaned at needing to go home so early and he promised she could spend her college career staying out until at least nine-thirty. In reply, she made a face and slung her purse over her shoulder.

  "Fine, let’s go then. I guess I can put my things away too. So, you’re not a neat freak are you, Jos?"

  "No, but I’m not a slob either so you’ll have to meet me in the middle I’m afraid."

  "Right, well that’s okay then. My sister is a neat freak and I need a rest from the strain of meeting her higher than human standards."

  Jocelyn just laughed.

  Chapter Two

  The Attraction

  The next day Kelli was off on a pre-semester university sponsored adventure and Jocelyn went to her interview, which she believed went well. Liam called to see how it went and offered to take her out to lunch.

  "We will try one of the typical California-type of places and see if there is anything on the menu that we can eat."

  He swung by and picked her up. They found there were many things they could talk about even if they did not agree on all areas. Jocelyn learned about Liam’s dreams of building a large working ranch. She watched as Liam warmed up to his favorite subject, ranching.

  "I’d love to eventually have all types of businesses going at the ranch and possibly have some of my brothers working parts of it. Ciarán is good with horses, but he is young yet. I am good with cattle of all types. I don’t know what Quinlan or Cián plan to do, but they have plenty of time to figure it out. Shane already does construction during the summer because running a ranch has never been for him. He knows how, he doesn’t care to do it. For me, I would love bison, cattle, and to work horses both privately and for trail rides. Possibly branch out into cabin rentals, and whatever else would make money. I’ve seen it done well and I’d like to give it a go."

  Jocelyn learned of his desires to start a guide business where he could take groups, research parties, scouts, whomever, out into the wilderness. Teach them what it was like to be in the world of wildlife and untouched beauty for the pioneers, the good and the bad.

  "I’m no tree hugger," Liam explained, "but I love the land. I see things from a more moderate perspective in most things, I guess. I would like to live in the midst of unblemished land and do my best to keep it somewhat untouched while still living comfortably on that land."

  "Where are you going to have this big ranch?" she asked as she leaned closer to him unconsciously. He slid his arm around to prop on the back of her chair seated next to him, leaning into her as he spoke.

  "Good question. I had hoped that I could work a ranch, more than my dad’s ranch, and get a sense of it. I was going to get my masters in Ranch Management, but I think I’ll work a bit first and then reconsider it. It is possible I won’t need to do that. College education isn’t everything. I received my Bachelors in Agricultural Business Management with an emphasis in Ranch and Cattle Breeding, so I’ll see if more is better later."

  "I haven’t ridden in a while, but I used to help my friend find the new calves when they were born in hiding and look for strays. I rode more when we lived further north than we live now. It was fun. I loved to just ride across the fields," she reminisced dreamily. "I went on a trail ride once and just couldn’t get into it, you know? It was confining and uninteresting, really. I want to go across a field, walk through the woods, along a creek or lake, or go into the mountains."

  "Either you had a worn-out trail master or you had a stale trail or both. I enjoy telling people the legends of the area, what they see, the significance of the trees, the history of the land, the people, and the animals. But I also love to camp under the stars at night with a group or alone, and lose myself in the environment. You would enjoy my trail ride."

  "I can hear you enjoy it by the way your voice goes soft and kind of gravelly. You and Kelli are quite different people aren’t you?" Jocelyn blushed at her unfiltered response.

  "Yes, quite different. But that is the fun about families, we all can have such different personalities but when it comes down to it, we love each other no matter the differences."

  Conversations about that family Liam so loved took the majority of the afternoon as they walked along the streets where they saw a pony express station before exploring a historic state park and wandered the visitors’ center. Both commented on the lack of actual nature in the area.

  "I don’t know how I am going to survive the time I am here when there are no real areas of wilderness. I guess I will take drives and find those areas still untouched, much, by humans."

  "Bet you don’t find bison," Liam teased.

  "Yeah, I bet you’re right. I am betting on the trade-off to be worth it, though. No snow means no blizzards, no cold. "

  "Well, I’ll ask you at the end of this year, how the trade-off went."

  Jocelyn didn’t miss the fact that what Liam said meant that he would be paying attention that long and she wasn’t sure whether she wanted to encourage that type of attention at this point in her life, especially when he lived so far away. She felt tingly when Liam even looked in her direction. Then when he put his hand in the small of her back or spoke low into her ear, there was no way butter wasn’t going to melt in two seconds. Jocelyn could even sense a warm dampness where she had rarely experienced it spontaneously and without personal assistance. In the last two days, she had multiplied that tingling and reaction exponentially. It was delicious but frightening. He was so attentive. It made a woman know she was special.

  Jos had had a few boyfriends, but they seemed immature and needier than she had time for, so she soon sent them on their way. Liam was neither immature nor needy and that made the atmosphere around him much more relaxed. The atmosphere was sexually charged but not hurried or frantic. She wasn’t surprised that she enjoyed her time with him and was neither irritated nor exhausted at the end of their day.

  When Liam suggested going back to his hotel before bringing her back to the dorm, she was pleased when he bent down and kissed her gently at first and then with confidence. It was as though he were deliberately and intently staking a claim. Jocelyn returned his kiss after her initial shock subsided. This was no teenager kiss. This was an entirely adult male kiss that held none of the hesitancy that she had previously experienced. She was not enduring his attentions but enjoying them. She agreed to go back to his room, knowing it might be leading him on but just for tonight, she wanted to feel like a desired woman. She did not know how far she was willing to go, but she was willing to explore the options.

  Liam led Jocelyn into the room and he carefully kissed her again. Jocelyn tightened in anticipatory fear that she might be asked to give her virginity to a man she had just met and yet he was gently possessive in a way that melted her very bones. She was drawn to him and his heat. And then, slowly but deliberately, he pulled away.

  "Jocelyn, I am attracted to you and I wouldn’t be honest if I did not tell you that I am aching to take you to my bed. But I don’t want t
o scare you or take advantage of you, so tell me if I am off base, but tell me now. I would like to think I could stop at any stage, but I am not sure how well I would be able to put on the brakes. You intoxicate my senses and I am lost in them."

  Jocelyn’s brain engaged and she told herself they should stop. It was so hard and yet she knew it was the right thing to do given that they had different goals and lived so far away. She had not given up her virginity yet and to give it to a man she yearned after with no real hope of an ongoing relationship was not what she wanted and she told him so.

  But then he ran his hand through her hair, slightly tangled by the day’s activity and used the snag to pull her to him and anchor her while he caressed her face with his other hand. Sliding his finger over her lips and watched her run the tip of her tongue over those tickled lips pumping fuel to his sidekick. He dipped to take her lips again. Not sweetly as before, but hungrily as he drew her even closer to him, sliding his hands to her back and under her shirt to connect with her skin, massaging it to flushed warmth. Then he pulled himself away almost violently.

  "You are right. We live too far away to make this work, I know, but I am not sure that I can let you go that easily." Jocelyn wondered if there was anything better than the feelings she was experiencing right now. Did she need more than this to hand over herself into his care? God, she couldn’t see how she could contain any more of the heat, the shivering that all ready tingled through her this very minute. Could she decide with any logical brainwave or did she just let this happen because it felt so good? She moaned and released herself. This one time, I can give him what he wants and I need. I can do this for me. In response to her decision, she reached up and offered her lips to Liam.

  "Jos, tell me what you want, honey. Tell me if I should stop for both of our sakes or do you want me to continue. I need you to be sure." He waited, having pulled back slightly to give her some space to respond.