“Damnit!” He threw himself off her again. Her wicked laughter followed him across the bed when he determinedly put two feet between them.
“Okay, fine.” She scooted next to him, tossed a leg across his thighs, an arm across his chest, and tucked her head beneath his chin. “We’ll play by your rules, you big, hairybutthead. But if we’re not going to be switching hammocks—”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You know, doing the whole over-under thing.”
“You’ve lost me.”
There was laughter in her voice when she said, “Dukes of Hazzard?”
“Are you speaking English?” he demanded. “Or ’Merican? Because I’m having the devil of a time figuring out what you’re on about.”
“Sixty-nine-ing, Sir Slow on theUptake.” The laughter in her voice turned into the real deal.
And there it was again. That image.
He groaned and once more tossed an arm over his eyes. Then he lowered it to the sheet and frowned up at the ceiling. “What doesThe Dukes of Hazzardhave to do with it? You’re speaking of that silly show about two cousins in the South who were always running from Mr. Pig, right?”
“BossHog. And, yes, that’s what I’m talking about.”
“Then I fail to understand the reference in the context of…” He couldn’t bring himself to utter the phrase. He was already having a dreadful time not saying,To hell with it!and jumping her delicious bones for a vigorous bout of…switching hammocks.
“Remember how Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane and his trusty basset hound Flash used to chase theDuke boys all around Hazzard County? ‘This is Rosco P. Coltrane,’” she said, donning a Southern accent that was far better than her attempts at an English one, “‘and I’m in hot pursuit!’”
“Right. And that has to do with what we’re speaking of because…” He let the sentence dangle.
“Because that souped-up orange car the Duke boys drove was a—”
“Sixty-nine Dodge Charger,” he interrupted.“Okay, I get it.”
“Figured you would. Let no one ever say you don’t know your cars.”
Despite himself, he chuckled. “Really, darling. These euphemisms of yours…”
“Seriously? You must have forgotten that conversation in the pickup truck. Gentleman sausage, todger, tallywhacker? Any of that ringing a bell?”
“Touché,” he allowed, loving that she let him pull her close. “But aren’tyou a bit young to have watchedThe Dukes of Hazzard?”
“Yep.” She nodded, her cheek rubbing against his chest. “Too young to have watchedThe Dukes of HazzardorI Love LucyorBonanzaorBewitched. But considering I was a latchkey kid with no supervision and nothing to do once I got home from school every day, it’s no wonder the television and all those old reruns became my friends.” Beforehe could dwell, once again, on how wretchedboththeir childhoods had been, she said, “So about this next truth.”
“I suppose it was too much to hope that we’d gotten far enough off topic that you’d forgotten about that.”
“Now that I’m on to your game, Christian Watsoning doesn’t work on me.”
He decided to give up on his demand that she stop using his name as a verb. He sighed resignedly.“Then let’s have it. What truth are you on about now?”
“What happened to your mom?” His breath stuttered in his chest. “I mean, after you sent her to rehab, what happened?”
Being in the old manor house had brought back so many memories.Goodmemories. Memories of a time when both his parents had been young and full of laughter and unbroken by the horrors of life.
He could clearly rememberhis mum in a blue sundress standing in front of the mural on the far wall. He and his dad had been walking around the room, looking at the tiny figurines on the tables, but his mum had only stood there, studying that mural for ages, her dark hair catching and holding the fading light streaming through the windows, burning like the sun itself.
It was one of the last happy days he’d spent withher.
