I Crave You Read online

  I Crave You

  C.C. Wood

  Copyright © 2020 by Crystal W. Wilson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  For Cat.

  I miss you.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Epilogue

  Wild for You (Crave, #2)

  About the Author

  Sign Up for C.C.'s Monthly Newsletter

  Also by C.C. Wood

  Prologue

  7 years ago

  This was the stupidest idea I’d ever had.

  Technically, it wasn’t my idea, it was J.J.’s. My brother, bless his heart, had lots of ideas. And, as usual, he’d gotten me in over my head. It had been this way our entire lives. My big brother would have a brilliant plan but I was the one who got bitten on the ass by it.

  Why did I never learn my lesson, you ask?

  For all his troublemaking ways, I loved J.J. and he loved me. Although he was three years older than me, we were a team. And even when everything went pear-shaped, J.J. was never malicious in his intentions. His strategies just tended to be...flawed.

  If I was going to blame anyone for this disaster, it probably should be Leanne, J.J.’s ex-girlfriend of exactly 48 hours. She’d dumped him when he made it crystal clear that he had no interest in proposing to her. Not that I blamed him. She was kind of annoying. Though I really wished he’d broken the news after the wedding because it would have saved me from his harebrained idea. Not his wedding because, as I said, he didn’t want to marry Leanne.

  The plan?

  Oh, nothing much. I just had to be his plus one for his best friend’s wedding. Sounds easy, right?

  He promised to sneak me champagne during the reception in return for me saving him from any rabid bridesmaids. I explained that rabies was an unlikely problem among women in their mid-twenties but he’d insisted. When he’d thrown in a hundred bucks on top of that, I’d decided to do him a solid. I was a twenty-year-old college student and a hundred dollars would buy me a lot of ramen. Or burritos from my favorite food truck near campus.

  Now that I was here, I realized my mistake. I should have charged him three hundred. Brody might be J.J.’s best friend but he and I didn’t get along. At all. And I kind of hated his stuck-up family. They thought that being the wealthiest people in our little town made them above everyone else and they never let me, or my brother, forget it.

  Brody didn’t think he was better than us. He just lived to irritate me. I’d had a huge crush on him when I was younger but that had died a swift and bloody death during my freshman year of high school. For no good reason, Brody had suddenly started treating me differently, giving me hell every time he saw me. And I gave it right back because McClanes didn’t tolerate nonsense, good-natured or otherwise. Yeah, fun times.

  He’d graduated the next year and I’d only seen him a handful of occasions since. He and J.J. had gone to the same college so he rarely spent time at our house when he came back to town to visit his family.

  But today was his wedding day and his blushing bride, a girl he’d met in college, had insisted they have the wedding at the local country club because the grounds were "just so quaint”.

  Anyway, back to J.J.’s brilliant plan that led to my current predicament. His bestie Brody Boy was completely and utterly shitfaced. There was no other word for it.

  At the moment, Brody had his head in the toilet as he puked his guts up. J.J., the awesome friend that he was, gave verbal encouragement from a few feet away. I leaned against the wall in the men’s room, studying my pretty peach pedicure. Sparkly.

  When the sounds of illness subsided, J.J. carefully removed Brody’s tux jacket.

  “Uh, man, you got a little, uh, stuff on this. I’m gonna go try to clean it up.”

  Oh, hell no. This was my chance to escape, vomit notwithstanding. I straightened and held out a hand. “That’s okay, I’ll do it.”

  Just as I said this, Brody heaved again.

  My big brother, my once favorite person, screwed me over without a second thought. “No, no, I’ll do it. Will you just, um, keep an eye on him?”

  Said eye twitched and J.J. put his hands together in a prayer-like fashion. “Please, Cam. If his mom finds out what’s happening, there’ll be hell to pay.”

  And no doubt I would end up paying it. That’s how it always seemed to work out in these situations.

  “Fine,” I sighed. “But you’re taking me out to dinner at Torino’s before you head back to the city on Monday.”

  J.J. winced. Torino’s was a fabulous Italian restaurant three towns over. It was expensive and my favorite item on the menu was the lobster linguine which also happened to cost more than anything else except for the steaks.

  “Cam,” he whined.

  “Keep it up and I’ll order a steak just to spite you.”

  “Okay, okay. Torino’s tomorrow.”

  I took a step back and leaned against the wall as J.J. darted out the door. I tried to ignore the sounds of Brody hurling up all the whiskey he’d consumed but it was difficult.

  Finally, after one final spasm, he groaned and collapsed on his ass.

  “This sucks,” he moaned.

  “For both of us, I’m sure,” I shot back.

  Brody twisted and his gaze landed on me. “Who are...“ he trailed off, squinting at me and tilting his head. “Shit, Cami, I didn’t recognize you.”

  I nearly rolled my eyes but refrained. Didn’t recognize me? He’d known me since I was eight for crying out loud.

  “I clean up okay,” I replied dryly.

  My sarcasm flew right over his head. Brody hauled his body up and stood on weak legs. Since he was wearing only a thin dress shirt and snug tuxedo trousers, I could see that his once somewhat lanky frame had filled out. And then some.

  Brody staggered over to the sink and rinsed his mouth out with water. Then he reached into the little Dopp kit on the counter next to him and withdrew a toothbrush and small tube of toothpaste.

  I tried not to watch as his broad shoulders flexed beneath the fine material of his shirt. Or stare at the way his ass filled out his pants. Damn, he no longer resembled the teen boy I’d crushed so hard on. He was a man.

  Brody Murphy was a nice-looking male specimen, despite his jerky ways.

  Once his teeth were brushed, he rinsed his mouth with some mouthwash he’d pulled out of the kit, splashed his face with cool water, and grabbed a handful of paper towels to dry off.

  Only then did he look at me and say, “You always looked more than okay to me.”

  I cocked my head and crossed my arms over my chest but said nothi
ng. Well, not aloud. I let my face do all the talking in this case.

  Brody mimicked my gesture, leaning his hips back against the counter. If I hadn't witnessed him doing the technicolor yawn a few minutes ago, I wouldn't even know that he was wasted. “What? You think I’m lying?”

  “Uh, yes. Yes, I do. I mean, you are the one who started calling me Flatty Cami my freshman year.”

  Brody scoffed. “How many times do I have to tell you I had nothing to do with that? And that was six years ago! Why won’t you let it go?”

  “Maybe I just like holding a grudge.”

  Brody laughed. “You’ve always had a contrary streak.”

  That might be true but he had no business commenting on it.

  “So, why did you decide your wedding day was a good time to get trashed?” I asked, changing the subject with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer.

  Brody blinked at me and, for a split second, he looked almost vulnerable. Then the wall slammed down and his expression turned nonchalant.

  “Just celebrating a little too much, a little too early.”

  I stepped forward until only a couple of feet separated us. “It seems to me that the urge to get trashed out of your mind is a big ole warning sign.”

  “Maybe that’s what it seems to you but I am not you.”

  I studied his implacable expression and nearly gave up. But I thought of J.J. and how much he admired Brody. How he loved him like the brother he never had and how he wanted the best for him.

  So instead of keeping my mouth shut like I should have, I said, “If you think this is a mistake, there’s still time to stop it.”

  “What’s a mistake?” Brody asked, his dark green eyes locked on mine. He looked intent, as though he were hanging on my every word but he was acting like he had no idea what I was talking about.

  “The wedding, Brody.”

  “Why would I want to call it off?” he asked but I could hear the bitterness in his voice. “I mean, it’s the happiest day of my life, right?”

  “Is it?”

  He stared at me, his eyes turning hard. “Why exactly do you think I’m unhappy on my wedding day?”

  “Because men in love don’t feel the need to drink themselves into a stupor the hours leading up to the walk down the aisle,” I replied.

  Brody continued to stare at me without speaking. I could almost see that bright mind of his working behind his eyes but he never had a chance to respond because my brother chose that moment to return.

  “Hey, Brody! Feeling better?” J.J. asked.

  Brody’s eyes stayed on me for one more moment before he broke our staring contest and looked at my brother.

  “Yeah, man. Thanks for getting my jacket cleaned up.” No trace of a slur in his words. It was as if all that throwing up had cleansed his body of alcohol. Or maybe he was just Satan in disguise. Good thing this wedding wasn't in a church or else Brody probably would have burst into flames when he walked through the doors.

  J.J. grinned. “No problem. The minister just cornered me on my way back. It’s almost time to start.”

  Brody took his tuxedo jacket from J.J. and shrugged into it. “Great. Let’s get this done.” He glanced at me. “Good to see you, Cameron.”

  I tilted my chin up slightly. “You too, Broderick.”

  Ignoring my use of his full name, Brody just grinned and walked out of the bathroom with my brother trailing behind him.

  Guess it was time for me to take my seat. After all, there was a train wreck in the making.

  1

  Present Day

  I inherited my intense love for rock n’ roll from my dad. He introduced me to classic rock at an early age and I still loved it, even if it was several decades older than I was. Right now, AC/DC’s Back in Black was blasting from my Bluetooth speaker as I organized and de-cluttered my office.

  To be completely honest, I hated cleaning. No, more like despised it with every fiber of my being. The only thing that made the activity remotely tolerable was listening to some damn good music while I did it.

  As it was, I had to get things organized because my silent partner, college roommate, and best friend, Sierra, was coming to town. When I’d asked her how long she'd be staying, her only reply had been, “A while.”

  With Sierra, that time frame could mean a few weeks, a few months, or even a couple of years. She worked remotely for some computer firm and made beaucoup money. So much money that she asked me if she could invest in my small business. At the time, I’d needed every penny of capital possible because I was twenty-two years old and no bank in our hometown would give me the time of day when it came to a start-up loan. It hadn’t mattered that I had a five-year plan, cost and profit projections, marketing plans, and a million other details organized. I was just a kid, and a girl at that, therefore I couldn’t possibly be successful.

  But I was.

  While Farley was a small town, it was surrounded by other small towns. Places that didn’t have cute little ice cream shops that served homemade ice cream in fun flavors and delicious concoctions with crazy names like “Sundae Roadkill” or “Texas Ice Cream Massacre”.

  When I’d opened Crave, I hadn’t just marketed to the people of Farley, I'd invested in advertising within a thirty-mile radius.

  And it paid off.

  Business wasn’t just good, it was great. I’d never be a millionaire but I was definitely comfortable and getting better every year. In another ten years, after I bought out Sierra, I could hire a full-time manager and not have to come into work almost every single day the shop was open, which was six days a week.

  Even though it was a lot of hard work, I loved my job. I got to make ice cream in nearly any flavor I wanted. When people came to my shop, they left with a smile on their face and a delicious, frosty treat. As far as careers went, it was pretty damn good.

  Oh, and I didn’t answer to anyone but myself. Or Sierra, but she didn’t hound me for information. I think that even if the shop wasn’t turning a profit, she wouldn’t have cared. In fact, I was almost certain she’d just invested so we could work together even when she wasn’t on the same continent.

  Which was about to change for the first time in two years. Sierra was coming to visit. I was incredibly excited but also stressed. While I kept the front of the shop and the kitchen spotless to keep the health department off my back, my office was one step above a dumpster fire. I had stacks of paper everywhere; invoices, payroll, order lists. Basically, anything and everything a small business owner should really keep organized in a file rather than in haphazard piles that tended to crash to the ground with alarming regularity.

  Then there was the dust. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d taken a rag to the desktop computer and I knew it would be the first thing Sierra would look at when she came into the office. Hmmm, now that I was thinking about it, I hadn’t dusted the computer since Sierra installed it two years ago when my last system crashed. Lucky for me, she’d been visiting then as well.

  Which lead me to my current situation. It was one in the afternoon and the shop wouldn’t open for a couple of hours. It gave me ample time to clean but not the motivation. Thus the rock n' roll turned up to window-rattling volumes. If rock couldn’t keep me moving, I had no hope of getting it done.

  AC/DC changed to Def Leppard and I danced around my office, tossing my hair and shaking my ass like an extra on an 80’s music video. In between wild gyrations, I put folders in the filing cabinet, put away bits and pieces required for clerical work like paper clips and sticky notes, and took a dusting cloth to every surface in the office.

  I’d just completed one badass, complex turn followed by a dramatic pose that consisted of me arching backward over my desk when the sound of someone whooping and clapping pierced the sudden silence at the end of Pour Some Sugar on Me.

  I jerked upright but the abrupt movement overbalanced me and I fell face first into what were admittedly a nice pair of boobs. At least that’s what Sierra insisted.
r />   “Good to see you too, partner,” my friend said drily. “If I’d known you were so hard up I would have stopped at one of those sex shops in Dallas and bought you something special.”

  I managed to disentangle myself from Sierra, pulled my phone out of my pocket, and paused Led Zeppelin. My Bluetooth speaker fell silent.

  “You know, you’ve got some pretty good moves. Or you did until that last one,” she commented.

  “Hey, it was spot on if I wanted to motorboat someone but still make it seem like an accident.”

  “Surely there are less dangerous ways to accomplish that goal.”

  I grinned at Sierra then glared. “You’re early. You weren’t supposed to be here until after closing time.”

  “I woke up at five and decided to head out,” she replied with a shrug.

  That was Sierra. She went wherever her instincts took her. It was something I both loved and hated. Sometimes it meant we went on a spontaneous adventure and others it led to us not seeing each other for two years.

  "Well, I'm glad you're here. I'll take you to the house, get you a spare key, and help you get settled in. I have to be back at the shop in two hours to open up, but we can have a late dinner together tonight if you want."

  Sierra nodded. "Sounds great. I'll cook."

  I stared at her.

  I clearly did a poor job of hiding my fear because she burst out laughing until she snorted. "You should see your face." She looked at me again then bent over, giggling uncontrollably. "I promise, my cooking has improved in the last two years. I took some classes."