Free The Wild One by Theodora Taylor Page B

had never been as embarrassed as she was after sleep humping Andrew. How the hell did she let that happen? She’d been called frigid by more than one guy who hadn’t been able to bust through her reserve and get into her pants. How did she go from that to creaming all over some dude in her sleep? What was wrong with her?
    She had to get out of here, she decided. She couldn’t take living in that house with Andrew Sinclair one more minute. She didn’t care what it took, she needed to get off this ranch. Like right now, before she went crazy with lust and confusion. She’d call the D.A.’s office first thing, as soon as she worked up the courage to go back to the house.
    Eventually, the adrenaline from what happened that morning faded, and sleep overtook her. But the next thing she knew, someone was shaking her awake.
    “Shirelle?” she said, blinking against the sunlight now flooding through the open barn door.
    But no, it wasn’t her mother, it was Andrew, looking even grimmer than usual. He had the straps of her heels looped under the first two fingers of his left hand.
    “Who’s Shirelle?” he asked.
    “Nobody,” she answered, sitting up on the bale of hay. “What are you doing here?”
    “One of the hands called the house, asking if there was a reason you were in the barn,” he answered. “C’mon.”
    He tossed her shoes at her.
    “Where are we going?” she asked.
    “Into Buellton. Jeb’s already there, picking up feed for the horses, but one of our generators just went out, so I’m driving it in,” he answered. He gave her an up and down look. “Plus, I’m sick of watching you flounce around here in that mini skirt. It’s distracting the hands, and it’s not the kind the look the Sinclair Ranch is going for, especially if you’re going to be working with the children’s program. You need some decent shoes, too.”
    Her cheeks burned, not only because he thought she had been purposely flaunting herself, but also because— “I don’t have any money on me. Not even a credit card.”
    “Let me guess, you’re afraid to use your credit cards because you don’t want Nathan to track you down here?”
    She looked away. She didn’t know this Nathan guy, but she was already sick of hearing his name. “Something like that,” she mumbled.
    “You know he’s on vacation, right?” Andrew asked. “That’s what Nathan does when he gets hurt. He runs away. He never even looked for you all those years you spent recovering and getting your degrees. Why do you think he’d look for you now?”
    The bombs Andrew kept dropping about his and Layla’s back story were excruciating. Seriously, the most excruciating thing she had ever endured, including her thirty days of mandatory house arrest. She vowed to look the whole story up as soon as she got reassigned to another place to lay low.
    But now she just answered. “I really don’t want to talk about Nathan anymore.” Totally true.
    He gave her a thin smile. “Of course you don’t. C’mon anyway. I’ll buy you whatever you need.”
    Wondering if she’d ever be able to go more than five minutes without feeling completely humiliated by this man, she said through gritted teeth, “I’ll pay you back as soon as I can. And when we get back from town, I’ll figure out some other living arrangement and get out of your hair. I promise.”
    He stared at her for a long, hard time, but didn’t say anything. In the end, he turned and walked out the door, apparently trusting her to follow, which she did as soon as she got her stilettos back on.
    Pride be damned. She was willing to do anything to get out of wearing these heels everywhere she went. Even spend more time with a man who really seemed to out-and-out hate her.

CHAPTER 10
    Roxxy thought she’d do anything to get out of her stilettos, but that was before she was informed she’d have to squeeze in next to Andrew in his old candy-red pickup truck, since the generator was already sitting in the