Free Their Ex's Redrock Midnight (Texas Alpha) by Shirl Anders

Whatever works to get hold of that cool guy you’re crazy about.”
    Cabe swallowed hard. “You’re shitting me,” he rasped.
    She scooted closer and moved, until he had to lift his arm over her shoulders. She dipped her gaze up to his. “Not shitting you,” she said softly. “I used them all on Finn. Even got him to feel guilty doing it a couple times. Gosh, I remember being so into it I nearly believed it myself ... Believed that I was that upset, when deep inside it was like I was looking out at him and gauging his reactions. Sometimes sucks to be a girl,” she muttered. “We’re kind of evil.”
    “She’s trying to push any button she can push?” he asked.
    “Yeah, Captain, any one that will get her what she wants. But the funny thing about it is ending up wanting it too much at the same time and it never gives you that golden feeling you’re jonesing for of being with that certain guy you want.”
    He stopped the taxi outside of WTSF, put it in park and ground a hand over his face. “Hell, I see girls trying manipulation all the time, boo. I even know Vega’s doing it, but she does it so fucking big, it’s scary.”
    “And you feel guilty,” Rusty whispered. “Un-crazy people ... normal and not-addicted people, they feel guilty because they can’t imagine playing such harsh games with anyone, let alone someone they love. So we feel guilty, thinking we must have done wrong or even we should help the poor, destroyed, addicted person, forgive them, and help them.”
    “You experienced this,” he asked softly.
    Rusty looked down at their fingers intertwined. “My druggy criminal mom would come in and out of my life, throwing guilt with each step, but her sister, my Aunt Clare that raised me, she’d fight hard to not let any of that stick.”
    Cabe let out a deep breath. “Your dad?” he asked.
    She shook her head. “He was gone before I was born. I don’t think my mom even knew who he was.”
    “Boo,” Cabe called softly, then lifted her chin. “I got fostered out of the boys’ home at ten but had to leave Vincent and Sam Blackfoot in there. But my foster mom was like your aunt; she’d fight to keep life as normal as she could.”
    “Just wow,” Rusty said, lifting a hand to touch his jaw too. “We have things in common, Captain.”
    He moved her hand on his jaw with his slow nodding, then both their hands dropped. “Let me ask you something,” he said slowly. Then he nearly didn’t ask, but he couldn’t help wondering. “You ever think of Finn?” He paused then added what he had to: “You two looked close.”
    Her head was already shaking halfway through his words. “My high school epiphany about him was solid, honey. We’ve just kind of known each other a long time without really knowing each other.”
    “Say that again,” he demanded, and she opened her mouth, but he added, “honey.”
    Her eyes darkened and her lips softened. “Honey,” she whispered. Then she said, “You said ‘she’s trying to drag you to bed.’”
    Cabe had never seen her look as vulnerable, and he didn’t even think about where they were. The next second he pulled her over his lap, until she straddled him and he had her face caught between his hands. “Baby, no way I’d let her touch me ever again,” he uttered. “If you need to know anything like that, you just ask me. I’ve put you in a bad place and I want you to know you can trust my word.”
    Rusty rubbed his shoulders, then squeezed them. “I trust you, Captain,” Rusty whispered as they looked deep in each other’s eyes. “Just needed to hear it like you did.”
    That got their lips meshed together in a meaningful kiss, turning hot as usual and just starting tongue action when—
    Rusty’s business cell phone rang and they both ignored it because they knew it was set to the answering service since she was off duty. But something caught the corner of his gaze and his fingers tightened on Rusty’s hips. As if she could read him,