Pressure Rising (Rhinestone Cowgirls Book 2) by Rhonda Lee Carver Read Free Book Online

Em.
    Could Pearl clear her plate of hostility and prior impressions of DJ and start afresh?
    Easier said than done.
    Why was Pearl the only one who found him obnoxious? After cleaning his kitchen and making his food, he didn’t even offer a thank you, but complained instead.
    Then again, while at the grocery, she hadn’t taken into consideration DJ’s food preferences. And it didn’t take a genius to realize he wasn’t a tofu-bean-sprout-turkey-bacon fellow. Even Joshua Stone grumbled when she prepared meals without meat, ‘real meat’ as he put it.
    Although she didn’t want to be here, especially with DJ, she had a strong desire to do her very best, and not because she wanted his approval. Of course not. But she could have bought a steak, maybe even a pound of Russet potatoes. She could cook a meal that’d put hair on DJ’s chest.
    She stifled a chuckle.
    What it all came down to, she had shot him.  Accident or not, she had to do the right thing. She didn’t need her father to tell her that because she already knew. When the gun went off and she saw what she’d done, the blood on the backside of his jeans and the bullet hole on the side of the house, she’d felt miserable. Why had DJ agreed to have her help him? He couldn’t be comfortable with this arrangement.
    His father forced his hand, but DJ was a grown man who could have gone against his father’s wishes. In fact, Pearl could have rejected her father’s wishes just as easily.
    That wouldn’t have happened.
    She couldn’t remember a time when she’d told Joshua Stone no.
    Being the middle child, she’d always been the peacemaker, mostly between Jewels and Em who seemed to rub each other the wrong way at every turn. Jewels was the motherly-type and Em was wild…and Pearl was the one who watched the world pass by, at least that’s what Em told her recently.
    Pearl guessed Em was right, because what woman her age was a virgin—or at least a second-time virgin as she liked to call herself. Seven years without sex was a long time.
    Sure, a few times over the years she’d gone to the very edge of going all of the way, but she’d always come to her senses before she’d plunged over the cliff because none of the men had made her feel like she should, especially if she planned to share herself.
    Pearl had never found the right one, and now she worried that even if she did, she wouldn’t know how to please him. After all, she couldn’t count the one man she did have sex with as experience. It had been okay, but not anything to write home about.
    She could watch as many movies or read as many books as she wanted but it wasn’t the real thing.
    Pulling on the thin and tattered T-shirt she wore every night, she wasn’t tired enough to fall asleep so she grabbed the sci-fi novel from the bookshelf—the book she guessed DJ had been reading. She climbed into bed and snuggled deeper under the cover. The sheets were fresh, but DJ’s scent lingered like an annoying itch where she couldn’t reach.
    Punching the pillow twice, she plopped her head into the middle and sighed. DJ’s big head had apparently worn down the puffiness. She slid the pillow between her legs and laid her head on the firmer, smaller one. But then thoughts of DJ’s head on the very pillow that she now had tucked between her inner thighs invaded her stability.
    Moisture filled her panties. She pushed the pillow lower between her knees. The last thing she needed was to leave her own scent for him to find. Instead of feeling better, the throb in her core beat like a heavy drum.
    Em teased her once saying that Pearl had gone so long without a man that she’d forgotten the true misery of needing sex.
    Pearl huffed. She understood, all too well, what desire felt like. It had lodged at the apex of her thighs, and it was DJ’s fault.
    She hated the betrayal of her body—and hated that the one person who made her temperature rise and her southern lips glisten would not be suitable for a