Her First Ride (Innocent Series Book 7)

by Kendall Duke

  Well, that did it.

  I couldn’t bear that. Not with him. Not with the balm that soothed my body, my soul, not with Sebastian, my unexpected, sweetest torment. I was so mixed up inside I thought I might be a bit delusional, but… A part of me was really falling in love with this guy. So I couldn’t handle the look on his face, the sound of his voice when he said—a man so brave that he literally ran into an explosion, who used to ride blood-thirsty bulls for fun, who retired to a quiet life in law enforcement, of all things—when this man said he was scared for me. Sebastian just didn’t do scared. Nervous and disappointed about the reactions to his scar, annoyed and impatient with anything that smacked even remotely of bullshit, easily bored by the status quo? Yes. Check, check, check. But scared? That just wasn’t a thing Sebastian Miguel Redhorse Walsh did, and I knew it even if I hadn’t known him very long. It was kind of a defining feature.

  I settled into his arms. He slid towards the head of the bed, taking me with him, and leaned back on the pillows before settling me into the crook of his arm, using one hand to hold me close and the other one to gently brush back the threads of loose hair that kept falling into my face. I talked. I talked and talked and talked; it was almost like kissing him, in a way—I couldn’t stop once I started. I felt so safe, I guess I just kept going until it was over, unable to keep myself from trusting him. I needed someone to hear me, anyway, someone who cared about me and didn’t need me to protect them, someone who would be able to listen without immediately wondering what was going to happen to them—or to me. When I got to my suspicions about Ripley sabotaging my car, I finally started to run out of steam. “And I guess that’s the whole story,” I whispered, nestling further into his skin, breathing his smell through the fabric of his uniform. Sebastian was quiet for a long time. A little too long. “Sebastian?”

  “Well, when I find him, I’ll be sure to thank him—in a weird way, I owe Ripley quite a bit.” I leaned back and narrowed my eyes at him. “Seriously. We never would’ve met otherwise. You would’ve continued your backroads tour of the wild wild west without a single reason to stop here, and as a general rule I avoid Idaho at all costs.” I snickered before I could stop myself, then landed a light slap on his chest. “What? The man should know he’s done a little good in this world before he leaves it.”

  “Sebastian,” I said, a tone of warning in the sound.

  “It’s fine,” he said, his voice full of the smug nonchalance I’d pegged as his actual personality before I realized how much of his recipe for infuriating someone was simply dead-pan sarcasm. “It’s a very reasonable thing to do, thanking someone for introducing you to the love of your life.” I blinked. He kept talking, indifferent seeming as ever. “I’ll make sure he knows how grateful I am just before I drop his ass in the fucking Grand Canyon. Or maybe I’ll throw him in the trunk and take him home, nail him to the Hills. I could probably find a grizzly around here somewhere—”

  “Sebastian,” I exclaimed, and he glanced down at me, his face still carefully blank.

  “What?”

  “You’re a deputy! And also a decent human being—you’re not going to do any of those things.”

  “Because you said not to?” A silky black eyebrow raised defiantly on that smooth caramel brow as his dark eyes narrowed at me.

  “No, because I am asking you not to.” I placed my hands on his chest, rolling so that our bodies touched along the length of our torsos. My breasts peaked as they nestled against his firm rib cage, and his eyes locked on mine when he felt the hard nubbins press into his flesh.

  “That’s hardly fair,” he hissed, then bit his lip, his fingers tightening on my shoulder. I felt the temperature in the room rise as the atmosphere absorbed the potency of our attraction, like magnets charging the air.

  “It wasn’t intentional either,” I whispered. “But is it effective?”

  “That depends,” he said, his voice husky. “What unintentional effect did you intend it to have, exactly?”

  “I guess…” I settled comfortably against him, letting him feel the weight of my body as it pressed into him. Sebastian gazed at me for a moment, then rolled so that we were chest to chest, his hand idling on my hip, long fingers lightly touching my backside. I sucked in a breath as I stared into his eyes; we were very close again. All I’d have to do is—

  “You guess what, Sierra Davenport?” His voice was low, his lips inches from mine… And then he pulled back a few more inches and his dark eyes snapped with a resolve that refused to be ignored.

  “I guess I wanted to distract you,” I said, and the thread of need woven through my voice made me hesitate. Sebastian raised his eyebrow again, watching me. “Did it work?”

  “Maybe,” he said softly, letting his hand slowly slip over my hip, his palm sliding under the fabric of my shirt. His fingertips, heated and rough, danced lightly over the skin of my back. “Sierra… I meant what I said earlier, about this mattering to me. If you’re still going to Idaho tomorrow then… I want to know now.”

  “Do I have a good reason not to?”

  “You could stay here with me,” he said, his eyelashes fluttering as he bit his lip and forced himself to meet my eyes again. “You should stay here with me.”

  “I have a job—”

  “So what? There are jobs everywhere.”

  “…I guess…” Now it was my turn to bite my lip. Was I being practical? Was I being fearful? I didn’t know.

  “If you’re going to say something ridiculous, like ‘we just met,’ or ‘I hardly know you,’ don’t bother,” he said with his usual dead-pan delivery. “I could care less, as far as that reasoning goes—you know more about my life for the last two years than anyone else alive. I tell you things I don’t even admit to myself, out loud, for no reason at all other than that you asked.” He blinked at me, the teasing smirk gone from his full lips. “I’m trying to tell you that I think I could love you, Sierra. And in my experience, death is too real for me not to do something about this—maybe even something that seems a little crazy.”

  The thing was… It didn’t seem crazy to me.

  It seemed too good to be true. “You don’t understand,” I told him, and rolled onto my stomach just so that less of my body was pressed against him, the nipples begging for his attention firmly pushed into the mattress. “I… I understand exactly what you’re saying. But this thing with Ripley…” I couldn’t even finish, the whole event was still so painful. But Sebastian reared up, putting his weight on his elbow so that he could look me in the eye. His mouth was hard, the glint in his eye like steel.

  “Ripley is not your concern, any more,” he told me. “Period. End of story. And all jokes aside, I want to kill him—but I won’t. And I won’t ask anybody else to either, so put that thought away. But he’s not going to be able to hurt people any more, Sierra. What happened to you is a one-off. And if you’re brave enough to sacrifice your whole damn life to protect the people you care about, you’re brave enough to testify when the time comes; I’ll be there, holding on to you, protecting you, making sure you know you’re loved and that this whole thing is getting wrapped up with a bow. Are we clear?”

  “What are you going to—”

  “Are we clear?” Some of the grim force left his voice as he dipped his head lower and brought us eye to eye. “Sierra. Trust me, okay?”

  I already did. I completely did.

  I trusted him before we even got to this point—I think I started trusting him in the truck, when he somehow knew how I felt when no one else, not even people who’d known me for years and years, not even my beloved family, had been able to tell how shaken I was. I trusted his instincts, the ones that made him a protector and a fighter, the ones that made him brave beyond imagining, even when he couldn’t see that for himself. It was the same trust that made my body beg to bond with his, to open and invite him into my deepest parts: my fear, my shame, and my heart.

  “I’m a virgin,” I suddenly said. Because I wasn’t going
to violate that trust, either. If he meant it… If he really wanted me to stay, we were going to do this with all of our cards on the table. “And I want to lose my virginity to you.”

  “There you go with that bluntness again,” he murmured, looking into my eyes. “My little straight shooter, everybody, Miss Sierra Davenport.”

  “Now,” I whispered. “Tonight.”

  “Then say something I can live with tomorrow,” he rumbled, rolling backwards and pulling me on top of him. His hands pressed me into his chest as they wrapped around my waist, the massive feel of him under me taking my breath away as I imagined doing this naked. “Sierra.” Sebastian was feeling it too; I pushed up on his chest, straddling him, and looked down at his handsome, chiseled face. “Please.” I felt the hard length of him beneath my body and exhaled, trying to relax. “I feel like I’m begging you, and I don’t like it.”

  “I do,” I retorted, and suddenly I was the one flat on my back, a mountain of muscle and hot skin pulsing between my legs as he pressed against my hungry flesh. My sweatpants were damp at this point, sticking to my skin; he slowly ground into me, making me whimper as my body responded instantly to the pressure and heat.

  “Do you like that?” His voice was thunder and sex all rolled into one.

  “Yes,” I moaned.

  “Then you can beg for it,” he whispered, “and we’ll see what happens.”

  Sebastian put his weight on his elbows, releasing my pelvis for a second before slowly pressing down again on my center, forcing my thighs to open wide with his weight and watching my face as I gasped at the size of him. He gently rolled his hips, increasing the pressure on my pussy, and I bucked into him, greedy for it; Sebastian once again pulled away, both of us groaning with the pain of release. I wanted him. I wanted him more than I’d wanted just about anything in my entire life. “Sebastian—”

  “Oh, no,” he growled. “Not yet.”

  Sebastian kissed me then, and it felt like a wildfire came to life and was consuming my skin, his lips searing mine and his body close enough, heavy enough as he pressed down that I moaned into his mouth. He took the opportunity to seize my tongue and suck on it, making me buck into him again, the charge of desire shooting down my spine and snapping it like a whip. His hands slid over my ribs and cradled my breasts, rough thumbs rubbing over my nipples as he kissed my throat and I arched into his touch, my mind slowly closing down as it became overwhelmed by the sensation of my nervous system firing from all quarters: his lips on my skin, my shirt tearing as he pulled it up and down at the same time, his fingers squeezing my nipples through the nubby fabric of my lace bra, his hard, thick shaft straining against my center, the heat and pressure of it grinding my clit… I succumbed. I came so hard I saw stars, his name the only thing I could say as my body surrendered and was submerged in the tidal wave of orgasm he pushed me through me. When it was finally over and I came to, he was gently sucking my nipples through my bra, his hands stroking my ribs. He wasn’t between my legs any more, instead laying to the side and letting my thighs fall open, my embarrassingly wet center easy to see. Those sweatpants weren’t hiding anything, now. Wordlessly, Sebastian continued to cover my skin with kisses, beginning with my jaw and working his way over to my earlobe, sucking it while his hands stroked my body from my bare sternum down to my pubic bone, never quite going further. Teasing me. Tasting me. “Sebastian?”

  He raised his eyes and met my gaze; I didn’t even sound like myself. My voice was quivering. “Sierra?”

  “Can we make love now?”

  “I don’t think so, baby, no,” he whispered, and went back to running a single heated fingertip back and forth, back and forth, over my sweats, then across my bare stomach and up to my chest, never straying to either side or slipping to the damp center below. His lips landed on my shoulder.

  “Why?” I could hear the need in my voice, so desperate to be filled with him.

  “I don’t want to be inside of you if you’re leaving,” he said softly. “And believe me, that’s hard to say out loud.”

  I rolled towards him. “I’m not leaving tomorrow.” I couldn’t, I thought, my eyes running over his face. I longed to kiss him, but I understood that he wanted a commitment from me now—even if it would kill him to admit that part out loud.

  “I don’t want you to leave at all,” he whispered, his eyes on mine. “I want… I don’t even know what the hell I want, I just know I’m different, now that you’re here. I’m better. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to… I can’t go back to the life I was living. And there is no one on the face of the earth that’s ever met me that would believe what I’m saying right now, but it’s true: it would break my heart to have you once and then have to tell you good-bye.”

  “Just because I have a job in Idaho doesn’t mean we’d have to say good-bye,” I said, and his dark eyes flickered over my face for a second, his mouth tight.

  “What does that mean?”

  “It means I love you too, and I want to be with you, and I don’t really care where we are,” I said, and his hand froze as his eyes bored into mine. “And I don’t care that that’s mostly crazy to say—I feel just like you do. I trust you, and I don’t understand it, but you know me better than the people that have been with me everyday since I was born.” I took a deep breath. “If you still want me… After what I told you—if you don’t mind the fact that I’m not as brave as I seem—then please, make love to me. And don’t ever stop.”

  Sebastian watched me for a long moment, and when he leaned forward to kiss me this time, it was different—it was slow, and deep, and I felt it in my bones. As if he was giving me a preview of the way he would fill my body. I reached over to him, grasping the collar of his shirt, and as his lips gently tasted mine I started to unbutton it. Before I could finish I was distracted by the silken feel of him—under the rough fabric, away from the calloused cowboy’s hands, his skin was as soft as velvet. Caramel all the way down, every inch a muscled masterpiece. When he sat up to take his shirt off, his back to me for just a moment, it took my breath away—he was so beautiful, so perfectly made, that he almost didn’t seem real. His shoulders were so wide and strong that the layers of muscle shifting over his bones were deep and ridged over his spine, his hips… When he turned back to me, his gaze hungry, it was all I could do not to moan out loud at the sight of him. He was a perfect inverted triangle, narrow hips at the base with a thatch of dark hair that presented an absolutely massive cock. I wanted it—I thought I might be afraid again, but I wasn’t. All I could think was this is my man. This is the man that belongs inside of me.

  Sebastian surprised me by tenderly removing my socks and shoes, then climbing up the bed and pulling my sweatpants off. I was thankfully wearing a pair of panties that matched my bra; when he saw them, he paused and raised an eyebrow at me. “Off,” he growled, and I lifted my ass, my knees knocking together as I slid them over my hips. When they almost revealed my center, slipping downward, his hand stilled mine. “Slower,” he whispered, gazing at the center of my body. I let my hands fall by my side as he hooked one long, strong finger under each thin strap and tugged them down, inch by inch. His eyes never moved, and when my panties were finally off he climbed up higher on the bed, surprising me again by pulling my thighs up and over his own, raising my hips and opening me so that I was spread-eagled before him. I’d never been so exposed before, but the look in his eyes made me feel… Free. Powerful. He took his time exploring every crevice, his fingertips slipping into the damp folds—never my tender, untouched hole in the center—and teasing my wet flesh until I shook.

  “You want me to beg, I’ll beg,” I panted, but the grin that flashed back at me was wicked.

  “I do. And you will,” he promised, and then I howled as one long, thick finger finally slid into me, bringing my body off of the bed in a fluid mix of pleasure and pain as my spine curved in a deep arch. I felt my weight on my shoulders, felt the width of his finger—one! Just one finger—as he spread me and fi
lled me from that alone. “Oh, baby, I need to be careful with you,” he hissed. “You’re so tight.” And wet. I could hear the sound of my body welcoming him, finally getting a taste of what was to come. He loved it; I looked down and saw that same flash of charming wickedness as he added another finger to the first. And then I squeezed my eyes shut and saw stars, and nothing else.

  Sebastian used his other fingers to expose my clit, rubbing it gently and lightly, using all of my moisture to make it swollen and ready. I didn’t know my body could tolerate such extremes of pleasure as he forced me in and out, over and over, towards the orgasm’s abyss. “Sebastian—”

  “Come for me,” he whispered, slipping a third and final finger in as he squeezed the bud of my clit between his thumb and forefinger, and I did. I came so hard I screamed for him, I begged him to stop, to do it again, more, harder, faster, please, Sebastian—And then I just made sounds, noises so full of raw need that I didn’t know what they were. They were just echoes from somewhere outside of my head, the place where I was dominated by ecstasy.

  Finally, I re-emerged. Sebastian was kneeling, naked and glorious between my thighs, silently watching me. I blinked up at him, my body damp with sweat, and reached out; he laced his fingers through mine, leaning forward to kiss my hand, and in doing so dragged his cock absently over my swollen pussy. I hissed as our bodies met, as I felt the breadth of what was to come. Sebastian leaned down and kissed my open mouth, his lips tender; fingers that smelled like my private center trailed over my cheek. He adjusted himself, hovering over me, and as our eyes met again, I felt the wide head of his cock, red and thick, meet my pink flesh. I cried out, his tender kisses covering my face, as he slowly glided inside.