“Touch me.”
He grinned, his dark eyes smoldering. “Here?” He put his hand on her elbow.
“You’re a jerk.”
He laughed. “That’s not what you want? How about here?” He cupped her breasts, his finger flicking over her nipple.
She shifted under his touch. “Better.”
“Where else?” he whispered, between kisses.
“Lower.”
“Here?” He cupped her knee, making her laugh.
“You’re such a pain,” she said with a giggle.
“I just want you to feel the power of telling me what you want.” He kissed her again, an intoxicating assault on all her senses, while his thumb drew circles on the inside of her knee. Okay, so she hadn’t thought she wanted him fondling her knee, but the way his thumb was sliding over the skin on the inside of her knee was sending tendrils of desire though her body.
“A little higher,” she whispered into the kiss.
He moved his hand to her thigh, his fingers tracing designs on the skin, making chills race down her leg and up her spine. “Here?”
“To the left.”
His hand slid to the inside of her thigh, still tracing designs on her skin. “Here?” He kissed her again, taking her breath away before she could answer. The kiss was so amazing she could barely think, and her hips shifted even more restlessly, moving of their own accord, as if she could force his hand to go where she wanted just by sheer force of will.
“Higher,” she whispered.
He moved his hand upward, until his fingers were brushing over the delicate fabric of her underwear, tantalizing her with the soft, barely-there touch as he glided across her body. “Nice,” he whispered, as he ran his tongue down the side of her neck.
She shifted beneath him again. “Take it off.”
“Take what off?” He pressed his palm to her folds, igniting a rush of desire, even through her underwear.
She groaned. “You’re so impossible. Just take off my damned underwear and make love to me.”
He laughed softly and kissed her, a kiss so penetrating that her body clenched in response. “You’re so bossy.” He finally released her wrists to drag her underwear over her thighs, trailing kisses down her leg as he slid the scrap of material off.
When she was finally naked, she had a brief second where she felt utterly exposed and vulnerable. There was nothing between them now. Nothing.
Then he kissed her toe, making her giggle. “You have such a sexy toe,” he murmured as he kissed the arch of her foot. “And under here. I’ve been dying to kiss this very spot.” His hand was warm where he’d wrapped it around her ankle, trapping her just as he’d immobilized her wrists. He kissed her anklebone, and then the front of her shin.
She swallowed, watching him as he worked his way up her leg. His eyes were on her, his dark gaze swallowing her up in its heat. He kissed her kneecap, and then the inside of her knee. And then he began working his way up the inside of her thigh, never taking his gaze off her face.
He hooked his arm under her right thigh, moving her leg to the side as he kissed higher, and then locked his other arm across her hips, pinning her to the mattress.
She didn’t think she would ever tire of his strength. “You like to do that, don’t you? Trap me.”
“Yeah, I do. You mind?”
She shook her head, her body taut with anticipation as he moved her legs further apart. He met her gaze, his mouth inches from her most private parts. “What do you want now, darlin’? Tell me.”
“Kiss me. Touch me. Do everything you’ve fantasized about.” Her voice was breathless, and her heart seemed to skip a beat when a slow, dangerous grin spread across his face.
“Be careful what you wish for,” he said. “You have no idea what I’m capable of imagining.”
“No one has ever fantasized about me before,” she whispered. “Show me.”
“You’re in trouble now,” he said. “Big trouble. Cowboy trouble.” Then he swept his tongue across her folds in a single bold swipe that made her entire body clench. He gave her no respite, still pinning her to the bed with his forearm as he invaded her body with his mouth, his tongue, and even a few light nips with his teeth. Sensations cascaded through her like fireworks in her blood. Her hips bucked under his sensual assault, but each time she tried to move, he simply exerted more force with his arm, holding her in place effortlessly.
She loved how he held her down. It was incredibly sexy, especially since she knew that if she ever asked him to release her, he would in a heartbeat. It was the illusion of being trapped that was so intoxicating, plus the way his muscles flexed to resist her was completely sexy as well.
He released his tight grip on her leg, and slid his fingers inside her. She gasped at the invasion, suddenly no longer able to focus on anything but his touch, and the way it felt to have him inside her. He didn’t let up on his assault with his mouth, his tongue swirling over her folds as his fingers slid deeper inside her, unfurling a cataclysm of need inside her.
She gripped his shoulders, gasping as her body burned with need. She could feel an orgasm building inside her, getting tighter and tighter until she thought she’d burst. “Stop,” she gasped. “Make love to me. Now.”
He responded instantly, crawling up her body to take her mouth in a devastating kiss as he kneed her thighs apart. She felt his erection pressing against her, and she wrapped her legs across his hips, trying to draw him into her. He didn’t give in. Instead, he broke the kiss and framed her face with his hands. “I don’t have any condoms.” His voice was rough. “I haven’t done this in a while, and I wasn’t prepared. I was so pissed this afternoon that it didn’t even occur to me this would happen.”
A little part of her died at what she had to say. “It’s okay. I can’t get pregnant. It doesn’t matter.”
“I got tested a year ago,” he said, not even appearing to notice her comment. “I wanted to know if I had paid the price for any of the shit I’d done. I’m clean, and I haven’t been with anyone since.”
She nodded, some of the tension easing from her body at his utter nonchalance about her confession. She realized that it truly didn’t bother him in the least. He didn’t see her as flawed or broken or anything. She smiled, her heart suddenly a thousand times lighter than it had ever felt. “My last boyfriend and I did the testing thing. He didn’t want to use a condom if he didn’t have to. I’m good.”
His eyes darkened. “I don’t like it when you talk about your last boyfriend.” He moved his hips against her, his cock straining at her entrance. “I want this about us. Me. You.”
Her breath caught at the sensation of his body pressing against hers, so close, so tempting. “It’s only about you, Zane. I feel like…” God, could she say it? Wouldn’t it make her too vulnerable? But she wanted to say it. She felt, somehow, that they both needed to hear it. “I feel like I need this with you. I need you. I thought I came here for Mira, but really, it was because I needed to meet you.”
He didn’t ridicule her or pull away. He simply nodded. “I feel the same way.” His fingers tightened where he was framing her face, and he kissed her again. There was something else in the kiss this time. Something new. A tenderness. A vulnerability. She wasn’t sure, but it made tears burn and her throat tighten. She felt utterly and completely cherished, treasured beyond words, despite all he was.
Zane pulled back to look at her, his eyes boring into hers. “You’re mine,” he said, his voice rough. “Mine.”
Her throat tightened even more, and she nodded, not quite able to speak.
His eyes still boring into hers, he moved his hips, sliding his cock past her barriers and plunging deep inside her. She gasped, her heart tightening at the feel of him buried inside her. “It feels so right, doesn’t it?”
“Yeah.” Still not taking his gaze off her, he withdrew, and then thrust again, deeper this time, making her body ache for more. “It does. You do. We do.” He braced his hands beside her h
ead, looming over her on the bed. “I give you my everything, Taylor Shaw. It’s not much, and you deserve more, but it’s my all.”
Tears filled her eyes, but before she could answer, he kissed her, a devastating, sensual kiss that seemed to carve a path through the aching loneliness in her heart. She wrapped her legs more securely around his hips, locking him against her as he drove deeper again and again, each thrust coiling desire more and more tightly through her, until she felt as if her entire body was going to explode.
She met his gaze, unable to drag her focus off his face. He was watching her so intently, as if he were trying to memorize her every feature so he could hold it in his memory forever. He was so present in this moment with her, making her feel like it was only about them, that this moment had meaning because it was the two of them coming together.
He cupped the back of her head and kissed her again, a feverish dominating kiss that tore through her like a fire that would never be stopped. Her entire body coiled, and she gripped his shoulders, gasping at the tension amassing inside her. This was her moment, her man, her everything.
“I’m yours, forever yours,” he whispered, and then he took one final plunge that thrust her over the edge into an abyss of sensation.
“Zane.” She clung to him as the orgasm raked through her. He bucked against her, and she knew the moment he surrendered. His entire body went taut, his muscles became rock hard beneath her hands, and then he shouted her name, driving deep inside her as the orgasm took him, sending him over the same precipice as she, until there was nothing left to hold onto but each other.
Chapter 11
Zane wanted to stay right where he was and never move…for at least ten minutes, until he recovered, and then he wanted to make love to Taylor again. And then, never move again. Until he recovered, and then—
“Wow.” Her sigh of contentment interrupted his fantasies, making him smile.
He grinned as Taylor nestled against him, her hair tickling his chest. “Yeah, it was.”
She splayed her hands over his stomach, tracing designs on his skin. “You’re going to make it hard for me to go back to my real life,” she said.
His amusement faded, and his arm tightened around her instinctively. “When are you leaving?”
She shrugged. “I promised Mira I’d stay ‘til after the baby is born and help out. I have about six weeks of vacation accumulated, but I doubt I can take them all. They need me.”
Six weeks. Or a week. He wasn’t a long-term guy in any way, but the thought of Taylor getting on an airplane didn’t sit well with him. But shit. What did he have to offer her? Nothing.
“Can I ask you something?” Her voice was slurred with contentment, making something inside him warm.
He liked that she was relaxed. He liked that he was the one she was relaxing with. “Yeah, sure. Ask away.” Anything was better than dragging himself down about her leaving.
“Why did you quit bull riding?”
A cold wind swept through him, and he stiffened.
Taylor lifted her head to look at him, her brow furrowed. “What’s wrong?” Her guileless gaze was fastened on him, utterly devoid of ulterior motive. He realized her question was genuine, not some tabloid wannabe trying to get the scoop on him.
Shit. He had to chill. Taylor was different. She wasn’t like the others.
With a sigh, he stretched out on his back, staring at the cracked ceiling as he ran his fingers along her spine. He never talked about his past, not to anyone, but for some reason, he wanted Taylor to know. She’d trusted him with her deepest secret, and he owed her that much. “Before I was born, my mom shacked up with my father. They never got married, but he knocked her up. We lived with him for a while, and then moved out.” He concentrated on the feel of her skin beneath his hand, trying to distance himself from the story he was telling. “She never held a job. She just hooked up with assorted men and slept with them in exchange for being able to live with each of them and have him support us, until she got tired of him and moved on.”
Taylor frowned, and propped herself up on her elbow to look at him.
He didn’t look at her. He didn’t want to see what she was thinking. Instead, he kept his gaze on the ceiling. “Most of the men she was with were bastards. I learned fast to vacate when her boyfriends were around. By the time I was five, I was spending my days on the streets. I was already trouble, I’ll admit that.”
Taylor scooted on top of him, so she was laying on his chest, her chin resting on her palms, while she watched him.
Zane scowled at her for interfering with his attempt not to make eye contact, but she smiled gently. “It’s okay, Zane. I already knew you grew up poor, and you told me you were like those boys. I knew that before I slept with you. I’m not going anywhere.”
At her words, something inside him eased, a tight knot that had been there for as long as he could remember. She knew who he was, and she wasn’t going to leave him. With a sigh, he lifted her hair off the back of her neck and let it slide through his fingers. “When I was six, I ran into Chase. He took one look at me, and he said I looked too much like a Stockton not to be his brother. I asked my mom, and she said yes. I was psyched, you know? I had brothers. I had family. I belonged somewhere.”
She smiled. “Chase seems like a good guy.”
“He’s a great guy.” Zane couldn’t keep the faint smile off his face. “He dragged me out to the ranch, which was owned by some old guy named Skip back then. Chase and his brothers, my brothers, used to go out there all the time and take care of the horses, and I got to tag along. The ranch wound up being my salvation. I had a talent for riding, and I loved it. Dealing with those bulls gave me a place for my anger and aggression.” He picked up her hand and pressed a kiss to her palm, needing to ground himself in her presence. “I was poor, my mother was a slut, and everyone thought I was worthless, until I met Chase and started riding bulls. I had a major chip on my shoulder, and if it wasn’t for the bulls, I would have wound up in prison for life.”
She smiled. “So, you found your place?”
“Not really.” He sighed. “My brothers had mostly grown up together. They had a closeness I never quite broke into. Yeah, I was one of them, but at the end of the day, I went back to whatever shit hole we were living in at the time, and they went home together. I hated being an outsider, both with my own brothers and in society. I figured if I became a star bull rider, I’d matter. I’d belong.”
She cocked her head, her eyes sharper than he’d expected. “It didn’t change anything, did it? The money? The fame?”
“I tried. I filled my life with women and parties and big trucks. I thought I was the man.” He twisted her hair around his index finger. “I found a woman I thought was right. We were engaged. I was on top of the world.”
“And then?” Her voice was soft, non-judgmental, and he found himself looking at her, wanting to see her, needing to connect with her.
“We were leaving a bar late one night with some other riders. There were some boys hanging around outside, kids like the ones you saw today, kids like I used to be. They wanted autographs, but a couple of the guys told ‘em to take a hike.” He gritted his jaw, that same anger returning. “They treated those kids like shit. My fiancée actually called them filth. Filth.” He met her gaze. “I’d once been one of those kids, Taylor. The people I called my friends treated them the same way that all those people had treated me as a kid. I felt like I’d betrayed who I was, and that my friends had betrayed me. How had I become the kind of person whose friends were like all the bastards who treated me like shit when I was poor? They liked me now, because I was rich and famous. It was just…it was crap.” The same fury and self-loathing boiled through him. “I quit at the end of that season. I was done. I didn’t want to live that life or be with those people.”
She was still watching him. “But bull riding is all you know,” she said, far too observant. “It’s your identity, isn’t it? Without it, you don’t know what
to do.”
He shrugged. “I don’t belong anywhere. I don’t belong with any people. Which is fine. I don’t care. I live my life, and I’m free to go where I want. No one counts on me, and I don’t count on anyone. It works.”
She was still resting her chin in her hands, studying him. “I count on you,” she said softly.
His hands stilled in her hair, and something shifted in his chest. “Shit, Taylor, I told you—”
She put her finger on his lips to silence him. “I didn’t mean that I’m counting on you to marry me. I just meant that I count on you to be the man I trust, the one that makes me feel like I matter. I don’t belong anywhere either, Zane. My parents are long gone. I travel so much that I don’t even know if my fridge actually works. Mira is my only connection, and now I’ve lost her too, in a way. But when I’m with you, I feel like…” She paused, as if she were trying to find the words. “I feel like my soul can stop fluttering around, and it can just rest in your arms and breathe.”
He stared at her, shocked by her words, by the way she’d articulated exactly how he felt when he was with her. He wouldn’t have been able to explain it, but the moment she’d said it, he’d known she was right. “That’s how I feel.”
She smiled, a gentle, genuine smile that seemed to light up her eyes. “I’m glad. You deserve to feel like that, but you know, I get the feeling that Chase and Steen would be willing for you to land there, on the ranch.”
“I know.” He started trailing his hands through her hair again. “But it’s not my thing. I’m not that kind of guy who connects like that. Trying to put down roots is a trap. It makes you blind.”
“Like when you didn’t see the true nature of your friends and fiancée?”
He nodded. “Exactly like that. I won’t make that mistake again. I like my brothers, and I’ve got their backs, but I don’t fit with them, not on a permanent basis.” He lifted his head to kiss her, needing to feel the softness of her lips against his.
A Real Cowboy Rides a Motorcycle Page 11
