by A. J. Pine
In that moment, Delaney didn’t care about her shelter or his ranch or anything that sent her peeling off from Vegas on the fastest route to Meadow Valley, California. All she cared about was his lips on hers, his hands in her hair, her heart thumping against her chest.
She didn’t have the same control as he did. There was no letting herself when it came to falling in love. And maybe two days was far too quick to truly know, but something started on that trail ride yesterday, and she couldn’t stop it now no matter how hard she tried. So she’d see these few days through, soaking up every second she could with this man.
Maybe they didn’t have a future, but they had today, and tomorrow, and a handful of days after that. For now it would have to be enough.
Chapter Twelve
After dinner, Sam took Delaney back to his office so she could show him the fruits of her labor.
He thumbed through the stack of brochures she’d printed on firm, glossy paper he hadn’t even known he owned.
“These are amazing,” he said. “Consider your room and board paid in full from here on out.”
She laughed, but the sound of it felt off. He’d dropped a bomb on her earlier, the seriousness of his situation and what he planned to do—or not do—about it. But his mind was made up, had been for years. It wasn’t simply a matter of knowing if he had the gene mutation, but there was Ben to consider too. As much as his brother drove him up the wall, he knew Ben’s way of life was his own way of coping with the situation. If Delaney thought Sam was barely living, then he guessed she’d describe Ben as living too much.
It was hard enough not knowing what his own future held, but knowing his little brother had the same weight on his shoulders was almost too much to bear. Colt knew the whole story. He also knew stipulations were in place for him to take over Sam’s or Ben’s third of the business should one or both of them no longer be fit to run it.
“I’m hedging my bets on you being around for a long time, Callahan,” Colt had said when Sam laid everything on the table before anyone signed on a dotted line.
As much as he hoped his friend was right, it was enough to know the ranch would be in good hands no matter what happened in the years to come.
“About my room and board…,” Delaney said, bringing him back to the moment.
He raised his brows.
“I was wondering if maybe there was any chance I wouldn’t have to sleep in that big bed all alone tonight.”
He grinned, happy she’d let the whole issue of his future go. He’d meant what he said, that she blew into his life like nothing he could have expected. And he knew that if she stayed in Meadow Valley, he’d have to let her go. He’d have to watch her fall in love with someone else and find the happiness and future she deserved. After what Wade Harper took from her, Sam wasn’t about to take anything else or offer more than he could ever give. He could give her tonight, though. He could be in the moment for the time they had, even when they both knew it would eventually end.
“You know, Vegas. Come to think of it, I don’t think you should sleep in that bed at all.”
He was sitting in the office chair while she leaned on the desk, facing him. He gave her arm a gentle tug, but it was enough for her to slip off her perch and into his lap.
She yelped with laughter and wrapped her arms around his neck.
“Stay at my place,” he said.
“But what about your brother? And Colt? They might see us together.”
Sam shrugged. “To hell with what anyone thinks. We have a week to make the most of this. We don’t need to hide from them.” He had this amazing woman in his arms who, despite their differences—despite knowing they had no future beyond these next few days—was willing to offer him more than he deserved. He wasn’t going to waste another minute.
“As far as they know, you’re Delaney Spence, stranded traveler. No way they’d begrudge me a few days of fun. In fact, I’m pretty sure Ben’s actual profession is ‘a few days of fun.’ They might be surprised, but that’s it.”
Her smile faltered, only for a second, but he caught it before she painted the mask back on.
“Hey,” he said. “We’re going to figure this land thing out.”
“But not right now,” she conceded, her expression brightening. “So you really want me to spend the night, huh?”
He slid a hand under her dress and up her thigh, his thumb stroking her at the tender spot where leg met pelvis. And heck if he didn’t want to play the role of Ben tonight and shirk his evening duties. But he’d already been gone the whole day, which was rare for him even if he did have the time off.
She sucked in a breath.
“I really do,” he said. “But first, you have to head back to your room and find something warmer to wear. We have a bonfire to attend.”
She smacked him on the shoulder. “You tease!”
He laughed. “I just want to make sure you’re aware that your stay tonight will be very worth your while.”
She dipped her head and kissed him, palming him over his jeans. She smiled against his lips, ran her hand up his length, and then hopped off his lap.
“One good tease deserves another, doesn’t it?”
“Fair enough.” His head fell back against the chair, and he groaned. Delaney backed toward the door. “Meet me back here in thirty minutes, Vegas.”
She was halfway out the door and into the reception area, her back to him now. She waved at him over her shoulder. “Hope that’s enough time for you to cool off, cowboy. See you in thirty.”
She sauntered out of sight.
Sam shook his head and laughed. When it came to Delaney Harper, he doubted he’d ever be able to be around her and completely in control. For tonight, he wouldn’t have it any other way.
Backyard s’mores couldn’t hold a candle to what Luis and Anna put together for a Meadow Valley Ranch bonfire. Because Luis insisted the berries be fresh, he’d asked Anna to deliver them specially for the evening activity, though Sam guessed the man had ulterior motives for requesting Anna’s presence at the ranch’s evening event.
Guests lined up at a picnic table covered in a red-and-white-checked cloth, the s’mores fixings that ranged from Anna’s fresh berries to organic peanut butter to gourmet chocolate to Luis’s homemade marshmallows organized to create an assembly line for the decadent creations.
Luis was giving lessons on how to perfectly toast a jumbo marshmallow when Anna interrupted, shoving her stick straight into the fire.
“Or you could burn the sucker just like this,” she said, pulling her stick back to reveal the flaming torch that was once a marshmallow. “Nice and crispy on the outside and not too gooey on the inside.”
Luis’s jaw dropped in horror. “That’s not how we do things in my kitchen.”
Anna blew out her marshmallow, stalked to the table, and picked up the bowl of fresh blueberries, strawberries, and raspberries. She glanced from Luis to Sam. “You haven’t paid me for this delivery yet. I can take it back.”
Some guests watched the interaction with suppressed smiles—much like Sam and Delaney were doing—while others on the opposite side of the fire were oblivious to the escalating row.
“You wouldn’t,” Luis said, calling her bluff.
Anna knew the best way to push Luis’s buttons was to threaten his food.
She tilted the stainless steel bowl, and a couple of berries tipped over the edge and into the dirt.
Luis gasped. Then he let loose in rapid-fire Spanish that Sam couldn’t understand, punctuating his tirade by brandishing his stick at her, the perfectly toasted marshmallow flying off the end and landing with a gooey splat right on Anna’s chest.
“Oh my God,” Delaney finally said. “This is amazing.”
Sam tilted his head down toward hers. “I should probably do something,” he said under his breath.
Delaney shook her head. “Are you kidding? Look around you. The guests are eating this up. Literally.”
Sam laughed
as he saw what Delaney meant. Guests’ rapt faces—both young and old—bore smiles as they devoured their s’mores and enjoyed the show.
“What’s the worst that could happen if I don’t intervene?” he asked.
He didn’t have to wait for his answer. Anna had already rested her marshmallow-topped stick gingerly on the corner of the table and was now facing Luis—no more than two inches between them—with a handful of berries.
“Diablo,” Luis said with a growl.
Devil. That one Sam knew.
“You would waste your stock just to spite me?” he added.
Anna smashed the berries against his chest, purple and red juices running down his apron and staining the skin under his neck.
“At this rate,” Sam said, “no one will even notice you messed up my face.”
Delaney elbowed him in the side, and he stifled a laugh.
“Why do I keep coming back here?” Anna asked, her berry-stained hand fisting the collar of Luis’s T-shirt. “Other than a paycheck, I get nothing but your nagging mouth. Your full-lipped, never-shuts-up, nagging mouth.”
“Cállame,” Luis said, his voice low.
“What the hell does that mean?” Sam whispered.
“‘Shut me up,’” Delaney answered. “Thank you, AP Spanish.”
And that was exactly what Anna did, planting one square on Luis’s stunned lips.
Whoops, hollers, and applause rang out from the guests along with a few grumbles and ews from some of the younger members of the crowd.
Sam laughed. He surveyed the scene—the happy guests, the people he worked with who were more friends than anything else, and the amazing woman beside him who would warm his bed tonight.
This was what he was fighting to protect. It was more than money or preserving the integrity of the ranch. He’d built the best life he could imagine for himself in Meadow Valley, and that meant everything to him.
“You’re like a little family here, aren’t you?” Delaney asked. “You and everyone who works for the ranch.”
Sam nodded. This was it now. Him, Ben, Colt, Luis, the rest of their small team—and hopefully Anna if Luis didn’t screw up. He still had both his parents, and he was grateful for that, but they weren’t a family anymore, not in the traditional sense at least.
Anna relinquished the berries back to their rightful spot on the s’mores assembly line.
“Hey, Sam,” Luis said, but Sam waved him off.
“We’re good here, Luis. Take the rest of the night off.”
His temperamental chef grinned as he grabbed Anna’s hand and led her from the bonfire.
“You still owe me for the evening delivery!” Anna called over her shoulder.
Sam laughed. He’d never admit it, but it was he who owed them for showing him—and Delaney—what this all truly meant.
“Okay,” Delaney said. “When do I get to make a s’more?”
Sam gestured toward the picnic table. “Right this way, ma’am.” He grabbed two sticks from the pile on the bench and handed one to her.
She bounced on her toes and smiled as she chose a suitable marshmallow. “I haven’t done this since I was a kid. Is that weird? We could never take long family trips, but we’d camp one night here or one night there. This reminds me of that.”
They grabbed a couple of open spots on large rocks that served as chairs around the fire.
“Are you a slow roaster or a burner?” Sam asked, holding his marshmallow just out of reach from the lick of the flames.
“Hmm,” she mused. “I think maybe I’m a combo of the two, a slow burn.”
She kept her focus on the fire, but he could see the blush in her cheeks lit up by the campfire’s glow.
Slow burn? Right. Delaney Harper was a blazing inferno he couldn’t extinguish. The more he tried to douse the flames, the stronger they grew.
They sat in silence, the two of them turning their sticks until both their marshmallows started to droop.
“Time to make a masterpiece,” she said, rising from her rock.
Sam followed her to the table. Of course, Luis didn’t serve the guests store-bought graham crackers. He baked them from scratch. The cinnamon and sugar coated Sam’s fingers as he put two of them on his plate.
“Oh my God,” Delaney said, licking the sweetness from her own fingers. “Did he make these?”
“Mm-hmm” was all he said, watching her slide the gooey marshmallow off her stick and directly onto one of the graham squares. She carefully placed a smattering of berries on next, then topped off her creation with a block of dark chocolate.
The ranch hosted bonfires every weekend, but they were simple. Store-bought grahams—much to Luis’s chagrin—as well as any other fixings. Not like this one. They’d gone all out for the festival. Sam had never brought anyone along before now. The guests were none the wiser, but had Ben or Colt been working tonight, they would haze him something good because when it came to matters of the heart, men were always thirteen-year-old boys on the inside.
“What?” she said, looking up at him. “Do I have something on my butt? Did I sit on a marshmallow?” She strained to look over her shoulder to confirm her suspicions.
“No.” He laughed. “I’ve just never done this with anyone before. It’s—different.”
She sandwiched her s’more together and stared at the two bare grahams on his plate, then looked down, where his roasting stick hung at his side, his perfectly toasted marshmallow now a sticky puddle in the dirt.
“Damn it,” he said when he followed her gaze. He used the stick to scrape as much of it as he could onto his plate, then threw the whole mess in the trash bin on the other side of the table. “Guess I got distracted,” he said, dusting off his hands.
Delaney picked up her s’more—the marshmallow dripping with warm berry juice.
“So, is me being here good different?” she asked. “Because the right answer might get you a bite, seeing as how you’re now completely without dessert.”
He wasn’t exactly sure how to articulate what it was like having her here, sharing something that was normally just a routine part of his job. But nothing about tonight felt routine, especially the idea of her feeding him her s’more.
“Yeah,” he admitted. “I guess it is good different. Did I pass the test?”
She bit her lip and grinned. “You get an A plus, Mr. Callahan. I guess you’ve earned your reward.”
She lifted the s’more to his lips and held her plate under his chin. He bit into the confection, and berry juice dribbled down his chin.
Delaney snorted and tried to catch the juice with her plate. “You’ve also got a big glob of chocolate right—”
He stuck his tongue out and licked the corner of his mouth, right where he could feel the warm, melted chocolate.
She pouted.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
She shrugged. “Maybe I wanted to clean that off for you.”
Sam’s whole body filled with heat as he imagined her doing just that. He wanted it, too, wanted so badly to let go of everything holding him back from being here in this moment. But letting go meant admitting that while the ranch and everyone who was a part of it were his family, something was missing—something he hadn’t realized until Delaney Harper blew into town.
He let out a nervous laugh, and she raised her brows.
“You don’t want to kiss me in front of the guests.” The words were an accusation, but she was still smiling. “I dare you, Sam Callahan. I dare you to break all your rules and plant one on me right in front of a big old audience.”
He glanced around at the various couples and families, and the group of women who all came to celebrate their fiftieth birthdays. After witnessing Luis and Anna’s fervent display of both contempt and affection, the guests had turned their interest back to enjoying their own conversations and desserts. Still, he was one of three owners of the establishment and the most visible, what with living on the property while Colt and Ben shared an
apartment in town. They each crashed in the guest cabin if they had a late night or early morning on duty. Or, if it was Ben, sometimes that crashing was with a guest or someone else in town. If Colt was doing the same, he made less of a show of it. Which brought him back to the case at hand.
Sam Callahan was not one to make a show of things, least of all his personal life.
“Wow,” Delaney said. “Those wheels are really turning. Don’t worry about it, cowboy. Some people are the dare-accepting kind. Some people aren’t. Consider yourself off the hook. You don’t need to kiss me in front of the clientele. I get keeping the business side of your life separate from the personal side. Or whatever this is.” She took a bite of her s’more, her lips now covered in marshmallow and chocolate.
His brow furrowed. “There’s no difference,” he said, realization in his tone. Every part of his life was right here at this bonfire. It was in the stable and the dining hall and the guest residence. It was walking Scout on one of the horse trails or hopping into the saddle and riding Ace to the swimming hole—with a beautiful stranger close behind.
Except she wasn’t a stranger anymore.
“I don’t follow,” Delaney said after swallowing.
If that one bite of her s’more was any indication of what those lips of hers would taste like now…He shook his head, momentarily freeing himself from the thought.
“The business side and personal side of my life. You were right about me throwing myself into my work. But it’s not a distraction. It’s what I love.”
She nodded. “I know. I was out of line.”
“No. That’s not what I meant. With you here—aw, screw it,” he said, snatching Delaney’s plate from one hand, the s’more from the other, and tossing both into a pile on the picnic table.
“Hey!” she cried. “What do you think you’re—”
He threw his arms around her, lifted her onto his hips, and waited the split second for her to wrap her legs around his waist before kissing her with everything he had and then some.
