by Em Petrova
Her insides still pulsated after that insane—what? G-spot orgasm? She had no idea what he’d done to her, but she wanted more.
And often.
Teasing him with strokes of her fingers over his ass and back up to his shoulders, she tried to shut down her mind. But after wanting him for so long, it was impossible not to analyze what was happening.
Gently, she pushed on his shoulders. He rolled into the mattress and lay staring up at her, eyes dark and glittering in the low light. “My turn to touch you.”
He made a quiet noise like leather chafing on stone but said nothing as she started at his lips and kissed her way downward. Tasting his skin, salty from their sex romp, drove her on with small moans of her own. She licked down his neck to his chest. Worshipped those carved pecs she’d spent years perving over and finally sucking his small nipples. They tightened in her mouth, and she smiled against his skin.
Sweet warmth trickled between her legs as she moved to his ridged abs, tasting every bump. Then on to the curls cushioning his cock. She loved that he was so confident and didn’t attempt to manscape away his natural body hair. It wasn’t thick, but it was enough to remind her she wasn’t with a boy.
No, Mav was far from boyhood. Before now, she’d considered that she’d chosen older men to date because of her infatuation with him. Now she knew it to be true. None of those men in her past had measured up to this, though.
She nuzzled his inner thighs and snaked out her tongue to flick over his balls. His sac tightened, and he let out a groan. She ran her tongue up the pebbled skin to the base of his cock.
“Fuck,” he growled.
She took that as a good sign and continued up the length, using the point of her tongue in short strokes until she reached the mushroomed tip. Swollen with desire and precum dripping from the slit.
She parted her lips and sucked it in. Salty sweetness hit her tongue, and her nipples tightened. Fresh need overflowed like lava inside her.
He was watching her suck him. His jaw set hard as if he held back. She flashed her eyes at him and swirled her tongue around and around the tip and then sucked him into the pocket between teeth and cheek, giving him a good look at the bulge of his cock in her mouth.
“Where the fuck’d you learn that? No, don’t tell me.” He closed his fingers around her upper arms and pulled her up his body, dragging her needy nipples over hard flesh covering pure iron. When he had her settled where he wanted her, he nudged her thighs so she was straddling him.
She leaned back and made a little move with her arm, mimicking a lasso in her hand. But when her slick folds rubbed against his hard shaft, they lost all playfulness and groaned.
He locked his fingers on her hips, the ends digging in just right. “Please tell me you’re on the pill and you haven’t slept with anybody unprotected.”
“Is this a fatherly talk because—”
He clamped his hand over her mouth and stared into her eyes. “Are you and have you?”
“Yes and no.”
“Good, because I want you to trust me that I’m definitely clean and I want you with no barriers. Slide over my cock, honey, nice and slow.”
Shivers gripped her, and she felt a razor blade of need slice her open wide. If she didn’t have Mav this way, she’d forever regret it.
She pushed onto her knees, poising his erection at the point of no return. With her hands resting on his pecs, she could feel his heart pound as she sank over him inch by slow inch.
“Fuck.”
“You cuss a lot.”
“Should I put my hand back over your mouth?”
She tossed back her head and laughed. But he grabbed her hips and shoved her down on top of him—deep and hard. She unleashed a throaty cry. He cupped her breasts and tweaked her nipples while jerking up into her, rubbing that spot he’d primed earlier with his fingers.
“Oh God, this angle. You’re so deep.”
“I fit you, fill every inch. Feel that?”
“Yes.” She rolled her hips.
“Nobody else can do that for you.”
“No. Mav!” She was contracting wildly around his shaft, about to burst with the intense pleasure pushing her higher and higher.
He pinched her nipples to the point of pain, but somehow that just hurled her deeper into the throes of bliss. He released the pressure and caressed the tips with a gentle brush of his fingers, back and forth as he drove up into her.
“So fucking beautiful. I knew you’d be this way.”
“I knew it too,” she rasped, curling forward as her body melted away and all she could do was feel.
He hooked his hand around her nape and dragged her in for a tongue-dueling kiss. Her pussy clenched tighter, and he grunted. Now that she knew he liked that, she tightened her muscles and raised a deeper groan from his throat.
She moved faster and faster, but he stroked a fingertip down her throat to her breasts. “Take it slow, honey.”
“I’m so close,” she panted.
He twined her hair around her fist and kissed her. She lost herself in sensations. Strong body, tight grip, deepest penetration, hard kisses. When she started to tremble on the verge of release, he let her set the pace.
She planted her hands on his chest and bucked her hips, bouncing on his shaft until the tip speared her so deeply that she couldn’t hold back another moment. She came in long, unending waves. Her whole body floating on the ecstasy he’d given her. Then he jerked upward hard, nearly splitting her, and she felt the first splash of his seed.
* * * * *
Wynonna lay on her side, hair glinting auburn in the faint light before dawn streaming into his room. Her breathing was deep and even and her lashes rested against her freckled cheeks.
After loving her all night and demanding she give her all, he’d finally found a way to exhaust Wynonna Calhoun. It was impossible not to look at the woman and see the girl she’d been, tagging around him as he worked on the ranch, chattering about horses and faster race times.
Now that he’d had her body and soul, he saw the truest part of Wynonna. The woman who could be vulnerable, needy, open. And she’d done a damn good job of mastering him too. She’d nearly ripped the control out of his hands with her hot little mouth. Not to mention those sweet pussy muscles clamping around him.
He needed to get up in a little bit and start his day. Beyond the walls, the horses were starting to wake, brushing lightly against the walls as they grew restless for their breakfasts and to run free.
He swallowed hard and stared at the woman in his bed. She tangled his heart up with spans of rope he had no hope of unknotting. Yet he had to send her on her way, to start a life without him. She deserved much better than a ranch hand who wasn’t totally whole.
His heart gave a rough jerk, and he bit his lip to hold in any noise that would wake her. Of course, he had to get her out of his bed before her brothers started coming down from their own houses. But Mav still had half an hour or so before he had to send her away.
It was gonna wrench him good—ending things before they even got started. But all-night sex wasn’t love, and she deserved to find that with someone her own age, someone without a history like his.
She was a tough woman, and she’d be mad at him. But she was sensible too. She’d understand in time.
Too bad his heart didn’t. Maybe never would. He hadn’t begun to quench his need with her, but he shouldn’t have taken things this far. Dammit, now he’d agonize over her even more.
A whicker from one of the horses made her bolt upright. Eyes wild, hair sticking out around the oval of her beautiful face.
“Shh, it’s just the horses.” He caressed her back, and she looked at him as if she’d found an alien in the barn. “You spent the night with me, remember?”
She flopped onto the bed with such force that the mattress bounced, and he smiled as he drew her close. “Of course I remember. I thought I’d dreamed it, though.”
Fuck, when she said things like that, his
job only got harder. He tried to reconcile that her curves were molded to his body right now, but in a little while, he’d lock her out of his life.
For her own good.
Keep thinking that. You’ve seen the assholes she keeps finding. She’ll end up marrying someone who will hurt her bad, and it will be too late for you to help.
Then I’ll keep driving them off.
His internal argument cut off as he found her staring up at him like a schoolgirl with a crush. Guess he’d get to the ending things part sooner than he’d hoped. His arms already ached at the thought of letting her go.
“Wynonna, we need to talk about this.”
She drew back from him, and his body missed the kiss of her skin. But he had to get used to it—it was forever.
“I feel like you’re going to tell me it was a mistake again.”
He searched her very blue eyes. “It was.”
“So when you called my name in that strangled voice as you came bareback inside me, it was a mistake.”
Fuck, he had done that, deep in the dead of night when he’d turned to her for more.
“I didn’t think you were such a coward, Mav.”
He sat up and she did too. They eyed each other with equal wariness. One could hurt the other with a few sharp words, and he didn’t want that. He wanted to see her walk away without regrets, only good memories. He sure as hell would be cherishing those for a long time to come.
“I’m only being smart about it, Wyn. We’d never work out, and what happens when you finally realize it and we break up? Then there’s weirdness and hard feelings.”
“Because we won’t have that now that your cock’s been buried inside me, along with your fingers and your tongue.” She hopped out of bed and started looking for her scattered clothing. Two simple pieces she’d come to him wearing. He held a groan in check.
He stood and they faced each other across the mattress. It would take one word from him, ordering her back into his bed and then his frayed emotions would be soothed.
She dropped her gaze over his nude front, and his cock roused in response.
“A man with that much between his legs has balls enough to stand up for what he wants.”
He could slice her deep and say he didn’t want her. But he’d be lying, and she was savvy enough to know it. Damn her. She was way smarter than any woman he’d ever known, and she’d made out the difference between lust and pure adulation.
“I think my top’s on your side of the bed.”
He bent and scooped it up, resisting the urge to bring it to his nose and inhale her scent. He tossed it to her, and she caught it neatly.
He watched her dress, and then she bundled all her hair over one shoulder. The ends waved over her breast, and it was impossible not to notice the hard tip of her nipple jutting against the thin cotton.
She dropped him a wink. “See you at breakfast.”
“Wynonna, wait.”
She gave him a serene smile that didn’t fool him one bit. She was angry—the corners of her eyes crinkled in that way he’d seen when she was close to blowing. “I get it, Mav. It was one night and we should never speak of it again.”
She moved toward the door and gripped the handle. His insides screamed to stop her, to tell her it couldn’t end this way—couldn’t end at all. But it had to. She deserved so much better than an old war vet with a fucked-up family and nothing to show for his hard work the past sixteen years but a lot of calluses and some arthritis in his knee.
“Wynonna, it was…” He couldn’t spit out the words.
She gave a light shake of her head as if she was just brushing off an interview question she didn’t want to answer. She had this routine down pat—smile for the cameras, give them what they wanted. But he knew her too well to believe she was agreeing with him.
She blew him a kiss and disappeared through the door, leaving him standing there buck naked and hard for her. Fucking aching for her.
Fuck the past, fuck the future, fuck now.
Chapter Six
Wynonna hadn’t come down for breakfast, and nobody in her family raised the question why. Mav sat through the meal, barely eating, her flavors still taking over his senses. The Calhouns were luckily a quiet bunch the first meal of the day, and nobody spoke to him directly.
He quickly buried his uneaten food in the trash and then put his plate in the dishwasher for Mrs. Calhoun. After that, he went out into the air. It was impossible not to shoot a look at Wynonna’s window and remember her coming across the dewed grass toward him in bare feet. How she’d come apart so many times—
He went into the barn and set about his chores, always keeping watch over his shoulder. If Wynonna had gone quiet, it couldn’t be a good sign. She was staging an attack, and she’d know when to catch him at his most vulnerable.
She wasn’t vindictive, but she’d been scorned, and well, he’d seen some bad shit from her over the years. Didn’t stop him from wanting her, though. Especially now that he knew he could tame her with two fingers buried in her pussy.
He mounted up and rode out to check the herd. The day was dawning bright, the clouds drifting on a light breeze and making way for the vast blue that was an Oklahoma sky.
There was word from West that a few buyers were expected this week, come down from North Carolina to look into some of the Calhoun beef for a ritzy restaurant. They wanted the best of the best. Which Calhoun beef was.
The horse rolled under him, but it didn’t take his mind off the woman who’d been there just hours before. He never should have laid a hand on her. Purging her from his system would take a lifetime.
And it worried the hell out of him, thinking what she’d do next. She could force a reckoning between them by simply telling one of her brothers what had happened. Mav thought of them as a kid brothers, and any animosity from them would cut him. But he was more concerned with her just running back to Austin and saying she’d made a mistake.
He guided his horse along the outer edge of the herd. With the rains gone overnight, the dry land had sucked up most of the excess water. He skirted the spot where he and Wyn had built the bridge and found it dry, just some mud sucking at the edge of the boards. When it was drier, he’d come up with some more permanent solution for that stretch of ground. Since they’d never had this trouble in all his years on the ranch, he had a feeling the ground had eroded over time.
He began circling the herd, looking for limping cattle or ones that didn’t want to get up. When he spotted a calf lying off on its own, he drew up. A few beasts scattered as he made his way to the calf.
When he swung down from his mount, hoofbeats filled his ears. He looked around to see West and Ridge coming his way. He couldn’t help but glance at their faces, trying to read if they knew anything. But their expressions didn’t give anything away.
He strode to the calf and knelt next to it. The scent of illness hit him hard, and he shook his head. “Fuck. Better hold my breath for this.”
He eased the calf up. It was dead weight, weak from a case of the scours. If left untreated, it would die, and especially out here with the herd. He’d take it back to the barn and nurse it.
“What you got there, Mav?” Ridge called out.
“Scours.”
“Bet that smells good.”
“Yep.” The diarrhea smell made him breathe shallowly as he carried the animal back to his horse. He got the calf up into the saddle and kept one hand braced on it so it didn’t fall as he swung up behind it.
“There’s Wyn. What’s she doin’?” West asked.
Mav jerked his head up to see the woman riding flat-out across the field on Zodiac. Damn her, she loved a thrill and a good adrenaline rush, but he couldn’t help but think she was taunting him. Knowing what had happened last time she’d ridden the devil.
“Something’s up with her,” Ridge said. “I’m willing to lay down a twenty that it’s to do with her fiancé. Mav, you want in on the bet?”
He grunted but didn’
t answer.
“Nobody’s gonna bet against you, West.” Ridge twisted his head right and left, looking out for more injured or sick among the herd as they rode. “She’s a country girl who needs a country guy. I could hook her up with Wyatt Harper. He’s shown some interest.”
“Not Harper,” Mav said and then almost bit off his tongue.
Ridge nudged his hat back to look at Mav. Damn, now he was under scrutiny. Mav kept his expression flat. “What’s wrong with Harper?”
“Heard some rumors ’bout him,” Mav lied. “Down at the feed store. Something about two-timing.”
“Oh crap. Hadn’t heard that. There’s gotta be someone we can throw in Wyn’s path to get her unhooked from this city slicker who’s all wrong for her.”
“Maybe one of the guys comin’ down from North Carolina will tip her hat,” West said.
Mav issued a low, rasping growl the brothers wouldn’t hear. Wynonna galloped past, and his thigh muscles tensed. She looked his way, and he turned his head aside. She slowed and looped back their direction.
Shit. Now she was coming over.
He made sure the calf was secured in the saddle and tried to slow his pounding heart. In his pocket, his phone went off as a flurry of text messages and voicemails came in.
West shook his head. “Damn, you’re popular. Got a new woman?”
Wynonna drew Zodiac up in time to overhear the question. “What’s this about a new woman?”
His ears burned, and he feared he was blushing. He dipped his head. “It’s just my brother.”
“He still in Oregon?” West asked.
“Yeah. Askin’ me to come help with our ma.”
“If you need some time off, Mav, all you gotta do is ask. You’ve been here for us forever, never taking time off for yourself.”
He felt Wynonna’s keen gaze on him, prying at the edges of his life he kept firmly nailed down. “Nah, I’m good, thanks. I’m going to get this calf on back to the barn and dosed.”
