by Alison Kent
Speaking of which… “It’s the middle of the night, you know.”
He leaned back beneath the high faucet, resting his head and arms on the tub’s curved lip, stretching out his legs so that his feet brushed her hips. “Nope. It’s the first thing in the morning.”
“You look like you haven’t slept.” His body was a work of art, his limbs long, leanly muscled, dusted with the same golden brown hair that grew in a wedge on his chest. His stomach was flat, his abs defined, as were his pectoral muscles.
His hands, however, were worn—bruised, scratched, a nail or two torn. And his face, his beautiful cheekbones and long lashes and lips that kissed like he could give her the world, was an exhausted mess of dark circles and lines etched deeply at his mouth and eyes.
“I slept,” he finally said. “In bed at ten. Up at three. Trip to town in a record-breaking twenty minutes.”
She wondered how many of the county’s sheriffs would ticket the Campbell black sheep for speeding, how many had grown up with him and would look the other way. “That’s not much sleep for the days you’re keeping.”
“Can’t be helped. I promised the guys no more hanky-panky on company time.”
That brought a grin. “Is that what I am? Hanky-panky?”
He opened one eye, but that was all. Not another part of his body moved. The water’s surface remained still. “Not from way over there, you’re not.”
And that was her cue. She got to her hands and knees, straddling his legs and crawling onto his lap. Then she realized this water level would never work.
She nudged his hip. “Lift up. You’re sitting on the plug.”
“You have sex toys in the tub?”
“Just you, cowboy.” She nudged him again. “The plug for the drain? The tub’s about to overflow. And we’re not even moving.”
“Got it,” he said, and obeyed.
She slid her hand between his thighs, her knuckles brushing against his sac where it hung heavy and warm, then against his ass where she stayed and played while the water surplus swirled around her fingers as it flowed.
Dax gave her a grunt and wiggled. “Careful with the goods there, woman.”
“I’m always careful,” she said, replacing the plug and lingering, pushing the tip of her finger against his tight hole, laughing and retreating when he twisted away. “And you’re way too tense.”
“No wonder, you knocking at locked doors down there.”
Yesterday, in her kitchen, he’d briefly let her in to play, and she’d remind him of that soon enough, but first… “Do we need to revisit the condom issue?”
This time, both eyes opened and his frown returned. “What? It hasn’t even been twenty-four hours. I’m not that big of a whore.”
“Are you going to be?” she asked, settling on his lap, his cock thrusting upward and caught between them.
“A whore?” When she nodded, his face broke into a wickedly dimpled grin. “If you’ll let me.”
He was big beneath her, broad and strong, and she ached to learn what he liked, to have him inside of her. To feel his hands and his teeth on her skin. To touch him in ways no other woman had. For as long as it took to work him out of her system, he was hers.
And when she was done, he would never never forget her.
She reached up, stroked a hand down his face, feeling the scratch of the stubble he hadn’t shaved. “You whore with me, you can ride bareback. You whore elsewhere—”
“Look at me, Arwen,” he said, his eyes fierce as he grabbed her wrist. “I’m half dead as it is. Where am I going to find time, not to mention the energy, for anyone but you?”
A flutter of something uncomfortable spread from her chest to her core. She wasn’t frightened, but suddenly well aware that she knew nothing of the past sixteen years and what they’d done to him. In her mind, he was the Dax she’d created out of the boy she’d crushed on in school, and fantasies weren’t always safe.
“Fine,” she said, her gaze moving from his to her wrist and back. “Just making sure we’re clear.”
“As clear as the rainwater that would make everything about my life as a rancher a whole lot easier,” he said, letting her go, awake now and stiff with worry and distracted when she’d wanted him pliant and in this moment with her. “Sorry. I didn’t mean… I shouldn’t have… Shit. Coming here probably wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had.”
And that wasn’t the best apology she’d ever received, but he’d made it and without prompting. “Why did you come?”
“So I could come,” he said, waggling both brows, the water sloshing as he gave a playful thrust of his hips.
All the better that they were on the same page. She wanted him for sex, that was all. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she threaded her fingers into the damp hair at his nape. “You don’t need me for that.”
“Yeah, but you make it a hell of a lot more fun.” Then he reached for the rings in her nipples and used them to tug her against him as he opened his mouth over hers.
SHE TASTED LIKE Arwen. Funny that he knew that about her after nothing but yesterday’s kiss. Knew how sweet she was. How warm and wet. How demanding. He probably liked that best of all. He got what he wanted and didn’t have to sweet-talk or beg.
Cupping the back of his head with one hand, the head of his cock with the other, she moved up and down as they kissed, a fucking motion that had the rings in her nipples scraping at his. All he could do was sit back and take it. Take it and try not to die.
She pulled her mouth free, kissed his jaw, his cheekbone, his brow, his closed eyes. He allowed her that liberty, too, sitting still, at her mercy. He liked it a lot, letting her have her way. After the kitchen where he’d called the shots, she deserved it. He wasn’t selfish as a rule. He’d just been starving.
“You can play along if you want,” she said, her thumb stroking a particularly sensitive spot that had his balls drawing close and tight.
He cracked open one eye. “I’m playing the part of the willing victim.”
She nipped his earlobe, growled. “That’s got to be a new role for a Campbell. Victim.”
Uh… wow. He’d thought himself too mellow these days to get irritated by a reminder of his roots, but damn if she hadn’t just yanked a big one. “Really? We’re going to bring families into this? Because I don’t think there’s a tub big enough—”
“Shh.” She pressed an index finger to his lips. “That’s all I wanted. Some sign of life.”
“This doesn’t do it for you?” He caught her hand still stroking his cock and pumped into their joined fists. “It sure seemed to hit all the right spots when I had you up against your kitchen door.”
Her finger moved, outlined his lips, pushed between, along his tongue, then withdrew. “It’s going to be hard to ever look at that door and not think about you.”
He was a professional bullshitter, not easily had. His ego on the other hand…
He moved his hands to her ass and eased beneath her, sliding into her when she next lowered her hips. Her head fell back on her shoulders. She closed her eyes. She sat still, impaled, her pulse a rhythmic throb in her throat.
His pulse throbbed elsewhere. It pounded inside her. It pounded in his chest. It pounded in his fingertips where he gouged her skin. He swallowed, waiting, and finally she smiled, a secret sort of sexy grin she caught in the corner with her teeth. Then she looped her arms around his neck, laced her hands, and rode him.
Up, down. Up, down. Grinding in a figure eight against the base of his shaft. Easing away until she barely held him. Teasing him. Making it hard not to give up and let go. It would be so goddamn easy to let go.
“I was thinking of you earlier while bathing,” she said. “Thinking about this.” Up, down. Grinding. “And there you were. My real-life fantasy.”
The woman was not playing fair. “You always leave your back door unlocked?”
“Only for you,” she said, rocking, taking him deep, withdrawing. “Just for you.”
> A howl clawed and snarled high in his chest. He wrapped an arm around her back and brought her close, burying his face between her tits and inhaling. She smelled like the water, like fruit and herbs, and his stomach rumbled, wanting things he couldn’t name.
He bit at her nipple ring, sucked flesh and silver into his mouth, winced at the metallic burn. His free hand found its way between their bodies, and he toyed with her clit, tweaking, tugging, working her as she squirmed, as tiny, breathy ohs and deeper, richer sounds escaped her lips.
He used his fingers, his teeth, and his cock on her, hurting her, soothing her, gauging her reaction, and giving her less or more. Her noises became commands of “Not so much,” and “Harder,” and “Yes, right there, please.”
And this time when she tossed back her head, he knew from the fluttering contractions she was coming. She was beautiful to watch, her parted lips, the tip of her tongue, the flush coloring her skin like summer peaches.
She finished with a shudder that sucked the air from his lungs and he groaned. Only when he was able to breathe again and the vibrations had faded did he pull out of her body. Then he spanked her once. Hard. “On your knees.”
She obeyed, sitting back and giving him the room he needed to get to his feet. Cock in his fist, he braced his legs against the tub’s sides and nodded.
Her eyes glittered as she took him into her mouth. He looked down, watched her lips, her cheeks, her tits bouncing as she sucked him and tongued him, her fingers using him like she was a singer and he was her mic.
Lust clutched hard, and his legs began to shake. The base of his spine twitched and tingled. His gut caught fire and burned. That was when she reached a hand between his legs, pushing a finger against the ridge behind his balls before sliding it to the rim of his ass.
He slammed a palm against the wall on his left, furrowed the fingers of the other into the rows of her wet hair and grunted like a pig. He felt her smile and he closed his eyes and he didn’t even stop her when she pushed deeper into his hole.
Instead, he grit his teeth and let her. Desire wrapped him up and tightened around him, squeezing as she made him forget everything but his cock. Nothing existed but the slick heat of her mouth, her finger in his ass, the fingers of her other hand ringed around his balls.
He was drowning in sex, suffocating, going down. Her lips caught at the ridge of his cock’s head, and with each movement of her finger, he clenched against what felt like a threat to his rules against involvement. What was he thinking, letting her in? He did not let women in.
As if he’d voiced his thoughts, she turned her attention to the slit in his cock and the seam beneath, flicking her tongue over his skin until he rose up on his toes. She was too good, and was taking too much, and he wanted to give it to her but not like this. Not like this.
He pulled out of her mouth, twirled a finger. “Hands and knees.”
She shot him a look, an arched brow, a quirk at one corner of her mouth, but did as ordered. He followed her down, palmed the flat of her back to hold her and guided his cock between her legs.
Another time he’d go slow. A time when he wasn’t feeling so unhinged. Her tub, her house, her invitation but his rules. He didn’t care how practiced her mouth, how quick her tongue. He was not letting her in.
He drove into her, holding on to her hips as he thrust. Around them, the water sloshed, splashing at his thighs and her elbows and onto the floor. Each time he hit bottom, she cried out, and he pounded harder, ramming into her, his balls slapping her ass.
Relief was all he wanted. From the worry and the exhaustion. From the crazy aching sense of being turned inside out when he had to keep his head on straight. From the emotions sprouting like weeds to make a mess of a really good thing.
Need built like a bomb in his gut, swelling, pressing, his cock a fuse and Arwen the match. Beneath him, she writhed and twisted, lighting him up.
He stared at the stars through the skylight and burst, spilling inside of her and thinking as he collapsed that he’d just borrowed himself a whole lot more trouble than he had ever caused in Crow Hill.
But at least he hadn’t let her in.
SIX
SEVEN O’CLOCK FOUND Dax at the counter in the Blackbird Diner, coffee in hand, corner stool swiveled toward the door, bootheels hooked over the rungs, knees spread. The breakfast rush was swinging, the smells of bacon and chorizo and eggs and hash browns competing with the aroma rising from the four pots of coffee that never saw a break.
The morning chatter clacking at the booths and the tables was as loud as the orders yelled from the kitchen and the squeak of the waitresses shoes on the floor. Black-and-white tiles. Just like those in Arwen’s kitchen—a thought he had to shove away or he’d find himself heading back to her house instead of returning to the ranch as promised.
He wasn’t exactly proud of how he’d cut out of there, saying nothing as he’d dressed and nothing but good-bye with his exit. He owed her more than that, but first he’d have to nail down what had sent him packing, then figure out how best to apologize for packing at all.
The one thing he did know was that it had to be done—just not today. Because even though he’d dipped into his pool of sleep hours in order to spend time in her tub, he was testing the limits of his partners’ patience by staying in town to catch Darcy.
By now, Casper and Boone would’ve put in a couple hours of hard labor each. Dax had spent those same two hours in the front seat of his truck outside the Hellcat Saloon, napping while he waited for the sun to show its face. Not exactly the legal three-way split of labor, profit, and loss he’d agreed to. And definitely not a great start to the day.
He’d fucked up with Arwen. He was in the process of fucking over his boys, and fucking himself in the process. For all he knew, Darcy would as soon tell him to fuck off as be happy to see him. But he was here, and good or bad, he’d deal with what came his way.
Chest tight, he brought his mug to his mouth and blew across the surface as he scanned the customers a second time. He didn’t think he’d missed his sister, but then it had been awhile. Awhile, hell. It had been half her lifetime. He was a first-class dick. He shouldn’t have waited this long to look her up.
“Dax Campbell? Is that you?”
Hearing his name, he twisted on his stool. The woman behind the counter wore a snug black polo with the diner’s logo embroidered in red above an amazing rack. Her tits were familiar. And he knew her blond hair, was pretty sure he’d seen it spread across a truck seat at some point in the past.
She was about his age, meaning he’d have known her in school, and she had the cutest dimple curled into her right cheek—
“Well, hell.” A big fat true-as-true-gets grin spread over his face. “Teri Stokes. How ya been, girl?”
“I’ve been great.” She showed him her left hand. “And it’s Teri Gregor now.”
“Whew. That’s some rock.” He held her fingers, let out a whistle, very glad he’d kept his appreciation of her assets to himself. “Mr. Gregor knows how to take care of his woman.”
“He most certainly does,” she said, withdrawing her hand and topping off Dax’s mug from the carafe she held.
Her smile had Dax thinking of Arwen. Taking care of her. Putting a look like that on her face. A ring like that on her finger. A ring on any woman’s finger. Nope. Not going there. Not letting any woman in.
He added a heaping spoonful of sugar to the coffee and stirred. “So where’s the lucky bastard? I’d love to say hello to the guy.”
“At the moment?” Shrugging, she returned the pot to the row of burners behind her. “I’m not really sure. Shane was somewhere in the Middle East last time we talked.”
The Middle East? “Shane a military man?”
“A Navy SEAL. Best of the best.”
And that would explain why Teri didn’t know where he was. Dax sipped, set his mug on the counter to cool. “You running the joint now?”
“I am.” She stacked her hands behind
her and leaned against the wall, her gaze taking in the customers, the servers, what the pass-through window allowed her to see of the short order cooks at the grill. “Dad still shows up every morning, but mostly to shoot the breeze with the same bunch who’ve been trying to kill it for years.”
That sounded like the Gavin Stokes who Dax remembered. Knowing everything about everyone. Having an opinion about most. Never forgetting a face… or a crime.
Tugging down the brim of his hat, he glanced at the clock above the door. Maybe he had it wrong and he’d have to hook up with Darcy someplace else. Someplace where he wouldn’t feel like a wanted poster.
“What’re you doing here, Dax?”
“For one thing, my best to lay low,” he said, turning back to Teri and his coffee.
“Probably not a bad idea. Though I can’t think of a worst place to avoid the gossip mill. And the hat?” She shook her head, calling him out. “Not much of a disguise.”
He grinned because she was right. “Actually, I was hoping to catch my sister. Thought she might have breakfast duty seeing as how I hear she’s the firm’s most junior employee.”
Teri huffed. “Not to mention she’s the only female.”
Yeah. That. “You’re acquainted with my father then.”
“Is there anyone in Crow Hill who isn’t?”
“Dunno, but I’ll bet more than a few wish they weren’t.” He gave a toast with his mug, brought it to his mouth. The door behind him opened to let in a blast of summer-morning furnace. And damn if he didn’t find himself missing the Montana cold.
“Dax?”
At the sound of Darcy’s voice, he choked, coughing and swallowing as he swiveled and jumped from his stool. He’d barely opened his arms before she was in them, a burst of energy hugging him, her fingers digging troughs in his shoulders and nearly tearing his shirt, her honey-brown hair catching in the stubble of his beard.
“Why do you smell like… oranges?” she asked before stepping away and looking up, her big green eyes, shaped so much like his, misty and strangely sad.
