by Aria Ford
She gasped and giggled and then we fell through the door together.
“Where's your bed?” I whispered.
She giggled. “In here.”
I let her lead me up the hallway and into a darkened room at the end. She switched on the light, revealing a place with a stark white-covered bed and charcoal-dark walls. I smiled as she dimmed the light and then I walked over, my body surging with excitement as she pressed against me again.
We collapsed onto the bed together. It was hard and her body under me was soft and sweet and yielding.
I reached up and put my finger under the strap of the dress. Then, frowning, I reached round behind her to find the zipper. She giggled.
She rolled over a little, letting me unfasten the dress. I was trembling, trying to focus, as I worked the dress over those firm high breasts and to the floor.
Then I sat back and just stared.
In the soft gold light of the lamps with her shoulder-length blond hair loose about her shoulders, dressed in a lacy bra and brief frilly panties, she was stunning.
My eyes lingered on the tight cleft between her breasts, working down lower over the gentle roundness of her belly and to the parting between her legs. I could see the soft shine of her satiny panties and I lost all control.
I bent down to her, growling in my throat as I planted kisses down that ivory smooth neck. Then I worked lower, my hands grasping and clutching as I felt over her breasts and around her back to find where her bra fastened over those high, full breasts. It came undone, freeing them and I greedily sucked her nipples into my mouth, first one and then the other. They were small and hard, just like I remembered.
“I want you,” I growled.
She sighed contentedly, her fingers twined in my hair. It was a strange feeling. I was with her, but it was different to how it had been. We were both older, more experienced, more mature.
I felt my body shudder with desire to find out more about this new Ainsley, this hot, experienced, not-shy Ainsley who was reaching for my tie and gently untying it.
“Let me,” I murmured.
“Why?” she said crossly.
“Because I'm faster,” I said with a shaky chuckle. She giggled.
Then I was undressing at lightning speed. I felt my clothes drop to the floor and joined her on the bed. I was shivering as I knelt between her thighs. I reached for the satiny panties and very gently dragged them off.
I stared down at her. Naked, she was even more beautiful than when she was clothed. I loved every single curve of her. I reached forward with a groan and let my fingers gently touch her folds. She moaned, eyes open wide with surprise. I gave her an inquiring look. May I?
She nodded and I bent down, parting her thighs.
She smelled sweet and spicy and the scent of her alone almost made me come. I made myself bend lower, taking her in my mouth.
She cried out loudly and I smiled to myself, loving the fact that I could make her moan and pant. I took her clit between my teeth, working it gently as she sobbed and moved, her motions having the effect of thrusting her clit against my mouth and making her shout even louder.
When she was shaking and shuddering, almost at the limit, I knelt up and plunged inside her.
She cried out and I groaned in sheer amazement. I had forgotten it felt so good.
“Oh, man,” I sobbed aloud as I moved back and thrust all the way into her again. “Oh, man...”
She was groaning incoherently and I pushed out and pushed back and pulled out and pushed back and my body was starting to throb and shiver and convulse...
She screamed and sighed and I felt all the tension go out of her all of a sudden. Her eyes were closed, mouth fallen open partway with her full-on pleasure.
I pushed in and out with complete release now, moving faster as I plunged in and out, in and out...then suddenly, my body was pulsing and I groaned aloud as a massive climax left me helpless and moaning, incoherent with wonder in her arms.
I collapsed and we must have laid like that for quite some time because I woke, much later, which meant I must have slept quite heavily, and kissed her.
I rolled off her and lay beside her and we slept like that the remainder of the night.
MOUNTAIN MADE BABY
PROLOGUE
His eyes held mine as he pushed inside me. I saw the passion written in their depths as he filled me, moving slowly so I could take him all in. I sighed.
“I…” I murmured.
He held my shoulders as he moved, a low growl escaping his throat as he began to pulse in me, his climax slowly building.
Mine was building, too, and I shook as we moved together, my entire body throbbing as all my pleasure places caught fire under his body. I had never had an experience like this until I met him.
I shuddered and closed my eyes until I could bear it no more. I cried out, and then he was moving inside me, thrusting wildly until he too cried out.
“Oh! Oh, baby! Oh man…”
He collapsed on top of me and our bodies molded together as we dozed.
As I lay there, my mind just returning from the place of intense wonder where it had been, I thought about how incredible it was to be here.
I could so easily have lived my life without knowing such pleasure existed.
If it hadn’t been for one letter, I would have been done.
I smiled. In this day and age, one doesn’t even expect to get letters anymore, but that was how it had all started. Without that, I would never have left my home in LA and traveled up to wild Wyoming, to Sheridan, and settled down.
My body felt as if I had been taken apart and put back together, every inch of me tingling and throbbing as he slid off me.
We lay together and he wrapped an arm round me, smiling down into my face.
“You enjoyed it too, eh?”
I smiled. “Yes. Of course.”
“Good.”
We lay like that, as we always did, with my head on his shoulder and my hand over his. I felt so safe there, so right. I stroked his hard body and he sighed.
“I am so glad we met,” I said contentedly.
He chuckled. “Goes without sayin’ I am.”
“Good.” I said it firmly and he chuckled.
“Pretty remarkable, though.”
“Yeah.”
We closed our eyes and I think he fell asleep—I could hear his regular breathing. But I was still awake. I was still thinking about the remarkable chain of events that had led to us being together.
Out in the yard I could hear a horse neigh and somewhere in the distance a tractor coughed to life, rumbling off across a field or down the street. I was so happy in this vast, barren landscape with its rural way and its huge sunsets.
I belongs here, I thought with a smile. Here everything is rugged and rough edged, like him. I rolled onto my side, looking at him more closely. He was made of muscle, with that surprisingly beautiful face—the long nose and firm jaw. His eyes were deep-set and looked to me the way a bear’s eyes do—fierce and strong and proud. A bear has black eyes, though, and his were leaden gray.
I reached out to run a finger down his straight nose and he stirred, his eyes opening.
“Mm?” he asked, seeing a question in my eyes. I laughed.
“I was just thinking you’re stunning,” I said innocently.
“Mm.” He sighed and closed his eyes again. I thought he was asleep, but then he kissed my forehead.
“Same to you.”
I thought my heart would melt.
I closed my eyes and snuggled close to I and thought about that day, that felt so long ago now, when I had received that letter that had caused us to meet and had changed everything.
CHAPTER ONE
Kelly
I put my notepad with the spreadsheets aside, put my head on the table and did the silent scream. It didn’t make anything any easier, but it did make me feel better.
“Kelly Gowan, you’re crazy, you know that?” Telling myself also d
idn’t make my job easier, but then, it wasn’t really going to get any easier. One of my duties, in my job as secretary at Friedman and Barne law firm, is keeping a current list of the year’s clients. And I had kind of forgotten about that bit until the week before the AGM. Which meant I had to do it all now. This weekend. Agh.
It was two P.M. on Saturday and I’d been at it since eight in the morning. I ran a hand through my tousled red hair and sighed. My head hurt. My eyes crossed. I was hungry and fed up and I felt mad at myself for my oversight during the year. I was only a quarter of the way done too. How was I going to keep at it?
“Coffee.”
I stood up and went to the kitchen, grumbling under my breath about everything and nothing.
“If only I’d kept track of it all year.”
That was just part of my list of “if only.” If only I had decided to stay in Florida, where I had my distracted and frazzled mom, my circle of friends, and quite possibly a job writing for a sports magazine. That would have suited me way better than all this tedious number crunching. If only I had some company in this city. If only I wasn’t so terribly forgetful.
“Damn it!”
The doorbell rang just as I had just discovered I’d forgotten to buy detergent. Now all my cups were dirty too. I stormed to the door in a foul mood.
“Hello?” I snarled.
The neighbor grinned at me. He lived across the hallway and I had half a mind to seduce him except that I don’t know if he’d have been up for it. He was cute in a boyish way and I had to admit he set my heart racing a bit. Now, he looked a bit ruffled.
“Sorry, Nic.” I sighed. “What’s up?”
“A letter for you,” he said. He held it out, looking nervously at me as if he expected I might take out his throat. I sighed.
“Thanks. Have a good day.”
“You too.”
“Thanks.”
I closed the door and leaned against it, sighing. Have a good day. I’ll do that—and I might also fly out the window and circle over the seafront. Both things had the same level of unlikely.
I ran my hand through my untamed, frazzled auburn curls, sat down at the table and looked at the letter.
Where’s this from?
The envelope looked beaten up. The rain had soaked it once at least, and then it had dried crinkled, the ink blurred here and there. It was a miracle it had gotten here at all.
I tore it open—it had no return address on the back, so where it came from was a mystery. I held it up to the light.
“Dear Kelly,” I read aloud. “I am writing this letter because I haven’t heard from you for years and I wonder, sometimes, what’s going on.”
I frowned. Who could it be from? I scanned on through the large, rambling writing.
I am still on the farm. I have a sore chest and I can’t sleep at night. I think I’m getting sick. Your mom doesn’t answer my phone calls, and I haven’t heard from her in years. The farm is a mess. Can you come and visit sometime? Grandpa H.
“Oh, for goodness…” I sighed. It was from my grandfather.
My grandfather, Josh Hayley, was my mom’s dad. He still lived on a farm in Wyoming, somewhere on the far end of the civilized world. He was a textbook eccentric and my mom had always despaired of him somewhat. I loved him. I recalled a big, friendly face, round glasses and a permanent grin. Grandpa was always content. He never got mad about anything. During the hard times when my mom was going through the divorce he had visited us. I had loved him. I wondered how he was now.
I have a sore chest and I can’t sleep at night.
I felt a stab of sorrow, reading that. Poor Grandpa. That sounded bad.
Your mom doesn’t answer my phone calls. I haven’t heard from her in years.
I wondered if he even had Mom’s new phone details. Probably not. My mom probably forgot to update him. That would be typical. Incapable of malice, Mom was entirely capable of forgetting about her entire family in the middle of a big project. A landscape designer, she was always getting swept off her feet by her latest inspirations and forgetting to make her own dinner, never mind forgetting other basic things like sleep. Her dad was probably the last thing in her thoughts.
“Someone has to help,” I said aloud.
I sighed. Why that someone had to be me, I wasn’t sure. Here I was, thousands of miles away, probably about as equipped to get stuff done in the back of Beyond as I was to man a hovercraft. But then I thought, as I dug out a sponge and some good old-fashioned Dawn dishwashing liquid, if I didn’t, who would?
Mom was Grandpa’s only living relative. And if she wasn’t doing something, it would have to be me.
I scrubbed the dishes and planned. As I worked, a crazy idea came into my mind. Why not just go? I had some leave left over, so why not just take a week off? Go to Wyoming, sort him out, come back? What was stopping me? In that moment, I made myself a promise.
I was going to finish the list of names for the company and get everything ready for the meeting. Then I was going to treat myself to a holiday. In wild Wyoming.
I finished the dishes, made coffee and some toast, and went back to work. With my mind thinking so positively, it seemed like the work was going faster. I was surprised when, by five P.M., I was more than halfway done. If I kept it up at this rate, by Sunday lunch I would be finished.
I stuck at it until dinnertime and then headed downtown to see if Alexa, the company accountant and a good friend of mine, was up for going out.
I drew up outside her stylish apartment block. She lived only three blocks away and so we were used to me turning up at her door, or the other way, at odd times, and ringing the bell.
“Yoo-hoo!” her cheerful voice came down over the mic when she heard my voice. “Dinnertime?”
“If you’re around?”
“Sure I am! You want to eat here, or go out?”
I shrugged. “Go out?”
“Great. Come up if you like. Just getting changed.”
“Okay.”
While Alexa changed out of jeans and a T-shirt into something more going-out worthy, I sat outside the bedroom door and asked her about the day.
“It was good,” she shouted, voice muffled as she shrugged off her top. “I went to the gym, then I headed up to The Table for lunch and then I went shopping…” she went quiet again as she reached for something. “How was your day?”
I sighed. “Not bad,” I lied. In contrast with her day, mine was unremarkable. I wasn’t really going to own up to it.
“Great! Let’s go.”
Alexa always looked good. In a soft gray sweater with charcoal slacks and a midthigh length duster, she looked chic and elegant. I felt clunky in my outsize ocher shirt and faded tan jeggings. I shrugged, ran a hand through my frazzled strawberry curls and joined her.
“What’s up, Kell?” she asked as we both got into my car and headed downtown. “You’re stressed.”
“Nothing important,” I lied. Then I paused. “Miller?” I always called her by her surname—it was a tradition we’d started when we met
“Mm?”
“Am I crazy?” I sighed. “I mean…why is it I’m not living the life everyone else seems to be living?”
Alexa put her head on one side. “You’re not crazy,” she said after a long pause. “And besides,” she added as we pulled away from the stop street, “why is that a bad thing?”
“Why is what bad?” I asked, keeping an eye out for the stoplight. I didn’t need a traffic fine.
“Not being like everyone else?” she questioned.
I paused. “Well…I guess it isn’t that bad.”
She laughed. “It’s not bad at all. You know what?”
“What?”
“Some people would wish they could say that. Even I sometimes wish I could.” She made a small rueful face.
“You?” I laughed. “I don’t believe that, Miller—you’re so perfect.” I thought she was. A good job, great wardrobe, a boyfriend who was starting his own compan
y. She was what everyone was supposed to be.
She snorted. “In whose opinion?”
I shrugged. “Well, our bosses. The rest of our colleagues and… everyone, I guess.”
“Well, it’s nice of you to say so. But really? Since when is doing everything normal anything but, well, normal?”
I blinked. “Well, when you put it like that, I guess…”
She laughed. “I do put it like that. You’re great the way you are, Kell.”
“Thanks,” I said, feeling a flicker of pride in my chest.
“Now, come on,” she said encouragingly. “Let’s go and get dinner. I’m ravenous.”
“Me too.”
As we drove to Green Food, our favorite vegetarian restaurant, I found myself feeling not only a small glimmer of pride, but of excitement.
I was going to do something out of the ordinary. I was going to pack my bags and head to Wyoming. To help my grandpa. And, for once, to enjoy being myself.
CHAPTER TWO
Reese
The dust on the road blurred my vision as the pickup coughed and then died in the drive of my farm. I ran my hands through my dark hair and sighed, my patience fraying even further.
