by Jessie Evans
Sawyer sighed and rolled his eyes. “We did, but we’re still a week and a half behind schedule. If we have any bad weather this winter, no way in hell we’re making the June opening. And I’m still waiting on bricks for the jailhouse that might not be delivered until November.”
Pike followed Sawyer to an uprooted tree where several of the other riders had tied their horses. He did his best to pay attention to his future brother-in-law’s talk of historical bricks and specialized mason work, but he couldn’t stop thinking about Tulsi flying off her horse and slamming into the ground. She could have done a lot worse than a bruised hip. She could have broken her damned neck.
The thought plagued him throughout the leisurely lunch of sandwiches, chips, and three different kinds of fruit salad. By the time Gram handed out her scavenger hunt sheets and everyone scattered into the trees to search for the items on the list, Pike knew he had to say something. He couldn’t leave Lonesome Point without speaking his mind about how crazy it was for Tulsi to risk her life for a few hundred bucks a month.
So when he saw her head upstream along the rocky creek bed with her scavenger hunt sheet, he gave her a few minutes’ head start before following after her. The stones beside the bank were smooth and slick and made for slow going. Pike nearly slipped twice before he caught up to Tulsi just as she tossed her hat and boots onto the bank and waded barefoot into the stream. He watched as she cupped the clear water in her hands and splashed it onto her face and neck before standing and lifting her hair as the water streamed down her throat.
Pike’s mouth went dry and his blood pumped faster, his body responding to the sensuality of the moment even before Tulsi lifted her face to the sunlight filtering through the trees and let out a sigh so sexy he felt it like a physical caress. That sigh affected him the way Tulsi’s touch always had. He could still remember the first time she’d stripped off his shirt while they were kissing, the way she’d explored his bare skin, her fingertips whispering over every dip and hollow, branding him with her touch before she pressed a kiss to the center of his chest and pronounced him the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.
That’s what she’d always called him—beautiful—but he’d never asked her to choose a manlier adjective. He knew why she’d chosen beautiful. What they’d had was too special for words like sexy or handsome. With Tulsi, it had always been about more than getting off. Her touch was a blessing that healed every hurt and there was nothing finer than the moment they came together, when he slid inside her and was surrounded by her sweetness, her love, and her good, good heart.
Almost every woman he’d slept with before or since had been more experienced, but none of them had rocked his world the way Tulsi had. Being with her was being naked in every sense of the word. Her body drove him crazy, but it was her vulnerability, the way he could look into her eyes and see a love big enough to save the world, that shattered him. Shattered him and then put him back together again, making him something better than he’d been before. He had been his best version of himself when he was with her, and a part of him had been chasing the perfection he’d found in her arms ever since. But no amount of fame or beauty or accomplishment on the part of the women he’d dated could make them live up to Tulsi. For him, she was in a class by herself.
He supposed some people got a second chance at love, but he had a feeling his one shot at forever was standing in the water a dozen feet away, humming beneath her breath as the sun caught her honey-colored hair and made it shine like a halo.
“You look beautiful,” he said, not regretting the words even though he hadn’t consciously decided to say them. But it was time to stop letting the past define the present. He didn’t want to walk away from this woman and he was sick of pretending he didn’t want Tulsi in his arms more than he wanted his stupid knee to heal.
Tulsi turned with a soft intake of breath. She didn’t speak, but she didn’t tell him to get lost, either, and he decided to take that as a good sign.
“I’m sorry I was an ass Monday,” he said, walking into the water.
“You’re going to ruin your boots,” she said when he stopped in front of her, close enough to catch the heady scent of her sun-warmed skin mixed with the musky-sweet smell of horse, a scent that brought back a hundred sense memories. When they were together, they’d spent every second they weren’t in bed on a horse. He still couldn’t smell a warm barn without thinking of Tulsi, at least for a moment.
“I don’t care,” he said, his voice rough. “The way I treated you was wrong. You deserve better.”
She crossed her arms, her cautious gaze shifting from his face to his chest and back again. “What do you want, Pike? Why did you follow me?”
“I heard you were breaking horses for your dad,” he said, because it was the truth and because he needed to buy himself time to figure out how to say all the other things racing through his head. “Sawyer told me you were thrown and hurt your hip, but it could have been a lot worse. You could have died, Tuls, and your life is worth a lot more than the few hundred dollars a month you’re clearing saddle-breaking those animals.”
“I appreciate the concern, but what I do to make a living is none of your business.” She frowned, but her mouth remained soft, making him think she wasn’t really mad. At least not yet. “Is that all?”
Pike swallowed hard, anxiety swarming across his skin like ants on a birthday cake. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this nervous. But he’d never wanted to say the right thing as much as he did right now. Back when they were kids, he’d been too stupid to realize how easy it would be to lose what they had. Now he knew all too well that one wrong word could ruin what might be his last shot to see if there was something alive and in need of saving, hidden among the wreckage of their failed love.
His tongue slipped out to dampen his lip as his thoughts whirled. What the hell was he going to say? How did a man even start in a fucked up situation like this one?
Tulsi’s brows lifted. “Are you okay?”
Pike cursed. “No, I’m not. I’m no good at this part and you know it.”
Surprise softened her features, and when she spoke, her words were a whisper barely audible over the leaves rustling overhead. “What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean,” he said, heart slamming in his chest. “I’m still in love with you, Tuls.”
Her eyes flew wide. “What?”
“I’m still in love with you,” he repeated, refusing to back down even if he couldn’t tell if that look on her face was shock or horror. “I never stopped loving you, and I don’t think I ever will.”
Tulsi shook her head numbly side to side, but before she could tell him he was crazy, Pike slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her close, cutting off the words he couldn’t stand to hear with a kiss.
For a moment, she stiffened against him and fear that she was going to push him away shivered across his skin. But then she moaned against his lips—a sad, hungry sound that echoed through his soul—and twined her arms around his neck. She hugged him tight and opened for him, her tongue swirling against his with the same shameless passion he remembered.
But this kiss was even better than all the kisses that had come before because now Pike knew how torturous it was to live without them. This kiss was priceless, perfect, and so bittersweet that he groaned in pleasure-pain as he crushed Tulsi closer, knowing she’d never be close enough.
How had he survived for so long without her? She was the treasure he’d been hunting for, the precious thing he’d lost, and all the proof he needed to believe in miracles. Her love was the best reason he’d ever had for living, the only thing worth dying for, and now that he had Tulsi back in his arms he never, ever wanted to let her go.
CHAPTER NINE
Tulsi
Tulsi stood on tiptoe, knocking Pike’s hat into the water as she drove her hands into his soft hair, kissing him with an intensity that left her breathless. But she didn’t need to breathe. She needed Pike’s li
ps bruising hers and his taste filling her mouth, banishing the memory of every kiss she’d shared with men who weren’t this man.
No one else had ever been able to make her feel this way—so wild and desperate. With other men, she remained in control and conscious of all the roles she played outside of the bedroom. With Pike she was pure need, pure desire. She didn’t care about playing nice or following the rules. She and Pike were a brush fire and a hot desert wind. He fueled every primal instinct inside of her, leaving no room for shame or doubt.
When he picked her up in his arms, she didn’t hesitate to wrap her legs around his waist and lock her ankles at the small of his back. She didn’t try to hold back the moan that burst from her lips as his erection pressed against her through their jeans, bringing her body even more savagely to life. She only kissed him harder, her breath coming faster as she circled her hips, grinding against the long, thick length of him, their tongues tangling and Pike’s hand tugging roughly at the top of her shirt.
He freed her breast to the warm air, fingers capturing her nipple and rolling it hard enough to send sharp waves of longing coursing through her body. She gasped into his mouth, fingers digging into his shoulders as the tension building inside of her twisted up another notch.
“God, Tulsi, you’re killing me,” he mumbled against her lips. “If we don’t stop now, I’m going to take you right here in the river.”
“Don’t stop,” Tulsi begged against his lips, hips bucking more frantically against his. “Please don’t stop. I want you so much.”
Pike spun toward the bank with a hungry sound that made Tulsi even more wild to have his skin on hers, his body driving inside of her as he filled the unbearable emptiness that had haunted her since the day he left her behind.
Tears filled her eyes as Pike laid her down on the rocks and tore at the button fly of her jeans. This was such a bad idea, but God help her, it had been so long since she’d felt this way—so awake, so alive. So terrifyingly, perfectly alive. She didn’t want to think; she wanted to get lost in the need that rocketed through her as Pike jerked her jeans down her legs and tossed them away before surging back over her, claiming her lips with another savage kiss.
“Now,” Tulsi gasped into his mouth as she reached between them, her trembling hands tangling with Pike’s as they both fought to free him from his jeans. “Now, Pike. I need you inside of me, I need—”
Her last word transformed to a cry as Pike shoved his jeans down around his hips and rammed into her, pushing all the way to the end, claiming her with one brutal stroke. He was large and thick and in the past it had sometimes hurt when he first pushed inside her, but right now Tulsi felt only pleasure—razor sharp and fierce—and relief so intense a sob ripped through her chest as Pike began to ride her hard and fast, his frantic rhythm matching the erratic pounding of her heart. He drove so deep he made her gasp every time their bodies connected, but it didn’t hurt. It was exactly what she wanted, what she hungered for. Each savage thrust was a promise that she was his, that she belonged to him and nothing else mattered. Not the past or the future or pain or regret or anything else that would try to come between them.
She squirmed her hands beneath his tee shirt and dug her fingernails into his sweat-slick back, pulling him closer. He was even more muscular than he’d been when he was younger—nothing but rock hard flesh covered by hot, smooth skin—but the way he made her feel was still the same. He made her blood burn and her heart race, made her nerves sizzle and her spirit swell past the boundary of her skin, like a bird with no permanent relationship to the ground.
As Pike’s hands slipped beneath her, gripping her bottom in his hands, angling her tight against him as he chanted things she could barely make sense of in her ear, Tulsi’s soul took flight. One moment she was in her body, the next she was nothing but light and beauty and bliss so complete it was almost too wonderful to bear. She threw her head back as she came, fighting for breath as Pike’s lips seared a trail down her throat and his pubic bone nudged at the top of her entrance, drawing out her orgasm until she felt like she would die.
“I love you,” Pike whispered against her skin, groaning as his rhythm faltered. “God Tulsi, yes, yes, this is all I want. You’re all I want.”
She sobbed his name as she wrapped her arms and legs around him and held on tight as his ragged breath rushed against her throat. At the last moment, he pulled out, coming on her stomach in thick, hot bursts that made her moan and squirm against him, wishing he was still inside of her. He felt so amazing, so perfect that her heart fought to keep reason from making an appearance for as long as possible.
This had been a mistake—she knew that—but she didn’t want to think about it now. She wanted to relish the feel of Pike’s weight on top of her, their sweat-slicked bodies pressed close, and his lips moving back and forth between her cheeks, kissing away her tears.
“Don’t cry, Tuls,” he whispered as he smoothed her hair from her forehead. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. I’m so sorry, baby. I’m so sorry.”
“You didn’t hurt me,” she said, struggling to regain control. “It was…wonderful. Perfect.”
“Then why are you crying?” His fingertip traced the trail of her tears as his worried eyes met hers. When their gazes connected, he sighed. “Never mind. I’m stupid, but I’m not that stupid. I’m so sorry, baby. I’m so sorry I fucked things up.”
“No, I’m sorry,” she said in a strained voice as she swiped at her damp face. “I’m so sorry, Pike.”
“Don’t be,” he said, his eyes shining. “Tulsi, please don’t cry. It’s my fault. You were right. I should never have shut you out. My only defense is that I was a stupid kid. I loved you like nothing else, and I thought that was enough for us to get through anything. I didn’t know how easy it would be to screw it all up. But I do now, and I swear to God, if you give me another chance, I won’t fuck up again.”
Tulsi’s eyes squeezed shut as regret twisted like a knife in her chest. It was everything she’d ever wanted to hear from Pike, everything she’d dreamt of, but it didn’t matter. There was no going back. What was done was done, and if Pike ever found out the truth, he wouldn’t love her anymore. He would hate her…and he might even try to take Clem away.
The thought banished the last of the ecstasy still shivering across her skin.
Pike was insanely wealthy, beloved by half the country, and had the best of everything at his disposal. That included the best child custody lawyers, who would have no qualms using Tulsi’s years of deception to prove she was an unfit mother. She had lied to keep Pike from his little girl and stolen six years of Clem’s childhood from her daddy. It would be all too easy for the court to rule in his favor. She could see it all playing out now—the baseball star vs. the selfish, small-town nobody in a high profile court case that would be splashed across every trashy magazine in the country.
She would be crucified. She might even deserve to be crucified—she’d been so wrong about Pike, she could see that now—but it didn’t matter. She couldn’t lose Clementine. Clem was her world and she was Clem’s. Her daughter was precocious and intelligent, but she was still just a little girl who needed her mother. Tulsi was the only one who could calm Clem down when she was having one of her temper tantrums, the only one who understood how hard it was for a kid like Clem, who was so ahead of the curve and so full of questions, to fit in with her peers.
Tulsi had been through every bump in the road with her daughter—from the long newborn nights when Clem wailed for hours with colic to the broken wrist when four-year-old Clem made her own flying machine to launch off the chicken coup. It was Tulsi who’d been there for the lonely days at the beginning of kindergarten—as Clem struggled to find friends and fit in with children who hadn’t been reading since they were three and hadn’t spent hours staring up at the night sky, trying to wrap their minds around the idea of space stretching on forever. No one else knew Clem the way she did, and no one was more committed to making sure her da
ughter grew up feeling loved, understood, and accepted for the person she was—flaws and all.
They’d made it almost seven years without a father figure in the picture and were doing just fine. Clem was happy and well-adjusted and Tulsi intended to do whatever it took to keep her daughter’s life drama free—even if it meant giving up on this.
This…everything that she found in Pike’s arms.
“Say something, Tulsi,” Pike whispered. “Please. At least look at me. Give me a clue what’s going on in that head of yours.”
Tulsi’s eyes opened and the hard words began to form, but before she could speak another voice cut through the silence of the woods.
“Pike, where are you?” Mia called, sounding too close for comfort. “Pike! Tulsi?”
Pike cursed as he scrambled off of Tulsi, hitching up his jeans as he reached for her discarded clothes. Pulse racing, Tulsi splashed away the stickiness on her stomach, wiggled into her underpants, and had just finished buttoning her jeans and tugging her tank top back into place when Mia appeared at the top of the bank.
“There you two are.” Mia frowned as her eyes flicked from Pike, who had just finished rescuing his hat from where it had floated downstream, to Tulsi and back again. “Didn’t you hear me calling?”
“Guess not,” Pike said innocently. “Sound doesn’t carry too well around here. What’s up?”
“I was worried,” Mia said, her brows still drawn together. “Everyone else is already back, but you two were missing. I thought maybe your knee was giving you trouble.”
“No, I’m good,” he said, glancing Tulsi’s way. “Tulsi and I were just catching up.”
“Pike was telling me I should quit breaking horses for Daddy.” Tulsi sat down on the rocks and began pulling on her socks and boots, past ready to make her getaway.
“He’s right.” Mia came to stand beside her, sending dirt skittering down the steep bank as she moved. “I’ve been saying that for months. Don’t suppose he got through to you, did he?”
