Lone Star Midnight

by Delores Fossen

His grave-baggage was already getting heavy, what with the two kissing rounds with Megan.

  It was also getting wetter.

  Shane didn’t even bother to curse when it started raining. It was probably some kind of sign from the fates for him to nix this and go home. But even the fates and the threat of pneumonia didn’t stop him.

  He felt both hope and disappointment when he reached Megan’s place and didn’t see her. No truck out front, and there was no sign of her favorite bay mare, Honey. Maybe that meant she’d changed her mind about him coming over. If so, that made her a lot smarter than him.

  There’d been some progress on her house since the last time he’d seen it. It now had windows and doors. No paint or trim, and the rainy spring weather was likely holding that up from being done. But the back porch had been completely screened in, and he could see the bed Megan had mentioned.

  No sign of her there, though.

  Since the rain had started coming down harder, Shane took the gelding into the barn. Megan wasn’t there, but a roan mare was munching on some hay in one of the finished stalls. It wasn’t a mare he recognized, but he was betting Megan had done a horse switch just as he had. They were like criminals covering their tracks. That realization was nearly enough to send him riding right back out, but then he heard the back door slam.

  And there she was.

  Megan was smiling when she came out of the screened porch and hurried down the steps toward him. No umbrella, just that smile and her revealingly wet clothes by the time she made it to him.

  Oh, man. Not her nipples again. Talk about a weak spot for him.

  He was toast.

  “You came,” she said, and he could hear that smile in her voice, along with seeing it in her sizzling blue eyes. “I thought you’d change your mind.”

  “I did. A couple of times. Actually, thirteen times.”

  That made her laugh, and he was about to launch into a whole bunch of arguments as to why this visit shouldn’t happen. But then she caught on to the front of his shirt, yanked him down to her mouth and kissed him.

  Every one of those arguments vanished right into the suddenly thin, rain-filled air. Heck, so did any shred of common sense, and Shane felt his arms close around her. She was wet and warm and suddenly his. Well, she was his until he regained his sanity. Judging from the searing intensity of the kiss, that might be a while.

  She melted against him, moving right into the kiss, and if his brain hadn’t already been clouded, the taste of her would have done it. Her taste, her heat, her touch slid through him, and she didn’t keep it tame, either. Megan pressed his back against the stall door and devoured until something inside him snapped.

  He turned her, pushing her against the stall so that he could free up his hands to lift her so that their zippers were aligned.

  Sex.

  He wanted sex with Megan. And that was the only coherent thought he was having.

  “Let’s go to the house,” she said, untangling them.

  Shane didn’t want to go anywhere. Sex against the stall door was fine with him, but he figured that logic was simply because it would be immediate. No time wasted going elsewhere. But Megan moved anyway. She led his horse into a stall, then caught on to Shane’s hand and started running out of the barn. If he hadn’t been wet already, he darn sure would have been with that little trek. They were both soaked to the bone by the time they got to the screened porch.

  Thankfully, she didn’t make him go any farther. Kissing him, she tackled the buttons on his shirt. “Don’t worry. If someone drives up, we’ll hear it,” Megan assured him in between the kisses. She pulled off his Stetson and tossed it on a chair by the little bed.

  Shane could have pointed out that it might be hard for him to hear anything, what with the rain pinging on the tin roof and his heartbeat throbbing in his ears. Actually, other parts of him were throbbing, too, and the urgency of her kissing and touching convinced him that they had nothing to worry about. Or rather—nothing else that he cared to worry about.

  He went after her shirt while she finished with his. Since she had a head start on the undressing, Megan finished first. His wet shirt made a sloppy thud when it hit the porch floor.

  And she made a sound of pleasure.

  “Oh, my,” Megan purred, running her hands over his chest. Then down to his stomach. “You are built.”

  He got a jolt of pride that might have lasted somewhat longer if her hand hadn’t skimmed over the front of his jeans. Then he got a jolt of a different kind.

  “Yes, built,” she repeated.

  No pride that time, but Shane thought he might go back and mentally revisit that compliment later in a shallow, masculine kind of way. For now, he intended to use every inch of his “build” and for that to happen he needed her naked.

  Shane stripped off her top and got busy with a little turnabout. After all, Megan had gotten to touch, and he wanted to do the same.

  With his mouth.

  He started with her neck and worked his way down. He used his tongue and nipped her with his teeth. Megan must have liked it because he got more of those silky sounds of pleasure, and she fisted her hand in his hair as he made his way to her stomach. Shane kept kissing her as he peeled her out of her boots and jeans. One kiss on the front of her panties, and he knew that he’d turned up the fire big-time.

  “We need to be naked,” she insisted, and Megan yanked his hair hard enough to get his attention.

  She pulled him back up, their bodies sliding against each other, and she got started on his belt. Megan made that interesting, too. She kissed him while her hands bumped and nudged his erection. The torture probably wasn’t intentional. She just seemed to be having trouble with the rodeo buckle.

  To stop the torture, Shane helped her. Not just with the buckle but also getting him out of his jeans and boots. The moment that was done, though, Megan slipped her hand into his boxers.

  Her eyelids fluttered down, and she clamped her teeth over the side of her bottom lip. That look was all pleasure. A hot hit of foreplay. So, Shane did the same to her.

  The sound she made was part whimper, part gasp, and it seemed to be her snapping point. Shane totally got that because he was close to snapping himself. So, they snapped together as they tumbled onto the bed. It was soft, and the fluffy mattress swelled around them.

  He kissed her again and likely broke some kind of world record getting her out of her panties. A second world record came for his boxers’ removal and then getting on the condom that he had to fish out of his wallet.

  Despite his speed, Megan was tugging and pulling at him when he was back on top of her. She stilled, however, when he slipped inside her. Stilled, and then made that pleasure sound and expression again.

  If he hadn’t already been as hard as stone, that would have done it.

  Shane made some pleasure sounds of his own when he started to move inside her. She was tight, wet and eager, already lifting her hips to meet his. Not that he wanted her to slow down. No. This was just one of those scalding hot fires that needed to be put out hard and fast.

  So, that’s what he gave her.

  Hard, fast, deep. It spun them both right to the edge, and Shane watched as she slipped over it. He didn’t fight his own release. Couldn’t. He just let the ripples from her climax take him right along with her.

  Yeah, he’d definitely have something big to take to the grave now.

  * * *

  SHANE GOT UP from the porch bed much too soon for Megan’s liking. Of course, a couple of hours might have been too soon for her.

  As long as he was still on top of her and she had her hands on all those incredible muscles, the only thing she’d been able to think about was the awesome orgasm that he’d just given her. Now that he’d gone inside to the bathroom, Megan began to dwell on everything else that she’d tried to keep out of her mind.
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br />   How the heck were they going to handle this?

  The mature thing would be just to tell their families they’d been together and insist that they back off. Then there’d be no need for them to sneak around, and Shane and she could have more sex. The idea of showering with him was especially appealing. Ditto for sex in the barn. Obviously, the location was secondary.

  Backing off wouldn’t happen, though, if they went with the spill-all route. No, not with their families. There’d be plans for their future wedding. That, in turn, would put tremendous pressure on Shane and her. Even more than there was when they’d just been resisting each other.

  Megan could see those family plans and that pressure starting a bad cycle where Shane and she would regret them ever knowing. Along with regretting that they’d even given in to the lust this one time.

  Well, heck. Her doom-and-gloom conclusion about their future put a real damper on that orgasm.

  So did the sound that she heard.

  Not Shane. This hadn’t come from inside the house but rather out front. Someone was driving up.

  That sent Megan scrambling for her clothes, and she nearly knocked herself unconscious when she went to snatch up her jeans and smacked her head on the chair. The pain didn’t stop her, though. She just kept throwing on her wet clothes, and then, so she’d have an explanation for the wet, she ran out into the backyard to circle around front.

  It was Janie.

  Megan felt some relief that at least it wasn’t her mother or, heaven forbid, her father. Unfortunately, though, Janie had sister-vision, and the moment she stepped from her truck and took one look at Megan, Janie’s forehead bunched up.

  Janie’s gaze slid from Megan to the house. “I take it I interrupted...something?” she asked.

  Dang it. Here, she’d gotten wet again for nothing. Still, Megan didn’t admit anything to her sister. However, she did step on the front porch to stop the continued drenching and tried to think of how to handle this. Maybe she just had to accept that she wasn’t the one in control of the info that was about to come out.

  Or stay hidden.

  It was all up to Shane. If he didn’t want to face Janie, and all the fallout that could come from her sister seeing him, then all he had to do was stay inside. Along with Megan hoping that Janie didn’t ask to see the progress the builders had made.

  With her umbrella sheltering her from the downpour, Janie hurried to the porch, but she continued studying Megan. “Well?” Janie prompted.

  “Well what?” Megan made sure to keep eye contact with her because a dodged gaze would only cause Janie to dig in.

  Janie just smiled, then sighed. “You rode a horse out here. A horse that you’ve never ridden before. And I saw your truck, which you parked on one of the ranch trails,” she added.

  Megan had been about to say that she’d taken the mare to give it some exercise, but she couldn’t think of a good reason for leaving her truck where she had. Well, no reason that didn’t point to hanky-panky, but still she could turn the tables on her sister.

  “What were you doing on a ranch trail?” Megan demanded.

  “Liam and I go there to have sex sometimes,” Janie readily admitted. Then she smiled. “It keeps things fun.”

  Great. That likely meant Liam was now suspicious, too. And Megan had just learned far more about her sister and brother-in-law than she’d wanted to know. She made a mental note to avoid ranch trails so she wouldn’t catch them in the act.

  “You’d better hope that Ella or Jacob don’t go riding back there when Liam and you are butt naked,” Megan grumbled.

  Janie’s smile took on a delicious little slant as if she’d tasted something yummy. “They use the south trail.” She chuckled, then paused. “Look, I’m not here to badger you. You get enough of that from Mom and Dad. When it comes to Shane and you, consider me Switzerland. Neutral,” she clarified.

  Megan eyed her to see if that was the truth. Maybe. “You want me to believe you don’t care one way or another if I get together with Shane?”

  “I just want both of you to be happy. I mean that,” she insisted. “The only reason I even put in my two cents’ worth is because I think Shane and you would be great together. And no, I’m not talking just about sex. Though I’m betting he’s darn good in that department. All those muscles!”

  Yeah, he was darn good, but Megan kept that to herself and hoped he wasn’t listening to this conversation.

  “I think you’d be good together for other reasons,” Janie went on. “You both listen to that old jazz music that no one else in the family likes. And you both watch those slasher movies.” She shuddered. “You swap paperbacks because you have the same taste in reading.”

  Megan frowned. “Are you sure you aren’t meddling?”

  Janie gave her a pat on the back. “I guess it sounds like that. Sorry. I just don’t see why you’d deny yourself a delicious hot fudge sundae just because it’s missing the whipped cream.”

  Megan frowned again.

  “That sounded better in my head,” Janie admitted. “I was trying to come up with something to make you understand that it could still be really, really good even when it’s not perfect.”

  “For it to be really, really good, I’d want the whipped cream,” Megan countered. And she hated that the idea of Shane and whipped cream popped into her mind. She wasn’t one who normally considered dairy toppings as a sexual enhancer.

  “Like I said, it was a bad analogy. Though if you nix the whipped cream, you could have room for more hot fudge. That wouldn’t be a bad trade-off.”

  True. Best not to verbally agree to that though since it would only give Janie more fodder for this argument that Megan wasn’t going to let her win.

  “I’ll just add one more thing and then I’ll hush.” Janie went on. “If Shane and you do ever get together, the meddling will stop. Not just the hints I give you but also the big stuff from the folks.”

  Of course, Megan had already considered that. And the flip side. “Yes, but then I’d have to listen to a lifetime of hearing things like ‘What took you so long?’ Or ‘I don’t know why you fought it so hard when it was so right.’ All those I-told-you-sos.”

  Still, Megan would put up with those if she thought Shane and she actually had a chance of making it work. She could blame her sudden change in attitude on the sex. While incredibly good, it did tend to plop a pair of rose-colored glasses over her otherwise jaded eyes.

  “Ella and I are having a girls’ night out this Friday,” Janie added a moment later. “We want you there, of course. No wedding discussion, no Shane pressure. Just the Reynolds sisters eating nachos and getting a little tipsy.”

  It’d been a while since they’d had one of those, and Megan had to admit it might do her some good. Besides, if she turned down the invitation, Ella would get suspicious. It was bad enough that Janie was on her scent.

  “I’ll be there,” Megan told her.

  Janie nodded, kissed her cheek as if ready to go, but then her attention slid to the front door of the house. She steeled herself up for Janie to ask for a look at the interior, but her sister merely opened her umbrella and made a dash back to her truck. Megan waited until she’d driven out of sight before she released the breath she’d been holding and went inside.

  Megan didn’t see Shane, but she heard him. Much to her disappointment, he was dressed and pacing across her kitchen while he talked on the phone. Judging from the way his forehead was bunched up and his tightened jaw, the conversation wasn’t a pleasant one.

  “No,” Shane said to whoever was on the other end of the line.

  Megan didn’t go closer so she could give him some privacy, but Shane did glance in her direction. The same tension in his forehead, jaw and shoulders was also in his eyes.

  “You just need to back off.” He jabbed the end call button as if he’d squashed a bug. He r
ubbed his hand over his face before his attention came back to Megan. “My mom,” he added.

  “Oh. Sorry. Was she matchmaking?” Silly question, though, so she waved it off. Of course she was matchmaking.

  “She wanted me to invite you to dinner on Friday night,” Shane explained. “She plans to host a wedding shower for Ella and wanted your input.”

  Megan nodded, filled in the blanks. “And she thought it would be a good idea if you were there, too?”

  He nodded, and because the frustration was practically erupting off him, Megan didn’t go to him. She was reasonably sure he wouldn’t want that. She could almost feel him building up the wall between them again. She recognized the mood because she had done plenty of it herself.

  “Don’t worry,” Megan assured him. “If your mom calls me, I’ll tell her I’m busy.” Which she was, since she’d just agreed to a girls’ night with her sister.

  “Did Janie give you any grief?” he asked.

  “Some, but a tiny amount compared to our parents.”

  “Yes,” Shane grumbled. He repeated the word again, and then the silence came.

  “The rain’s nearly stopped,” she said, giving him an out. Part of her wanted him to ignore that out and come to her. As a general rule, you couldn’t build walls if you were kissing or having sex.

  He glanced around and muttered some profanity under his breath. “I should go.” Now he came to her, taking long strides across the room to reach her, but it was only to give her a quick kiss. “I’ll call you,” he added.

  And with that tried-and-true blow-off line, Shane walked out.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  SHANE FIGURED THIS was the worst idea in the history of worst ideas. He definitely wasn’t in the mood for coming to the Gray Mare Saloon for a drink with his brothers. Heck, he wasn’t in the right mood for breathing, much less socializing with anybody. Yet, he was going anyway.

  Considering the sex with Megan had been downright amazing, it hadn’t done a darn thing to soothe the rankled feeling inside him. Of course, that was his fault because he’d allowed his anger from the phone call with his mother to spill over everything.