Maybe, just for one night, she could step out of the life she’d constructed so carefully and be herself. She took Lane’s face in her hands, burying her fingers in his hair as she bent down and ran her tongue over the curve of his lips. As her breasts flattened against his chest and his hips flexed to meet hers, she spilled everything she felt out into a hot, fiery kiss that burned through the last of her scruples.
Sarah Landon, Two Shot cowgirl, had returned. And surprisingly, Sarah Landon, prissy professional, was really glad to see her.
***
Talk about shifting gears. Lane had never seen a girl change from prim and proper to sweet and sexy so fast in his life. He drew back, partly to appreciate the sight of Sarah sprawled beneath him and partly to make sure it was really happening.
Her eyes were half closed, her hair a tangled mass framing her pale face. Her T-shirt had ridden partway up and somehow the top button of her jeans had come undone. She was an open invitation any man would accept.
He stroked a finger across the waistline of her jeans. His finger dipped down into the V created by the undone button and her skin rippled in response.
Bending down, he kissed her again, his hand skimming up her body. Her abs didn’t feel like a city girl’s; they were taut and strong but not hard like a gym six-pack. He kissed the spot at the juncture of her ribs, then lifted the shirt higher. She sighed and arched her back, her breasts straining at the confines of her bra, and he deftly undid the front clasp and peeled away the thin fabric.
The sight of her lying half naked on his bed in the moonlight was something he never wanted to forget, and for a minute he just drank her in. She twisted her body, closing her eyes and parting her lips as if not having his hands on her was torture. He cupped both hands around her breasts, squeezing them gently, and licked a slow circle around each nipple. She gasped and made a pleading sound, a little cry that flooded him with feeling. He’d been hard since they danced, but now he was balanced on the thin line between pain and pleasure, his skin stretching over muscles so taut and tense that the slightest touch would send him over the edge.
He made a conscious effort to slow down, flicking his tongue over the rising peaks of her breasts, giving each one his full attention. She squirmed her approval and her jeans edged lower, the zipper parting to reveal a hint of lace and a few reddish curls. His hand drifted down and touched her there and he felt that ripple run through her body again as she threw her head back and bit her lip.
He wanted to have her, take her, now. He wanted to claw off her jeans, rip away the lace, spread her open, and bury himself inside her. The urge was so strong it shocked him.
She reached up and pulled his face to hers, kissing him with a wildness that echoed his own, and suddenly they were writhing like animals, clawing at each other’s clothes.
Slow down, he told himself. Slow down. But she buried her fingers in his hair and slid her tongue into his mouth, gliding it out and in again in an unmistakable demand. Slowing down was out of the question.
He reached down to unfasten his belt and her fingers tangled in his, clawing and tugging until she managed to release him, and then her hand skimmed up the underside of him and her thumb swept over the top. He was afraid he’d be finished before they even started, so he sat back, resolving to savor the way the moonlight polished her body and shaded her curves.
But when he stopped, the world rushed in and reality hit. He stopped with his shirt half off, and when she reached up to finish the job he trapped her hand in his.
“Sarah, you—I think you might have had too much to drink.” He breathed out a long, shuddering breath. “I’m sorry. I lost control.”
She sat up and yanked at the shirt, hauling it away from his bruised shoulder.
“I am not drunk,” she said. “I can hold my liquor. I’m from a town called Two Shot, for heaven’s sake.”
“Honey, you’re no bigger than a minute,” he said. “There’s no way…”
“Do you want me to walk a straight line down the middle of the trailer? Look.” She closed her eyes and spread her arms, then touched the tip of her nose with each index finger.
It was silly, but somehow ridiculously erotic. At that point, she probably could have stood on her head and it would have turned him on.
He closed his eyes, then realized that if he left things up to his imagination they’d only get worse. But when she threw off her shirt in a gesture straight out of a strip show, he had to close them again.
***
Sarah didn’t know if she wanted to screw Lane or strangle him. For the first time in her life she had a man she really wanted, right where she wanted him. He was so aroused he was shaking. She’d been about to have the best sex of her life.
And he’d decided to go all conscientious about her level of inebriation.
“I’m fine,” she said. “And if you don’t touch me again I’m going to go over there and find a kitchen knife.”
“Yikes,” he said. “How do I know you’re not just a mean drunk?”
“You don’t. But how pathetic is it that I have to threaten you before you’ll have sex with me?”
“I don’t want to take advantage.”
“Take advantage, all right?” She realized she was screeching and took a deep breath. “Stop making me beg. Let’s just pretend we can’t help ourselves, okay?”
He smiled. “Okay. If we can’t help ourselves, that would mean we have to help each other.”
“Right. You rip off my clothes and I’ll rip off yours.”
“Yours are already gone.”
“Then catch up, cowboy.”
She heard a distinct tearing sound as she tugged at the sleeve of his shirt. Well, maybe she should rip off the other sleeve too. That was kind of a cowboy thing, wasn’t it—wearing a shirt with the sleeves ripped off? It should be, anyway, if the cowboy had muscles like Lane’s. The preppie types she’d dated the past few years hadn’t even come close to this.
She pulled him down on top of her and then they were both naked and he was kissing her and she was sinking her fingertips into the hard muscles of his haunches and steering him right where she wanted him.
“There,” she said. “Go. Please. Go.”
The muscles flexed and she felt him there, right there.
Still there. No further.
She opened her eyes to find his face inches away. His gaze was so intense she closed her eyes again.
“Open your eyes,” he whispered. “Look at me.”
She didn’t want to do it. If she looked into his eyes there’d be more than a meeting of bodies going on; there’d be a meeting of minds, and that was the last thing she wanted.
“Just go,” she whispered.
He started to pull away and her eyes flipped open like a doll’s. “I’m here,” she said.
“Good.” He moved into her, then out, watching her face. His gaze was tender and hot all at once, and she felt her shield slipping. She could almost believe this meant something to him, but that wasn’t possible. They barely knew each other. This was a one-night stand, a brief, hot interlude of mindless sex, a slaking of both their appetites and nothing more.
Besides, he was Lane Carrigan. He could have damn near any woman he wanted. A small-town girl turned spinster businesswoman was hardly what he’d choose.
“Nobody ever felt this good,” he whispered. “Nobody.”
She tried to say something witty, but what came out was a pleading animal noise as she pulled him into her again. After that she stopped thinking and simply moved. It was like music, the way they dipped and soared, asked and answered, over and over, until she cried out again with a scream that released all the darkness inside her and let his light flood in to take its place.
When she opened her eyes again, the moon had slid into the small skylight and was looking down at her with its blank, serene face. It felt like a blessing. Lane lay beside her, sleeping. She hadn’t noticed what long lashes he had. They softened the masculine planes of hi
s face, making him look less like a mythical outlaw and more like a man.
A man who made love to her like there was actually love involved. But then, Lane did everything all-out. When he rode, he rode wild animals; when he made love, he chose a woman determined to resist him. Even when he slept, he slept hard. She shimmied out from under the arm he’d tossed over her waist and slipped off the bed, gathering her clothes. When she’d finished dressing, she tapped him on the shoulder.
“Lane, I need to go home.”
He rose and dressed without a word, as if he was still asleep—or maybe he knew talking would break the spell. As he dressed, his shadow shifting in the moonlight, Sarah sat on the edge of the bed and slowly came to her senses.
What the hell was she thinking? Real life didn’t end at the entrance to the rodeo grounds. You couldn’t step outside your life. You couldn’t stop time and do what you wanted and expect no repercussions.
What was done was done, and there was no point in regretting it. But she needed to figure out how she was going to move on. For instance, what she was going to tell Eric in the morning? She was supposed to be changing his brother’s mind about the drilling, not seducing him.
Hopefully Lane would agree to keep their liaison under wraps. Maybe he’d understand that this had been a one-time thing, that she wasn’t that kind of girl. That she’d slipped, and she simply needed to right herself and move on.
***
Lane pretended to be absorbed in finding his scattered clothes, but he watched Sarah’s face surreptitiously. She looked confused, impatient, and regretful—and none of those expressions boded well for the future.
Didn’t she know what they’d just shared? It didn’t matter that she worked for his brother. It didn’t matter that they were different kinds of people, with different goals. She was driving on a fast road to prosperity, and he was fleeing just as fast in the opposite direction. Maybe the fact that they’d collided head-on was a sign that both of them needed to stop and think about where they were going and why.
Talking about Two Shot with her made him realize he might have idealized the notion of small-town life. But she was being just as unrealistic about wealth and prosperity. Being well-off might mean you’d never starve, but it didn’t guarantee happiness.
“Okay.” She pasted on the same smile she’d worn at the office, before she’d let down her guard. It was about as bright and meaningless as the painted smile on a Barbie doll. “I’d better get going then.”
“Sarah.” She’d let her hair fall over the side of her face and he swept it back with one finger. “Don’t shut down on me.”
“I’m sorry, Lane. I have to go back to work tomorrow. With your brother.” She reached up and pushed his hand away. “It was—fun, you know? But it’s time to get back to reality.”
“That was reality.”
“It’s not the reality I had planned.”
She draped her purse strap over her shoulder and opened the door, slipping down the steps and into the dark night without looking back. He followed, his boot heels crunching on the gravel walk. They’d passed the beer tent, the potato skins stand, and the shuttered booth where she’d bought the running horse necklace before he spoke again.
“You know, it’s funny. I’ve been trying for years to shed that veneer you’ve been working so hard to build up. Trying to get real.”
She kept walking.
“It’s an advantage, you know—coming from Two Shot. The whole reason you understand rich people so well is because you can see them from the outside. And you know all about small towns.”
“Way more than I want to know.”
They reached the truck and he opened the door for her. He put out a hand to help her inside, but she pretended she didn’t see it and climbed in on her own.
He slid behind the wheel and turned to face her, propping one leg up on the seat. “Two Shot made you who you are. If you’d been born rich, you wouldn’t be you. You wouldn’t have all this ambition and drive.”
“So you’re saying it’s good to have something to run away from?”
“I doubt you ever ran away from anything.” He leaned over and took her chin between his thumb and forefinger, forcing her to face him. “Except me.”
He could tell she wanted to swipe his hand away, but he held her with his eyes as well as the touch of his hand. The only way she could get loose was to shake him off, and she was too dignified to do that.
“Look, Lane, you can’t possibly understand. When you wake up Monday morning, you’ll still be a Carrigan. You’ll always be a Carrigan.”
“And you’ll always be you.”
“I can’t afford to be me.” She blinked, avoiding his eyes, and the connection fizzled and shorted out. “And please don’t talk to Eric about me—about the things I told you.” Suddenly she seemed a whole lot less sure of herself. “I kind of misled him about where I come from.”
“You lied on your resume?”
“No.” She shifted uncomfortably. “I didn’t have to put down where I was from. But he’s always assumed I was born to—you know.”
“Privilege?”
She nodded. “I never lied to him, but he made assumptions, and well—it’s gone way too far. If he found out I’m from Two Shot now, he’d feel like I lied.”
Lane shook his head. “I don’t understand why you try to hide it.”
She sighed. “I don’t either, sometimes. It just happened. One thing led to another, and now it’s like his whole concept of me is that I’m this high-class society girl.”
“You know, he might be impressed by how far you’ve come.”
“I doubt it.” She pulled the seat belt across her body and fastened it, letting the sharp click punctuate her answer. “Please don’t tell him, okay?”
He pressed the clutch and started up the truck, driving out of the gravel lot and swinging onto the dark empty highway without a word.
Chapter 12
The next morning, Sarah stared into the bakery case at Casper’s only Starbucks as if the fate of the universe depended on the choice between Very Berry Coffee Cake and a banana nut muffin. But she wasn’t thinking about breakfast; she was thinking about Lane. The evening at the rodeo had stirred up memories and misgivings and way more hormones than she could handle. She’d slept uneasily, waking to realize she’d dreamed of him.
He’d gotten bucked off again in her dream, and she’d crawled under the fence and run to him while the noise of the crowd roared in her ears and the clowns lured the bull away. Bloody white bones stuck out of his chest, and she’d knelt in the arena, hurrying to force the broken ends together while the bull pawed the dirt. The bones kept snapping apart in her hands and she woke with her mouth dry as dust, her arms aching as if she’d worked out all night.
The dream and the night that inspired it proved she’d made a mistake by getting personal with a cowboy. With Lane, there was too much risk. Too much feeling. Too much everything. She was her normal, rational self until he touched her, or looked at her in that intense way that made her feel like their souls had met and mated in some previous life.
She couldn’t erase what had happened, but she needed to forget it. She’d avoid Lane and make a solemn vow to keep herself on track. From now on, she would keep friendships and business relationships separate.
“Never again,” she muttered to herself, making a quick and very vague sign of the cross.
“Warding off temptation?” She turned to see Eric standing behind her, holding a steaming venti cup that gave off the sweet, milky scent of a latte. Damn. It was like seeing the Devil’s brother beside you when you’d just sworn off sin.
But Eric didn’t have the effect on her that Lane did. She wondered why. He was just her type—classy and sophisticated. Why did her heart beat so fast for the yahoo brother? If she was going to screw up her life, why couldn’t she choose a guy who fit into the future she had planned?
“How did it go with my brother last night?”
She moved up a spot in line as a guy in a denim jacket finished giving his order and moved to the pickup counter. “Well, let’s see. He got bucked off his bull and we spent most of the night in the medical unit.” She caught a flash of concern in Eric’s eyes and hurried to say, “But he’s okay.”
“Did you change his mind?” His posture stiffened slightly. “Or did he change yours? Please don’t tell me he made you long for the romance of cowboy life?”
It wasn’t the cowboy life Lane had made her long for; it was the cowboy himself. But that was the last thing she wanted Eric to discover. The rivalry between the two brothers was probably a holdover from adolescence, but it was obviously still strong. Shifting her loyalties to Lane wouldn’t just make her less effective on the job; her boss would see it as a betrayal.
All the more reason to step away from the cowboy.
She shrugged one shoulder in what she hoped was a casual gesture. “As far as I can tell, there is no romance in the cowboy life.” She faked absorption in the menu, as if she hadn’t already memorized the coffee shop’s offerings. “Basically, the whole thing just proved what I already knew. That cowboy culture he’s so set on is a dying concept, and the people clinging to it aren’t exactly enriching the community. Bringing in oil workers would probably improve things. But I doubt anything can convince Lane of that.”
Eric took another sip of his latte and pulled his wallet out of his back pocket. Flipping it open, he fished out a gold Starbucks card and turned it in his long, slender fingers like a street-corner magician. The metallic surface of the card caught the sunlight streaming in the window behind them and arced glints of light off the wall behind the bake case. Everything about the man was accomplished and graceful. The fact that she was attracted to the cowboy brother and not the executive just proved she hadn’t left her old self behind as effectively as she’d thought.
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