James dodged the hand smacking his when he tried to steal yet another one of Ivy’s French fries. They were on their thirteenth “not a date” lunch at the diner, sitting in their booth by the front window. He’d been back in West Yellowstone for this year’s rotation a full two months, and very few days since that initial lunch had gone by without him at least talking to Ivy, if not actually seeing her.

Just like his boss, the daughter was stubborn as a mule. She continued to insist they maintain the “just friends” status, and he’d taken that deal because he loved Ivy’s company, loved spending time with and talking to her.

But he didn’t want to kiss his “friends” goodbye every time they parted, the way he did Ivy. He wasn’t sure why she was so resistant to the boyfriend/girlfriend concept, but at some point, he was going to have to push the issue. However, after their brief interlude in the storage shed, he had been afraid to bring it up again. Something bad was rambling around in her head, and he didn’t have a clue how to assuage her fears.

The sight of it had given him the strength to dial things back for a couple of weeks.

But only a couple of weeks.

Now that willpower was shot. The attraction between them sparked, sizzled, and singed. He was on fire, and starting to wonder if the fresh calluses on his hand were due to getting back into the swing of work around the base, or from jerking off in the shower every morning after another night of dreaming about her.

“I really need to start looking for another job,” Ivy said. James had learned somewhere around “not a date” number three that Ivy was merely filling in at the clinic for the regular vet, Barbara Anderson, who had been dealing with some medical issues. Dr. Anderson planned to return to work in a day or two, and while she wanted Ivy to stay on permanently, Ivy was champing at the bit to find her dream job.

If she found it, she’d most likely be relocating and moving away. James hated the idea of her vanishing before they’d had a chance to really give this budding relationship a chance, but Ivy was growing more and more bored with life in a pet clinic.

“So you keep saying. I’m not sure what’s wrong with the clinic. Everyone loves you there, and you can stay close to your dad.”

“Dad managed to do okay on his own without me all those years I was away at school. Besides, I’m not talking about an East Coast job, even though Mom has sent me no less than twelve options in North Carolina.”

“You’d hate the East Coast.”

“I know. That’s one of the reasons I didn’t move with her after the divorce.”

James had become fairly astute when it came to Ivy’s forbidden topics. His job and the details surrounding her parents’ split were the top two. So he was surprised when she opened the door to the subject.

“One of the reasons?”

She hesitated for just a moment. “Mom moved in with her sister and her family right after the divorce. She was going to have plenty of support to get through,” she paused, “to get through the breakup. Dad didn’t have anybody, so I stayed with him.”

James couldn’t help but feel like there were more reasons, but that was the only one she offered. “I know he was glad you stayed here. I really haven’t understated it when I say the guy talks about you all the time.”

Ivy gave him a ghost of a smile that didn’t feel quite genuine. She was quieter today than usual. She’d even tried to bail on the standing date when he’d stopped by to pick her up. Something she hadn’t done in weeks.

“You okay?” he asked when the silence at the table drifted a few moments too long.

She nodded half-heartedly and he noticed the dark circles under her eyes.

“You’re not sick, are you?”

His continual questions appeared to break through whatever was bothering her. And in typical Ivy fashion, she flashed hot with an annoyance that lasted about three seconds. “I’m fine, Jamie,” she snapped.

It never took her long to regret her tone, which meant her reply was instantly followed by a long sigh. “I’m sorry. I warned you at the clinic I wasn’t going to be good company today.”

She had. But she was wrong. Even when she was in a bad mood, James would rather be with her than without. The idea wasn’t as unsettling as he might have thought. His cousins and brother had gotten a kick out of learning that he was smitten. And he could hear Jake making some comment about it being time he grew up and stopped thinking with his dick.

Not that his dick wasn’t smitten too. It was just that, for the first time, his primary objective with a woman wasn’t getting her naked.

“I won’t keep pushing,” he said. “If you want to talk about it, I’m here. Otherwise, you’re going to have to listen to me list again all the reasons why we should stop pretending we’re not hot for each other.”

Ivy rubbed her forehead wearily. “That is sort of the problem.”

James reached across the table and took her hand in his, giving it a squeeze. “Why?”

Her gaze met his, and James could swear he actually saw some sort of veil being lifted. One second, her eyes were troubled, the next her face cleared.

“I want to have sex with you.”

Of all the things he’d expected to hear from her at that moment, that probably wouldn’t have even made the list. He gave her a shit-eating grin that didn’t piss her off like he’d anticipated.

“So what you’re really saying is, I’ve worn you down. I’ve won.”

She shook her head. “I was on the track team in high school. Hurdles. Did I tell you that?”

“No.” James pictured her lifting her legs, gracefully straddling the bar mid-stride. He’d give anything to have been able to see her in action.

“I used to stand at the starting line and count the hurdles, then the pistol would fire, and I’d do a mental countdown as I put more and more of the hurdles behind me. I’m sitting here, staring down this track you and I are on, and I’m counting the hurdles, Jamie. There are a lot of them.”

“Let’s start counting them down.”

Ivy glanced out the window, but it was obvious she wasn’t seeing anything beyond the glass. “They aren’t all equal height. Some of them are insurmountable.”

“I refuse to believe that.”

She rolled her eyes. “You know, the more we’re together, the more I’m convinced that not enough people have said no to you in your life. Everything’s come too easy.”

He laughed, but he was hard-pressed to disagree. He had lived a fairly privileged life with two doting parents, a protective older sister, a brother who was a best friend, a huge, supportive extended family and, while life on a ranch was hard work, Compass Ranch was prosperous, so he’d never been hungry or cold or had to fight for much of anything. “Are you calling me spoiled?”

She grinned. “Yes.”

He figured Ivy’s life, while devoid of the hunger and cold aspects, had probably been more difficult. Her parents had split up when she was just sixteen, her mother moving clear across the country. And while he’d worked on the ranch to earn his allowance, there had been money there for him to go to college if he’d chosen that path. Ivy had worked her way through college, but she was still starting life with a fair amount of debt, thanks to school loans.

“I just want the chance to date you. I’m not asking for any big lifetime commitment. We have fun together, and I think this chemistry between us is pretty much off the charts. What do you say we just take a stab at jumping the first hurdle?”

Ivy sighed. “You just cleared that one.”

“So you’ll stop turning me down when I ask to go out on a date?”

“Okay, I lied. You just cleared the second one. Because I’m pretty sure what we’ve been doing the past two months is dating. You nailed the initial hurdle the day you showed up at the pet clinic and invited me to lunch the first time.”

“You could have fooled me. I haven’t been able to steal a kiss from you since the shed.” He paused, then realized he was still confused about something. “What’s the second hurdle I just cleared?”

“The one where I invite you to my apartment.”

“Right now?”

She nodded.

“And what happens when we fly over that hurdle? Because, darlin’, I’m definitely nailing that one. Literally.”

He thought his joke would provoke a laugh.

Instead, her face sobered. “I’m not sure what happens after that. That’s where stuff is going to get sticky.”

“Literally?” he teased.

She tilted her head, feigning exasperation. “No, perv. Not literally. Or at least, not just literally. I don’t suppose I could ask for the same deal Becky Miller got. Friends with benefits.”

He winced. “You know about Beck?”

Ivy appeared to enjoy his discomfort. “This is a small town, and I figure I had the full rundown of your local escapades before I went to bed the night after our first lunch together.”

“From one person or lots?”

“Lots.”

He frowned, unhappy that, deserved or not, he’d earned a reputation in the area. “That many people were trying to warn you away from me?”

She laughed. “Hell no. Only a couple considered their gossip warnings. The rest were women telling me I’d be a fool to turn you down.”

His brows furrowed. “I haven’t slept with that many women!”

Ivy was grinning from ear to ear. “Oh, I know. But you’ve clearly impressed the ones you have been with. Apparently, your cowboy side comes shining through. Heard something about you and rope. Not going to lie. Bondage sounds pretty hot to me.”

James had never left a plate of food uneaten in his life. Until then. “Ivy?”

“Yeah?”

“Let’s go.”

Fortunately, she was renting an apartment over the local hair salon, which meant James only had to battle walking with a raging hard-on for three blocks. During the walk, they both texted work to say they’d need the afternoon off. James turned his phone off before Roscoe could reply. He was afraid Ivy’s dad would ask why, and he wasn’t touching the question with a ten-foot pole.

They hadn’t gone two steps inside her place before he’d twisted, pushing her against the front door she’d just closed behind them, and kissed her. The move was reminiscent of the one he had made in the storage shed. Except this time, they weren’t stopping.

Months of pent-up lust came out in a rush. There was a small voice in his head telling him to take it slow, but it was shut up pretty quickly when her hands reached around to cup his ass.

He broke the connection of their lips so that he could suck in some much-needed air, then he let them drift lower, skimming his mouth along the side of her neck. Ivy’s hands clenched his ass cheeks tighter, tugging him closer, so that his denim-covered cock was pressed firmly to her stomach. There was a good foot difference in height between them, which meant he could either bend over to kiss her or stand up straight to grind his cock against her body.

Ivy’s grip on his ass had taken that decision away from him. Not that he was complaining.

He reached down to lift her so that she was able to wrap her sexy legs around his waist. The change in position moved his dick closer to the target. Or would have. If he could manage to take the time to strip off her clothes.

“Where’s your bedroom, darlin’?”

Ivy lifted her lust-glazed eyes to his, and he wondered if she’d even heard the question.

“Bedroom?” he repeated.

She tried to lower her legs, but he wasn’t having any of that. He shifted her slightly to firm up his grip, then he turned toward the hallway. “How about you just point it out to me?”

“End of the hall on the left.”

The journey couldn’t have been more than twenty steps, but it felt like twenty miles as his gait left her bouncing up and down on his cock. Shit. If he didn’t rein it in, this wasn’t going to last nearly long enough.

James placed her on the bed, not bothering to look around the room. There would be plenty of time for a proper tour later. Maybe.

Or maybe he’d just let night fall and darkness surround them without ever taking his gaze off her pretty face.

Ivy wasn’t shy about what she wanted, not bothering with any of those coy games women liked to play in bed. She tugged her long-sleeve T-shirt off in one quick pull. Her bra wasn’t far behind.

“Jesus,” he muttered as he took in her full, lush breasts. Her rosy nipples were tight and just begging to be sucked. She started to unhook her jeans, but he captured her hands.

“You gotta give me a second to enjoy this first.” He lightly pressed her to her back on the mattress, coming over her. James took one of her breasts in his hand and drew her hard nipple into his mouth.

Ivy gasped as her hands flew to his hair. As he played, alternating between tiny nips, soft strokes and rough sucks, her grip tightened until she was pulling his hair to the point of pain.

He lifted his head and gently disentangled her hands.

She grinned sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“Come here.” James offered her a hand, pulling her back up to a sitting position as he stood in front of her. “Undo my jeans, baby.”

She narrowed her eyes, but he didn’t mistake her look as anger. “You ever ask nicely, Cowboy?”

“Undo my jeans, baby. Suck on my cock and I’ll treat you to some of that same hair pulling you just laid on me. Nice enough?”

She laughed. “You realize there was no asking in there.”

“Last part was definitely a question. Gotta warn you now, Doc. When it comes to sex, I’m not going to go slow or easy or do a lot of checking up on you. You want something, you tell me. You hate something, you tell me. Otherwise—”

“James?”

“Yeah?”

“I want to suck your cock. And I definitely want you to pull my hair.”

He bent over, unable to resist kissing her. It was hard and deep and quick. When they parted, he kept his face close to hers. “I knew it would be like this between us.”

“I did too.”

He didn’t fail to recognize the sound of regret lacing those words. Ivy was nowhere near finished fighting him, fighting them, but it didn’t matter anymore.

For the first time in his life, James wasn’t looking for an out, wasn’t trying to figure out the end game. With Ivy, the end game was going to be a real relationship, something serious and, God willing, lasting.

He stood again. There was time to worry about the next hurdle tomorrow. Right now, he wanted her too much to care about anything except her lips around his cock, and then his cock rocking deep inside her.

He unfastened his jeans himself, shucking them and his boots off, revealing exactly how much he wanted her. His erection riding high. Ivy was there, ready and waiting. She wrapped her hand around the base, tightening her grip as she sucked the head in greedily, hungrily. Her suction was hard, rough, and he saw stars.

Then he remembered he’d promised her something skirting the edge of pain too. James ran his fingers through her hair, softly combing it before twisting the long dark strands into his grip and tugging.

Ivy groaned around him, the sound reverberating just enough to drive him wild. He pulled harder and she repeated the sound.

Before he lost control, he released her, taking one full step away from her as he fought to drag air into his lungs. He never—never—had a problem taking his time with a woman, but right now he was three seconds away from coming like a teenage boy.

Ivy was breathing heavily as well. Her hands drifted to her scalp.

“Did I hurt you?” James barely recognized the gruff sound of his own voice.

She shook her head as he struggled to read her expression.

“Ivy?”

“No one’s ever…I almost…you weren’t even…I was so close to…”

Her bewildered dialogue told him he hadn’t been alone. “You were going to come? From me pulling your hair?”

“Is that even possible? I mean,” she glanced down, “my pants aren’t even off yet.”

He laughed. “Hate to break it to you, but it sounds like you’ve got a kinky side. You like the pain.”

“That sounds ridiculous.”

“It’s not exactly an uncommon thing.”

Ivy blew out a hard breath. “I’ve obviously been sleeping with the wrong kind of men.”

James tried not to react, not to think about Ivy in bed with anyone else, but it didn’t help. “Past is gone. For both of us. From now on…”

He returned to the bed, his hands making short work of her jeans and panties. Once she was naked, he took care of the rest of his own clothing. Within moments, they were both naked.

“Get in the middle of the bed.”

She didn’t call him to task for the demand this time. Instead, she crawled to the center of the mattress. He expected her to lie on her back, but Ivy didn’t blindly follow commands.

She remained on her hands and knees, shaking her firm, full ass at him in invitation. “Teach me more. About being kinky.”

James lifted his hand and brought it down on her ass with more strength than he should have, considering she’d never been spanked before.

Ivy arched her back in obvious bliss. “God! Yeah. Do it again.”

He placed five more smacks on her skin, building up a pretty pink flush. Ivy grew more excited with each swing of his hand.

She was close again. Thank God.

James prided himself on always making sure his lovers came first. Ivy was the first to test that ability.

He knelt behind her on the mattress and pressed two fingers inside her, quickly, deeply. She was soaking wet, so he slid in easy.

Ivy’s whole body fell forward, his hand falling free as her teeth sank into a pillow, absorbing her loud cries. She was fighting the goddamn climax, trying to stop it.

She really was his kindred spirit. She didn’t want this to end any faster than he did.

But it didn’t matter if she came now. He wasn’t going to quit until she came. And came again. And a thousand more times.

He reached down and grasped a handful of her hair, pulling her head back up. Caging her body beneath his—her back to his chest—he placed his lips next to her ear as he thrust his other hand lower, three fingers penetrating her this time.

“Don’t you dare hold it back,” he growled.

The threat was wasted. Ivy’s ability to fight vanished before he’d managed a second thrust. Her pussy spasmed, clenched, tightened around his fingers as he continued to fuck her with them. She jerked and trembled and begged for more, and then she pleaded for mercy, but James didn’t give any. The first orgasm had only begun to wane when the second hit.

“Motherfucker,” she cried out. “Fuck. Fuck!”

James slowed his motions, giving her a few minutes to recover. She’d fallen facedown on the bed, her body limp, only the occasional shudder passing through her as he kept his fingers buried deep, though still.

James slowly stroked his erection as she lay there. It would be the work of mere seconds to bring himself to that same peak. He’d jerk himself off, paint her soft back with his come, then crawl next to her to steal more kisses.

He’d almost decided that wasn’t a bad idea at all when Ivy slowly rolled over, her legs parting, inviting him to kneel between.

“Inside me,” she demanded. “Now.”

He was as alpha as they came in the bedroom, but that clearly didn’t mean Ivy would play the submissive.

He didn’t move. Instead, he glanced toward the floor to see how far away his jeans were. “Condom,” he said as he started to move.

She gripped his wrist and shook her head. “I don’t need it if you don’t.”

James bent forward, placing his elbows on the pillow under her head. “I’m afraid this isn’t going to last long.” He might have managed to buy some time with the latex muting some of the sensations, but riding bare? He’d never done it before—which was yet another way Ivy was different. Unique. Special.

She reached down, grasping his dick and guiding it to her. He waited until she had the head tucked just inside, and then he took over.

Gripping her wrists with his hands, he held them next to her head. On any other woman, it would look like a pose of surrender. With Ivy, it felt more like he was doing her bidding, giving her exactly what she desired.

He fucked her hard, fast. She liked that bite of pain, so he gave it to her.

And then, as he’d warned her, he was there. The amazing part—she was too. They came together, both cursing, pleading, gasping for air.

He collapsed on top of her briefly until she pushed against his shoulders, forcing his sated body to her side.

Neither of them spoke for a long time. He was content to lie there for the rest of the day, lightly caressing her stomach as he watched her breasts rise and fall with each inhale and exhale.

Ivy was the first to return to reality, to break the silence. “You never answered me in the diner.”

“About what?”

“About giving me the same deal as Becky. Friends with benefits.”

James lifted his head and studied her face. “You really think that’s possible?”

He knew her well enough now to know she wasn’t capable of lying about her feelings. She’d been up-front with him about not dating smokejumpers from day one. And while he still didn’t know the why, he’d known her reluctance was there because she didn’t wear a false face.

Ivy shook her head. “No. It’s not possible.”

It was as close as she’d ever come to confirming he wasn’t the only one whose feelings were engaged. That idea made him way happier than it should.

Until she added, “And there’s the insurmountable hurdle.”