Seven
Four days later . . .
“COME HERE,” GRAY GROWLED.
I slid him out of my mouth but wrapped my hand around him and immediately started stroking as I turned my head, kissed the inside of his thigh before my eyes went to him and I whispered, “Not done, baby.”
“You’re done.”
“Give me a little while longer.”
“You get longer, Ivey, I’ll come in your mouth. You know I come in you and by you I don’t mean your mouth. Now come here.”
This was true. And at his words I suddenly wanted him in me.
Therefore I started crawling up his body.
The room was dark. I had no idea what time it was. Gray had woken me with his hands then added his mouth then I added my hands and mouth. Except for me and my fans and sequined panties, we’d never done this. I’d adjusted to Gray’s sleeping schedule just as easily as I adjusted to Mustang. A couple of days, I was there.
But if this was an indication that Gray had sleepless nights, I wasn’t going to complain if this was how he worked through them.
I made it up his body, he shifted his legs so they were between mine and I was straddling him. One of his arms curved around my waist, moving me down, the other hand drove into my hair, his hips bucked up, my mouth hit his, my tongue slid inside and he slid inside me.
Oh yeah.
He rolled us, mouths and bodies connected, and his hips started moving, fast, hard, driving deep.
Oh yeah.
He was nearly there and intent to take me with him. I loved it when he got this way, driven, on the edge of losing control and what I loved about it was that I made him that way.
Then, from far off in the silence of the night I heard what sounded like a shotgun blast.
Gray’s head shot up and he stilled a half a second then slid out, rolled and angled off the bed, clipping, “Fuck.”
“What was that?” I whispered but I knew. Gray had told me about the shotgun rigged in the barn.
“Dial nine-one-one, Ivey,” Gray ordered, tugging his jeans on.
“What?”
“Dial nine-one-one,” Gray repeated, bent over and snatched up his shirt. I saw his head turn toward me in the dark and he went on, “Now.”
I jerked out of my surprised stupor, rolled to his nightstand and grabbed the phone.
Gray tagged his boots and sprinted out the door.
“Shit, shit, fuck,” I whispered as I dialed in the dark. I jumped off the bed and started looking for my nightie and panties.
“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”
“This is Ivey Larue. I’m at Cody Ranch off of fifty-seven west of Mustang. We have an intruder.”
I had the phone tucked between my ear and shoulder and I was shimmying on my panties then awkwardly pulling my little, red satin nightie over my head, answering the operator’s questions when I saw it.
A weird light dancing through the opened window.
I blinked at it while it hit me what that hue and dance meant. I rushed to the window and saw the barn was on fire.
“Oh my God!” I cried, cutting off whatever the operator was saying and dashing back across the room to my jeans. “Notify the fire department. Our barn’s on fire. We have twenty horses in there! Hurry!”
I didn’t even bleep it off before I threw it on the bed, yanked up my jeans, zipped them and didn’t bother with the button. I raced out of the room, down the stairs, through to the kitchen and to the back door where I pulled on my wellies without socks.
I dashed out the back door.
I didn’t hesitate to dash across the back lawn to the burning fire even as I saw Gray leading out two horses, smacking one on its rump, and both galloped toward the opened paddock.
Gray saw me and, running back in, he shouted, “Get in the house!”
Then he disappeared in our burning barn!
Gray was in there.
Our horses were in there.
Horses I fed, horses I watered, some of them even nuzzled my neck with their nose.
And the man I loved, who for seven years had been taken from me, was in there too.
And again, I didn’t hesitate.
I ran into the barn.
Flames licked everywhere, and if I gave them a chance, they would terrify me.
So I didn’t.
And it was hot, hotter than anything I’d ever experienced. The smoke was thick. And just the sound of the blaze burning was petrifying. That burn could burn me, that smoke could choke me and just thinking about it could paralyze me.
So I didn’t.
Gray, no longer leading horses out, just opening stalls, racing through them and shouting, “Heeyah!” saw me instantly.
“Get outta here, Ivey!” he roared.
I ignored him, rushed through the barn and did what he was doing. I opened an unopened stall and luckily the horse raced out toward safety without me having to prompt her. Then again to the next stall and again. The fourth stall the horse, one of the ones with foal, was backing against the wall, eyes wide and wheeling, front hooves making short, panicked hops. I remembered Gray telling me not to get behind a horse and there was no way I was getting in front of those hooves so I rushed cautiously to her side, put one hand to her ribs pressing in the direction of the exit, slapped her rump and shouted, “Heeyah!” like Gray.
It took three slaps then she heeyahed.
I got one more horse out before the horrifying sound of creaking wood and the petrified shrieks of penned horses penetrated my brain. Before I could locate Gray, he located me. His hand closed tight around mine and he dragged me toward the opened front doors.
We weren’t out of the barn when the back collapsed and I couldn’t swallow my terrified scream at hearing the booming crash and feeling the force of the wave of air and blast of heat that blew my hair forward.
But we weren’t back there. We were fifteen feet from the doors . . . then ten . . . then five . . . then we were out. The much cooler summer air hit me like a slap and I sucked in its clean air as Gray kept racing us away from the barn.
He stopped me, yanked on my hand and I looked up at his soot-streaked face.
“We need to get the horses in the paddock. They’re spooked. Be cautious. Don’t approach unless you get a good feeling. Guide them in, herd them in, chase them in, clapping and shouting, whatever you gotta do, but stay away if they’re spooked. Yeah?”
I nodded.
He let my hand go and took off. I looked right and left seeing horses all around. I approached one then saw Gray with another one. It was the one he rode often, his horse, a stallion, white with big brown splotches called Answer. Then I watched in astonishment as, bareback, he swung up then somehow wheeled Answer around and started to race through the area, herding horses.
I did my bit, dashing around and herding them toward him.
My work was done, all of the horses near the house were in the paddock and Gray was galloping off toward a couple that were further away when I heard the sirens.
But I didn’t look to the sirens. I looked to the still burning barn, the flames dancing high, licking the air. Another section had collapsed.
I looked to the paddock and counted.
Ten horses.
Numbly, my head turned and I watched Gray driving the two other horses toward the paddock.
With his horse and those two, that made thirteen.
Thirteen.
Thirteen.
Listlessly, I turned back to the barn.
Seven horses were dying in there or already dead.
Seven.
The sirens got closer. I heard shouts, men working and the red, blue and white of emergency vehicle lights flashed through the dancing light of the flames.
“Ivey!” I heard my name shouted but I stared at Gray’s barn burning, knowing which horses were in those back stalls, stalls Gray and I didn’t have time to get to. I’d fed them. I’d moved them to the paddocks. I’d even ridden two of them.
Two hands clasped my arms and pulled me away ten feet but I didn’t tear my eyes from the barn.
I was shaken and heard, “Talk to me, Ivey. Gray’s seein’ to business and I gotta know what went down.”
I turned and looked up at Captain Lenny.
Then I told him everything he needed to know.
“Gray’s shotgun blasted.”
Lenny’s entire face went hard in a way that, if I wasn’t numb with shock and sadness, would have scared me.
Then his eyes shifted to the dancing flames.
One hour, forty-five minutes later . . .
“I know what I saw, Len,” Gray rumbled and Lenny stared at him as uniformed officers shuffled around, and far away, in the smoldering remains of the decimated barn, firefighters cautiously circled, beat out, stomped out and sprayed their hoses to dampen the embers and keep any sparks from catching something else.
I knew this was happening but I only had eyes for Lenny and Gray.
This was because Gray had seen something this time.
And what he’d seen was Lenny’s nephew Pete running to his pickup and racing away.
“You saw him get in it?” Lenny asked quietly.
“Saw him runnin’ to the lane and jumpin’ in the truck,” Gray confirmed.
“You sure it was Pete?”
“Went to grade school with him, Len. Shared first grade, fourth grade and I reckon two dozen classes all through high school with him. Seen him in that truck at least a hundred times in the three years he’s had it.” Gray’s voice was low, rough and really, really pissed. “I know Pete when I see him, Lenny.”
“Fuck,” Lenny whispered.
“He burned down my barn and killed seven of my horses,” Gray stated, his voice starting with the same qualities but degenerating with every word. “Ivey didn’t help, twelve horses would have gone down. And, I’ll add, my woman was in there helpin’.”
Gray paused and a muscle jumped in Lenny’s cheek.
“You bring his ass in,” Gray whispered. “You get him in the tank, Len. You know what I’m sayin’ to you.”
Lenny stared at Gray and he knew what Gray was saying. The safest place for Pete to be was in jail.
Lenny turned his head to an officer and jerked up his chin.
That officer jogged to a cruiser.
Lenny avoided Gray’s eyes and mine as his went to the smoldering destruction.
Then he whispered, “Christ, boy’s got shit for brains. Always has.”
“This isn’t shit for brains,” Gray ground out and Lenny flinched. “Ivey was in that barn with me and I got seven horses down. Me and my woman are breathin’ but half the fuckin’ thing collapsed while we were in it.” Lenny looked back at Gray. “This shit’s gotta stop, Len. You got this one last chance to make it stop. You don’t, I’m takin’ measures.”
“Keep calm, Gray,” Lenny whispered.
“Fuck calm!” Gray suddenly exploded and I got closer to him as Lenny’s officers got closer to Lenny. “Did you not fuckin’ hear me?” Gray asked. “Half the goddamned barn collapsed with me and Ivey in it!”
“I hear you son, but let me do my work,” Lenny replied.
“Yeah, you do your work,” Gray shot back. “You got one last fuckin’ chance to do your fuckin’ work.”
As he was saying this, headlights bounced up the drive and all eyes turned to look.
Earlier, even though they had motion sensors, I had run into the house to turn on all the outside lights. We were on a ranch in the middle of nowhere but Cody men weren’t stupid. The middle of nowhere could still hold dangers, evidenced by a now destroyed barn. There were a lot of outside lights that shone all around the house so the space close to the house and then some was brightly illuminated. Therefore, as the shiny, long-cab pickup stopped close and the engine died, I saw it.
I also saw a man get out of it and I knew instantly he was a rancher seeing as it was the dead of night and he was still in a western-style shirt, Wranglers, cowboy boots with his own tattered baseball hat on his head.
“Fuck me,” Lenny muttered, and the officers and him all moved fast as I belatedly felt the vibes rolling off Gray.
Really bad vibes had been rolling off him but now they burned so hot they scorched.
I got closer, took his hand, and the minute I did his fingers closed around mine tight. It could be they did this because he was glad I had fingers to hold on to. It could be, from what I was getting from him, he did this because he needed to hold on to me so he didn’t wail on the newcomer.
“Who’s that?” I whispered, getting closer and pressing to his side.
“Jeb Sharp,” Gray answered tersely.
I sucked in breath and saw Lenny get up close to Jeb Sharp as the remaining three officers staggered themselves between Sharp and Gray, preparing, should Gray lose it, to lock him down.
Lenny and Sharp had words I couldn’t hear even if they weren’t that far away. Lenny shook his head then moved his body as if to block Sharp but Sharp shook his head too and rounded Lenny.
“Not a good idea, Jeb,” Lenny called after him as Sharp approached Gray and me.
Gray, already tense, went so solid I feared touching him would make him shatter. Still, I curled into him and put my other hand on his abs.
Sharp, astutely, stopped outside arm’s reach.
He was like his son, good-looking. But he was that way in the way Gray was. He’d be that way until he died. There were lines on his face that came from hard work in the sun and hard laughing often in his life. There was a burn in his eyes that came from not a small amount of anger and a hint of shame he couldn’t quite hide but he was trying. I knew he was Buddy’s dad and, one look at him, I still couldn’t help but like him.
“I’ll deal with this, son,” he announced.
“Time for that’s passed, Jeb. Got seven dead horses and no barn,” Gray returned.
“You’re smart, you’ll let me take care a’ this,” Jeb said quietly.
“He’s been gunnin’ for me since junior high and tonight he put my woman in danger. Not feelin’ like bein’ smart right about now,” Gray replied.
Jeb’s eyes came to me, his hand went to the bill of his baseball cap for a second before it dropped and he muttered, “Ma’am.”
I lifted my chin to him but no more and he looked back at Gray.
“Ask you one more time, Grayson, let me deal with this.”
“You do what you gotta do. Len’ll do what he’s gotta do. And I’ll do what I gotta do,” Gray stated.
Jeb Sharp held my man’s eyes.
Then he whispered, “Fair enough.” His eyes went to the barn and he kept whispering when he said, “Cryin’ shame.”
He was not wrong about that.
I pressed closer to Gray and Gray’s hand squeezed mine tighter.
Sharp looked through me and back to Gray.
“You need help cleanin’ up and buildin’, you call on me. I’ll send some boys,” he offered.
When Gray made no reply, I had a mind to suggest he didn’t hold his breath but I kept my tongue.
“Right,” Sharp muttered, knowing exactly what Gray’s non-response meant. He looked to me. “Mizz Larue, wish we’d met under more auspicious circumstances.”
“Me too,” I replied quietly.
He nodded. He looked at Gray. He sighed deeply. Finally he turned and walked away.
That was when I sighed.
Jeb Sharp got in his truck, turned it around and drove down the lane.
I felt some of the tension leave Gray’s body and he shifted us to face the destruction.
Wood barn, it went up like tinder, came down in no time flat.
“I’m gonna go make coffee for the firemen, honey,” I told my man.
“Good idea, baby,” Gray murmured, his eyes never leaving the barn.
I squeezed his hand. He squeezed mine back but he did it not looking away from his loss.
I let him go, took two steps away then turned and took two back.
Pressing again to his side, I lifted up until I was as close as I could get to his ear and whispered, “Say you love me, Gray.”
I rolled back to the soles of my feet and watched as he closed his eyes. He opened them and turned to me.
His hand came up, he cupped my jaw and his eyes moved over my face.
Then he said, “I love you, Ivey.”
I grinned a small, sad grin.
He gave me the same.
Then he bent and touched his mouth to mine, dropped his hand and I turned and went into the house to make coffee for firefighters.
Three hours later . . .
Dawn was hitting the sky, weak light beginning to glow through the window.
Gray and I had had showers but no sleep. We were in bed, Gray on his back, me pressed to his side, my head on his pectoral, hand flat and lightly trailing his chest and gut, his arm around me, hand in my panties cupping my ass.
We’d been there awhile, lying close, not speaking but also not sleeping.
Finally, I broke the silence by asking, “You okay?”
“No.”
I pulled in a breath. Then I slid my hand up his chest, lifted and turned my head and rested my chin on my hand under me.
He had four pillows bunched haphazardly behind his head and shoulders (this was his way, my man liked pillows) and his eyes dipped to me.
“Please don’t kill Buddy,” I said quietly. “Just got you back after seven years. I don’t want to spend the next seven visiting you in the penitentiary.”
His face softened but he didn’t smile.
Still, he replied teasingly, “You’re in the mountain plains of Colorado, dollface. No jury from these parts would convict me for killin’ a man who killed seven horses.”
His joke fell flat. I knew he saw it on my face just as I saw it on his but I suspected his was worse. He was a cowboy, horses were kind of important to cowboys.
I lifted up, pushed up closer, sliding more onto his chest, my hand moving to curl around the side of his neck, all as I whispered, “Baby, I don’t know what to do to help you.”
That was when he grinned. It wasn’t a big one and it didn’t warm his beautiful eyes the usual way but it still warmed his eyes.
His hand left my panties so his arm could close tight around the middle of my back and he told me, “You’re doin’ it, Ivey.”
I nodded and smiled.
Then I said gently, “I’m sorry, Gray.”
“Me too.”
“We’ll be okay.”
It was his turn to nod. “One thing I got is insurance. So, yeah, eventually, we’ll be okay.”
It was good to know he had insurance but that wasn’t what I was talking about.
“That isn’t what I meant, honey.”
“I know that, darlin’, and my response still stands. We’ll be okay in all ways. Just that right about now, when we need to crash so we can get at least a little sleep so we can face whatever the day’s gonna bring, you need to know that it’s all gonna be okay.”
He was right.
I tipped my face so I could kiss his chest. Then I repositioned and looked at him again.
“Do you get sleepless nights often?”
“Nope, work hard all day, sleep hard all night.”
“So, you waking up is unusual?”
“Can’t say it’s never happened, can say it’s so rare don’t remember when it happened last.”
“So what woke you?”
That got me a different kind of grin but he still wasn’t committed to it.
“Thought it was my subconscious reminding me you’d gone to sleep without your panties on.”
I grinned back and pressed gently, “But that wasn’t it?”
“If you’re askin’ if I heard somethin’, then no. I heard somethin’, I’d look. I wouldn’t start somethin’ with you. If you’re askin’ if I got a sense of somethin’, a vibe, who knows? What I do know is, awake or asleep, I’d hear that blast. I sleep hard but I don’t sleep so deep I’d sleep through that and I know since I didn’t the last time.”
“Mm . . .” I muttered, my eyes sliding away.
“Ivey,” he called and my eyes slid back. “We got a mess outside and a fight that was already pretty fuckin’ ugly that just got a whole lot uglier. We need to sleep so we can be prepared to face the day.”
He was right.
“Okay, honey,” I agreed and started to move to settle back into him but stopped when his arm gave me a squeeze and I focused back on him.
“I’m not used to sleepless nights but that don’t mean after what happened tonight, seein’ you run around a burnin’ barn, I won’t start to have them.”
I knew where this was going from my macho man rancher cowboy so I opened my mouth to cut him off.
He saw it and his arm gave me another squeeze.
“Let me finish, baby, yeah?”
I closed my mouth and nodded.
“You saved five horses,” he whispered.
I did. I did do that.
Gray wasn’t done.
“You runnin’ into that barn like that, workin’ to save those horses, this ranch, I didn’t like it and pray to God nothin’ like that’ll happen again. But I gotta say, wherever you were born and whatever you did, pool hustler, showgirl, tonight, you were a rancher’s woman and just like you, when you do somethin’, you’re the best there is.”
That meant so much, was so beautiful, my nose instantly started stinging and his face got fuzzy as tears filled my eyes.
He pulled me up his chest, ignored my burgeoning tears and ordered, “Now, say you love me, Ivey, kiss me then settle and go to sleep.”
I swallowed then whispered shakily, “I love you, Gray.”
“Now kiss me,” he whispered back.
I touched my mouth to his and he pulled me back down his chest.
“Now go to sleep.”
I put my cheek to his chest nodding and deep breathing.
I didn’t go right to sleep, it took me a while just as it took Gray but I eventually got to sleep and I did it before him.