Chapter Thirteen
They kissed for ages, until Nicki’s lips were tender, her body burning up. She stroked Miah’s rough cheeks with her thumbs, savoring every taste of him. The movie was still playing, but she couldn’t hear it. The whole of the world had filled up with the sounds of their gasping and panting, with the rustle of their damnable clothes, the creak of old leather beneath her back as Miah thrust.
He was hard; she could tell that much, but little else. His belt buckle clicked against the button of her fly, hip bones digging into her thighs, so thrilling. She dragged her nails down his back beneath his shirt. He moaned.
“Too rough?” she asked.
“Never.”
“Let me know if you change your mind.” Nicki was known to get intense where sex was concerned.
“You make me feel so goddamn wanted,” he mumbled. “Rip me to pieces, if that’s what you want.”
She fisted his hair instead, drawing his mouth back to hers. His fingers dug into her skin between her shoulder blades, kneading, the other hand lost under the pillows, his elbow holding his weight, making those excruciating strokes of his hidden cock possible.
He groaned and spoke against her lips. “Fuck, you smell good.”
She’d felt silly even putting on perfume earlier and had nearly wiped it off, knowing she had a date with a rancher.
“So do you.”
Miah smelled vital and earthy, like a whole different breed of male. It made her feel different in turn, like a new woman. This could have been her first kiss, for how uncharted it felt.
“I’ve wanted this for ages,” he whispered between deep sweeps of his tongue.
“Me too.”
He slowed, then stopped, pausing above her, smiling, the gesture carving deep lines beside his lips. Combined with the gray in his beard and at his temples, he was about the most manly thing she’d ever seen. And that smile . . . so similar and yet so different from the one that had made her fall for him.
She couldn’t help but smile back. “What?”
“This is the best I’ve felt in forever. I’d forgotten I could even feel this good. Like there’s nothing going on in my head.”
“Was there ever?” she teased.
He retaliated, one hand flashing to her ribs, fingers wriggling.
“Ah! Fuck!”
He laughed and relented. “Knew you’d be ticklish. And keep your voice down—you’ll wake my mom up.” His own voice was a silly, conspiring whisper, an echo from a previous life, a simpler one punctuated by stolen teenage kisses and the threat of parental discovery.
“I was only kidding. Your intellect was never in doubt.”
He smirked. “Oh, it was. I was supposed to have a college degree, you know.”
“For ranching?”
“Mm-hm. A business degree, anyhow, or an ag degree, like my mom has.”
“Your folks pressure you?”
“A little. But I think they knew by the time I finished high school I wasn’t setting foot back inside a classroom.”
“And here I was, thinking I was entrusting my son’s punishment to a man who respected the system.”
He laughed. “I respect education. I just barely survived my own, is all.”
“Too many rules?”
He shook his head, letting his nose brush hers in the sweetest way. “Too many walls.”
She nodded, liking that answer. He looked right outdoors. “Do you actually ride a horse, as part of your job?”
“Not much. Not for any of my dad’s duties. Not when I was foreman, either, really—I was basically in my truck all day. But when I can, I like to crash the odd cattle drive. Not nearly often enough, though.”
“Shame. I bet you look very manly on a horse.”
He shifted to brace himself on both forearms. “Can I tell you something I’m deeply ashamed of?”
“Sure.”
“Last fall, half the hands got food poisoning. They were off their usual duties for three or four days.”
“Yikes.”
“I called in some temporary folks to cover . . . but not quite enough.”
“I see. And did you enjoy yourself?”
He nodded, smiling. “Best recent workdays I can recall, playing ranch hand.”
“Very naughty.”
“Hey, it’s not like I poisoned them myself.”
“But now that the idea’s been planted . . .”
He hushed her with a kiss, soft to start but deepening in seconds. Whatever they’d been talking about was gone like a puff of steam, Nicki’s awareness reduced to hungry mouths and curious hands, and the smell and sounds and weight of the most exciting man she’d ever had a chance with. In minutes, she was losing her mind. If she didn’t get him someplace private she’d explode and vaporize this entire room, and all its taxidermied voyeurs with it.
“Where’s your bedroom?” she whispered.
“Other side of the house.”
“I’d like to see it. If it’s okay with you.”
He pursed his lips. “It’s in the same wing as my mom’s room.”
“Ah.” Nicki was all for furtive and frantic, but she was also eager to get Miah, undiluted. She’d never been with a man quite like him; she’d hate to give him any reason to hold back.
“There’s a guest room,” he added, nodding up toward the second floor, the doors that overlooked the den. “It’d be way more private.”
“Show me.”
He got to his feet and took her hand, and together they crossed the big room and mounted the steps to the landing. He opened the first door, letting her hand go so he could fumble inside and turn on a lamp. It revealed a queen-size bed made up in a green–and-blue-checked quilt, an oak dresser, a woven rug. It was cold, but he strode to the thermostat and bumped it up. Nicki heard the click and whir as the heat kicked on.
Miah nodded toward the bed and extended a hand.
It was a squishy old thing, but not squeaky, she noted. Man, it was weird—and weirdly exciting—to feel this particular anxiety again, worrying somebody’s mom might catch you at it.
He joined her atop the quilt, their legs tangling and mouths coming together once more. Nicki did what she’d been itching to since they’d first started kissing, sliding her hand down his chest and belly, over his belt, seeking his erection through his jeans. She found him half hard, and was happy to remedy that.
“Nicki.” It sounded like a plea, mumbled against her cheek, and it set her alight.
“You feel good,” she told him, the chilly room forgotten as he grew stiff against her stroking palm.
“I want you. So much.”
“I want you, too. Not to presume anything,” she said, “but do you have condoms?”
“Yeah. Not here in this room, though. Other side of the house.”
“I brought some. They’re downstairs, in my bag.” Sadly. But it was still a shorter trip, and right now, every single step that might carry this body away from hers sounded like a mile.
“You sure you want that?” he asked softly.
“Positive. If you do, that is.”
A pause, one long enough to cool Nicki’s overheated head. “What?” she asked.
“It’s not a matter of wanting. It’s a matter of circumstances.”
She frowned. What did that mean? Something to do with her having a kid? To do with their agreement that this affair had to stay uncomplicated? She’d always assumed “simple” merely meant “physical,” implying that sex was on the table. “What circumstances?”
Miah didn’t reply right away. Though his gaze didn’t leave her face, its focus seemed to dull. “It’s tricky.”
She mustered a smile. “And here I thought the two of us were both after simplicity.” Hadn’t he known what she meant when she’d asked him to take her to his room?
“No, no,” he said, “it’s nothing like that. I want you, trust me. I want this more than I’ve ever wanted anything.”
“So . . .”
He sighed, smiling or maybe grimacing, his expression some tortured mix of frustration and amusement.
“What, Miah?”
He cleared his throat. “I’ve never actually . . .”
Holy shit. “You’re not a virgin?”
He slumped, face drawing back, eyes shutting. “No.”
God help her, she laughed. “Sorry. You just looked so serious.”
“I’ve never . . . you know. In, like, a bed.”
For a long moment, nothing but crickets. “Wait. You’ve never had sex in a bed?”
His cheeks darkened, if she wasn’t imagining it. “I’ve barely ever had sex indoors.”
She blinked. “Hold up. You’re not, like, an exhibitionist, or . . .”
“No, Jesus, no. I’m claustrophobic.” He seemed annoyed, but she could tell it was only covering up how embarrassed he felt, and she let it slide.
“I’ve been indoors with you. We’re indoors now.”
“It’s different, when things get intense. When you need to be relaxed, and focused, and into it . . .”
Ah, okay. Blood flow, quiet mind. She tried to imagine if the sexual norm reflected her own worst fear—that people routinely had sex with mice running across the bed. She’d need some reassurance. Or some distraction.
“So the indoors . . . it’s what?” She snuggled against him, speaking at his throat, smelling his skin. “Close?” she offered. “Warm. Tight . . .” She watched him swallow, felt it, heard it. “I can be those things, too, Miah. But I think you like being with me.”
“Course I do.” Bless the boy, his voice was so damn deep now.
“Let’s just see what happens, then.”
“I want this to be good, if we go there. More than anything.”
“It will be. It already is. Just come with me, okay? See where this ends up. And if we both get nothing more than hot and bothered . . . Well, what are the options, then? Where would you take me next time, if you could? Close your eyes and tell me where we’d be,” she said, speaking against his jaw. She felt him shiver.
“Outside. Under the stars.”
“That sounds nice.” Not half as nice as this bed felt, but if this odd and charming breed of dirty talk worked for him, she was all for it. “How do we keep warm?”
“Fire.”
Okay, that was pretty fucking sexy, she had to admit. “What are we laying on?” She snaked a hand low to cup his cock through his jeans.
“Oh.”
“Tell me.”
Another swallow. “Blankets. Thick ones, spread out over the sage grass.”
Nicki added that fragrance to the fantasy unfolding in her mind. In it, Miah’s bare skin was painted gold by that fire, those black eyes reflecting the lapping flames. She imagined dry, crackling heat on one side, a cool breeze caressing the other, raising goose bumps. “Are there clouds?”
“Not a one.”
“The moon?”
“Just like it was the first night we kissed.”
She sketched it into the picture, a perfect opal circle rising high above them, painting everything not gilded by the firelight a ghostly blue-silver.
“Get on top of me,” she said. “I want to see the stars.”
She caught his smile as he took the order—a tight, beguiling little smirk that she hoped marked his surrender to her game. I’ll prove you wrong about this claustrophobia bull if it kills us both, she vowed.
“Hang on.” Looking steeled and businesslike, Miah suddenly left the bed, then the room. Nicki listened to his steps as they moved to the stairs and down, through the den. He reappeared with her tote and she took it from him, finding the two condoms she’d tucked into her wallet. She set them on the table beside the lamp. “Just in case,” she reminded him. “Wherever we end up, that’s where I want to be.”
He nodded once, not seeming like a man who relished reassurance. She made a note of that, deciding the dirty talk was a better strategy.
Miah braced himself above her and the second his erection pressed between her legs, every last ounce of rational thought abandoned her. Fuck, she wanted him. Needed him so badly, so deeply and fully in her body, she didn’t think she’d ever known an ache this sharp, desire bordering on pain.
“How big is this fire you’ve built us?” she murmured.
“Huge. A bonfire.”
She could all but hear it crackling, the sound layered behind his panting breaths and the sounds of their kissing.
“Is there wind?” she whispered. “Aren’t you cold?”
“I’m burning alive.”
Heat chased through her at the thought. “Take your jacket off.”
Miah stood, getting that and his shirt off with such fervor, one might’ve thought they’d been strangling him. His body was beautiful, spare and muscular, with a sharp tan line at the base of his neck, softer ones at his biceps and wrists. A little chest hair and a soft dusting on his forearms, a thin line trailing from his navel to his fly. So fucking gorgeous.
She peeled her own sweater and tee away, hoping he was even half as awed by what she bared. His eyes said he was. They’d been darting and frantic before, but now they slowed, making a long journey over her belly and breasts and whatever else he saw. He swallowed, and that single gesture trumped every compliment she’d ever been given.
“Come here,” she said.
Again, the dip of the bed as his body joined hers, and a fresh thrill crackled through her. They lay on their sides, hands seeking skin, lips seeking lips.
Between kisses she told him, “I want you so bad it hurts.”
“Me too.”
“Let me feel you.”
“How?”
“Kneel back a sec.”
He did and Nicki got her jeans and panties off like they were on fire. Looking mesmerized, Miah took the cue, leaving the bed to push his shorts to the floor. Nicki took him in, every bare inch of that extraordinary workingman’s body. The lamp even felt like firelight somehow. Two pairs of eyes moved across two bodies in hungry wonder. She hoped he’d been imagining this moment just as she had—as intensely and for just as long. Since the day I made him smile, her memory echoed.
They came together, him on top, everything multiplied. His bare cock was against her and she could feel how wet she was. She hoped he felt it, too. He was thick, blazing hot, sinfully hard and pressed flush to her labia. Her clit throbbed, begging for friction.
“Sure this isn’t too fast?” Miah asked. From another man—some urbane thing with a Master’s and a leased Audi—it would’ve been a cloying question, too sweet, too patronizing, too sensitive. But Miah was panting. What he wanted was permission, nothing more, and she’d give him that, eagerly.
“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted this. It can’t possibly happen fast enough.”
His laugh was silent, the breath of it heating her skin. “Good to hear.”
With that, it was on. Hands explored and mouths tangled. Nicki was barely aware of any of it, too fixated on the press of his cock against her, growing slicker by the moment. He could shift his angle and be inside her quicker than either of them could blink.
“Are we still outside, under the stars?” she whispered.
He smiled down at her. “No. We’re right here.”
“Well, well.”
“Yeah. Trust me, you’re blowing my mind on all fronts tonight.”
“Feel free to return the favor.”
He laughed. “That a challenge?”
“Could be.”
After that, neither spoke for some time.
Those deep kisses had her fidgeting, grasping, aching all over. She explored his beautiful body with her palms and fingertips, stroking, squeezing, grazing. And then, without a word, he leaned back and took the condom from the table. She watched him roll it on, holding her breath. Their gazes met and retreated, met again as he lowered back down. She held his shoulders as he angled his cock and found her lips, her fingers curling, nails digging as he eased inside her.
She murmured his name. He spoke hers so quietly, it could’ve been a whispered prayer. He sank deep and stayed there, making her feel quenched and ravenous at once. This man, above her, his scent all around, his flesh claiming hers . . . She’d forgotten how sacred sex could feel, how real and how right, how essential. And she’d forgotten how hard a man could get, and how fucking good that made her feel, as a woman.
“You feel amazing,” she told him.
“You too. It’s been ages since I’ve been this way with someone.”
“Me too. And I’m glad it’s you.”
He grunted softly at that, then began to move. Slow to start, the thrusts deliberate, explicit. He looked down between them and Nicki did the same.
“Tell me what you like,” he said.
“Fast, eventually. Don’t rush, but eventually, fast. A little rough.”
“Rough?”
“Vigorous,” she revised. That word would’ve felt silly, had she not been out-of-her-mind horny.
“I can do that.”
“And noisy. As noisy as you’re comfortable with.”
“We ought to take this outdoors then,” he teased, finding a smooth, steady pace.
“Next time, you strange man.”
“I’ll hold you to that.”
They got lost in the sex, Nicki guiding Miah’s motions with her hands on his hips until he was giving her exactly what she needed—quick, taut thrusts that jolted her in that delicious way, making her sex pulse and clench.
“Can I get on top?” she begged when all that taunting contact went from tease to torture.
“Course.” He backed off, arranging a pillow and sitting with his back to the headboard. Nicki straddled him and he helped guide her until she’d sunk down, owning him to the hilt.
He muttered, “Fuck,” and she grinned to herself to hear him this exasperated, proud to be the woman to have done it to him.
“Can you . . .” She took his hand and led it between them, turning his palm so that the pads of his fingers brushed her clit. She shivered to feel that rough, callused skin. Damn, she’d missed a man’s touch. No sex toy she knew of could offer a woman this.
“Good?” He kept that hand still and Nicki began to move, feeling his cock stroking her inside, his fingertips completing the arc, lighting her up.
“Perfect.”
“Take whatever you need.” His free hand moved to her shoulder, kneading softly. Even with her eyes half closed she felt his gaze all over her body, real as his hands.
She reached back to unclasp her bra, then tossed it to the floor. “Touch me.”
His palm stroked along her neck, then down over her collarbone to hold her breast. Her breath caught. Her eyes shut. Her motions grew wild and greedy, pussy owning him deeply, clit spoiled by his touch each time she drew back.
With her body catered to, all that was missing was the sight of him. She opened her eyes and drank him in. This body, tensed and tight, even in repose. That gorgeous face, those coal-dark eyes, his full lips parted and panting. And now, suddenly smiling.
She smiled back, feeling shy and liking it. “What?”
“You’re so fucking beautiful. And you feel so good. I’d give anything to make you come.”
“I don’t need much. Just this.” Their angles were so right, and so effortless. This position had always been her secret weapon, but she didn’t think she’d ever been with a guy who fit so exquisitely the very first night. This could have been their tenth time in bed together for how familiar his body felt.
“Use me,” he whispered, his attention dropping to her breasts, her belly, the spot where his fingertips taunted. She could tell from the way he said it, the idea excited him.
Nicki was holding the headboard, but she freed one hand, drawing her fingers through his hair, then clutching it. Not too rough, but not shyly, either. She let this touch tell him You’re mine. She let her hips work him faster, harder, claiming his cock in eager strokes.
“Oh. Nicki.”
“Miah.” She’d imagined this any number of times, imagined it the way you did when you never expected to actually wind up in bed with a person. Imagined it ridiculously, cinematically good, and yet . . . Goddamn, the reality of him blew her fantasies clear out of the water.
Her pleasure was building, and fast. Her body grew graceless, any show she’d been putting on for him falling aside in favor of the chase. For so long she’d anticipated kissing this man, touching him, feeling their bodies come together, but now those needs changed, becoming simpler and starker. She was beyond the seduction and the details. She needed to come. That need was the entire world.
It wasn’t lost on him. Those panting breaths steamed her throat and she felt his restless hips shifting, dying to thrust. Knowing he wanted to feel used, she hoped that frustration was nothing short of ecstasy.
His voice was a harsh rasp just below her ear. “You gonna come for me, honey?”
“Yeah.”
He moaned, the sound edging her that much closer.
“Fuck, let me hear you, Miah.”
Another moan, then the mantra of her name, spoken so close, so quiet. She liked her men vocal, dirty-mouthed, downright noisy, but these private whispers . . . They trumped everything.
“Tell me how you’ll want it,” she mumbled, lost, “when it’s your turn.”
Another moan. “Fuck, I don’t know. Maybe like this. Maybe you, doing just this, making me come. Or me on top.”
“How would you be?”
“Rough, how you like it. Fast.”
“I’d want to see it,” she admitted, blushing all over from the thought. “When you get there, I’d want you to pull out and let me watch.”
His face transformed at her words—a man going from excited to teetering in a breath. Her own body followed suit.
“Miah.”
“Tell me what you need.”
“Just exactly this. Exactly what you’re doing. And your voice.”
“You’re so fucking sexy. Tell me you’re close.”
“So close.”
“Come for me, honey.”
She groaned. He couldn’t call her that enough. She spoke his name, drank in his words, then his moans when coherent thoughts abandoned him. The pleasure drew tight, hot, almost painful, almost, almost, until finally—
“Miah. Fuck.”
“Yeah. Take what you need.” He kept it all up, his hands working until suddenly it was too much. He sensed it, pulling her body tight to his as the spasms rolled through her.
She came for a long time, longer than she’d remembered possible after all these lonely years. When the climax finally ebbed, she crumpled against him, wrung out and high and giddy. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
He chuckled softly and stroked her hair, though she could feel his cock inside her, hard as steel, pulsing and impatient.
“Now you,” she said.
“Lay back.”
She moved to the side, her legs like Jell-O, and welcomed him atop her.
“I want to give you exactly what you said,” he whispered, easing back inside.
“Good. Show me that.”
It didn’t take long. She watched and felt him coming apart above her and marveled at his strength and his body, the sweet anguish written across that handsome face as he chased his pleasure. She held his arms, feeling the power there and feeling powerful herself, to think she’d driven him this wild.
“Nicki, God.”
“Whatever you want, take it.”
He groaned, hips racing, expression strained and disbelieving. His hammering body halted. He pulled out and stripped the condom with a crazed motion, stroking as he lost himself across her belly.
“Miah.”
He groaned and gasped, and finally stilled. He dropped to his elbows, resting his face against her throat, breaths rushing.
She grazed his back with her fingertips, listening as his breathing grew slower, deeper, smoother. Finally he sat back, looking around them deliriously. He spotted his undershirt and wiped her skin, shooting her a bashful sort of smile.
She turned onto her side and urged him to join her. They kissed for a time, the contact lazy and goofy, punctuated here and there with a delirious sigh or sweet cuss.
He scrunched her hair. “Goddamn, I like you. You, as a person, and having sex with you.”
She laughed. “Thanks for clarifying.”
“Seriously, you’re . . . You are so fucking sexy. The way you know exactly what you want, and you’re not afraid to ask for it.”
“You make me sound so liberated . . . But really, I just get sort of mouthy when I’m horny.” She giggled, feeling silly and smitten, a hundred pleasant things. “My filters just go out the window.”
“I’m glad they do.”
“You been with a lot of shy girls?” she asked.
“Not especially. A couple. My share of mouthy women, too, I suppose. But you . . . Jesus, it’s hot.”
“Glad you think so.”
He sighed, gaze rolling up toward the ceiling. “Fuck, I’m going to be such a shitty boss after this. This, clogging up my brain with distracting thoughts, on top of all the other clutter and the sleep deprivation . . .”
“Worth it, I hope.”
He kissed her throat. “A hundred times over. Just saying, if you were considering taking up cattle rustling, this would be the week. I doubt I’d even notice.”
After a long pause, she asked, “You think we’ll do this again?” The hope was right there in her voice, unmistakable. She suddenly felt more naked than she already was.
“I sure hope so. If you want that.”
“I do.”
He nodded, a dip of his bearded chin. His eyes sought hers. “Good. So do I. And to be honest, I needed it. More than I even realized. Not, like, biologically or whatever. Not like . . .”
“I think I know what you mean. In fact, I know exactly what you mean. And you’re right,” she said. “When you’ve gone a long time without being sexual with anyone, then you are, and it’s really, really good . . . It’s like you’d gone for ages without eating or something. Without breathing. I mean, I feel fucking high right now, if I’m honest.”
Miah laughed. “Careful, Deputy.”
“I know. I’ll have words for you if this sex has me failing a drug test.”
“Take it out on me with our clothes off,” he said. “That’s all I ask.”
“Don’t think I won’t.”
They lay without speaking for ages, trading kisses and touches, bodies cooling. Nicki could feel the minutes slipping away, the reality of parenthood solidifying as the spell of the sex waned. Not that Matty was a baby anymore, apt to need her in the night. But a mother had a certain timer always ticking inside her, never letting her forget where her true place was, ultimately.
“I should get going soon,” she whispered, stroking Miah’s back.
He didn’t reply.
“Miah?” she drummed her fingertips along his spine, and his eyes blinked open.
“Mm?”
“I ought to get going.”
“Of course.” With a grunt, he sat up.
They dressed, exchanging sneaky, smirking glances, openly admiring each other’s bodies before the clothes wrecked their fun.
“This was . . . This was exactly what I needed,” Nicki said, plucking a bit of lint from her sweater.
“Me too.” He held her gaze as he buckled his belt, and heaven help her, the deft motions of his hands had her feeling weak all over again. “Let me walk you out.”
“Thanks.”
He pocketed the condom wrapper and the second, untouched one, smiling at her. “Never know when we might need this.”
“You never know. And I’m sure cowboys value preparedness, same as Boy Scouts.”
“Deeply.”
He stripped the cases off the pillows and gathered up the bedspread, then followed Nicki downstairs. She collected their glasses and the wine bottle while Miah retrieved the DVD.
“Verdict on Blazing Saddles?” he asked, handing the case over.
“For Matty? Not anytime soon. Though it is pretty fucking funny.”
They both fell quiet as they swung by the kitchen to stash the evidence—the glasses in the dishwasher, the wine bottle in the door of the fridge. Nicki smiled to herself, enjoying this sneaky feeling. Plus the stakes were low—should Christine suddenly appear at the threshold, it would be a little embarrassing, nothing more. The woman seemed discreet, and Nicki suspected she’d probably approve. Or hoped she would, anyhow.
Miah held the door and Nicki stepped out onto the porch, waking the motion sensor light, the night so much colder than when she’d arrived. Or maybe just that much colder with the hot charge of anticipation finally burned away.
Anticipation’s nice, but memories are just as good. Particularly the memories Nicki would be using to warm herself on the drive home.
They walked to her car, their steps dawdling as they got closer. She felt his hand at the small of her back.
“Thanks for inviting yourself over,” he said.
She laughed. “Damn, that’s accurate, isn’t it?”
“Yup. But you won’t catch me complaining.”
She unlocked her car, then turned, leaning back against the door and smiling at him. “You ought to think twice about taking up with fast women. Especially out-of-towners.”
“I’ve been doing altogether too much thinking lately,” he countered, stepping close. “And tonight it was awful nice turning things over to instinct.”
“Well said.”
He kissed her lightly. “Mm.”
She ran both her hands over his beard and his hair, then gently pushed him away so she could open her door. “Goodnight, Miah.”
“Night, Deputy.”
She shot him a little glare at that, then dropped, smiling, into her driver’s seat. She shut the door.
“Drive safe,” he mouthed.
She offered a wave, then washed the lot in her high beams, buckled up, and backed out and away.
Miah lingered in her rearview, then her side mirror as she turned onto the road. And he’d linger in her memories for a long, long time that night, before she’d finally fallen asleep.