He poked his head out of the bathroom, still rolling his stubborn, damp shirt down his torso. “Stay here?”
“Just for the night,” she clarified. “I finished setting up the guest room last week, so there’s somewhere comfortable for you to sleep.”
He took his time coming to a decision, and she wondered why. It seemed like an obvious choice to make. Stay the night, get the truck fixed in the daylight. What could make more sense than that? “Are you sure you don’t want to put me up in one of the other cabins?” he asked.
“No way.” She didn’t even second-guess herself. “They aren’t finished yet. It’s much more comfortable here. That way I can make you breakfast. Come on, it’ll be much better if you just stay here.” She opened the door of the guest room and gestured for him to check it out. “Let me tempt you, huh? Brand new mattress. Fresh sheets. Potpourri.”
He walked into the room and took a deep breath. She could feel him surrender, and she silently celebrated. “Fine,” he said. “But I’m only staying for the potpourri. The mattress and sheets don’t tempt me at all.”
“Impossible,” she said. She waltzed into the room after him, turned on the bedside lamp, tugged down the sheets, and fluffed the pillows until the bed was more than inviting. “No one can resist a bed this nice.”
“Really?” Cole stepped closer to her, and Kat instinctively took a step back. “Then why aren’t you lying in it right now?” He stepped toward her again, and she backed up just enough to bump the mattress behind her and fall onto the bed. “I guess you can’t resist it after all.” He laughed and offered her a hand to help her up.
She took his hand, but instead of pulling herself up, she yanked him down until he was right on top of her. “It’s too late,” she said. “You’ve convinced me. I’m sleeping here tonight, so you’ll have to stay with me or swap me for my bed. This mattress really is the best in the house.” She shifted her weight to bounceon it like she was testing it. “Great support, don’t you think? Doesn’t move too much. I think we can both sleep here quite comfortably.”
Of course, she was only joking—or, at least, she told herself she was only joking—but the way Cole looked at her made her think he might actually be considering whether to stay with her. She’d never seen him like this before. He was only an inch away from her, and his eyes were filled with so much desire. She’d been hoping to tempt him to stay. It turned out she was actually tempting him to do much more than that.
He confirmed her suspicion with a kiss that burned like fire. Before she realized what was happening, his hand was at the back of her head, his fingers tangling in her hair. Then he stopped, pulled back, and looked at her face, so many questions in his eyes. “Yes?” he finally asked.
Rather than answer, she pushed in and kissed him again. They were lying sideways across the bed, face to face, tongue to tongue. He pulled his still-damp shirt off and slid his hands around her waist, under her shirt, around to her back. Neither one of them was thinking straight. They were discovering each other for the first time, touching each other for the first time. Probably, they should have taken things a bit slower, but neither one of them was going to be the first to stop what was happening.
Kat was not someone who dated around a lot, so she had less experience when it came to her own libido. She had no idea how explosive her desire could become, how much of a lit fuse she really was. The fact that he was wearing her pajama pants only made things hotter. They were so thin, and he was pressed against her, kissing her neck and her shoulders. She reached down and pulled the drawstring to untie it in one swift motion.
At almost exactly the same time, Cole’s hand found the bra hooks at her back and quickly undid them. He kept checking in, she noticed, making sure she was OK. But she was more than OK. All she wanted was to feel him between her legs, so she told him, “Yes,” over and over again, so he wouldn’t have to wonder, so he wouldn’t even slow down.
Before she was completely undressed, Cole had pushed himself between her legs, his hand squeezing her thigh as he continued to kiss her skin again and again. She pulled him closer and bit his shoulder when she couldn’t take it anymore. And he picked up his pace, inside her now, bringing her more pleasure than she would have thought possible.
The man was passion incarnate in bed, and Kat moaned in response to everything he did. He brought her close to the edge over and over again, pulling away at the last second, teasing her until she begged for him to just let go. The second she finished, he did too, like he’d been waiting for her.
When he finally fell heavily on top of her, all she could do was mutter, “Wow,” and the second she did, he burst out laughing.
“Thank you,” he said before adding, “and the same to you.”
“This wasn’t exactly what I meant when I asked if you wanted to spend the night,” she joked. “But let’s do it again soon.”
He nuzzled and kissed her as they shifted to the pillows and made themselves comfortable. “Anything you want,” he said. “Just say the word, and I’ll give it to you.”
“I’ll remember you said that.” She smiled. “So, can I stay here tonight?”
He chuckled. “It’s your cabin.”
“Then, I’m staying. Will you stay, too?”
He paused, and she knew he understood what she was asking, as well as what she wasreallyasking, but was still too scared to say aloud. “I’ll stay at the ranch as long as I can. But I swear to you I’ll be here in the morning.”
They fell asleep tangled in each other’s arms, and Kat felt so safe that she slept better and had better dreams than she’d ever had before.
CHAPTER 13
KAT
Kat’s favorite part of her old job and her new one had always been video editing. There was something so satisfying and creative about taking a series of random clips and arranging them into a clear story. She’d decided to put the clips of the calves together into a story with a rescue angle, and the lambs into a story with the theme of getting them ready for children to visit them at the petting zoo. She was also doing a renovation-themed video—a before and after of each individual guest cabin. Picking the music for those was going to be fun.
Her mind was whirring, her thoughts going a mile a minute. All the time she spent with Cole only gave her more energy. By the way he spoke and acted, she’d thought he might be the type of guy to run as soon as things got serious between them. But they’d spent several nights together now, and he had come about as close as one could come to moving in without actually doing so. He only rarely went back to the motel, and she was gearing up to ask him if it didn’t make more fiscal sense to just stay here with her.
Truly, things were kind of perfect, and Kat couldn’t have been happier. Sure, he still had things from his past he didn’t want to talk about. He was still a bit guarded sometimes. But she chalked that up to him being a more private person than she was. Maybe he had some childhood traumas he didn’t want to relive, and she didn’t want to push him into sharing anything he didn’t want to share.
She finished up editing the lamb story early in the afternoon, and the clips were so cute, she decided to go ahead and visit the lambs themselves. That was one of the best parts of running a ranch like this, where it was totally safe to get attached to the animals. She could visit them any time to relieve her stress or remind her why she was working so hard in the first place.
