Page 16 of Saved By the Mountain Man Ranger

"You can write later."

Something in my voice must land because she looks up, studies my face, reads whatever she finds there. The laptop closes. She stands, takes my offered hand, follows me through the screen door into the cabin.

The bedroom smells like both of us now. Cedar and cocoa butter. The quilt is the one she brought from Denver, folded at the foot of my bed. Her things on the nightstand. My things on the dresser. A room built for one that has, somehow, expanded to fit two.

The flannel comes off over her head. Underneath, just a tank top and underwear. Her body in the afternoon light. Full breasts, soft stomach, hips that curve under my hands when I pull her close. Eight months, and the sight of her still makes my mouth dry.

"You're staring," she says.

"I'm always staring. You just don't always catch me."

Her laugh dissolves when my mouth finds her neck. That spot below her ear where her pulse jumps. My hands pull the tank top up, thumbs tracing the undersides of her breasts before I strip the fabric over her head. She's not wearing a bra. My mouth drops to her left nipple, tongue circling, teeth grazing, her back arching into me.

"Bed," she breathes.

We fall onto it together. My jeans come off. Her underwear, plain blue cotton today, slides down her legs. She pulls me over her, and my cock presses hard against her inner thigh while I hold my weight on one arm.

"Wait." I reach for the nightstand drawer.

Her hand on my wrist stops me. "Don't."

My whole body goes still. "Eliza."

"I stopped taking the pill two months ago. I was waiting for the right time to tell you." Those dark brown eyes on mine. Open. Certain. "If you want this."

The air leaves my lungs. My forehead drops to hers. "If I want this."

"Do you?"

My hand spreads across her stomach. Flat, warm, soft. I press my palm there, imagining. A kid. Our kid. On this mountain. Running through these trees. Growing up with this sky.

"Yeah." The word comes out wrecked. "God, yeah."

No condom. First time bare. When I push inside her, the sensation is so raw, so immediate, that my vision blurs. Every nerve ending alive. Her pussy is hot, tight, gripping me with nothing between us. Her legs lock around my waist, heels pressing into my lower back, pulling me deeper.

"Fuck, Eliza." My jaw clenches. "You feel incredible."

Her nails rake down my back. My hips find a rhythm, slow at first, grinding deep so she feels every inch. My thumb finds her clit between our bodies, circling in time with each thrust. She gasps, her hips rolling up to meet mine.

"Harder."

I give her harder. Bracing both hands on the headboard, driving into her with strokes that make the bed frame hit the wall. Her breasts bounce with every thrust, and I lean down to take one nipple in my mouth, sucking hard while my cock fills her completely. The sounds she makes are raw, unfiltered. Not the careful sounds of a woman performing. The real sounds. The ones that come from the belly.

"Right there. Weston, right there, don't stop."

Lifting her hips, I change the angle. Her eyes fly open. My cock hits the spot inside her that makes her voice break, and I stay there, grinding, circling, watching her face as the orgasm builds. Her pussy clenches around me, the tightening making every thrust more intense without the barrier of latex.

"Come for me, baby." My thumb presses her clit firmly. "Wanna feel you."

She shatters. Back bowing off the mattress, mouth open, pussy pulsing around my bare cock in waves that drag me right to the edge. Watching her come undone, knowing I'm the reason, knowing this woman chose my mountain and my silence and my rough hands over everything easier, is enough to end me.

My orgasm tears through me. Deep inside her, nothing between us, my body pouring into hers with a groan I feel in my teeth. Her arms lock around my neck, holding me through it. Both of us shaking. Both of us breathing hard.

The aftershock rolls for a long time. My forehead rests against her collarbone. Her fingers trace lazy circles on the back of my neck. Outside, a hawk screams across the valley. The pine trees creak in the wind. The mountain does what it always does. Endures.

"I have something else," I say against her skin.

"If you say a ring, I'm going to cry, and I just stopped crying about Mrs. Farrell."