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“I saw that footage!”
“YouTube?”
“It was awful. You were like a ragdoll.”
“I know. I was there.” His laughter amazed her; she could only gape at him.
“How can you laugh? Didn’t you think you were going to die?”
“I did. But somehow I didn’t.” He finished his beer and set the bottle down beside him. “But that’s part of the job. A rare part of the job, but there isn’t a rider out there who doesn’t watch that gate get thrown open and know that he might be living his last seconds on Earth.”
“That’s crazy.”
“That…” His eyes sparkled, his grin widened. Her breath caught at the danger that glittered around this man, the thrill. It was like breathing in sparks. “…is the beauty of rodeo.”
“You miss it.” It wasn’t a question because it was all too obvious the man lived and breathed that kind of excitement.
“You have no idea.” He stared up at the sliver of moon that crouched at the edge of the junipers on the edge of the lawn.
Oh no. She set down her beer bottle and put her hands between her knees. If there was one thing she loved more than a handsome man in the moonlight, it was a sad handsome man in the moonlight. It was a sickness, she knew that, one more weakness in her already weak character.
She liked to think she could save men.
A doomed proposition every single time, but it didn’t stop her from trying.
She stood, her boots catching the dew from the grass, and turned to face him. He looked up at her, his eyes alight with interest, with a sexual speculation that made her entire body hum and purr. It had been so long since she’d been touched and stroked, and she planned on being noble right now and walking out of this house without having removed her clothes, but not without taking a little something for herself.
“Stand up, cowboy,” she said, feeling that same reckless thrill that always spelled disaster.
The moonlight danced in his hair, on the corner of his smile where it tipped up toward heartbreaking. Toward devilish and risky.
When he stood, his chest brushed her breasts and she gasped slightly at the pleasure/pain of her nipples getting so hard so fast. They’d barely touched and she was panting.
But so was he, and that was about the sexiest thing she’d ever seen.
“What are you going to do with me, Lucy?”
“I’m still deciding.”
“Take your time.”
Her hand found the hard curve of his biceps, the soft cotton of his tee-shirt brushed the back of her hand and her palm embraced the soft skin of his arm.
“I’ve decided.”
“Thank God.”
“I’m going to kiss you.”
2
Once, a long time ago, Jeremiah had been a gentleman. It was a point of pride in his life. He could afford to go slow or take his time. Or even refuse if the moment didn’t quite feel right.
And not just women and sex. He could turn down advertising contracts, another cup of coffee, a role in a movie. It didn’t matter.
He could be a gentleman because he was never desperate.
But then his brother-in-law died, and then his sister, and now he craved, every day, every minute, just a taste of all the things he’d turned away in his old life.
There was no abundance in his days right now. Every bone was rubbing up against another bone, his stomach growled, his body hurt and he went to bed every damn night hungering for what he used to take for granted. And now Reese was here, reminding him of everything he no longer had.
If this beautiful, sexy woman wanted to kiss him, he wasn’t going to say no. When maybe he should.
He should.
There was no maybe about it.
He was too old for one-night stands. And these days, with his three nephews inside, with the work involved in running this ranch, he had nothing left over. There was no time, no energy, no feeling to give Lucy except whatever she was going to take.
But there was no way in hell he was going to open his mouth and tell her all of that. Not when she was about to kiss him and he hadn’t been kissed in months.
Lucy Alatore had been a skinny girl on the edge of womanhood last he saw her. But the sparkle, the dare in her eyes, was still there, and that was what he could not resist.
Her long, elegant arms twined around his neck, and the sensation of her soft skin against the back of his neck made him ravenous for more. Ravenous for something sweet and soft and tender, just for him. Something he didn’t have to share or reject or postpone because three lost boys needed him.
The beer on her breath went right to his head and he waited, patient, but burning for the silken graze of her lips over his, and when it came it was like the chute had been thrown open and he was holding on for dear life.
