She felt like she was wishing on a star. Sadness washed over her. She wasn’t in Wildcat Bluff to find love. She was here to do a job—one that had turned out to be more important to the locals than she could have imagined when she’d arrived in town. She needed to keep her mind on business. Yet Trey beckoned to her with wine and so much more.
“Penny for your thoughts.” He glanced back at her as the last rays of the fading sun turned him into a dark silhouette.
She tried to plaster a smile on her face, but she wasn’t sure how far she succeeded in looking happy again.
“Come over here.” He held out a hand to her. “I’m lonely.”
She didn’t say it, but she was lonely for him before he was even gone from her life. They’d been born too far apart in too many ways to ever bridge the gap. Yet he’d made her giddy with happiness and she wanted to keep that feeling forever.
She walked over to him and he wrapped a warm arm around her waist, snuggling her against the length of him. He smelled of cinnamon, citrus, and his own unique compelling scent.
She laid her head against his broad shoulder and watched the sunset, savoring the specialness of the fleeting moment. Magenta, crimson, and orange streaked across the deep blue sky. Longing burned so brightly in her that she felt tears sting her eyes.
“Do you think you could be happy in a place like this? I mean, outside the city.” He stroked her waist with long fingers.
She caught her breath. How could he tantalize her with fabulous sex, endearing family, fascinating friends, and a beautiful home? After Christmas, he’d snatch it all away. She’d be left with what would now seem like a lonely life in an uncaring city teeming with millions of strangers. Of course, she had plenty of friends and acquaintances in Dallas. Cindi Lou was there. Her business was there. Memories were there. But Trey wouldn’t be there and that now made all the difference in the world.
“You don’t have to answer. I know what you’re going to say.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah. You’d be bored here in five minutes flat.”
She swallowed against the lump in her throat. “You’re so wrong.”
“Am I?”
“You’re here.”
“And?”
She hesitated—and took a chance on love. “What more could I possibly want?”
Chapter 33
Trey felt a great tenderness wash over him. He crushed Misty against his chest, stroking down her back with hands gone hot. He molded her to the length of him as night slowly fell across the ranch and wrapped them in a soft cocoon of gray shadows. He felt as if no one else existed except the two of them in this time and place of new beginnings.
He pressed a soft kiss to her forehead before he tilted up her face so he could look into her luminous eyes. She glowed in the soft, colorful lights of the Christmas tree, as if she truly were an angel come to Earth.
“Do you know how happy you make me?” His voice sounded low and raspy as if he’d delved deep into his soul to bring this message to her.
“Tell me.” She pressed a fingertip to the corner of his mouth as if to encourage him.
Yet no words came to him. Only feelings. He kissed her fingertips, and then placed her hand over his heart so she could feel the fast beat of his desire, the solid strength of his intent, the enduring quality of his love.
She answered him with no words. She clasped his hand and moved it from his heart to her heart. And he could feel the strong, steady beat beneath his palm—a heart that beat for him alone.
Still, he didn’t want her here under false pretenses so that she grew disillusioned with him later. It’d been so fast—their coming together—that nothing seemed quite real and yet nothing had ever seemed so real. He forced words to form in his mind and he pushed them out through reluctant lips. “You know I’m tied to my ancestral land.”
“Yes, I know.”
“Do you truly like it here?”
She reached up and softly cradled his cheek with the soft palm of her hand. “I feel as if I’ve come home.”
“But is this enough for you?”
She gazed at him with green eyes as bright as a Christmas ornament. “You’re all I need, all I want, all I desire.”
And her words were his undoing.
He kissed her, all gentleness gone in the sudden surge of heat and need that rocked him to his core. He nibbled her lips, feasting on her as he slipped inside her soft mouth to delve deep as she returned his kiss with her own urgent fervor. He couldn’t get close enough even as he wrapped her in his arms and felt her hands clasp his neck, then his shoulders, her nails digging into his skin through his T-shirt. He growled deep in his throat as he stroked downward and grasped her butt in his hands and pulled her against his hardness.