Cowboy Up (Coming Home #3)

“You don’t even know me,” she gasps with wide eyes, correctly reading between the lines. I’d go through that bullshit again just to have one more taste of her. I have a feeling that after she lets those walls down and really lets me see her, I’m not going to feel any different.

“And you don’t know me. What I do know, though, is how I feel when I’m around you. I know what you feel like when you’re comin’ undone. How you curl into my side when you’re exhausted, your body trustin’ me without thought. I know you hate your feet bein’ under the covers while you’re sleepin’. And that I’ve never felt like I was comin’ and goin’ at the same damn time and not been pissed I couldn’t control the chaos of it.” I walk around the island and brush my fingertips across her neck until I’m cupping her head delicately and tipping her face up to look at me. “One night of being bad with you, Caroline, and I felt more with you in the darkness than I’ve ever felt with anyone else in the light. We might not know every little thing that makes the other tick, but you can’t deny our chemistry alone is enough to make explorin’ the rest worth it. I feel the pull to you like someone lassoed me around chest and yanked.”

“Just because we’re compatible in bed doesn’t mean we’ll be the same out of it.” Her argument is weak, since she’s staring up at me with hooded eyes and flushed cheeks that I know have nothing to do with her being embarrassed or shy. She feels it, that same yank right in the middle of the chest that is impossible to ignore anymore.

“How about we just figure out the rest together?”

“And I’m supposed to just . . . what? Trust a man I don’t know blindly?”

“You know me, Linney. Your body already trusts me,” I murmur as she jerks her head from my hold when she realizes she’s been leaning into me. “You feel that trust. You know my family and you know more about my past than even they do.”

She snorts, the sound cute as hell. “If we’re being honest, then yeah, I reckon I do know you. I know what you feel like between my legs and in my mouth. Other than what you told me tonight, I don’t know much more about you than how amazin’ it feels when you fuck me.”

I cough on the swallow I had just taken. I don’t know what was more of a shock, what she said, or that she used the word fuck. I knew that feisty princess was in there.

“Well aren’t you a little whiskey in a tea cup, darlin’? The most delicate thing you’ve ever held in your hand, but on the inside, there’s a fire just waitin’ to burn right through you. Tell me, Linney, tell me just how amazin’ does it feel when I fuck you?”

“I don’t know where that came from,” she squeaks, a mixture of mortification and disbelief in those big round eyes. As the silence settles around us, she makes another tiny peep through her parted lips before looking away from me.

With a smile, I reach out with a gentle touch and take her fidgeting hands out of her lap and guide her to stand in front of me. She continues to give me the top of her head until finally, looking up with no encouragement from me other than the soft circles my thumbs are making on the top of each hand, she looks me straight in the eyes.

“I enjoy the hell out of seein’ your skin turnin’ pink because you say somethin’ cute, Linney, so no more of that backpedalin’ because you think I’m not gonna like it when you speak your mind and sass me.” I bend, her eyes widening as I move. “Just so there’s no mistake, I find it sexy as fuck when you speak freely.”

She bites her lip while contemplating me. “I’m not used to bein’ able to say what’s on my mind, Clayton,” she whispers, the way she says my name—my whole name—hitting me in the gut before makin’ it roll with flutters. Jesus. “I never been with a man who allowed that.”

Once it stops feeling like the ground under me is shaking and I mull her words over enough to read between the lines, the pieces start to click together. And when I start arranging the things I do know, I don’t like what I see.

A small accepting frown tugs at her mouth and she nods, seeing understanding starting to bloom in me. “I don’t want to talk about what I’m sure is goin’ through your mind right now, but I can admit that you aren’t the only one who feels the pull, and if you really want to keep gettin’ to know each other, I promise I’ll tell you everything you’re wonderin’ about another day. Might not be on date two, five, or even ten, but if things start becomin’ more between us, I promise I’ll give you all of my ugly.”

Tucking a piece of her dark hair behind her ear, I nod. “You keep givin’ me the fire that burns inside that teacup, I’m gonna be fine waitin’ for you to be ready to give me more, darlin’.”

She slowly leans into my hand, still hovering at the side of her face, and this time the move isn’t something done subconsciously. “I don’t understand the connection I have to you at all, but I like how you make me feel.”

“And how’s that?”

She shrugs and smiles a small, sweet-as-fuck smile that makes me fight the urge to wrap her up in my arms and never let go. What the hell is this woman doing to me? I might not have the answers to explain it, but when she opens her mouth to answer me, I vow right then and there that I’m not going to let my past be a reason to cloud my future anymore.

“Safe. You make me feel safe, Clayton Davis.”





10


CAROLINE


“All on Me” by Devin Dawson

- -

“What’s the latest on the insurance stuff, Caro?” Lucy asks around a mouthful of fries.

“Yeah, Carrie, they seem to be takin’ their sweet-ass time,” Luke joins in, reaching across the table to nab one of my two pickles while he talks. I slap his hand away when he comes back for the other.

“Caroline,” I scold, saying my name slowly while looking between the two of them. “We’ve been best dang friends since I shared a dorm with you Lucy, but still years later, you two refuse to stop callin’ me childish nicknames. Caroline. C-A-R-O-L-I-N-E. One is mature, elegant even, while those nicknames make me sound like a badly pronounced Spanish dish or a five-year-old.”

Luke shrugs, lifting his hand to wave the pickle I hadn’t notice him successfully sneak while I was ranting away. I roll my eyes and reach for it, but he just laughs and pulls his hand farther away.

“That explains why you have a problem with callin’ me a nickname a five-year-old would have, seein’ as you’re always actin’ like one yourself, Luke.”

Lucy giggles, and I narrow my eyes at her. “You—”

Her hand shoots up, interrupting me before I can go at her too. “Calm down, Caroline. You need to get out of that thundercloud you’ve been stuck in.”