My voice came out tiny and small. “Yeah. Let’s do that.”
Chapter 5
Thatcher
“Yeah?” I asked in surprise.
Shelby nodded her head. It was a tiny movement that would have been easy to miss if I hadn’t been looking for it… hoping for it.
She slammed back the rest of her wine, and more firmly told me, “Unless you’re not man enough.”
A wide smile split across my lips. There was the feisty woman I’d first met. For a second I’d gotten confused by the soft hint of humanity I’d spotted in her eyes.
But none of that mattered.
All that mattered was that she’d agreed to leave the party with me.
A man had to take action when a miracle like this occurred.
So I stepped forward and slipped my arm around her waist, then led her to the front door.
Sara came in at that moment, eyes wide and mischievous. She asked, “Shelby, are you leaving with Thatcher?”
Shelby nodded, with a soft lilt back in her voice. “Yeah. He’s going to walk me home. Will you tell Brook I’ll return her dress tomorrow?”
Sara grinned. “Don’t forget your purse!”
“Oh. Right. My purse.”
Sara handed it over, eyes darting between the two of us, reading the signals clearly.
Shelby and I were about to turn into this week’s gossip. Not that I minded. I liked the idea of everyone knowing she’d been claimed. There were too many single men in Deer Springs. And I didn’t wantanyof them to get any ideas about my woman.
I steered her right out the front door and asked, “Which way do you live, hon?”
She pointed north, and we started walking up the wide, old sidewalk.
Deer Springs had been built back when cars were still a rarity. So there were sidewalks everywhere, designed for actual walking.
The cold nip of fall was in the air, and I felt her shivering, so I slipped my flannel off and tucked it over her shoulders before sneaking my arm around her waist.
We didn’t say a word as we walked, the snap of energy between us saying everything for us.
We were going to fuck. And fuck hard.
Every encounter we’d had since she moved here had been building towards this moment. And my cock was firming in my pants, making them uncomfortably tight. I itched to shift myself but held back, enjoying the tight feeling of constraint, knowing that soon it would be even more constrained when I found myself in the tight cave of her cunt.
I’d never wanted to fuck a woman as badly as I did right now.
My grip slipped lower, dropping from her waist to her hip as we passed house after house decorated for the season.There were jack-o’-lanterns and uncarved pumpkins, Halloween decorations, and harvest displays. All of them highlighted by the swirling of leaves, fallen soldiers dropped from the deciduous trees in the neighborhood.
“Which way, Shelby?” I asked as we came to a crossroads, four directions open to us. Four possibilities for us to wander down.
Quietly, she said, “Left.”
What had happened to the fierce demon of a woman I’d met? The one who threatened men and made it seem like sport. I’d seen the wicked glint in her eye that day. She’d enjoyed threatening me and putting me in my place.
And the thing we both knew was that since that day, I’d picked up the trash from the law firm meticulously.
