Chapter 29
Sky
A hand covered my mouth, jarring me awake. Immediate, brutal instinct took over. I lurched up, ready to kill whoever was holding me down. My thumb was perfectly placed to make my attacker hella sorry but then the scent of Rock’s skin teased its way into my awareness.
He had no idea how close he’d come to a broken hyoid bone.
I relaxed. “You smell delicious.”
“Thanks.” He leaned closer to me, letting the edge of his unshaved cheek rasp against mine.
“So you know, it’s probably not a great idea to sneak up on me when I’m asleep.”
“Sorry. I just got back. I was so happy when I saw you lying there, I didn’t think.”
The hot, sweet weight of his body on mine was making thoughts impossible for me too. My throat contracted as I opened my mouth to speak, but he pressed his lips to mine before lifting his finger to shush me.
I nodded that I understood. The walls in the bunkhouse were paper thin.
He got up and I followed. It didn’t matter where we were going. It wouldn’t matter, ever, because wherever Rock wanted to go, I’d follow.
We stepped out into the evening, footfalls soft on the packed earth between the bunkhouse and the equipment shed.
“The boss?”
“Still wait-and-see. Elena let me come back with Foz.”
“I’m glad.”
“Me too.” I took his hand.
After that, we didn’t talk. Sound carries and neither of us wanted to wake up the ranch’s residents, human or beast. Maisy crept out of the shadows to slink along beside us, and apparently she’d gotten the memo we were sneaking, because she wasn’t the usual curious, lively creature I’d come to know.
Maisy was probably tired. Her master showed exhaustion in the way his shoulders hunched, the hard set of his mouth, the dark circles under his eyes. I’d worried about him when he was away. But he was home now where I could look after him. Get him to eat something, maybe. Make sure he rested when he was supposed to.
Thinking about taking care of Rock gave me a strange feeling. Jitters slowed my steps. It took a minute to realize that I was feeling something close to joy. Not a bad thing at all, just outside my experience.
Rock put me off-kilter like that, all the damn time.
Once we were in the shed, I realized he had something specific in mind.
He’d gone out there first to set things up—little plastic lanterns glowed around a bunch of bed rolls, open and stacked on the floor to create a nest. He’d even gone to the trouble of gathering snacks and bottled water and Cokes.
“This is nice,” I glanced around, suddenly cold, suddenly nervous, since what he’d planned was pretty obviously romantic in nature and I wasn’t real sure I had a whole lot of romance in me. “You went to a lot of trouble here.”
“Wanted it to be special.” Clumsily, he pulled me toward him. Our noses, elbows, and knees met in a comic collision. “Aaaand, wow. That’s was so clumsy.”
We laughed about it.
“What do you want?” I dragged my shirt off over my head. He stopped my hands before I could undo the ties on my sleep pants.
“Nuh-uh. That’s for me to do.” Without taking his gaze from mine, he pushed me into the soft pile of blankets, easing down with me, crawling between my legs so I could feel the whole hard heat of him against me.
“Okay.” A helpless needy sound escaped me when he flexed and his hips drove into mine. “Oh God.”
Soft music started playing. Man thought of everything.
“You don’t have to work this hard.” The words came out huskier than I planned. “I’m a sure fucking thing, honey. You can have my mouth, my ass. You can—”
