RESCUED BY THE RANCHER (6 page)

“I had a fiancée, Faith. She was pregnant with
my child. And one night some asshole ran her off the road, some lowlife who’d
drunk over three times the legal limit.”

Faith’s eyes widened. “They were her clothes,
the ones you gave me, weren’t they? They belonged to her.”

Jake looked up at the ceiling. Talking was even
worse than he’d imagined it would be – so hard that he was already wishing he’d
kept his mouth shut.
“Yeah.
They were Rachel’s.”

She was nodding her head, crossing her arms and
shifting her weight like she had no idea what to say. “I’m sorry. I know it
doesn’t mean much or help, really, but I’m sorry for your loss.”

“It was a long time ago now.” Jake’s voice was
rough, deep. It didn’t even sound like him, but the emotion choking his throat
was thick. “Having you here has kind of brought it all back. Seeing Tom? It’s
reminded me of what I could have had, of my own son that I never even got to
meet.”

“You were having a boy?”

He nodded.
“Yeah.
We’d
just found out. I was at home painting the nursery and she’d gone out to get
something for dinner. We’d decided we needed takeout to celebrate the room
being finished. ”

“Jake, I appreciate everything you’ve done for
us, but I meant it when I said I’d find somewhere else…”

“No.” He as good as barked out the word. “No,
that’s not what I want,” he said, softer this time.

She tilted her face up to him, head on an
angle. “What do you want, Jake?”

“You,” he said, eyes never leaving hers. “
You’re
what I want, because I’m so damn
tired of being alone, of hurting, of thinking about the past. I want
you
, Faith.”

He walked toward her, gave her the chance to
back away, before taking hold of her around the waist, locking her against him.
Her eyes were wide, unsure, but nothing was going to stop him, not now he’d
made a decision to forget about the past.

Jake crushed his mouth to Faith’s, kissing her
like a desperate man.
Like a man on death
row with one last wish
. He cupped the back of her head with his hand,
tilted her head further back as he pressed his lips to hers over and over
again. Jake moaned as her tongue darted out to touch his, teasing him. Kissing
Faith was the best decision he’d made in a long time.

She relaxed into him, caught her arms around
his neck and pulled him down further, like she wanted him as desperately as he
wanted her. Faith’s mouth kept up with his – exploring, tasting – and Jake
couldn’t have backed off even if he wanted to.

Faith was going to tell him
no
, knew she should have pushed Jake
away, but she couldn’t.
Because it felt
right and it felt good
.
 
She was
ready to enjoy herself, to relax and stop acting like she was middle aged
instead of not even 30 yet.

Screw being sensible
.
Right now was about doing something that made
her tingle in all the right places.

“Jake,” she murmured.

He pulled back, his lips hovering away from
hers. “You want to stop?”

She shook her head, bottom lip caught between
her teeth as she looked into his eyes – saw the raw need there that she was
sure were reflected in her own. “Can we take this somewhere more private?”

Her son was asleep, and she didn’t want to
waste a moment alone with Jake. But she also didn’t want to worry about Tom
walking in if he woke.

“My room?” he
asked,
voice husky.

She laughed. “Why do I feel like a naughty
teenager all of a sudden?”

Jake moved so fast that she didn’t even see it
coming, scooping her up into his arms and cocooning her against his strong body
as he walked them upstairs to his bedroom. “Because we
are
being naughty,” he whispered.

He made a growling sound and kissed her on the
neck. Faith pressed her face into his shirt, refusing to make a noise, not
wanting the moment to end any sooner than it had to.

Jake kicked open his door, dropped her to the
bed and marched back to shut and lock it. She was only alone on the bed a few
seconds, but it was enough to make her nervous, to make her wonder if…

“Stop,” he commanded.

“What?” Faith asked, inching back a little
further against the pillows as he stalked closer.

“Giving me that look that says you’re thinking
about changing your mind.”

She laughed. “Was it that obvious?”

“Yes.”

He came closer, reaching for her hand as he sat
on the bed. Jake turned it so her wrist was face up and bent his head to place
a kiss there, so gentle it made her pulse race. He used the tip of his tongue
to trace against her skin before replacing it with his lips – soft, wet lips
that made her eyes flutter shut.

“Don’t think, Faith. Just close your eyes and
forget everything. This is just about us.
One evening just
for us.”
He sighed. “I know you’ve got your own demons, I can see it in
your eyes, but right here, right now it’s just you and me.”

She might have been close to pushing him away
before, but now? Now there was no going back. And she wouldn’t have wanted it
any other way. She needed to do something just for her for once.
Something indulgent.

“So we forget everything?” she asked, tilting
her head back and offering her lips to him.

Jake didn’t need to be asked twice. He leaned
in close, arms around her, holding her tight as he gently placed a kiss to her
mouth, slowly teasing her with his tongue, deepening their kiss as she moaned.

“We forget everything. Tonight is just you and
me.” He laughed as she pulled back and started pressing wet kisses to his neck
instead.
 

Jake pushed her, gently, on to her back. He
kicked off his boots and socks, unbuttoning his shirt at the same time. Faith
just lay and watched him as he peeled of his clothes, eyes wide as she took in
his thick, muscled arms, tanned dark from so many hours out under the sun. She
wanted to reach out and touch him, to pull him down on top of her, but she was
also enjoying the show.

“Faith?”

Jake’s low voice, the huskiness of his tone,
made her smile, even though it scared the hell out of her. She nodded.

“Just you and me?”

Faith grinned. He wanted to forget everything
else for a night?
Then game on.

“You and me,” she repeated, eyes trawling down
his almost naked body and then back to his face again.

If
only she was brave enough to tell Jake exactly what she wanted him to do to
her.

“YOU know I don’t usually do this kind of
thing, right?” Faith pushed Jake back, her palms planted firmly against his
chest.

He laughed. “I don’t care.”

Faith groaned. “But I need you to know. I’m not
a one night stand kind of girl.”

Jake grabbed her wrists and put her hands back
down at her sides. “And I’m not the kind of guy who asks girls to stay over, so
go figure.”

Faith smiled at the way he was watching her –
like he’d eat her up for dinner if he could, every last bite.

“Any other confessions?” he teased, keeping
hold of her wrists so he could trace a circle of kisses across her stomach.

She
needed to learn to keep her mouth shut.

Jake stopped. He dropped his head so they were
touching, nose to nose.

“What’s wrong?”

Faith’s face burned hot. She wished she’d just
been able to switch off the part of her brain that was freaking her out.

“It’s just, well…”
Damn it!
“I kind of had a pact with myself that I was sworn off
men, and I haven’t, ahem, been…”

Now he was grinning. “You’re worried you’ve
forgotten what to do.”

She
laughed,
it was
all she could do. That was one sentence she was pleased someone else had
finished for her.

“Something
like
that,”
she mumbled, grabbing hold of his shoulders so she could pull him down and bury
her face against his chest.

Jake gently pushed her back, settling down on
top of her and forcing her to look up at him. He held her gaze, steady, like
nothing would ever faze him.

“How about we take things slow? You tell me
what to do, what you like.”

She shook her head.
There was no way she could tell him.

Jake raised an eyebrow. “Or you could just tell
me if I do anything you
don’t
like.”

Faith smiled, but the devilish grin he gave her
in reply wiped the smile away. Because everything about Jake right now was
sinful, right down to the dimple he flashed her as he yanked her top up. She
let him, holding up her arms for him to remove it.

He went to reach underneath her to unhook her
bra, but she shook her head.

“No?” Jake chuckled. “I’ll let you keep it,
then.
For a few more minutes.”

Faith’s heart was starting to race, but she
wasn’t nervous anymore.
Now?
Now she was excited,
quivering with anticipation. Jake had made her pulse ignite from the moment
he’d taken her into his home, and there was no way she was backing out of this,
even if she wasn’t quite ready to strip naked just yet.

“Can we turn the lights off?” she asked.

He shook his head and grinned.
“Nope.”

Faith felt a flush ignite her cheeks.
“Compromise on the lamp?”

Jake stared at her, long and hard, making it
almost impossible for her to stare back into his dark eyes.
“Deal.”

He reached over and flicked the switch for the
overhead light without unlocking his legs from either side of hers.
It gave her the chance to look him up and
down, to stare at his stomach, the muscles that seemed to cover every inch of
his body.

“Like what you see?”

Now it was Faith laughing. “Yeah, maybe I do.”

Jake moved down her body, flicking a thumb
beneath the waist of her jeans as he unhooked the button, before starting to
slowly pull them off. He stepped off the bed to remove them completely and then
sat astride her again.

Faith was expecting him to finish undressing
her, but he didn’t. Jake just gave her a long, hard look – before lowering his
head and tracing down her skin with his tongue. It was hot and wet against her
stomach, teasing its way past her belly button. She gasped when he licked
around the edge of her panties, ducking beneath the lace for barely a second
before slowly moving back up her body. Now he was pressing kisses, slow and
delicious against her stomach and all the way to her breasts.

Jake suckled the soft skin of her breast before
raising his eyes, looking at her, and finally reaching to unclasp her bra. She
arched her back, never taking her eyes off him, until he slipped her bra off
and closed his mouth over her nipple. Faith swallowed a moan, biting down hard
on her lip as he suckled one and caressed the other between his forefinger and
thumb. She grabbed the back of his head, forcing him to stay there, to keep
pleasuring her, but the moment she did that he pushed her back down, held her
arms at her sides again.

She wanted to pleasure him, too, wanted to
give, but what he was doing to her? It was making her toes curl, making her
want to scream out his name,
which meant
she couldn’t stop him even if she wanted to.

“You like?” he asked, taking his mouth off her
nipple and staring down at her.

Faith nodded – she wasn’t capable of any other
response, given that he was already on his way down her stomach again, teasing
her with his tongue.

But this time she tensed, was nervous about
what he was about to do her, until…
oh
.
He’d skipped past her panties, was pressing kisses to her
inner thigh, stroking his fingers down her other leg at the same time.

 
“Jake…”

“Relax,” he ordered, hardly taking his lips
from her skin. “Just relax and enjoy.”

Jake let his fingers glide across Faith’s
thigh. Her skin was like silk and her lace underwear was enough to make him
groan – he hadn’t been expecting sexy lingerie, especially when 12 hours
earlier she hadn’t even owned a bra.

Stop.
Thinking about the fact he’d seen the very
pert outline of her breasts through her flimsy tank top while in his kitchen
this
morning,
and now he could move half an inch and
see the same full breasts bare, wasn’t going to help him slow down.

Jake slipped his fingers beneath the lace,
yanking her panties down and grinning at her gasp.
Faith was like a drug, an addiction he hadn’t even known he had until
now.
He let her kick them off the rest of the way before bending his head,
wanting to pleasure her before giving in to his own needs.