Authors: Starr Ambrose
She opened her eyes to find his gaze locked on hers. “Come here,” she said, reaching for him. He did, holding himself over her as he kissed her, a long, deep kiss that only increased the throbbing wetness between her legs. “Reese,” she said, leaving the rest unspoken.
His eyes never left hers as he reached between them, positioning himself. Then he lowered his body until his heat merged with hers and the thumping of his heart vibrated against her ribs as he slid inside her.
She closed her eyes again because it felt so good, and because looking at Reese made her think about
him
rather than what he was doing, which was too dangerous if she was going to keep this purely physical.
What he was doing was more than enough. He moved slowly, driving her crazy with increasing need. Hooking her heels over his thighs, she pushed against him, urging him to go faster. “More,” she whispered.
He kissed her, causing her to open her eyes. “Not yet.”
“Oh, God.” She half-laughed it, wondering how he expected her to not come if he kept moving like that. The urge building inside her was growing stronger with each deliciously slow slide.
He pushed into her gratifyingly hard and deep, then stopped. “Jesus,” he whispered, burying his face in her neck. She felt the strain in his shoulders as he held himself still.
“Reese!” She dug her fingers into his back, balancing on the brink.
“If I move, it’s over.”
She gave a hoarse, desperate laugh. “Move!”
He kissed her instead. Then he moved. His hips pumped hard and fast and she gasped at the sudden explosion of pleasure, arching into him as she rode out the intense waves. She felt him stiffen, felt the cool sweat break out on his back as he found his own release, then finally collapsed on top of her.
She breathed a long, satisfied sigh and wrapped her arms around him, unwilling to let go. If it was purely physical, there was nothing wrong with enjoying the feel of his body against hers, stroking the hard line of his back as his skin dried beneath her fingers. It was the warm feeling in her heart that she couldn’t examine. That would just complicate things.
He rolled off her and groaned happily. She sat up, smiling at his prostrate form and satisfied expression. The look he gave her in return was strangely amused. “What’s so funny?”
“Your hair. You have hay stuck all over it.”
“Oh, crap!” She had a sudden, horrifying image of what she must look like, hair in wild ripples from her haphazard finger styling, spiked with pale green pieces of hay. Lovely. Muttering swear words, she tipped her head to the side, swiping frantically at the still-damp strands.
Reese laughed and sat up. “Here, let me.” She held still while he pulled out alfalfa stems and tried not to think about how she must have looked lying beneath him, her shoulder-length hair sweeping up chaff like a mop. No wonder he was laughing. It was nothing like what he was used to seeing when he took one of his sophisticated Boston women to bed. It was a safe bet they didn’t smell like horse shampoo, either. An embarrassed flush warmed her cheeks. She wouldn’t blame him if he’d had his eyes closed most of the time. In fact, she hoped he had.
“There,” he said, plucking a final bit from the top of her head. He still looked like he was holding back a belly laugh. To make up for it, he took her face in both hands and kissed her, then dropped a light peck on the end of her nose. “I kind of like it, though. It’s you.”
Oh, great. Just the impression she wanted to make. But how he felt about her wasn’t supposed to matter, so she managed a weak smile. “I guess it is.”
“Hey, that’s a good thing.” He gave an affectionate tug to a lock of her hair. “You’re my country girl.”
Her stomach tightened. She was an interesting fling when he got tired of silky sheets and silkier skin. Not to mention hair.
Well, she couldn’t complain. It was what she’d wanted. There was no chance she’d feel emotionally tied to a man who considered her his amusing country adventure.
Reese hummed to himself as he drove home, something he almost never did. Making love with T.J. had been even more incredible than he’d anticipated. He wasn’t sure if it was because he’d never imagined doing it in a hay loft, or because she’d looked so appealing. There was no artifice with T.J.—what you saw was what you got. No hidden agendas, no carefully calculated social life. And no obsession with looks, right down to the unselfconscious way she’d turned the hose on herself and shampooed her hair in a horse wash stall.
Better yet, the way she’d let
him
turn the hose on her. Thanks to that hose, he’d already had a good idea what she looked like under that exercise top before she whipped it off. That was another thing he appreciated about her—she wasn’t overly fussy about time and place. He’d known women who were forward, even aggressive, about wanting sex, and not always on fresh, clean beds. But he’d never known one who would have taken her clothes off in a barn and lain down on a cushion of loose hay. That take-me-now attitude had been arousing. Not to mention the soft curves on her toned body. And her easy laugh. Hell, everything about T.J. aroused him.
She might have asked him to stay. It was just his luck he’d promised his dad he’d help move the hospital bed out and get his bedroom back to its original state. Michael Barringer had not proved to be a cheerful, cooperative patient, and since getting his walking cast earlier today, he wanted every reminder of his temporary helplessness gone. If it made him easier to live with, Reese was all for it. He just wished the timing had been better.
He pulled up to the house just as two men were rolling the folded hospital bed through the front door. From the driveway, his dad supervised, balanced on two crutches. Pointing one crutch, he called, “Watch out for the steps.” He turned as Reese walked up to him. “Thought you’d never get here. What kept you? Is there a problem at the resort?”
“No problem, I just stayed late to do some stuff.” Pocketing his keys, he helped the men move the bed down the steps, then load it into their delivery van.
Michael hobbled closer as the truck left. “What stuff?”
“What?”
“You said you stayed late to do some stuff? What stuff?”
Sex stuff, which he wasn’t about to say. Reese gave him a blank look as he mentally ran through the possible answers. “Payroll stuff,” he said, which seemed suitably complex and vague.
“You made Jeanie stay late to go over something that could have waited? She has two kids to pick up from day care.”
Hell, lying was complicated. “I didn’t need Jeanie, I was just reviewing some figures for my own benefit.” He bit his cheek, keeping the double meaning to himself.
“Why? Do you think there’s a problem with the accounting?”
He sighed. “Dad, forget it. There’s no problem. Everything’s running smoothly. Your people know their jobs, and I hardly have to do a thing.” That was overstating it, but his dad deserved a break from the worries of management, and the resort didn’t need two managers. “Come on, show me where you want your bedroom furniture.”
He walked behind Michael as they climbed the stairs, impressed to see him managing so well on crutches. Cutting ahead, he held the front door open. Michael glanced at him as he walked past. “You have something on the back of your shirt, son. Looks like hay.”
“I do?” He bit back a smile and did another mental scramble. “It probably is. I stopped by the barn before I left, and they were feeding the horses. Guess I got too close. I think those new stable hands T.J. hired are going to work out well for you.”
“How is T.J.? I haven’t heard from her in a few days.”
“Fine. She said to tell you that new guy, Scott, is capable of running the place until the new manager moves in, and from here on out you’re paying her for doing nothing.”
His dad chuckled. “She’s worth it. I really like that girl.”
Responding to that didn’t require any thought. “I do, too.” Since his dad seemed to be waiting for more, he added, “Too bad she didn’t want the manager’s job herself.”
“She’s got her own place to run.”
“So I heard.”
Michael stopped outside his bedroom and leaned on the crutches, watching him. “Said she doesn’t care to have a job where she just meets a lot of tourists.”
“Right.” Reese couldn’t figure out why he was getting such a thoughtful look, but it made for an awkward silence, so he filled it. “She told me she doesn’t like to work with people, only horses.”
That seemed to get some serious thought. “I don’t think that’s true.”
“I think you’re right,” Reese replied.
“She’s very outgoing, and has a lot of friends.”
“That’s nice.” He hoped one of them wasn’t a boyfriend, but he didn’t think so. Or if there had been one, Reese was pretty sure the guy was history after today. He didn’t like to brag, but that had been one satisfied look on her face.
“She’s good with people, too. I think she’s just pulling back temporarily. You ask me, that’s a woman who’s been hurt and needs some special care.”
“Uh-huh.” That had been Reese’s conclusion, too, but he wasn’t sure why his dad had given it so much thought. “Why are we talking about T.J.?”
Michael blinked innocently. “You’re the one who brought her up.”
Whatever; he was the one ending it. Talking about T.J.’s personal life felt too . . . personal. Besides, he had the odd feeling that he was missing something. This conversation was starting to remind him of talking with Caroline, full of hidden meanings, and he’d had more than enough of that.
“What’s for supper? Leftovers?”
“They’re gone. I thought you were going to bring something home.”
Damn, he’d meant to ask the chef before he left. “I forgot.” An unexpected situation had wiped any thought of food from his mind.
Michael shrugged. “Then I guess it’s bachelor fare. Pizza.”
* * *
T.J. didn’t know what excuse Beth had given for not coming to the barn with Tad, and she didn’t care to ask, not that day or for the week following it. She was just glad the girl had sense enough to stay away.
Tad could use a little of that sense, since she obviously wasn’t getting through to him. The picnic basket he set on the tack room floor started an annoying buzz in her mind. “What’s that?” she asked.
“Lunch.”
“It’s eight a.m.”
“Then call it brunch. It’s for after my lesson.” He reached inside, dispelling any doubt that she was included in his plans as he pulled out a bouquet of wildflowers and held them in front of her. “But the lady should have these now.”
She ignored the flowers that nearly brushed against her shirt, focusing her frown on Tad. “Tad, what didn’t you understand about
no
?”
“I heard,
Not now, Tad, I need to be persuaded
.”
The line would have been cute two weeks ago, when she hadn’t already said
no
fifty million times. “You think you’re irresistible, don’t you?”
“That’s what I’m told, and I have box office numbers that prove it.” He grinned like an unabashed little boy who was used to charming his way out of trouble, which was probably exactly what he’d been. When she didn’t take the flowers, he shrugged and laid them on the picnic basket. “No, huh? You don’t look like the flower type to me, but it was worth a shot.”
“Tad, has anyone ever refused you anything?”
He actually thought about it. “Not that I recall. It’s my special gift. But more to the point, no woman has ever been sorry she said yes.” He wiggled his eyebrows at her.
“Well, Tad, this is going to be another new experience for you, because I’m not changing my mind. And if you don’t quit hitting on me, I’m pulling out the big H word, and using it.”
“What’s the H word?”
“Harassment.”
She expected annoyance, or maybe confusion, but Tad nodded as if she’d suddenly made everything clear. “Okay, I get it. I thought I’d give it one more try, just in case, but I guess Beth was right. You’re a lesbian, aren’t you? Why didn’t you just say so?”
She stared. “I’m what?”
“Beth told me after last week’s lesson, but I didn’t believe her. Boy, I really missed on that one.” He laughed, shaking his head. “But, hey, we can still have lunch, maybe talk about the waitresses from the Backstreet Bar. I think a couple of them go both ways, you know?”
She blinked at his conspiratorial expression and thought about setting him straight. Then thought again. He’d finally found a way to accept her lack of interest in him, which was what she’d been trying to achieve for the past two weeks. She shouldn’t mess with a good thing.
“I have to pass on lunch, but thanks for understanding. Now how about getting Misty saddled up?”
“Sure.” He gave her a friendly punch on the shoulder and walked past her to get the saddle and bridle. She cleared her throat to cover a laugh. In a matter of seconds she’d dropped completely off his sexual radar. If she didn’t find Beth so repulsive, she’d thank her.
* * *
Reese met her at the barn again after work and suggested they go out for dinner. She insisted on stopping at her house first to change clothes. They never made it out of the bedroom.
He was there the next day, too, and the days after that. By the time two weeks had gone by, they were in a comfortable routine. She knew it had an end date, but it was getting harder to keep that in mind as their affair became a friendship. It didn’t seem to be a bad thing. How could friendship be bad?
It had been going on for over two weeks when he showed up at the barn at lunchtime in his suit and tie. T.J. finished hitching the manure spreader to the tractor, and looked up in surprise. “Hi.”
She’d gotten so used to seeing him after work and outside of the resort, that she’d nearly forgotten the businessman side of him. It was an uncomfortable reminder, but probably needed—he had another life where his off hours weren’t spent in a barn or eating burgers at Del Tanner’s Bar and Grill in Barringer’s Pass. The reminder was a bit unsettling. His serious expression was even more worrisome.
Reese glanced at Lexie, the girl driving the tractor, then back at T.J. “Can I see you in the office?”