“Hmm. You sure are ready, aren't you?” Despite the knowing words, his tone was casual. Something danced beneath it, though, that set Claire's nerves on fire again.
Finding her voice, which came out slightly scratchy, she said, “I'll be too ready if you keep doing this.”
Tate laughed, the rich sound of it surrounding Claire in warmth. “One thing at a time, then, darlin'. So. Let's introduce you to Luna.”
To her surprise, he gently steered her in the direction of the tall, two-colored horse. “Luna?” she asked, tentatively reaching out her hand, expecting the creature to throw up its head in alarm and strain away from her. But the beautiful animal merely sniffed delicately at her touch. She smiled in utter delight. “Does this mean she likes me?”
Tate's hand gently rubbed her lower back in reassurance. “She sure does. Luna's a sweet girl. She'll take good care of you today.”
“I thought I'd be on the smaller one.” Claire eyed the other horse, who looked back at her with its large, velvet brown eyes.
“Not today. Maybe someday, if we manage to make a decent hand out of you.” Tate untied Luna from the side of the trailer and, gently steering Claire on his other side, walked them both several feet away.
“Hand?” Claire asked, mystified. She reached out again to Luna, this time to pet the horse's pretty neck.
“Like a ranch hand. Someone who's good with horses.”
Claire snorted. “All I've done around a horse is drool at them in movies and books. If you expect me to be your ranch hand, you might be taking on a bigger challenge than you think.”
Her sweet dark cowboy looked at her, a flicker of something hot and smoldering in his gaze. “I have no illusions about what a challenge you are, darlin'. But,” and that perpetual twinkle returned to his eyes, “I do know how to sweet talk the horses. Guess it'll work on you, too.”
A surprised laugh huffed out of her. No matter how much he teased her, never once did it ruff her fur. In fact, she enjoyed it. A lot.
“Okay, here's how we do this.” With the same practiced, gently efficiency he'd used on the horses, Tate showed Claire how to get in the saddle, sit, hold the leather reins, and manage basic control of her horse, which he told her was called a mare because she was a girl. For her part, Luna stood calmly through the process, as unalarmed as a prey animal could possibly be in the presence of a predator.
With each passing second, Claire felt her heart melting a bit more. For the horse or the man, she wasn't entirely sure.
Both,
her wolf murmured very quietly. She'd kept her presence as muted as possible around the horses.
“And hi-ho Silver, away,” Tate said once they were both mounted. His horse moved off, with Claire's immediately following as soon as she lightly pressed it with her legs as he'd instructed. “Look at you,” he said, smiling at Claire. “A natural already.”
“Hmm,” she returned, but she could feel her own huge smile splitting her face.
They rode in an easy silence for several minutes, Claire focusing on her balance and trying to remember everything Tate had told her to do, watching her horse's head and the trail immediately before her ears. With each passing moment, however, she relaxed a little more, then a little more, until finally she found herself looking up and watching the scenery instead.
Most of the scenery, of course, was Tate's back. She studied his broad shoulders beneath the sky-blue button-down shirt and black vest he wore. His seat in the saddle was as graceful as if he'd been born there. They rounded a curve in the trail, allowing the spread of canyons, buttes, and distant mountains to frame the man on his horse. Despite the breeze, the day promised to be beautiful in that crisp, clear way of fall. Claire let the landscape suffuse her every sense. The reds and creamy tans of the sandstone walls in the canyons ahead, the soft russety dirt the horses trod over, the sharp tang of crushed sagebrush from underneath the horses' hooves all filled Claire with a sense of heady peace. This was her home, her landscape—yet it was also undeniably Tate's. He fit here with as much ease as she did. Maybe she'd somehow entered a Western fantasyland, she thought with a contented sigh. Complete with sexy cowboy who could ride a horse as well as he rode—
Claire broke off her train of thought with a quick shake of her head despite the sudden heat in her thighs. If she went down that path in her mind, she'd jump the man as soon as they took a break. Her mate. Just the thought made her giddy with a wild wash of desire.
Tate turned his body and his head toward her, the brim of his hat shading his eyes. “It's pretty quiet back there. You having fun?”
“Are you kidding?” The laughing words spilled forth so effortlessly Claire couldn't contain her joy at the moment. “This is perhaps the best date I've ever been on.”
“Only perhaps? You're killing me here, woman. Killing me.”
“One thing would make this absolutely the most perfect date,” she said, watching with a bit of envy at how effortlessly he sat half-turned in the saddle, still facing her while his horse walked on.
“What's that, darlin'?” The velvet smooth tones of his voice slipped over her skin, making her shiver with a quick rush of pleasure.
“Well...I've always wanted to run on a horse. Luna's pretty sweet so far. Aren't you, girl?” Claire crooned to the pretty mare she rode, reaching down for what must have been the seventeenth time in the past ten minutes to stroke that soft neck again.
Tate grinned at her. “We can probably make that happen. Let's just keep walking for a bit here, though. She's a sweetheart for sure, but I want you to get a little more comfortable in that saddle before we whoop it up down there by the mesas.”
He swung his arm in the general direction before them. Claire looked ahead. Three mesas, the ones she privately called the Sentinels for their imposing stances, as if they guarded a castle, squared off against the deep blue sky. And flat ground beneath them, she recalled. Tate easily turned back in the saddle to look ahead. Claire watched the play of muscles in his neck as he rode. Remembering the taste of his skin there as she'd softly nibbled it between her lips and teeth, she managed to not fall off as her thoughts wandered purposefully toward the point of no return.
Really, just being the man's presence was turning her into a mushy-brained female.
He is good,
her wolf gently thought.
Mate.
Yes, very true, that. And she'd spent the last two nights very restlessly, imagining Tate's tongue on her breasts, kissing his way down her stomach, gently reaching to play between her spread legs as she senselessly begged him to tumble right over the brink into that screaming ecstasy once again. And then again. Why he hadn't come back to her before today was making her crazy.
Which, she suddenly thought as she narrowed her eyes at his back, was probably his intention. He wanted her to come to him. To be very honest, if that was his plan, it was working.
Her horse snorted at something and moved suddenly to the side. Startled, Claire exclaimed and grabbed onto the horn Tate had told her to hold if she felt remotely uncomfortable. She slipped around a bit in the saddle, but didn't fall. The second she shifted her weight, Luna stopped cold and stood stock still.
“Hey, now, what's going on back here, hmm?” Tate had swung around at Claire's gasp, quickly assessing the situation. “Ah, sweet Luna, you've got a cactus spine in your leg.”
“What?” Horrified, Claire started to dismount.
“No, stay on her,” Tate said. He swung to the ground himself in a smooth motion, his dusty black boots thumping on the ground as he strode up to Claire and his mare. “She's okay, I just have to pull it out.”
“Won't that hurt her?” Claire automatically started stroking the mare's neck, again admiring its softness and the sleek lay of red and white hairs beneath her hand. She also admired the man, who might have strode in from a Marlboro Man commercial, sans the nasty cigarette. Damn, he was gorgeous.
Already bent down by Luna's front leg, Tate's hatted head shook no. “She'll barely feel it. In fact,” he stood up and flourished his hand at her, “it's already out. Kinda wicked little thing, isn't it?”
Claire stared at the thin, sharp cactus needle on his palm. She'd met up with her share of cactus spines in her paws over the years, but she could pull them out with her teeth or, if that failed, shift back to human to deal with them. Luna had no such resources.
“Are you sure that didn't hurt her?” she demanded with some suspicion. “Poor sweet girl,” she said, again crooning to the mare.
Tate threw back his head and laughed. Tendons rippling across his neck, face tipped into the sun, he exuded so much pure cowboy Claire really felt like she was in a movie.
But this was real. As deliciously real as the sensations he'd pulled and sucked and stroked and licked from her body. As real as the thin sunlight caressing her skin, the beautiful live creature who carried her with no worries at all about her wolf nature, the truth that this man was her mate.
Claire shivered with the bone-deep, stunning knowledge of it all.
“You're such a goner for that horse,” Tate teased. “Gonna be calling her 'snookums' any minute now.”
“And you don't ever call a horse 'snookums'?” she asked, arching a skeptical brow at him.
Tate just chuckled as he easily swung back up on his own horse. “Come on, beautiful.” He set them off down the trail again.
“So why do you wear those things?” Claire asked as Luna followed his horse.
“What, pants? So I can stay legal,” he said in a deadpan tone.
She couldn't help the peal of laughter that rang out. “No, your chaps. I know cowboys always wear them, but why?”
His answering voice stroked her in all the right places. She was a total goner.
Should be. Mate,
her wolf thought, utterly satisfied with the fascinating new, simple answer to everything about the gorgeous male wolf with her.
“To protect our legs from bushes, branches, things than can snag on your jeans and rip them.” He glanced back at her. “We'll have to get you a pair someday. You'll need them if we keep riding out here”
Claire's heart and body warmed to supernova levels. He wanted to do this again with her. He planned to. The realization he understood how much she was enjoying this unexpected fulfillment of a childhood dream both amazed and soothed her more than anything else at the moment.
“There's lot more country to see out here,” Tate went on. “Though you probably know it pretty well already, don't you?”
“I do,” Claire said simply. “This is home.”
“I know,” he returned in a serious voice. “I knew you were from around here somewhere. I could smell home on you. Though you did scent block pretty damn well. Like right now.” He twisted in the saddle again to look at her, eyebrows raised inquiringly.
Claire nodded. Yes, putting on scent blocker was a habit for her, despite how lax she sometimes got.
“But I surprised you when I showed up at your door the other morning,” he said. “And in Cortez, that first time we met. You sometimes don't check for other wolves around here, do you?” He carefully watched for her reaction.
Instinctively, she bristled just a bit. “This is my home. My territory.”
A long beat passed with only the sound of the horses' hooves on the soft sand and the call of a raven winging through the air currents far in the distance. Tate nodded at her, then turned around to face front again. The crisp scents of fall lay everywhere, even though they rode in the canyon lands. Then he quietly said, “This is free territory, Claire. It's not claimed by any pack. But you live here.” His voice was a question, but Claire sensed without a doubt he already knew the answer.
She decided to face it head on. “Yes. A wild wolf lives in free territory. You know that.”
Her words hung in the air between them while silence wrapped around them. But Claire must have tensed up more, because Luna suddenly lifted her head and crowded into the tail end of the horse Tate rode.
“Steady there, cowgirl. She picks up on everything your body does.” He lightly clucked to his horse, who moved out a bit.
“Does it bother you?” Claire asked, stroking Luna's soft neck.
Tate sent her a questioning glance over his shoulder.
“Me being a wild wolf.”
After a few seconds of apparent consideration, Tate casually said, “Should it?” But doubt edged his tone.
Claire didn't answer him, concentrating instead on relaxing so Luna would relax as well. She didn't feel at all frightened—she knew Tate wouldn't let her get hurt, and this mare was just too sweet—but she didn't want to upset her horse. Or, if she was honest with herself, the sexy man who easily rode in front of her. Her mate. Which apparently she could have, despite being a wild wolf. Her mind still boggled at the concept, grappling with all the implications. She decided not to pursue the conversation down the path of her being a wild wolf and him being a pack wolf. For now. Taking some deep breaths, she focused on the moment. All she wanted to do was enjoy the day, the ride, and the company.
Neither one said a word for the next several miles, but Claire sensed an easiness between them. Tate was enjoying this time as much as she was. She could tell by how he took in the scenery now and again, his expression one of true appreciation. She inhaled all the distinct smells of this desert country, her home. Mingled with everything was the sweetly horsey smell she was quickly growing to love, and the still wildly arousing scent of her—mate. Even though she still had some trouble wrapping her mind around the concept of having a mate, his scent she already very much enjoyed. For the thousandth time, a flash of his sweaty face moving above hers as their cries filled the room together flashed through her mind. She pressed her nails into her palm to distract her. It still drove her crazy that he hadn't really touched her just the other day, when he'd shown up at her house. She knew he'd wanted to, and god knew she had.
She also, reluctantly, understood why he hadn't. He was fully aware she was a wild wolf. And mate or no, he probably was scared of moving too fast with her. Since, of course, rolling around in an uncontrolled frenzy together on the hotel bed wasn't moving too fast at all. Swallowing a nervous giggle, she finally broke the silence.