At Whit's End (Wells Ranch, #4)(116)
“Absolutely.”
With that, he’s pulling me back through the barn and shoving a heavy wood door open. A single light bulb hangs in the middle of a room filled with saddles and horse equipment, none of which I know anything about. While my sister was spending her teenage years barrel racing and doing farm chores around Wells Ranch, I was playing video games and smoking pot in Alex’s basement.
“I don’t give a shit what the other guys think—we needed colorful name tags for each horse’s tack.” He steps forward, tapping his index finger against a piece of lime green construction paper that reads Hank in bubble letters embellished with tiny flowers. “Odessa’s spelling is…a work in progress, so Jonas wrote the names.”
“I love how much he loves it here. Reminds me a lot of Blair when she was younger.” My eyes meander between strips of paper, and I smooth a hand over the soft leather of a saddle, then mindlessly pick up a thick, deep green rope draped over it. “She came here once and we basically never saw her again. She became a Wells.”
Still looking around the room, smiling to myself at both the ridiculous name choices and Odessa’s attempts at drawing horses, I twist and loop and knot the rope in my hands.
“They kind of have a way of doing that here,” Colt says. “You come around one time, and suddenly you’re part of the family. If you aren’t careful, you’ll be next. Suddenly you’ll be wearing overalls and slinging horse crap like the rest of us.”
He playfully nudges me with his shoulder at the same moment I create two perfect loops with the singular rope. And I tug one circle tight around my wrist.
“I do look very cute in overalls.”
“Oh, I have no doubt about that.” He glances down at my hands, then his eyes cut back to mine. “Overalls with nothing underneath, so I have easy access to your perfect tits anytime I want.”
“And here I thought this was a family-friendly place.”
His fingertips graze the back of my hand, and he plucks the rope from my wrist.
“Oh, sorry, I—” I start to apologize for playing with something I probably shouldn’t have. It probably had some important function I’m unaware of and wasn’t supposed to be touched—I don’t know how cowboy things work.
“It’s fine. It’s just a lead rope.” He smirks, slipping his hand into one of the loops I made. He repeats the action with the other. The dark green fibers brush through his arm hair, and I notice I’m not the only one with goosebumps on my skin. With the rope hanging loosely, draped around his thick wrists, his eyes search mine.
When his wrists pull away from each other, the rope tightens and his eyes widen. Then he steps in front of me, slipping his bound hands up and over my head to settle at the nape of my neck. And he kisses me. My needy body melts into his. The kisses we shared earlier only made me more ravenous after weeks without his taste.
His searing tongue delves into my mouth, stealing my gasp. The strong, thick rope pulls against my neck, forcing me even closer and cradling my skull as he devours me. His pelvis rocks into mine, and it’s not until the outline of his firm cock presses into me that I realize he’s just as hungry for me as I am for him.
“Tell me what to do,” he murmurs into my mouth between bruising kisses. “Tell me what you want from me.”
For tonight? Or…
“Forever.” I accidentally say the quiet part out loud.
“You already have that.” He puts a breath of space between us. “Tell me what you want right now.”
I drag my fingertips down his spine to knead the firm muscle of his ass. Since the moment I noticed he was wearing a green button-down to the wedding, I’ve been thinking about tearing it off. So I do.
The buttons pull apart easily, and I throw my head back with a giggle. “The fucking raccoon shirt. So much for getting to run my tongue over your bare chest.”
“Wait, wait, wait.” His hands and the rope tangle in my hair as he frantically lifts them over my head. “Let me fix that.”
Grabbing the rope between his teeth, he wiggles the rope to free his hands, and in seconds he’s tossing both shirts on top of a random saddle. My eyes crawl over his body, curving with the ridges of his stomach and the hair trailing down to his belt buckle. He’s mine. Colt Campbell is mine. For tonight and for forever.
The green rope hangs loose in his hand when he holds it out to me. The need in his voice is gravelly and deep. “Tie me up, honey. I’m yours.”
With a gulp, I take it and form the same two adjustable loops as before. Muscle memory from years of playing Cat’s Cradle as a little kid comes in handy for the first time in my adult life.
I instruct him to turn around, and he does without hesitation, both hands immediately moving behind his back. I secure the makeshift handcuffs around his right wrist, then repeat on the left. When he spins to face me, the pull of his arms tied behind him makes his chest and shoulders more prominent than usual. His smile is easy and flirtatious, and he steals a glance down at his crotch. The tight denim isn’t doing much to hide his want. And neither is the underwear sticking to my damp skin.
My fingers fumble with his belt. Despite barely any time apart, this feels like our first time all over again. I wonder if he can hear my thunderous heartbeat.
When his jeans fall to the floor, belt buckle thudding on smooth cement, I reach between his legs to stroke a hand down his anxiously bobbing cock. Colt curls forward with a dark, feral groan.