The Truth About Cowboys

by Jones, Lisa Renee

  “Whatever is going on in your head right now,” he says, “stop. Look at me.”

  The words are hard and fast and I jolt with them, my eyes meeting his eyes. “Be with me. Be fully present.”

  I wet my lips. “I am and I’m not sure that’s a good thing. Don’t you just want to—”

  “No. No, I don’t.”

  “You don’t know what I was going to say.”

  “Do I want to fuck you and be done with it?” he challenges, turning my thoughts into something much harder and colder than they’d sounded in my head. “Not a chance in hell.”

  He presses his lips to my belly, tongue circling, and slides a hand between my legs, one finger, just one finger, stroking my clit. The light touch is anything but light in my reaction. My sex clenches. Goose bumps lift on my body. My nipples tight, breasts heavy.

  “What do you want?” he asks, stroking that finger along the wet seam of my body.

  “For you—” A finger slides inside me. “Ohhh.” Now another. I pant and grab his shoulder.

  “What do you want?” he asks again, and this time his breath is a hot trail over my sex, blowing over my clit, sending waves of sensations through my body.

  “You know what I want,” I accuse. “You’re just teasing me.”

  His hands grip my hips. “Tell me. Say it. What do you want?”

  I don’t know if I can do this. I’m not overly experimental. I guess the truth is I’ve never had a man in my life that pushed me, that excited me. That ignited this kind of hot need and yearning in me. I don’t know how to be what he wants me to be. I’m failing at this now. I shove my hands into my hair. “Jason, please—”

  “Please what, sweetheart? Say it. Say you want my mouth on you.”

  “I want your mouth on me.”

  “Jason,” he says. “I want your mouth on me, Jason. I want to know you know—”

  “I want your mouth on me, Jason.”

  His eyes warm, not with gloat or conquest, but real warmth. “That’s damn good, sweetheart, because I want my mouth on you, too.” His words are low, rough, affected, as if he’d been on edge, as if he thought—I don’t know what he thought.

  He licks my clit and then he’s suckling, stroking, using his fingers, tongue, and lips and, oh God, he’s good at this. Somehow I’m sitting on the ottoman, and then I’m on my back. One of my legs is on his shoulder, and his mouth remains dedicated to the most intimate part of me. His hand and fingers go to my breast. I squirm beneath him. I grab his hand on my breasts, just because I need to grab something. I’m coming out of my own skin with pleasure, with that need to be there in that perfect place, and that need to make this last a little longer, but there is no lasting. Warmth spreads across my body and that tight ball of tension in my sex, that aching, perfect ball of tension, explodes into orgasm. I shatter with such sudden fierceness that I can’t stop the quake of my body. I have never quaked in my life.

  Jason eases his tongue with the ease of my body, in tune with my pleasure in ways no man ever has been, and he has never touched me before today. I melt into the cushion with satisfaction, but there’s this ache of emptiness inside me. This need to have him inside me, and when he kisses my belly and stands up, I shoot to a sitting position. His back is to me, his pants sliding down, and I can hear the tear of a condom. I’m on the pill, but you know, he could be a player who fucks everything with legs. Oh God. Is he a player? Is that why he’s so good at this? Has he done Debbie at the store?

  Stop.

  Stop now.

  Enjoy him. Just enjoy him.

  He turns around, his cock thrusting forward, thick and heavily veined with arousal and I am once again present. I am with him, only him, and out of my head. His body is perfection, long, lean, muscular perfection with abs of steel. What girl doesn’t want abs of steel? Craig didn’t have abs of steel. Craig didn’t have this man’s cock. No wonder I didn’t come with him. No wonder I wasn’t eager for sex.

  I stand up, and just that quickly, Jason’s pulling me to him, kissing me, folding me against him, the thick ridge of his erection at my hip. I’m hungry for him, so ridiculously aroused that it’s as if I haven’t had an orgasm. I need. I want. I have to have him, and I feel that in him, too. I feel passion. I feel lust and I’m empowered by this knowledge. He’s here with me, present, so very present, and when he sits down and pulls me onto his lap, our lips part for only a moment.

  His hand settles between my shoulder blades and he molds me close, while my hands explore all of those muscles. So many muscles. So much hard everything, including his cock, which is at my backside until he whispers. “I need—”

  “Me, too. Yes. Please, now.”

  He lifts me, anchors me, and I have no idea why the way he holds me makes me feel so completely his, but it does. He presses into me and I gasp with the intimate invasion, slowly sliding down the length of him, the thick pulse of him stretching me, filling me. When he’s buried deep inside me, our eyes collide and I swear I tremble with that connection. I swear his eyes register the same kind of jolt. He cups my face and drags my mouth to his. “I knew you were trouble.”

  He doesn’t give me time to ask what that means as he withdraws. He kisses me and thrusts back into me, pushing me down on his shaft. I gasp and moan. He swallows it with a kiss that burns me alive. I’m burning alive with the slow, sultry dance of him fucking me. Of me fucking him. No. The slow, hard, dirty dance. It’s not proper and it’s everything. He touches me. I touch him. We savor every moment. It’s the idea of this being it, I think. We know there’s nothing beyond this. We know we have to enjoy every moment because there’s no do-over. I don’t want it to end, but our bodies won’t listen to me. There’s this frenzied need between us that expands and takes charge. We don’t own that need. It owns us.

  What was slow and sensual is now about crawling into each other. That’s what the burn is like. We need to be closer. We need to move fast. We need to fuck harder. And then it’s too late to stop the tumble. It rushes over me, compliments of a hard thrust of his cock, and I’m done. I stiffen and then quake, my sex clenching his erection, spasming around him. He thrusts again, a low groan escaping his lips, torn from deep inside his chest, and he, too, is done. He quakes. He shakes. We collapse together.

  Now, we’re there, on that chair, my face buried in his neck, the scent of man and the best sex of my life enveloping us. The inevitable awkward goodbye is officially here. I don’t want him to leave, I really don’t want him to leave. Oh God. I’m in trouble. I need to take control before he knows what I’m feeling, since he seems to read me so damn well. And what am I feeling?

  I try to push away from him and suddenly, I’m rolled to my side and we’re facing each other. He’s still inside me. “How about you go in that there kitchen, like a good country girl, and make me some mac n cheese?”

  All the tension of moments before eases, and I laugh. “Why don’t you go in that there kitchen and make me some mac n cheese?”

  His eyes warm. “That’s what I wanted. An invitation to stay.” He kisses my nose. “I accept.” He pulls out of me and stands up, giving me his back as he grabs a tissue and deals with the condom. I sit up, blinking with confusion. What is he doing? What are we doing?

  He grabs his pants and pulls them on, while I gape at the view of his really hot body that wasn’t like a drunk high with overinflated attraction as a result. He’s really that hot. He’s really so damn hot. He clears his throat. My gaze jerks to his as he leans down close to me. “I’ll make the mac n cheese, but if you keep looking at me like that, we won’t get to eat it.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Jessica…

  I’m having a very strange naughty dream.

  There’s a shirtless man in my kitchen, filling a pot with water. It’s not the fantasy I’d naturally radiate toward, but who knew it could be this darn perfect? Said shirtless
man has a body so hard you could bounce a coin off any body part you so choose. I’d like to test that statement. Just have him sprawl out on the kitchen island and let me throw money at him. Then I could lick every spot I punish with a coin. Maybe I could trade a lick for a lick. Jason shifts his weight and turns to the sink, the muscles flex and ripple down his back, eye-catching. Oh yes. Perfect. Throwing baseballs and hay seems to work for the man.

  While Mr. Perfect Body works, I, on the other hand, am naked and still on the chair in the connected living room. The chair where he fucked me senseless. He glances over at me, and my state of undress, and all those cookies become a problem for me.

  “Bring your pretty little ass over here and help a man out,” he says. “Clothing optional, but for the record, you naked is always my preference.”

  No. No, it’s not, I think. Cookies. Pie. Chocolate. Those things argue otherwise. And sex is like booze. Everything looks better while you indulge in the moment. Regret and critique usually come later. God, I sound cynical, but I do have my reasons. I lean forward and snatch a blanket from the couch, wrapping it around me. “I’ll be right back,” I say, darting for the bedroom, with his soft, deeply affecting male laughter following me. Everything about this man is deeply affecting.

  “Now she’s shy!” he calls out.

  Not shy. Judgmental. Of me. Not him. I’ve already judged him just as hot as he was ten minutes ago while inside me. I really need clothing right now, and I enter the bedroom, hurrying to the dresser on the wall near the bathroom. Once I select leggings and a tank top, I dash to the bathroom, shutting the door behind me. My heart is racing. My body is still electric from that man’s touch.

  What am I doing? Besides trying to make my escape from men all about a man? Aside from trying to get my heart broken by a man who might really be able to break it this time. That has me rejecting that idea, dropping my blanket and shoving off the door. I can’t get my heart broken because this isn’t personal. That hot encounter was not personal. I look down at my naked body, an ache still ever present between my thighs. Okay, it’s pretty personal, just not emotional. Lust is not emotion. It’s—well, it’s lust. We wanted to have sex. We had sex. Really good sex, at that. God, the man does everything right. He’s even cooking, because why? My brows knit. Why is he here cooking?

  Not because he wants to establish an emotional connection, I quickly remind myself. This is still about the sex. Food helps us have more energy to have more really good sex. That’s all this is. And that’s what I need. More sex. More of that man staring at me and declaring my beauty right before his tongue works magic, and I’ll be good as new, no more self-doubt for me.

  As I dress, there’s a knock on the door. I jolt and whirl around to face it. “Who is it?”

  He laughs, deep and full—Mr. I Don’t Laugh, it’s not my thing—and I facepalm. Thank God, I don’t get this rattled in court. I drop my hand before opening the door. He’s standing there, of course, once again, really close, and that was impactful the first time he did it. Now, with him shirtless and his pants unzipped, it’s downright blistering. “That was a joke,” I say. “That ‘who is it’ thing.”

  His lips twitch. The man is holding back more laughter, and I scowl. “Or,” I amend, “you just make me stupid.”

  “You are many things, sweetheart. A beautiful pain in my ass, yes, but you aren’t stupid.”

  Beautiful. He keeps calling me that, and I soften. “I am when you’re running around my house, which is really your house, with hardly any clothes on.”

  He drags me to him and folds me in close. “Is that an invitation for me to get dressed or stay as I am?”

  My hand flattens on his chest, springy dark hair teasing and curling around my fingers. “Before I issue a reply—”

  “Issue a reply?” He laughs. See. He’s a liar. He does too laugh. All men are liars. Or not. I just have to embrace my bitterness here and there. I’m a woman scorned. “Now you’re speaking like an attorney about to issue an official statement,” he adds.

  “Before I issue my official statement,” I amend. “Aren’t you supposed to run for the door, because you’re Mr. Fuck and Run? That’s what you said. Paraphrasing of course.”

  “From asshole to Mr. Fuck and Run. Hmm, I’m not sure if that’s better or worse.” He softens his voice. “And I did plan on fucking and running, but I’m still here.”

  “Why?”

  “Why indeed.”

  “That’s not an answer,” I counter.

  “Because I don’t seem to want to leave. And I think it’s important I know the person spending so much time with my grandmother.” He motions to the door. “How about that food?”

  “We can’t order pizza, right? I’m rethinking the mac n cheese.”

  “No, city girl, we can’t order pizza, but my grandmother makes a hell of a pizza you can take home and bake. Ask her. She’ll be elated to make you one. Now.” He pauses for effect oh so perfectly. “Should I get dressed?”

  I hold up a finger. “One more question before I answer that question.”

  “I don’t know what we’re doing, Jessica,” he says, as if he’s read my mind. He has read my mind. He’s like a voodoo monster. That’s what I used to think when I watched him pitch. That has to be the truth or I wouldn’t be this into him after I just got ridiculously burned. “But let’s figure it out later,” he adds.

  In other words, he’s not ready to draw that line, and the truth is neither am I. “No need to get dressed,” I say, trying to duck under his arm to exit the bathroom.

  He tangles his fingers in my hair and drags my mouth to his. “Don’t plan on keeping yours on for long.” His mouth closes down over mine, wicked and hot, melting me like chocolate on a hot Texas day. I melt for him and I’ve never melted for any man, even the one I was going to marry. I thought this was fake, romance-novel stuff that I stopped reading because those books made me yearn for the impossible. They made me expect too much, but when Jason tears his mouth from mine, uses his thumb to wipe my lips, and catches my hand, leading me through the bedroom, it’s just like a perfect romance novel. It’s also my life.

  No.

  It’s a sex high.

  We had sex.

  We want more sex.

  The end.

  “I thought you bought groceries?” he asks, pouring not one box, but two boxes of macaroni into the water. I guess it takes a lot of food to make that kind of body. I really have to stop eating myself happy. I’ll regret it when my jeans get too snug. I’ll regret it when he notices my jeans are too tight.

  “I was a little distracted by you waiting in the truck,” I say, sliding onto a barstool at the island. “You weren’t exactly a warm and fuzzy helping hand.”

  “I was a perfect gentleman,” he says, giving me a wicked wink. “You know I was. Getting you boots to protect your legs. Getting you jeans to protect your legs.”

  He walks to the fridge and grabs two Diet Sprites, which I had, in fact, bought. He sets them on the island. “Diet?”

  “I’m paying for the boots and jeans,” I say, and then to my purchase of the soda. “And contrary to Martha’s belief, I normally watch what I eat.”

  He sits down on the stool beside me and we both rotate to face each other. “What else is normal for you?” he asks.

  It’s an innocent question that manages to hit a nerve or ten, and I cut my stare, hating the knot in my chest. “I don’t know. I don’t know what’s normal for me.” Damn it, my voice cracks.

  His hand comes down on my leg. “Jessica,” he says softly, a command, a plea—somehow both, and I don’t resist the pull of this man.

  I look at him and repeat, “I don’t know anymore. One minute I’m in a courtroom handling divorces for the rich and famous, about to be partner, living in a Dallas high-rise. Now I don’t know who I am.”

  “I get it. You have to k
now that I get it. If anyone can relate,” he says. “I can. I was the pro pitcher, living the life, and then it was just over.” He cuts his stare and I can almost feel him trying to drag the words back from his mouth.

  “I’m not going to ask you why that happened, so you don’t have to regret telling me. And just for the record, your grandmother tried to tell me why you made certain decisions, and I told her not to do that. Your story is yours to tell, but it was hard to talk to her and not find out anything.”

  He searches my face. “What did you find out, Jessica?”

  “She talked a little about your dad teaching you to pitch, about his history.” I hesitate. “About the plane crash. She talked about you with love. She really does love you.” I reach out and touch his arm. “I promise you, I don’t want to invade your space, but it’s hard to keep her from talking about you. It’s like denying her a pleasure.”

  He catches my hand and grabs my stool, pulling me closer. “Ask what you want to ask.” His voice is rough, intense.

  “No,” I say. “No, you don’t need to open that door for me. We’re fucking. You owe me no answers to any questions.” And the truth is that setup is safe. My romance novel mental chatter can stop there. No pain. Only gain. All that mental bravado and yet I want him to object to my statement, but he doesn’t.

  The sound of the water overflowing the pot has him cursing, and he releases me. I stand up, needing to do something, anything, all of a sudden. I’m confused with Jason, so very confused in indescribable ways. I reach the stove before he does, turning down the heat.

  “I was recovering from a serious injury when they died,” he says from behind me, as if I’ve asked a question. “I couldn’t leave my grandmother here to tend to the ranch. I couldn’t leave her alone.”

  His emotion radiates through him and through the room, wrapping around me. I turn and his back is to me, hands on the island, his shoulders knotted. I step to him and rest my hand on the roped muscle of his shoulder, allowing him that space his back tells me he needs. “It’s never going to be the right time to leave her.”