by Nicole Casey
I was in Laz’s cabin.
But he was married.
I spun to hurry for the door, throwing it open and making my way into the living area of the quaint cabin.
I didn’t know where I was going or how I’d gotten there but I knew I needed to get out before I was forced to see Laz face-to-face.
Unfortunately, that ship had sailed.
The ranger was standing in his kitchen, his muscled shoulders exposed under a white undershirt as he hummed quietly. He was cooking breakfast, the smell of bacon tantalizing me. He was also directly between me and the door.
I looked around desperately, wondering if there was another way out but before I could move, he called out, “Want some coffee?”
I jumped. I hadn’t realized he had seen me and as I pivoted back to stare at him, he still hadn’t looked in my direction.
“Uh…yeah,” I mumbled, unsure of what else to say. I couldn’t just run out now. From what I could glean in my alcohol fogged mind, he had probably saved me from being eaten by a bobcat or something.
“Come and sit down,” Laz said, nodding toward the kitchen table. “I hope you’re not some picky eater or on a weird fad diet.”
“I-I don’t think I could eat,” I muttered but he snorted.
“After all you drank last night and the night before, you probably want to put as much as you can into your stomach.”
The words mortified me.
He thinks I’m an alcoholic.
But why wouldn’t he? Two out of the three times he’d seen me, I’d been loaded—so much so that he’d had to transport me.
“I-I…” I inhaled. “I don’t remember coming here.”
I blurted it out before I could think of how I wanted to ask. For the first time, Laz raised his eyes and looked at me. I thought I saw a flash of guilt shadow in his inky irises.
“I figured you might now,” he sighed. “You passed out. I wasn’t sure if you were in any danger back at your cottage so I brought you here to sleep it off.”
“Danger?” I echoed. “Why…”
I trailed off as I realized the state I must have been in when he found me.
“It was a judgement call,” Laz said gruffly. “A stupid one in retrospect. Just have some breakfast and I’ll take you back.”
“No!” I said quickly and he looked at me in surprise. Concern colored his face. “Something happened then. What?”
I shook my head, my cheeks flushing. How could I explain to him that it wasn’t anything he’d sympathize with? Laz would look at me like Kennedy did—like I was a spoiled, selfish brat, causing drama when there wasn’t any.
“No, nothing,” I replied, lowering my eyes. “I…wouldn’t mind hanging out for a bit is all.”
He studied me and I looked at my hands.
“I’m on call today,” he offered, turning back toward the stove where he pulled the bacon off the burner and skillfully prepared two plates. A moment later, he placed a cup of coffee in front of me.
“Cream? Sugar?” he asked and I shook my head.
“Black is fine.”
He eyed me, a now-familiar smile forming on his mouth.
“I read somewhere that only psychopaths drank coffee like that.”
I darted my eyes up toward him and saw he was teasing me. A quick glance at his cup told me that he enjoyed his morning cup the same way.
How’s that for fate? I thought ridiculously and blushed.
Laz placed the meal in front of me and I waited for him to sit before picking up the fork to stab them into the grits. I was stunned at how good it was.
“This is amazing!” I said with surprise and he chuckled.
“You sound shocked.”
“I-I don’t know a lot of men who cook,” I confessed and he nodded understandingly.
“I bet.”
I thought I heard a note of contemptuousness in his voice but his face didn’t reflect any malice.
“Where are you from, Ayla?” Laz asked after a few minutes of silent eating. The food was doing wonders for my churning gut and throbbing head.
“Miami Beach.”
“Ah. Roughing it this weekend then?”
“Something like that. How about you? Have you lived here a while?” I asked, not wanting to talk about me. His life was far more interesting, I was certain.
“I’m from Knoxville,” he confessed, his face darkening at the memory. “I’ve been in Gatlinburg for a little over two years.”
“How does your wife like it here?” I blurted out, remembering the photo in the bedroom. His face shadowed darkly.
“I’m not married,” he said coldly and I instantly regretted bringing it up even though his answer filled me with relief.
In my world, affairs were commonplace, even expected but I couldn’t imagine being the other woman in a scenario like this.
Wow. What an ego on you. The guy did you a favor bringing you here and you’re acting like he brought you here for some well-executed seduction.
That was just wishful thinking on my part. It was hard not to recall my fantasy when I cast him a furtive glance over my eggs.
“Top up?” he asked nodding at my cup and I bobbed my head.
“Please.”
I found myself staring at his ass as he wandered back into the kitchen and I bit on my lower lip, willing myself not to gawk.
Married or not, Laz Payne didn’t want anything to do with me. I was there only because he’d found me, loaded, two days in a row no less.
My ears grew hot as he wandered back, coffee pot in hand to fill my cup. Our eyes caught unexpectedly and I felt my heartrate increase.
Why did I feel like he could see right through me when he stared at me? Like he knew exactly what was going on in my head?
Laz leaned over, pouring the hot liquid into my cup as he leaned across me and I shivered at the scent of his masculine scent. I must have inhaled too loudly because he turned and looked at me with raised eyebrows.
“You okay?”
“Yeah!” I cried out too quickly, humiliation burning through my body. What was I doing here? Was I so desperate to be seen, to be heard, that I would throw myself at any guy who looked at me?
But I knew it was more than that. I was attracted to Laz in a way I could never remember being and before he moved away, I impulsively lay my hand on the rippled muscles of his upper arm.
His dark eyes widened in surprise and I immediately moved my hand back, confusion and embarrassment sweeping through me.
To his credit, Laz didn’t comment.
He really was a class act.
I tried to envision how Damien would have handled seeing me drunk two nights in a row. He’d be giving me a blast of shit from now until kingdom come. Laz wasn’t being catty or accusing. He only seemed…concerned?
This stranger has more compassion in him than all the men I know back home put together.
I wondered if that wasn’t what made him so attractive to me.
“Did you eat enough?” I looked down at my plate and realized I’d demolished everything he’d put in front of me.
“I can’t believe I ate that much,” I laughed and sat back, putting the napkin I’d had on my lap onto the dish.
“Did you want to take a shower?” Laz asked, reaching for my plate. Again, I was baffled at how seamlessly he did domestic chores.
I rose too and reached out to touch his arm again, deliberately. Our gazes locked but I didn’t move my hand this time. My heart was pounding so wildly in my chest, I was sure he could hear it easily but he didn’t break his gaze.
“Let me do this,” I said and he chuckled, his gleaming white teeth curled under that full lower lip.
“I have a dishwasher,” he replied. He made no effort to pull away, as if he was challenging me to make the next move.
Or was I imagining that?
“Let me do something to thank you,” I heard myself say. Good lord, did I pick that line out of a porn movie?
I watched his pup
ils dilate and I felt his breaths increase against my touch. I wasn’t imagining anything—he was attracted to me too!
But before I could even consider going in for that kiss I had wanted the first night, the spell was broken and Laz unhooked my hand from his arm.
“You don’t need to thank me,” he muttered, turning his back to me and heading into the kitchen with the plates. “I was just doing my job.”
I couldn’t stop myself from following him like a hopeless puppy, knowing he was full of shit. He wouldn’t have brought just anyone back to his home, his obvious sanctuary, away from the rest of civilization. There was a reason he existed out there—he wanted his privacy. For some reason, he had let me in.
“Please,” I insisted, sidling up to him. It was only then I realized exactly how tall he was. I was five seven and he towered over me as he scraped the scraps into the compost pile.
“Please what?” he muttered, carefully avoiding me eyes.
“Let me do something.”
I placed my hands over his hips and gently angled him toward me, my face cocked upward to stare at him imploringly.
“What are you doing, Ayla?” His voice sounded strange and the veil over his face both entranced and worried me.
“Thanking you,” I whispered, pushing myself onto my tiptoes to brush my mouth against his.
“I don’t need to be thanked!” He snapped but he didn’t move as I pressed myself against him, my pelvic bone flush to his.
Oh God…he was as big as I had fantasized—and growing bigger as my tongue darted out to tease his lips.
Our gaze held and I realized my breath was caught as I waited for him to push me away.
He was wrestling with the idea but I knew I could tip the scales in my favor. My hands slid up around his neck and I pulled him down but even then, I could feel his resistance.
His arms hung at his sides, unmoving but the bulge in his pants told me everything I needed to know.
“Thank you,” I breathed, crushing my mouth to his. Tentatively, his tongue prodded mine and he finally, blissfully, wrapped his strong hands around the curve of my ass cheeks, yanking me fully toward him.
“You’re the devil,” he hissed, pulling his mouth away from mine and glaring into my eyes. I was consumed with dismay, thinking he was rejecting me but without warning, I was in his arms as he strode toward the back of the cottage, his fingers pressed against my buttocks.
I was sure he was going to leave a bruise but that only made me wetter.
It wasn’t until we were in the bathroom that I realized what he was doing. He plopped me unceremoniously onto the counter and started the shower before slipping my sundress over my head.
My nipples were hard enough to cut glass and Laz, explored them with his thumb and mouth, a groan escaping his lips as he sucked at the prickled flesh.
My fingers fumbled at the undershirt, ripping in from his body to expose the abs I knew he had to be hiding underneath.
God, he was unreal. How could anyone this fucking hot be living out in the middle of nowhere?
In seconds, he was as naked as I was but before I could reach for the shaft I’d been thinking about nonstop for two days, my legs were entwined around his shoulders. Steam filled the small bathroom, obstructing my view of Laz’s full head of hair but the sensation was not lost in the sauna around us.
My clit was throbbing under the latch of his mouth and I cried out when his tongue lashed out to lap up the juices spilling from me.
“Fuck!” I purred, falling back against the mirror, my ankles locked around his neck. Laz’s hands cupped me upward, his nose buried deep inside me.
“You taste so sweet,” I heard him murmur and the words only sent me further back into the mirror, sweat forming on every crevice of my body as I felt the momentum of my orgasm building.
“I-I’m going to come,” I rasped.
He made a noise which sounded like a laugh and the vibrations pushed me directly over the edge.
My back arched upward and my body spasmed, my pussy squirting against him until I heard him exclaim with approval.
“Nice,” he muttered, inching his way back up by body, his fingers taking over where his mouth had left off.
He wasn’t even close to done with me yet.
His thumb rubbed against the swollen skin of my clit, two fingers sliding inside the sopping mess of my core and I moaned.
The noise was cut short by the crush of Laz’s lip and I sucked on his lower lip eagerly, my ankles still on his shoulders.
I felt like a twisted, helpless pretzel as his digits slid in and out of me, coaxing me into yet another orgasm.
“You’re tight,” he rasped at me, eyes boring into mine again. “I hope I don’t break you.”
That did it and again, I was spilling over his hands, quivering beneath him.
Laz unhooked my legs from his neck, pulling me down with surprising force before spinning me around.
I could feel the smooth, heated skin of his head pressed to my ass cheeks and I shuddered with excitement.
With his hands cupping my breasts, he walked me forward into the tile shower. If I couldn’t see in the bathroom, the shower was a cloud but I didn’t need to see anything. In fact, the second I felt the heat of the water against my skin, I was bent forward, my hands splaying to the wall for balance as Laz spread me wide.
I expected his cock but instead I felt his tongue again and I cried out for mercy.
“Fuck me!” I begged him. “Please!”
“I like it when you plead,” he chuckled and I found myself wondering how he could be the same mild-mannered who had been making me breakfast. He had called me the devil but Laz almost seemed possessed when he thrust his massive cock inside me.
I screamed out, even though I had been expecting it. I just hadn’t realized exactly how big he was until he reached me in places I’d never known I could be reached.
“Shit!” I gasped, bucking back to take him fully. His palms encircled my slender waist and I heard him groan loudly.
“So fucking tight,” he gasped. Hard and deep he plunged into me, keeping me grounded with the steel rod inside me.
My fingers struggled to curl against something for grip but my fingertips slipped uselessly against the wet tile.
The sound of his sack slapping wetly against me brought me to the brink a third time but nothing more than the way he pressed his solid body against my back, murmuring my name in my ear.
“You’re so fucking beautiful, Ayla.”
Had anyone ever called me beautiful before in the middle of unadulterated sex? If they had, I certainly couldn’t remember it with Laz pounding into me like he had just been released from prison.
An index finger played at my sensitive button and I tried to struggle against the feeling, afraid I might go crazy with all the climaxes but Laz held me firm.
“Don’t,” he hissed. “I’m going to blow inside you.”
How could his simple words keep bringing me to the point of no return? And yet I came again, for the fourth and last time, my juices mixing with the heat of his as he shot into me.
I groaned, my body weak but he didn’t let me fall, even as he withdrew from me. Instead, he gently turned me around and for the first time since we entered the shower, I could see his face clearly.
Without a word, he reached for a bottle of shampoo and poured some into his hand before returning the bottle.
He offered me a slow, soft kiss and raised his hands into my hair. At first I didn’t understand what he was doing but it clicked it—he was washing my hair.
“Where did you come from?” I asked in awe, relishing the feeling of his strong fingers in my hair.
“Knoxville,” he chuckled, knowing that wasn’t what I was asking. “I already told you.”
“They raise the boys different in Knoxville, don’t they?”
“They raise men in Knoxville,” Laz replied and I had to smirk at that answer.
That’s been my problem all a
long—I haven’t been around enough good country boys.
When he had finished my hair, he moved on to soap my body and I found myself responding to his touch again, even though I was aching from what he had just given me.
But I didn’t resist when his hands slid easily back along my crevices, seeking any place he might have missed.
This time, he left nothing unexplored and I was given the opportunity to learn him too, my mouth dripping with droplets of water when I fell to my knees to take Laz into my mouth.
His hands curled into my drenched tresses and he guided me, his movements slower and more deliberate than they had been the first time he had filled me with his incredible cock.
I gasped, clinging to him when his head touched the back of my throat but I wanted him all.
And in those moments, in that cooling shower, I felt like I had him.
7
Laz
Her mouth was hot lava as the shower began to cool around us. I found myself leaning forward to not only brace myself but turn up the hot water.
It was pointless, of course. The reservoir of hot was depleted from our escapades but it wasn’t cold enough for me to stop Ayla from doing what she was doing.
Heat had surged through my body, increased only by the suction of her lips and I forced myself not to think about what I’d done by bringing her home with me. Remind Me Later
Had I wanted this to happen? Was this my plan all along?
It didn’t matter now—we were too caught up in whatever the hell we were doing to backtrack.
I realized that she was shivering, on her knees before me and I quickly turned off the shower and pulled her to her feet.
“What are you doing?” she demanded, a slight pout on her precious mouth. “I was just getting started.”
“Hold that thought,” I chuckled, grabbing a terrycloth towel with which to embrace her.
I wrapped us both inside, feeling her body melt against mine without hesitation and instantly, her skin began to warm, despite the way her hair dripped wildly over both of us.
Her lips found my neck but before she could continue what she’d begun, I took her hand and led her to the bedroom where I’d lay her to sleep the night before.
She fell back onto the comforter and extended her arms for me to come. I didn’t need more urging and I pounced on her, marveling at the fact I was ready to take her a second time in such a short period.