Beauty and the Bull Rider

by Victoria Vane

  Chase guided them out to the top of a bluff that offered a commanding view of the majestic Rio Grande as it meandered through a valley of leafy cottonwood trees. His pride in their piece of this high desert landscape was evident as he pointed out the various landmarks that identified the boundaries of the Lazy Q ranch.

  Zac pulled up beside Delaney just in time to watch the setting ball of fire cast shadows of pink over the rocky peaks of the Sandia Mountains. “What did I tell you about that sunset?”

  “It’s incredible,” Delaney said. He hadn’t exaggerated the magnificence of it. The show was nothing short of spectacular. Too bad she was too uptight to truly appreciate it. “What’s wrong, Zac?” she asked, unable to stand the silent treatment any longer.

  “What do you mean?”

  “The way you left today. Your remoteness. I don’t understand it. Did I do something to piss you off?”

  He jerked his head back in surprise. “Is that what you think?”

  “Frankly, I don’t know what to think.”

  “We’ll talk. I promise,” he said. “Tonight.”

  Dark was settling in fast. Chase signaled the group to turn back toward home. They arrived back at the ranch just as the last rays of sun dipped below the horizon. After a quick wash-up, Zac and Delaney joined the Quinns and their guests for supper in a rustic dining hall with Mexican tile floors and exposed beam ceilings. The meal consisted of several savory dishes of beef and wild game, accompanied by beans and rice, all prepared with a distinctly Southwestern flair. The meal was good, but once more Delaney’s low spirits were less than conducive to fully enjoying it.

  After dinner, they had drinks around an outdoor fire pit. As expected, Chase was the life of the party, telling jokes and sharing rodeo stories, while Zac continued as before, unusually subdued, sitting with his boot heels propped on the edge of the fire pit and his hat tipped back, nursing a beer, and stealing occasional heated looks in her direction. Delaney couldn’t comprehend the mixed signals. Yet, each time he looked her way, she experienced a tightening in her belly that three glasses of wine had failed to dispel.

  It was around nine o’clock when Zac finally rose and made his and Delaney’s excuses to their hosts with an apology about having to rise early. Delaney followed his lead, exchanging smiles, handshakes and more pleasantries, all while hyper-aware of Zac’s big, warm hand lightly resting on the small of her back. They exchanged no words as they followed a xeriscaped luminary-lit path back to their cabin. But this time, when he opened the door, long-stemmed red roses graced the table and fireplace mantel, with lit candles creating a soft, romantic glow.

  “Roses? Candles?” Delaney paused on the threshold. “Whose idea was this?”

  Zac’s face colored slightly. “It must be a mistake. Told you they use this for the honeymooners. You can take this bed. I’ll take the loft.” He pointed. “There’s a twin up there.”

  “So there are two beds?” she remarked.

  “Yup,” he grunted.

  “It doesn’t seem right that you should take the smaller one.”

  “Doesn’t matter to me,” he said. “Give me a pillow and I can sleep anywhere. Hell, I’ve spent more nights in bathtubs than I ever care to recall.”

  “Zac,” she began slowly, her stomach knotting. “I don’t understand any of this. When you told me we were coming here, I had the distinct impression that we were going to . . .”

  “I’m sorry.” His laid his hands on her shoulders, meeting her gaze with an almost grim look. “When I suggested coming here, I had a plan. I had it all worked out to the last detail. I knew exactly how I wanted to do this. Had a perfect vision of how it would all play out . . . but now that we’re here, it just doesn’t feel right.”

  Had he changed his mind? After all they’d been through, he didn’t want her anymore? “What do you mean? Isn’t this what you wanted?”

  “I’ll tell you what I wanted. I made this crazy baby-making deal with you in the belief that if we spent enough time together, you’d eventually see how well we fit. And I’m not talking about baby partners. I’ve tried to be patient, to give you time and space in hope that you’d come to see what’s plain as day to me, but I don’t know if that’s the case. Before we do this, Delaney, before anything can happen between us, there’s something I have to know.”

  “What is it?” she asked softly.

  “What I want . . .” He shook his head. “No. Let me rephrase that. What I need to know is whether or not this—and I mean you and me together—means anything to you?” His gaze was earnest and intense as it probed hers. “I need to know that you want me for me, and not just for the baby you’d hoped to make.”

  Delaney gaped at Zac as if she were seeing him for the very first time. Her heart hammered against her chest at the realization that she’d misread everything.

  “Yes, Zac,” she whispered, her throat thick with emotion. “I wouldn’t be here with you if it didn’t mean anything to me. You’re the only person who hasn’t passed judgement on me, the only one who seems to understand me, and that means everything to me.”

  How could she ever have thought of him as rough and insensitive? Zac had been there for her from day one, just as he’d said he would be. He’d been supportive and encouraging and a better friend to her than anyone outside of Rosa, who’d practically raised her.

  Her hands crept up his chest to slowly entwine behind his neck. She grew breathless as they stood breast to chest and heart to heart. “I won’t deny the physical attraction. I’ve tried all along to ignore it, but I can’t. I also can’t ignore that it goes much deeper than skin. Yes, I do feel something for you, Zac, and now that I’ve said it, what I want most is to feel you inside me.”

  A smile spread slowly over his mouth. “Damn. I’m sure glad we got that straight.”

  Although Zac answered glibly, there was nothing glib about what he was feeling. His heart galloped wildly at the realization that Delaney McCall, the woman he’d only fantasized about for eight long years, was about to become his. Although she’d stopped short of saying she loved him, she felt something, and that was good enough to keep him hoping for more.

  He poured his heart and soul into the kiss, praying that his body might reach the part of her she still held back. She melted into him with a soft, sweet sigh of surrender. Their mouths melding, their tongues tangling, he backed her slowly toward the bed. Breaking from her lips, he pressed fevered kisses to her warm skin. Tangling his fingers in her hair, he sought her sensitive neck, licking, sucking, inciting sharps breaths and soft sighs.

  He continued kissing, sucking, stroking, caressing, as his hands worked her blouse buttons free. He drew back only long enough to appreciate the view of the ripe mounds of mouth-watering feminine flesh spilling from her bra cups. Staring back at him with blue eyes filled with passion, Delaney shrugged out of her blouse and reached wordlessly behind her back to unhook her bra. She let it fall to the floor. Her gaze never breaking from his, she cupped the generous globes, offering them up to his hungry gaze and even more ravenous mouth.

  Zac reached out to claim them, burying his face in her lush mounds with a moan. Kissing, biting, gently squeezing, he laid her back on the bed, intent on worshipping every inch of her lush, womanly body with his own. His desire for her ran marrow deep. He’d never wanted to please a woman as much as he wanted to please her. He leaned over her body, covering it with his while rooting between Delaney’s ripe breasts and rosy nipples. He tongued and teased both nipples before sucking one fully into his mouth. She clutched his head to her breasts and arched her back. With one gasp, her pleasure became his own.

  He inhaled the heady essence of vanilla and honey as he worked his way down her body with his lips and tongue while his hands mapped the full, feminine curves of her hips. Sweeping his hands slowly up her thighs, he unzipped and peeled down her jeans, throbbing with anticipation of the moment he’d slide his fingers into her slick, wet heat. Licking and sucking, he worked down to that heaven
ly place that reminded him so vividly of peaches and cream.

  She exhaled a hiss at the first long swipe of his tongue along the upper edge of her panties, and squirmed under his mouth as he teasingly traced the folds of her slit with his fingers through the delicate fabric. He removed her panties, licking and kissing his way back up her legs, paying special attention to the erogenous zone behind her knees. He worked his way back to her sweet spot with hot open-mouth kisses and lazy licks of his tongue. Nudging her trembling legs apart, he moved between them and spread her lips to gaze at the most gloriously erotic vision. Unable to hold back the powerful urge, he nuzzled his face into her. Stroking, kissing, licking, teasing, ramping her higher until she whimpered and begged.

  “Please, Zac.” She dug her fingers into his scalp and pulled his head up. “I want . . . I need . . . you . . . inside me. Now. Please.”

  The needy look in her eyes ruptured the dam of his self-control. With eyes locked on her beautiful naked body, he stripped to his skin. His eyelids fluttered as she licked her lips in invitation, but it wasn’t her luscious mouth he’d dreamed about for eight years. He ached to have her long legs tangled around him, locked at the ankles, as he plunged into her over and over until they were mindless, boneless, and spent.

  Her gaze dipped to his jutting erection as he took himself in hand. “Last chance, Delaney. Do you want me to use protection?” he asked in a gravelly voice.

  “No, Zac. I want you. Only you with nothing between us.”

  He murmured a prayer of thanks as he lay over her, kissing her wildly as she wrapped her hand around his staff and guided him to her entrance. He shut his eyes on a long shudder of sheer, unadulterated pleasure as he sank himself slowly into her hot, sweet center. She broke from the kiss with a gasp at his first deep thrust and began moving in counterpoint with undulations that perfectly matched his rhythm. His world contracted to friction, slick, wet, sinful, and sweet.

  She gripped his ass cheeks, urging him deeper, harder. Plunging and retreating, he moved like a piston while she lay beneath him, golden hair lay splayed out on the pillow, blue eyes heavily lidded and lips parted in panting passion. Her breaths came sharper and faster, her gasps piercing the air, mixing with the erotic slap of flesh on flesh. Surrounded in her slick, hot flesh, his cadence intensified to a frantic frenzy at the finish. His lungs burned. His balls throbbed with the intense need for release, a need that had become the essence of his being.

  “Please don’t stop, Zac.” His chest seized as she whispered his name. “Don’t ever stop. Promise me you’ll never stop . . . loving me.”

  Her words crashed over him like a tidal wave. Madly pumping, he poured himself into her body and soul. She released a sob as her legs clamped tightly around him, then trembled convulsively as her climax overtook her. He shut his eyes on a primal roar, as her inner walls squeezed him with pulsatile contractions that milked him to a state of utter sated repletion.

  Delaney never wanted to open her eyes again. She wished she could lie here forever, totally and completely immersed in Zac—in the taste of his lips still lingering on hers, in his musky, heady scent filling her nostrils, in the sounds of his passion still echoing in her ears, and most of all, in the sensation of his body joined with hers. She’d never felt so at peace and complete as in this moment, lying cradled in his big, strong arms. After a while he stirred, rousing her out of her reverie. She opened her eyes to find him staring intently into her face.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked.

  “You asked me to make a promise I can’t keep.”

  “What promise? What are you talking about?”

  “When we were making love,” he said. “I was buried to the hilt in you and you asked me to never stop loving you. You asked for my promise.”

  She swallowed hard and looked away. Once a fool, always a fool. She’d thrown her heart away once more. “It was spoken in the heat of passion, Zac. It doesn’t mean anything. I won’t hold you to it.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to make that promise,” he continued. “It’s that I can’t.”

  Her chest constricted. “What do you mean, you can’t? What are you saying?”

  He cupped her face. “I’m saying that I want to make you that promise, but I can’t love you if you won’t let me.” His voice was husky with emotion as his gaze held hers. “I’m saying that I love you and I want to love you every day for the rest of my days. I’m asking you to let me, Delaney. You told me you feel something for me. Is it only friendship? Respect? Those are at least foundations to build on.”

  Her pulse raced madly and her eyes burned with welling tears. She never thought she’d ever hear those words. She’d even married a man who’d never spoken them to her.

  “Marry me, Delaney,” Zac continued. “I think I can make you happy—if you’ll only let me love you.”

  He wanted to marry her? She tried to speak, but her throat was too tight. She swallowed hard and then nodded vigorously.

  Zac’s gaze narrowed. “Is that a yes?”

  “Yes, Zac,” she croaked in a barely audible whisper.

  He pulled her into his arms for a long, tender kiss. “You’ve made me a happy man. I never thought I’d hear you say it.”

  Finding her voice, Delaney replied. “I didn’t think I needed a man. I didn’t think I’d need anything more in my life to be happy once I had a baby, but sometimes you don’t recognize what’s wrong until the right thing comes along . . . and that’s you, Zac. You’re everything that’s right. So yes, I mean it . . . and even more . . . I promise with all my heart to love you back.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Las Vegas

  “’Bout damned time you got here!” Ty exclaimed as Zac threw a leg over the bar stool in the Last Chance Saloon. “I’ve got a lot of shit to wrap up before I get on that plane tomorrow.”

  “Sorry, ’bout that,” Zac grunted. “I got waylaid in Albuquerque.” Or better said, laid really great. He and Delaney had passed all night and most of the following day making love in that honeymoon cabin. He couldn’t wait to go back.

  Ty signaled Gabby for two beers. “So what brought you out here? You’ve had me wondering about this whole face-to-face thing. You haven’t changed your mind about our deal, have you?”

  “Matter of fact, I have. That’s what I came to talk about. I’ve been thinking Ty, between rebuilding the hotel and running the Circle B, how are you really gonna have time for stock contracting?”

  “That’s what I’ve got you for,” Ty said.

  “Thanks.” Zac nodded to Gabby as she slid a foamy mug in front of him. He turned back to Ty. “But why me? Delaney’s done a fine job running your place and she knows her livestock. Why not give her the contracting business?”

  “Are you for real? Shit, Zac, you know a woman can’t handle bulls.”

  “Maybe not alone, but what if she had some experienced help?”

  “Wait a minute.” Ty’s gaze narrowed. “Are you saying you want to work for her?”

  “Not exactly.” Zac raised the mug to his lips. “I’d like to work with her.”

  “What are you getting at?” Ty asked.

  “When we first made this deal, I asked you if I could buy a share of the business once I sold my place. Well, circumstances have changed, Ty. I’d like to propose something a little different.”

  “Go ahead,” Ty encouraged. “You’ve got my ear.”

  “I came to ask if you’d consider selling me your half of the double M instead.”

  Ty’s brows met, furrowing a deep crease over the bridge of his nose. “You want to buy out my share of the ranch? Delaney would shit a brick.”

  “Would she?” Zac asked. “I don’t think so. She knows she needs help and you’ve always said you and she could never run it together. On top of that, you’ve got your hands full with everything you’re doing out here. I think it’s the perfect solution. Hell, we wouldn’t even have to change the Double M brand. Instead of Morgan—McCall, it’d be McC
all-McDaniel Ranch.”

  Ty eyed him skeptically. “Do you really think you could get along with that woman?”

  “Yeah.” Zac grinned. “I think we’d rub along well enough, which leads directly into my second reason for coming here.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “I wanna marry her, Ty.”

  Ty sputtered his beer all over Zac’s shirtfront. “Have you been smokin’ locoweed?”

  “You heard me right. I want Delaney. I love her, Ty. Hell, truth be told, I always have.”

  Ty sat back with an incredulous look. “You’re really serious? Shit, Zac! Why did it take you eight fucking years to say it?”

  “The timing was never right,” Zac mumbled lamely. He didn’t want to admit he’d been too chickenshit.

  “Are you looking for me to give my blessing?” Ty asked.

  Zac jutted his chin. “Don’t give a damn if you do or you don’t. I’m having her either way, but I would like you to stand up with me if it’s not asking too much.”

  “So this is the real reason you want to buy me out?”

  “Yeah. I don’t want to go into this empty-handed. I figure she’s already getting the short end of the stick.”

  “I admit I talk a lot of smack about Delaney, but she got a raw deal with me,” Ty said. “She deserves better. She deserves to be happy. Make her happy, Zac.”

  “I promised her I would,” Zac said. “And I’ll die tryin’.”

  “This is so depressing. We’ve been looking for hours.” Delaney grimaced as Monica held up an ivory-colored sheath. “That would be gorgeous on you with your slim hips and long legs, but my ass would look huge in it. I need something in a darker color.”

  “At least try it on,” Monica replied. “It’s not every day you get married. Here. Take these too.” Loading Delaney’s arms with pastel-colored designer frocks, she propelled Delaney toward the fitting rooms.