by Nicole Helm
There wasn’t space between them, nor air, just the hardness of his muscles, like a wall. A wonderful, delicious wall, whose mouth was everything she’d hoped for.
“Summer,” he murmured against her lips, his tongue stopping its lovely exploration.
“Don’t stop.” Because she could tell that terrible idea was floating somewhere in him, muttering her name, and she wanted nothing to do with stopping.
Nothing.
* * *
This was out of control. Completely and utterly out of his control, and Thack couldn’t care. Where were the pieces that had made up his life for the past seven years? All that control and caution and choices made for everyone but himself.
He wanted something for himself. He wanted Summer for himself. A kiss wasn’t enough. Touching, being all tangled together, none of this could possibly be enough. She’d said, “Don’t stop,” and she was right. Why should he stop? The air had changed when his lips had touched hers. All that heat and pent-up frustration, all that need he’d been trying so desperately to ignore. This thing she unlocked in him that he didn’t understand. Surely, it was just a symptom of the isolation of the past few years, not…her.
He slid his hand down her back until it met the one under her shirt, and then—because every sensible, respectful, responsible thought in his head had combusted—he inched both hands under the waistband of her skirt and underwear and cupped her gorgeous ass, holding that soft expanse of skin with his rough hands.
She didn’t unwind her arms from his neck, didn’t stop exploring his mouth with her tongue. Instead she pushed even more flush against him.
He was hard. So damn hard. She was all soft fabric and jangling jewelry and complex scents, and he wanted to bury himself in everything she was, everything she exuded.
Don’t stop. No, he didn’t want to stop. He wanted her naked. He wanted to be inside her. He wanted what he had denied himself so long, not just because it had been so damn long, but because she was the first person, real person, to unlock anything like this surge of feeling inside him.
Her fingers trailed off his neck, and he held tighter onto her ass, like his palms belonged on her always. Belonged.
But she didn’t let go as he’d feared she would, and her mouth never left his. Instead she trailed her hands down his chest until they rested on his belt.
Touch me. Touch me. Touch me. He’d say it if he could stand to be separated from the sweetness of her mouth for one second. But she tasted like heaven, far better than any liquor he could drink. She smelled better than any spring field of flowers, and she felt softer and more perfect than any blanket straight from the dryer.
Summer was this magic thing—better than any other experience he could think to name. Because she enveloped him like he belonged exactly here, as if there was no question.
She traced the outline of him through the rough denim of his jeans, and he’d forgotten. Forgotten that it could be like this, like his blood had turned into molten lava, like he’d never be okay, never be able to breathe again if he didn’t get to sink into her, come inside her.
And, oh shit, that thought right there. He stepped away from her, pulling his hands so quickly out of her skirt that he might have ripped something. He took a stumbling step back, away, gulping air. He gulped at sanity.
Fuck. Actual full-fledged fucking damn it. Because he…
He shoved fingers through his hair, trying to find some center, some ability to breathe. The last time he’d had the thought Oh, who needs a condom, it had ended in a daughter.
He’d made a lot of mistakes in his life, but he tried very hard not to repeat mistakes. This would be a repeat mistake. Something born of his desperation that would only end with someone hurt or dead.
“Sorry! Did I do something wrong?”
“No, of course not. I just…” Something about the worry on her face, the uncertainty in her voice made him remember how young she was. Not that young, but…
Because the only way to make this worse—the thoughts in his head, the desire in his gut—the only way to make this worse would be if she… “You’ve done this before, right?”
“This?” Her voice was high. Too high. “Oh. Sure.”
“Okay, let me rephrase.” He took a deep breath. He was reading this wrong. His fears wouldn’t be confirmed because this couldn’t be any more complicated than it already was. He didn’t deserve any more complications. “The where this was leading to part. You’ve done that before, right?”
“Where was it leading?”
Only, she didn’t ask as though she didn’t know. She asked as though he was being ridiculous. He was being ridiculous. In every possible way. But that didn’t mean he appreciated her giving him a hard time. Even if he deserved it.
“Maybe that proves my point,” he grumbled.
“Are you asking if I’m a virgin?”
It was a little unmanning to realize he was being a complete wuss about actually saying the words, when he’d had his tongue jammed down her throat little more than a few seconds ago. When his bare hand had cupped her bare skin like he had any right to lead from a first kiss to an ass grab in five seconds flat.
He’d wanted her so bad, wanted something just for himself. But there was a problem with that. A problem in all of this. As much as he might want Summer, as much as he might be perfectly happy to relieve the tension in his life for a few minutes by screwing her against his father’s woodshed, Summer was…well, a person too. With her own wants and problems and tensions to unwind.
She might be just as eager to find some kind of sexual release together, but she was a woman with her own stresses and baggage, and the two of them didn’t get to just walk away and never see each other again. Their lives were intertwined.
He didn’t have any space left for more entanglements. He didn’t have any extra time in his day for another person who would come to expect certain things. Hadn’t the last few days been a glaring reminder of that?
Especially if she had honestly never done this before. “Yes, I am asking if you’re a virgin.”
“I don’t see why it matters.”
“See, if you answer with It doesn’t matter, rather than an actual answer, I think it might matter.”
He could sense her frown more than he could see it.
“I have to go.”
He almost asked her not to. He almost grabbed her arm and kissed her again. There were a million almosts running through his mind, all the things he wanted, but…
Hadn’t he learned? He didn’t get what he wanted. He had Kate, and that meant he didn’t have leave to take things for himself. His daughter was everything. If he ever let that slip, he would lose her too.
His chest contracted so painfully at the thought that he almost stumbled. The thought of losing Kate, coupled with all it would mean, nearly brought him to his knees. He had to get inside and check on her, make sure everything was okay, but Summer was walking away into the deeper dark.
“Let me drive you home,” he offered, unable to let her face the vast emptiness of the space between their homes alone. It was freezing, and though she had a coat and boots and he’d made a path, in the dark, she could easily fall or get lost. “It’s stupid to be walking through the dark and—”
“The moon and stars are bright enough.” She stopped walking away, turning to face him. He could only make out her faint outline, and the cowardly part of him was glad he couldn’t see her face, didn’t know what her reaction was.
She should be relieved, even happy he’d stopped things before they’d gotten even more complicated. Because even if they’d done irrevocable things, he had nothing to offer someone like Summer, so young and vibrant and full of cheer and hope.
“Please let me see you home.”
She whirled away from him, the swish of her skirts and jangle of her jewelry a testament to how violen
t the motion was. “Let me assure you, I’m fine.”
“Summer.”
“Good night, Thack.” She took a stomping step away, and he made a move to touch her, but she grabbed his discarded bottle from earlier and heaved it at the target instead.
The gesture and subsequent crash startled him enough that he didn’t even move after her quickly retreating form.
She muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, “Enjoy your erection, jerkface” on her way past the woodshed and toward the line between their properties.
He should go after her. He should go check on Kate and Dad. He was torn in two different directions, and this was the absolute last thing he needed. Another no-win situation.
And he couldn’t blame anyone but his own damn self for this one.
Chapter 15
Summer stormed through the dark trees and climbed over the fence, wishing she could bust through it like some kind of wild, feral animal. If she had any room in her brain for something that wasn’t anger, she might have been afraid. Yes, the moon and stars lit the way, but that didn’t make her any less alone in the dark of night in a cold, wild land.
She didn’t even know why she was so angry. She should have stayed. They should have talked it out. She should never have thrown that bottle.
But, damn, she understood it now—how amazing it felt to fling something and hear it destruct.
Crash.
She wanted to do it a hundred more times, and that scared her as much as it pissed her off. As much as him asking if she was a virgin—without even actually asking it, the wimp.
How dare he? How dare he? And…and…
Damn it. Why was she so mad? She didn’t get mad. She was calm and levelheaded. She was a problem solver. And if she couldn’t solve a problem, she ran away… Which was how she’d ended up here. Of course she’d run away this time too, but not before her temper had boiled over.
No one appreciates nasty words, Summer. Always smile when you want to frown. Always offer a nice word when you’re uncomfortable. For once in your life, try to be accommodating. For me.
Summer stopped stomping in the clearing around her caravan. She wanted to cry. She wanted to get in the caravan and drive away from the memories, but more than that, she needed to drive away from the possibility that Mom had warped her irrevocably.
Neither Mel nor Delia bent over backward to make other people happy. They had a way of holding themselves, an inner strength, a belief of purpose and self. They didn’t need to make everyone around them happy. They didn’t defer to their husbands or their fathers.
They didn’t do whatever a man wanted because he might grace them with a few dollars or a pretty necklace.
They wouldn’t turn their daughters into servants or try to sell their virginity to the highest bidder. They’d never threaten their children.
“Summer.”
She whirled around, only managing not to squeak because she was so lost and upset and angry that it seemed perfectly natural for someone to pop out of the woodwork. She couldn’t see him, but of course it was Thack’s voice and Thack’s ridiculous need to make sure she got back okay. As if she hadn’t already saved herself from worse than him.
Once she caught her breath, she planted her clenched fists on her hips. He was still too shadowed to make out, but she glared anyway. “Oh my God, you followed me?” She was horrified. Angry. Irritated.
Pleased beyond belief.
Even though she couldn’t see him, even though she was so angry she wanted to throw things at him, to know that he would come after her… No one ever came after her.
“Yes, I followed you. It’s hotheaded and stupid to go off into the woods on your own.”
Well, that undercut any pleasure she might have taken in the moment. “The line of trees hardly constitutes woods. And you know what? I got myself here from California alone and without a cent to my name. Without help. Without some pseudo-cowboy who thinks he has to look out for everyone. I have done more alone and in the dark in my life than you have in yours, I can almost guarantee you.”
That seemed to shut him up. Why was he here, lecturing her as if he cared? He probably just wanted to make sure he hadn’t defiled the poor, innocent virgin. She wanted to laugh at the thought. Sure, technically. But only because her mom had been using it as a bargaining chip.
She felt sick and angry, and he was the perfect target for her anger. Hey, he’d followed her, and this was her domain. She deserved her anger, had a right to it, and he deserved to get the blunt edge. “And furthermore, you are going to have to walk through those ‘woods’ alone and back to your ranch. So, if you want to talk about hotheaded and stupid, go look in a mirror.”
Silence followed, and she had to squeeze her eyes shut. Oh God, that was so not the way to talk to someone who had a hand in her employment. Someone she liked, someone she genuinely respected.
Sometimes the worst thing is someone you can’t trust with your anger. Why did that foolishness keep coming back to her? Like she was going to believe something her father had uttered. The man was the most nonfunctional person she’d ever met. Oh, but you’ll listen to your mother telling you that you need to be accommodating and sweet?
“I know this land better than you.”
“Whoop-de-doo.”
“Whoop-de-doo,” he repeated. “You really say the weirdest things.”
“And I think I’m over being insulted on my own property, Thackery. You can leave now. Or would you like me to call someone to escort you back to your home, so you can be safe? Oh, I know—you want to kiss me again and then grill me on my sexual history?”
It had ruined the entire moment. Because there was no real answer. That was why she was angry. There was no easy answer when it came to her experience, and she never wanted to have to explain that to anyone.
She needed to be alone. She needed to meditate or find some other way to get away from all these thoughts and memories and gross feelings. What she’d really love was a shower, but she could hardly go up to the big house now and explain that one away.
Tears stung her eyes so she whirled away from him and made for her caravan. It was her sanctuary, the place that had meant safety and peace the past two years. She reached the end of her battery-powered string of Christmas lights and turned them on. It was just a little pop of color in an otherwise bleak, dark night, but it made a difference.
Thack’s footsteps followed her across the yard. “Summer. Stop. Listen.” After a moment when she did not stop, he uttered the word that made her finally acquiesce. “Please.”
She turned, folding her arms over her chest. Mortification flooded through her for losing her temper over something so silly, but she wanted—she was determined to be like her sisters. She wanted to be like them, not like what her mother had wanted her to be.
“I apologize.”
Her first instinct was to slump and say he was forgiven, smile and comfort him and move on, but that was not the right answer. She didn’t even know what he was apologizing for. “For?”
“I don’t have…room. In my life. That’s not personal. I’m not pretending I’m not attracted to you. I’m not pretending I don’t care. I simply don’t have room for anything else, not now.”
Wait. He…cared?
“So, you shouldn’t be angry. Or upset. Because…”
“Because you get to decide whether I’m allowed to be angry or upset?”
“No!”
It was weird to have an argument in the dark. Though it had been shadowy back at the Lanes’ bunkhouse, there had been a semblance of light not just from above, but silhouettes made by the lights from the house, from the barn.
Here, there was only darkness. All that filtered through the blackness were the faintest hints of silver moonlight, which didn’t offer a true glimpse of either of them, and the little dots of color hanging fr
om the eaves of her caravan.
She and Thack were only voices. It gave her the illusion of freedom and strength—the illusion that she could be whoever she wanted to be. She didn’t have to make him happy, or make him like her, or put any effort into helping him.
She could just be her. But who was she? A woman trying to copy her sisters? Or was she her own person?
Or are you just a mess?
“Summer, I need you to understand that what happened back there can’t happen again. It doesn’t have anything to do with you or your…history. It simply can’t happen.”
“What part?”
“All of it. The losing my temper. The kiss. Touching. And that is all on me. The way my life is. I don’t have room for women in my life. I thought maybe I could try, but lunch reminded me why this is always impossible. There’s too much. There have been no women in my life since my wife died because there’s just not room for another thing.”
“No…women.” She tried to make sense of that. None?
“None.”
“Oh.” Now she felt like an idiot. If his wife had died when Kate was a baby, that was…years. Years. And he had to have married fairly young.
“There’s a reason I haven’t been with anyone aside from Michaela, and it isn’t that she was my soul mate or one true love or whatever other bullshit people want to believe in. I loved her, I did. I grieved, and there is a part of me that always will, but that’s not what keeps me…”
“Alone?”
“I’m not alone. I have Kate and my father. And the ranch.”
“But…” Summer chewed on her lip, wondering why she felt so compelled to have this conversation, why she was so bound and determined to push when he obviously didn’t want to be pushed. When had her anger vanished? When she learned that he hadn’t been with anyone since his wife? No, it was more than that. It wasn’t just that he was alone—which he was, whether he wanted to admit it or not. It was that he seemed to think he had to be.
She’d been there. She’d tried to make herself believe it had taken two years to get to Montana because of money, because of life, but it had been more than that. She hadn’t thought she’d deserved to find this place, hadn’t thought she’d be wanted.