by A. D. Ryan
Breaking Rein
Copyright © 2017 A.D. Ryan
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical terms, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Ryan, A.D.
Breaking Rein / A.D. Ryan
(Horse Play Series ; 03)
ISBN 978-1545233900
Text and Cover design by Angela Schmuhl
Cover Image: Shutterstock, © Kiuikson
Chapter 1. One Thing at a Time Here
The way Jensen’s lips felt moving along my shoulder, placing the sweetest, gentlest kisses, caused my entire body to break out in goose bumps, regardless of the water temperature around us. Slowly, his arms encircled me, his hands resting softly on my belly, right over our baby, and I melted into his embrace. He turned his hands skyward and took mine in them, our fingers interlaced as he lifted our left arms from the water. The feel of his thumb stroking the back of my hand caused the goose flesh on my arms to return, and I turned my head into his neck, giggling softly as I did.
Then, out of nowhere …
“Marry me, Madison.”
We’d only known each other just shy of three months and been together marginally less than that. Admittedly, there had been something between us ever since that first day on the ranch when he rode up on his motorcycle. I should have known it the second I fell from my horse that first time, but it took two more times before I knocked my attitude completely loose and was able to see him for who he really was, instead of the cocky bastard I assumed him to be.
He took such good care of me in the days that followed my accident, and I started to see him in a whole new light. Our pasts weren’t all that different in some regards. While Jensen had found himself in a heap of trouble after avenging his sister, we’d both been hurt by those we thought we loved. This abuse of our trust followed us into our budding relationship, but we were trying to work through it. Together.
Finding out we were pregnant came as quite a shock, and definitely forced our fears to the surface where they festered and waited for the worst possible time to erupt. We’d literally just addressed these fears and insecurities a couple hours ago, and now he was proposing marriage …
Were we ready for that?
I inhaled sharply as his whispered words reached me, holding my breath and pressing my face farther into the crook of his neck. It would be a lie if I said I hadn’t thought about how he’d ask—when, where—and there was nothing I wanted more than to say yes, but we were already going through so much so fast; was this really the right time?
“Madison?”
Swallowing thickly, I pulled my face from his neck, not quite ready to look at him yet, because my heart was screaming YES! while my brain was trying to remain logical.
“Yeah?” I whispered against his skin.
I felt his body tense behind me, and when I looked up into his eyes I saw nothing but joy and excitement. “Yes?”
Shit. I should have known he’d misinterpret me.
Pulling myself up, I turned in the tub so I could look at him, displacing some of the water over the edge with a splash. Jensen moved his leg from behind me when I sat sideways and hugged my knees to my chest. The porcelain of the tub was cold against my back compared to Jensen’s body, but I needed to face him as we talked this out.
“Jensen, I love you …” I started.
He smiled that sexy crooked grin and reached out, grabbing my calf to pull me back to him—probably to celebrate what he thought was my acceptance to his proposal. “I love you, too.”
“Wait …” I whispered as he began to scoot me across the tub toward him. The look of rejection in his eyes made my stomach lurch and my heart ache, but I had to be a big girl, and we were going to talk about this. No more dancing around topics. No more avoidance. “I love you. So much, but I don’t think that now is the right time for us to get engaged.”
“Madison—”
I quickly interrupted, trying to explain myself better, because I knew I was doing a poor job of it. “I’m so excited to be having this baby with you—so much that it’s all I can think about lately … But I don’t want to be that girl who agrees to marry someone just because they found out they were going to be parents.”
The dejected look on Jensen’s face disappeared, and he smiled. He ran his hand up over my leg again, awakening my desire for him. “Is that why you think I’m asking?”
Shaking my head, I smiled back. “No, I know you’re asking for the same reasons I want to say yes. The reason I’m telling you that we should wait is because I don’t want everyone else to think that’s why we’re getting married.”
Jensen’s smile fell again as he interjected. “So, you’re afraid of what others might think?”
In a move that made more bathwater spill over the curved edge of the antique tub, I moved to kneel before him, cradling his face in my hands. “I know it shouldn’t matter what other people think, baby, but we haven’t even told anyone about the baby. Let’s take that step and enjoy that for a little. I want the excitement to be about the baby for a now.” Jensen looked ready to object again, so I brought a hand to his face and smiled. “And when I walk down that aisle toward you, I don’t want one single person to be thinking we’re doing it because of our situation.” My stupid hormones took that moment to wake the hell up, and a tear fell from my eye as I envisioned myself in a white gown and Jensen in a black tux, waiting for me. “I want them to know that it’s because we love each other.”
Nodding, he seemed to understand, his hands moving to my hips, and our eyes locked. “Ask me again a little further down the road, okay? When we’re sure our motives won’t be questioned.”
“Okay. I’ll wait.” Jensen sighed, bringing his hands up to cover mine before pulling them from his face and staring at his thumb moving over my bare left ring finger.
“Good. Let’s take life one obstacle at a time, all right?”
Jensen chuckled, and I breathed a sigh of relief as he leaned forward to kiss me softly. “Trust an equestrienne to compare life to a course.”
“So, we’re good?” I asked carefully.
Jensen’s hands found their way up and into my hair as he rested his forehead against mine. “Yes, we’re perfectly fine.” He smiled, and it reached his eyes, the outer corners creasing slightly as they seemed to sparkle magnificently. “Besides, asking you while the both of us were naked wasn’t exactly my finest moment. As I’m sure you’ve noticed by now, I suffer from impulse control issues.”
With a laugh, I shrugged, twisting my body and leaning back against his chest. “I don’t know,” I said, “I thought it was kind of great. Anyone can propose in a crowded restaurant or on vacation in one of the more romantic cities in the world … This, though? To me, when a person proposes, they’re always at their most vulnerable. I mean, you never really know what the person’s answer will be, so there’s always a little bit of fear there. It doesn’t get more raw than that. Add to that being naked and …”
A shiver moved through me as Jensen’s hands moved down my body. “I just think you like seeing me naked, Landry.”
“Well,” I rasped, my voice full of lust as Jensen adjusted himself behind me, possibly trying to conceal his arousal. I smirked. “I’m not going to lie; it definitely has its”—I tipped my hea
d up to look him in the eyes—“ups.”
With a moan, Jensen’s lips descended on mine, kissing me hungrily as his fingers curled into my flesh. Even though we’d sorted through everything, we were both still so tense from our argument earlier. That tension loaned itself to our desire as I turned around and tried to straddle Jensen, forcing more water from the tub. Jensen groaned into my mouth, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of my backside in an effort to try and slow down my expeditious actions.
“Make love to me, Jensen,” I murmured against his lips, opening my eyes to meet his intense stare.
Conflict flashed briefly in his eyes before a smile brightened them. “Come on,” Jensen said. “Let’s take this to the bedroom.”
Even though I was quite content to finish what we’d started, I agreed, standing up and allowing Jensen to step out of the tub. He handed me my towel, wrapping his own around his waist as I shamelessly checked out his hard, naked body.
Jensen smirked, having caught me ogling him—again. Without warning, he wrapped his arms around my waist, threw me over his shoulder, and bolted down the hall, throwing me down on the bed where we ravaged each other’s bodies until we collapsed into post-orgasmic bliss. The sex didn’t expunge our argument or the anxieties we both still obviously felt, but after everything that had happened that day, it was the perfect way to reconnect.
Chapter 2. Cat’s Out of the Bag
Upon waking the next morning, I looked up a few spas in Savannah and made an appointment for a massage. After Jensen’s amazing neck rub last night, I could feel a little tension in my body had been released, and I could only imagine what a full massage would do. Okay, so maybe the make-up sex helped, too.
Honestly, after our argument the night before, I fully expected Jensen to go ape-shit again—to tell me that there was no way in hell he was going to be without me for any given amount of time so soon after we fought. And I wouldn’t have blamed him in the least, given where his fear was stemming from.
My dad’s suggestion actually came as quite a shock to me, and I truly believed that had he known why Jensen and I were fighting, he wouldn’t have even mentioned the idea to begin with. He probably would have been Team Jensen all the way, even going as far as to help hog-tie and stuff me in a closet in order to keep me from going anywhere.
Okay, so maybe that was a little far fetched …
When I left the house earlier, I hadn’t planned on going over to Dad’s, but I realized about five minutes—and two almost-falls—into my walk that it was dangerous for me to be so deep in thought while trying to navigate my way over uneven terrain at dusk. So, after tripping on my own two feet for the third time, I decided that I just wanted to sit and think. I didn’t want to walk. I didn’t want to talk. I didn’t want to do anything, and with Dad being the type to keep his emotions bottled up, I figured he’d watch whatever sporting event was on TV, and I could curl up on his couch and pretend to watch.
In reality though, I would probably be thinking about how I had totally missed the mark on Jensen’s fear of his past repeating. Was he right to speak to me the way he did? No, but I could see why he might have felt justified—kind of. On the flip side, I knew I wasn’t innocent. I did nothing wrong by going into town, but I could have been open with him about my fears since the beginning of this pregnancy. But I wasn’t, and that was what caused his fears to manifest themselves until they took him over completely.
“Madi?” Dad said upon opening the door to find me on his stoop. Even though I had tried to keep my expression clear of what I had just been through with Jensen, my dad was unusually perceptive. “Honey, what’s wrong?”
And, like anytime anyone ever asked that damn question, the floodgates opened, and I threw my arms around his waist. The force of my forward momentum sent him back a few steps into the house. He mustn’t have been expecting it, because he seemed stiff for a few seconds before he finally wrapped his arms around me. I was so sick of crying. I blamed the extra hormones coursing through my body; if not for them, I’d probably be somewhat normal. Somewhat …
“Kiddo, what’s going on?” Dad urged gently, loosening his grip with one arm to close the door as he led me into the house.
Sniffling, I shook my head. “It’s nothing. We’re fine.”
“We?” he inquired.
“I meant I, sorry. I’m fine… Well, no, I meant we. Jensen and me …” I rambled.
Dad stopped us in the hall and looked me in the eye. “What do you mean ‘you’re fine’? Did you and Jensen have a fight?” I shrugged, and he arched an eyebrow at me questioningly. “You’re unsure if you had a fight?” he assumed from my gesture.
Rolling my eyes, I huffed. “We had a fight. Yes. But we’re fine.” I wiped the remaining tears from my cheeks and felt the ache in my chest begin to ebb.
“Well, I don’t know if you’ve forgotten the definition of the word ‘fine’, Madi, but showing up on your old man’s front step, crying your eyes out isn’t it …”
He was right.
“What it really boiled down to was a huge lack of communication between us. I withheld some stuff, he withheld some stuff. The end result was a fight,” I explained, trying to keep as many details out of it as possible.
Dad continued to eye me skeptically. “Well, that’s … vague. Does it have something to do with why he was acting like a crazy person all afternoon?”
My eyebrows drew together in confusion. “You never mentioned anything about him acting like a crazy person… You only said he’d been asking when I’d be back. That’s all. Geez, Dad, you sent me in there blind!” I wouldn’t deny that I overreacted just a smidge.
He blinked a few times, likely trying to figure out how to react to my outburst. “Look, he seemed a little out of sorts, but I figured he’d just had a long day. What exactly is going on? Is there a reason he should have been as erratic as he was?”
Yes. “No,” I replied, and I knew he saw right through me. “Well, yes… Kind of… Ugh!”
Now he was looking at me like I was the crazy person—and rightfully so. “You, uh, seem a little tense there. Want to come in and take a load off? I’ll make you some hot cocoa. With marshmallows …” Dad always was good at lightening the mood.
Nodding, I followed him to his kitchen where I sat at the table while he filled the kettle and put it on to boil.
“You hungry?” he asked, turning to me before opening his fridge.
Truthfully, I was, but I knew if I ate what I wanted to, he’d start to ask more questions I didn’t want to answer without Jensen here. After everything we had unleashed tonight, I honestly didn’t care about waiting to tell anyone now, but I did want to make sure we were together when we did it.
“Um, I think Jensen’s cooking, so I’ll wait until I get home to eat. Thanks, though.”
Dad shrugged, grabbing a loaf of bread, tomato, lettuce and some of his fake deli meat before setting it all on the counter to make himself a sandwich for dinner. “So, do you want to talk about the fight?”
I shook my head. “Um, not really. Jensen and I talked about it afterward, and we really are fine. I think my emotions are just still a little all over the place from everything we brought up. It was kind of our first fight.” I ran my fingers through my hair. “We should have been communicating with one another, and we just weren’t. I think we’ve learned to try harder to avoid this sort of thing in the future.”
Dad’s head bobbed up and down as he swiped some mayo and mustard onto his bread. “Communicating is definitely important. It’s a hard lesson to learn, but every couple has to learn it at some point.”
“Yeah, I know that … now. I just wish I had figured everything out before we got to this point. I never meant to, I really didn’t. It’s just, he’s always there, you know? And I just wanted some time to myself. Everything is just moving so fast, and I needed time to think.” I was rambling again; the words were coming out of my mouth faster than I could think them through, and I couldn’t seem to st
op them before Dad looked up at me quizzically.
“Well,” he started, his eyes bouncing between mine as I stared at him wide-eyed. “He was on the ranch all of what, a week before you two”—he twirled his finger around in a circle as if that was supposed to mean something, all the while looking at me like he was begging me to understand so he didn’t have to say it—“got together. You really haven’t had any time to yourselves. With as deep as your feelings for each other may run, it was only inevitable that you’d fight eventually. Maybe some time apart might be a good idea?”
“I don’t know …” I started to say, knowing without a doubt that if he knew about the pregnancy this suggestion wouldn’t have even come up. I momentarily considered telling him, but stopped myself. For Jensen.
“Think about it, sweetie. It might do you some good to get out. You admitted that you wanted some time to yourself.” Dad turned to the kettle as it started to whistle and mixed our hot cocoa before bringing it to the table.
“I know I did, but don’t you think that would be an awful lot like running away? I don’t see how it’s going to solve anything. We got into an argument about not communicating, we finally start and now you think we should … take a break?” His logic did not resemble mine. At all.
It wasn’t that I didn’t see his point, I did—I think—but given the circumstances, I really didn’t feel like this was the right time. Had we not been pregnant? Sure, I’d probably consider it. If Jensen hadn’t just expressed how fearful he was about what I may or may not do while away from him? Maybe. But I was dealing with both of those things, and I couldn’t just up and leave, knowing that the entire time Jensen would be out of his mind with worry. While he was aware I would never do anything like that, his fear was still legitimate, and he can’t just turn it off.