by Maisey Yates
But there was no distance here.
And certainly none as he undid the button of her jeans and drew the zipper down slowly. As he pushed the rough denim down her legs, taking her panties with them.
If she had felt vulnerable a moment before, that was nothing compared to now. She felt so fragile. So exposed. And then he reached up, pressing his hand against her leg at the inside of her knee, spreading her wide so he could look his fill.
She wanted to snap her legs together. Wanted to cover up. But she was immobilized. Completely captive to whatever might happen next. She was so desperate to find out, and at the same time desperate to escape it.
Rough fingertips drifted down the tender skin on her inner thigh, brushing perilously close to her damp, needy flesh. And then he was there. His touch in no way gentle or tentative as he pressed his hand against her, the heel of his palm putting firm pressure on her clit before he pressed his fingers down and spread her wide.
He made his intentions clear as he lowered his head, tasting her deeply. She lifted her hips, a sharp sound on her lips, one she didn’t even bother to hold back. He shifted his hold, gripping her hips, holding her just wide enough for his broad shoulders to fit right there, his sensual assault merciless.
Tension knotted her stomach like a fist, tighter and tighter with each pass of his tongue. Then he pressed his thumb against her clit at the same time as he flicked his tongue against that sensitive bundle of nerves. She grabbed hold of him, her fingernails digging into his back.
He drew his thumb down her crease, teasing the entrance of her body. She rocked her hips with the motion, desperate for something. Feeling suddenly empty and achy and needy in ways she never had before.
He rotated his hand, pressing his middle finger deep inside of her, and she gasped at the foreign invasion. But any discomfort passed quickly as her body grew wetter beneath the ministrations of his tongue. By the time he added a second finger, it slipped in easily.
He quickened his pace, and it felt like there was an earthquake starting inside her. A low, slow pull at her core that spread outward, her limbs trembling as the pressure at her center continued to mount.
His thumb joined with his tongue as he continued to pump his fingers inside her, and it was that added pressure that finally broke her. She was shaken. Rattled completely. The magnitude of measurable aftershocks rocking her long after the primary force had passed.
He moved into a sitting position, undoing his belt and the button on his jeans. Then he stood for a moment, drawing the zipper down slowly and pushing the denim down his muscular thighs.
She had never seen a naked man in person before, and the stark, thick evidence of his arousal standing out from his body was a clear reminder that they weren’t finished, no matter how wrung out and replete she felt.
Except, even though she felt satisfied, limp from the intensity of her release, she did want more. Because there was more to have. Because she wanted to be close to him. Because she wanted to give him even an ounce of the satisfaction that she had just experienced.
He knelt back down, pulling his jeans closer and taking his wallet out of his back pocket. He produced a condom packet and she gave thanks for his presence of mind. She knew better than to have unprotected sex with someone. For myriad reasons. But still, she wondered if she would have remembered if he had not.
Thank God one of them was thinking. She was too overwhelmed. Too swamped by the release that had overtaken her, and by the enormity of what was about to happen. When he positioned himself at the entrance of her body and pressed the thick head of his cock against her, she gasped in shock.
It hurt. Dear God it hurt. His fingers hadn’t prepared her for the rest of him.
He noticed her hesitation and slowed his movements, pressing inside her inch by excruciating inch. She held on to his shoulders, closing her eyes and burying her face in his neck as he jerked his hips forward, fully seating himself inside her.
She did her best to breathe through it. But she was in a daze. Joshua was inside her, and she wasn’t a virgin anymore. It felt... Well, it didn’t feel like losing anything. It felt like gaining something. Gaining a whole lot.
The pain began to recede and she looked up, at his face, at the extreme concentration there, at the set of his jaw, the veins in his neck standing out.
“Are you okay?” he asked, his voice strangled.
She nodded wordlessly, then flexed her hips experimentally.
He groaned, lowering his head, pressing his forehead against hers, before kissing her. Then he began to move.
Soon, that same sweet tension began to build again in her stomach, need replacing the bone-deep satisfaction that she had only just experienced. She didn’t know how it was possible to be back in that needy place only moments after feeling fulfilled.
But she was. And then she was lost in the rhythm, lost in the feeling of his thick length stroking in and out of her, all of the pain gone now, only pleasure remaining. It was so foreign, so singular and unlike anything she had ever experienced. And she loved it. Reveled in it.
But even more than her own pleasure, she reveled in watching his unraveling.
Because he had pulled her apart in a million astounding ways, and she didn’t know if she could ever be reassembled. So it was only fair that he lost himself too. Only fair that she be his undoing in some way.
Sweat beaded on his brow, trickled down his back. She reveled in the feel of it beneath her fingertips. In the obvious evidence of what this did to him.
His breathing became more labored, his muscles shaking as each thrust became less gentle. As he began to pound into her. And just as he needed to go harder, go faster, so did she.
Her own pleasure wound around his, inextricably linked.
On a harsh growl he buried his face in her neck, his arms shaking as he thrust into her one last time, slamming into her clit, breaking a wave of pleasure over her body as he found his own release.
He tried to pull away, but she wrapped her arms around him, holding him close. Because the sooner he separated from her body, the sooner they would have to talk. And she wasn’t exactly sure she wanted to talk.
But when he lifted his head, his blue eyes glinting in the dim light, she could tell that whether or not she wanted to talk, they were going to.
* * *
He rolled away from her, pushing into a sitting position. “Are you going to explain all of this to me? Or are you going to make me guess?”
“What?” She sounded overly innocent, her eyes wider than necessary.
“Danielle, I’m going to ask you a question, and I need you to answer me honestly. Were you a virgin?”
Joshua’s blood was still running hot through his veins, arousal still burning beneath the surface of his skin. And he knew the question he had just asked her was probably insane. He could explain her discomfort as pain because she hadn’t taken a man to her bed since she’d given birth.
But that wasn’t it. It wasn’t.
The more credence he gave to his virgin theory, the more everything about her started to make sense. The way she responded to his kiss, the way she acted when he touched her.
Her reaction had been about more than simple attraction, more than pleasure. There had been wonder there. A sense of discovery.
But that meant Riley wasn’t her son. And it meant she had been fucking lying to him.
“Well, Joshua, given that this is not a New Testament kind of situation...”
He reached out, grabbing hold of her wrist and tugging her upward, drawing her toward him. “Don’t lie to me.”
“Why would you think that?” she asked, her words small. Admission enough as far as he was concerned.
“A lot of reasons. But I have had sex with a virgin before. More accurately, Sadie Miller and I took each other’s virginity in the woods some eighteen years ago. You d
on’t forget that. And, I grant you, there could be other reasons for the fact that it hurt you, for the fact that you were tight.” A flush spread over her skin, her cheeks turning beet red. “But I don’t think any of those reasons are the truth. So what’s going on? Who is Riley’s mother?”
A tear slid down her cheek, her expression mutinous and angry. “I am,” she said, her voice trembling. “At least, I might as well be. I should be.”
“You didn’t give birth to Riley.”
She sniffed loudly, another tear sliding down her cheek. “No. I didn’t.”
“Are you running from somebody? Is there something I need to know?”
“It’s not like that. I’m not hiding. I didn’t steal him. I have legal custody of Riley. But my situation was problematic. At least, as far as Child Services was concerned. I lost my job because of the babysitting situation and I needed money.”
She suddenly looked so incredibly young, so vulnerable... And he felt like the biggest prick on planet Earth.
She had lied to him. She had most definitely led him to believe she was in an entirely different circumstance than she was, and still, he was mostly angry at himself.
Because the picture she was painting was even more desperate than the one he had been led to believe. Because she had been a virgin and he had just roughly dispensed with that.
She had been desperate. Utterly desperate. And had taken this post with him because she hadn’t seen another option. Whatever he’d thought of her before, he was forced to revise it, and there was no way that revision didn’t include recasting himself as the villain.
“Whose baby is he?”
She swallowed hard, drawing her knees up to her chest, covering her nudity. “Riley is my half brother. My mother showed up at my place about a year ago pregnant and desperate. She needed someone to help her out. When she came to me, she sounded pretty determined to take care of him. She even named him. She told me she would do better for him than she had for me, because she was done with men now and all of that. But she broke her promises. She had the baby, she met somebody else. I didn’t know it at first. I didn’t realize she was leaving Riley in the apartment alone sometimes while I was at work.”
She took a deep, shuddering breath, then continued. “I didn’t mess around when I found out. I didn’t wait for her to decide to abandon him. I called Child Services. And I got temporary guardianship. My mother left. But then things started to fall apart with the work, and I didn’t know how I was going to pay for the apartment... Then I saw your ad.”
He swore. “You should have told me.”
“Maybe. But I needed the money, Joshua. And I didn’t want to do anything to jeopardize your offer. I could tell you were uncomfortable that I brought a baby with me, and now I know why. But, regardless, at the time, I didn’t want to do anything that might compromise our arrangement.”
He felt like the ass he undoubtedly was. The worst part was, it shone a light on all the bullshit he’d put her through. Regardless of Riley’s parentage, she’d been desperate and he’d taken advantage of that. Less so when he’d been keeping his hands to himself. At least then it had been feasible to pretend it was an even exchange.
But now?
Now he’d slept with her and it was impossible to keep pretending.
And frankly, he didn’t want to.
He’d been wrestling with this feeling from the moment they’d gone out riding today, or maybe since they’d left his parents’ house last week.
But today...when he’d looked at her, seen her smile...noticed the way she’d gained weight after being in a place where she felt secure...
He’d wanted to give her more of that.
He’d wanted to do more good than harm. Had wanted to fix something instead of break it.
It was too late for Shannon. But he could help Danielle. He could make sure she always felt safe. That she and Riley were always protected.
The realization would have made him want to laugh if it didn’t all feel too damned grim. Somehow his father’s ad had brought him to this place when he’d been determined to teach the old man a lesson.
But Joshua hadn’t counted on Danielle.
Hadn’t counted on how she would make him feel. That she’d wake something inside him he’d thought had been asleep for good.
It wasn’t just chemistry. Wasn’t just sex. It was the desire to make her happy. To give her things.
To fix what was broken.
He knew the solution wouldn’t come from him personally, but his money could sure as hell fix her problems. And they did have chemistry. The kind that wasn’t common. It sure as hell went beyond anything he’d ever experienced before.
“The truth doesn’t change anything,” she said, lowering her face into her arms, her words muffled. “It doesn’t.”
He reached out, taking her chin between his thumb and forefinger, tilting her face back up. “It does. Even if it shouldn’t. Though, maybe it’s not Riley that changes it. Maybe it’s just the two of us.”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t have to change anything.”
“Danielle... I can’t...”
She lurched forward, grabbing his arm, her eyes wide, her expression wild. “Joshua, please. I need this money. I can’t go back to where we were. I’m being held to a harsher standard than his biological mother would be and I can’t lose him.”
He grabbed her chin again, steadying her face, looking into those glistening brown eyes. “Danielle, I would never let you lose him. I want to protect you. Both of you.”
She tilted her head to the side, her expression growing suspicious. “You...do?”
“I’ve been thinking. I was thinking this earlier when we were riding, but now, knowing your whole story...I want you and Riley to stay with me.”
She blinked. “What?”
“Danielle, I want you to marry me.”
Eight
Danielle couldn’t process any of this.
She had expected him to be angry. Had expected him to get mad because she’d lied to him.
She hadn’t expected a marriage proposal.
At least, she was pretty sure that was what had just happened. “You want to...marry me? For real marry me?”
“Yes,” he said, his tone hard, decisive. “You don’t feel good about fooling my family—neither do I. You need money and security and, hell, I have both. We have chemistry. I want... I don’t want to send you back into the world alone. You don’t even know where you’re going.”
He wasn’t wrong. And dammit his offer was tempting. They were both naked, and he was so beautiful, and she wanted to kiss him again. Touch him again. But more than that, she wanted him to hold her in his arms again.
She wanted to be close to him. Bonded to him.
She wanted—so desperately—to not be alone.
But there had to be a catch.
There was always a catch. He could say whatever he wanted about how all of this wasn’t a transaction, how he had taken her riding just to take her riding. But then they’d had sex. And he’d had a condom in his wallet.
So he’d been prepared.
That made her stomach sour.
“Did you plan this?” she asked. “The horse-riding seduction?”
“No, I didn’t plan it. I carry a condom because I like to be prepared to have sex. You never know. You can get mad at me for that if you want, but then, we did need one, so it seems a little hypocritical.”
“Are you tricking me?” she asked, feeling desperate and panicky. “Is this a trick? Because I don’t understand how it benefits you to marry me. To keep Riley and me here. You don’t even like Riley, Joshua. You can’t stand to be in the same room with him.”
“I broke Shannon,” he said, his voice hard. “I ruined her. I did that. But I won’t break you. I want to fix this.”
&nb
sp; “You can’t slap duct tape and a wedding band on me and call it done,” she said, her voice trembling. “I’m not a leaky faucet.”
“I didn’t say you were. But you need something I have and I... Danielle, I need you.” His voice was rough, intense. “I’m not offering you love, but I can be faithful. I was ready to be a husband years ago, that part doesn’t faze me. I can take care of you. I can keep you safe. And if I send you out into the world with nothing more than money and something happens to you or Riley, I won’t forgive myself. So stay with me. Marry me.”
It was crazy. He was crazy.
And she was crazy for sitting there fully considering everything he was offering.
But she was imagining a life here. For her, for Riley. On Joshua’s ranch, in his beautiful house.
And she knew—she absolutely knew—that what she had felt physically with him, what had just happened, was a huge reason why they were having this conversation at all.
More than the pleasure, the closeness drew her in. Actually, that was the most dangerous part of his offer. The idea that she could go through life with somebody by her side. To raise Riley with this strong man backing her up.
Something clenched tight in her chest, working its way down to her stomach. Riley. He could have a father figure. She didn’t know exactly what function Joshua would play in his life. Joshua had trouble with the baby right now. But she knew Joshua was a good man, and that he would never freeze Riley out intentionally. Not when he was offering them a life together.
“What about Riley?” she asked, her throat dry. She swallowed hard. She had to know what he was thinking.
“What about him?”
“This offer extends to him too. And I mean...not just protection and support. But would you... Would you teach him things? Would your father be a grandfather to him? Would your brothers be uncles and your sister be an aunt? I understand that having a child around might be hard for you, after you lost your chance at being a father. And I understand you want to fix me, my situation. And it’s tempting, Joshua, it’s very tempting. But I need to know if that support, if all of that, extends to Riley.”