by Flynn, Ava
Lily lifted her hand to his cheek. "You have no idea how many times I thought about making love to you today, wondering if I’d ever get another opportunity." She shook her head. "Wondering if I’d gotten too caught up in the fantasy and in danger of thinking it was something real."
His chest grew tight. If he was crazy feeling like there was more between them than client and sexual plaything, then she was evidently crazy, too. But now wasn’t the time to explore that. Now he just wanted to get her into bed, bury himself inside her, make her come so hard she cried out his name. Honestly, it scared him a little how much he wanted that.
After kissing her deeply again, he led her inside, straight to the bedroom. Neither of them spoke as they discarded their clothes as quickly as they could. As Lily lay on the bed, a flash of what she’d done for him in the shower had him foregoing burying his straining dick deep inside her. Instead, he grabbed her legs behind her knees and dragged her to the bottom edge of the bed.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"Repaying a favor." He got down on his knees and spread her legs wide. Her quick intake of breath only fueled his desire to explore her this way, to drive her crazy with his tongue. He slid his hands under her hips and angled her up toward his face. He trailed kisses along her inner thigh, then placed his mouth on her hot center. When he flicked his tongue inside, she bucked against him.
Raging hot desire shot through him, and he went deeper, lapping at her core. Lily had said that being with him had given her a sense of power over events she hadn’t felt in a long time. Here, with her giving herself over to the pleasure he could give her, he knew exactly how she felt.
* * * *
Lily pressed her head back into the mattress and dug her fingers into the comforter covering the bed. She moaned as Connor flicked his tongue inside her, making her quiver with the need to come. But she also wanted this feeling to last as long as possible. It felt as if lightning was traveling along her skin.
He readjusted his hands beneath her hips, bringing her even closer to his mouth as he began to suck at her core.
"Oh, yes!" she cried out. "Yes, yes, yes."
Her words must have fueled his because his tongue went back to work at what seemed like an impossible speed. Her muscles tightened all over her body, but nowhere did they contract more than inside her.
"I’m coming," she said in between gasps for air.
He rocked her against his wonderful, wonderful mouth until she came in a glorious rush. She was in the middle of trying to get her breath when she realized he wasn’t done. When he moved to enter her, she pressed a hand against his smooth chest. "Wait." She flipped over and leaned forward onto her forearms, giving him easy access. She’d never be able to admit it in the light of day, but she liked sex this way, from behind.
He wasted no time sheathing himself and beginning to pump inside her. She concentrated on making her inner muscles squeeze around him with each deep thrust of his penis. Connor made a guttural sound deep in his throat before he impaled himself one more time and came.
Somehow they managed to find the energy to clean themselves then curl up together beneath the covers, her head on his shoulder. She thought about what he’d said earlier, about not being with anyone else after her. It was crazy, irrational, impossible, but she felt the same way about him. She indulged in a secret fantasy as they both drifted toward sleep, one in which she could reveal herself to him, he’d think she was beautiful, he’d be just as wonderful in the full light of day, and they could live happily ever after.
But unlike the past few days, that was a fantasy that could never come true.
* * * *
In the middle of the night, Lily awoke to Connor nuzzling her ear. That led to a kiss, then a deeper kiss, and then to slow, beautiful lovemaking. Afterward, they slept again. When she woke, several hours later, the sun was already rising and Connor was still next to her, his chest to her back and his arm draped over her.
She expected a surge of panic to hit her, but it didn’t. Instead, her heart beat fast for an entirely different reason. She’d come to Pleasure Ridge to enjoy a lover in the dark, one who would never know who she was or what she looked like. But now, the morning after he’d told her about his mother and his desire to quit working at the ranch, she found she wanted to share something with him. This man she barely knew had changed her. He’d pushed her to frenzied, sexual ecstasy, and then made such tender love to her that it had nearly brought tears to her eyes.
Lily shifted her head just a little, enough to see his hand. It looked exactly how she thought it would — long fingers, strong, a couple of small scars. The hand of a cowboy, even if it had been awhile since he’d ridden.
Connor shifted behind her, and she knew he was awake the moment he froze.
"Lily, you awake?"
"Yeah."
"I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to sleep this late." He started to pull his hand back over her, but she captured it in her own and guided it close to her chest.
"It’s okay."
"It is?" He sounded genuinely surprised.
She took a deep breath and released it slowly. "Yes. I don’t want to hide in the dark anymore, even though the idea of you seeing me scares me."
He settled his hand on her hip. "Why?"
"Because the man who attacked me...he left an ugly reminder behind."
Connor applied gentle pressure where he touched her, a gesture of support. "What happened?"
She closed her eyes and forced herself to remember the details of that day. "I was having a show at a gallery in St. Louis. I was on my way inside, going up the front steps in broad daylight, when this guy grabbed my arm. I didn’t recognize him at first. He’d grown a beard, and his hair was all a mess, but he was someone I’d seen at a couple of art shows. He’d asked me out, and I said no because there was just something about him that felt a little off. He didn’t take rejection well, and...he pulled a knife and started slashing at me." A shiver went through her at the clarity of the memory of that knife — huge, shiny, and heading straight for her.
"A guy nearby saw what was happening and tackled my attacker, but it was too late to keep him from making contact with the knife. I know I’m lucky to be alive, but it didn’t feel that way for awhile because he cut my face, bad, and I saw it every time I looked in the mirror. Still do."
She paused, giving him an opportunity to say something.
Connor dropped his head to her shoulder and planted a kiss there. "I’m sorry you had to go through that, but I’m thankful that bystander was there."
"Me, too." She waited for him to say that he knew who she was, but he didn’t. "The attack was bad enough, but..." Did she really want to go into this, on the off chance that he might have no idea who she was? "What followed was almost worse. The media seized on the story, making me the poster child for stalker victims when I just wanted to be left alone."
"Sometimes good people get thrust into shitty situations. It’s not fair, but it doesn’t keep it from happening." He paused long enough to place another kiss on her shoulder. "It’s up to you if you want to show me, but don’t worry about what I’ll think. I already know you’re beautiful."
She shook her head. "Maybe once I was."
"No, you are."
Unable to take the tension of not knowing anymore, she took a deep breath and rolled over onto her back, allowing him to see her and her damaged face for the first time. For a moment, however, she forgot she was waiting for a shocked reaction because she was the one who was shocked. He was so handsome with dark hair and eyes, strong lines on his face. He took her breath away. It took her several seconds to realize he hadn’t jerked back, hadn’t gasped, hadn’t reacted in any visible way to her scar.
"Like I said, beautiful," he said, and then he surprised her again by lowering his lips to her marred left cheek and kissing his way up the length of her scar.
In that moment, she fell in love with him. Hopelessly, irrevocably in love, no matter how that
didn’t make any sense whatsoever.
She closed her eyes as tears pooled and spilled out the corners.
"Hey now, don’t cry," Connor said as he wiped away her tears.
She opened her eyes and noticed the look of honest concern on his face. "You mean that? It’s not just because I’m paying you?"
A flash of hurt or anger or maybe both swept across his eyes. "I could give you every scent of your money back, and I’d say it to you again, however often you needed to hear it until you believed it."
The way he said it almost made her believe they could have a future together beyond these few days, ones that were flying by much too quickly.
"You have no idea how much that means to me. How weird to find someone who doesn’t know who I am."
"I know who you are, Lily. It just isn’t that person they plastered all over the news because they knew it would get them viewers. You’re the woman in front of me, beautiful inside and out."
She smiled while she lifted her hand and placed it against his cheek. "You’re not so hard to look at yourself, Connor..."
"Langston."
She rubbed the pad of her thumb over his cheek. "Langston. Sounds like a good rodeo cowboy name."
His eyes dimmed. "I’m not a rodeo cowboy anymore."
She gave him a mischievous grin. "Seems to me you still ride pretty well."
He snorted. "Is that right?"
"Question is, are you only a nocturnal rider?"
He lifted a dark eyebrow. "That sounded like a challenge, Miss Gibson."
She shrugged. "Take it how you like."
With a growl, he pinned her hands above her head and lowered his mouth toward hers. "Hope you weren’t planning on going anywhere today."
* * * *
CHAPTER NINE
Over the next couple of days, they spent almost every moment together other than one trip home for him to get more clothes and to check on his mother. Connor felt more alive than he had since before that horrible night when the bull had ended his career. He and Lily spent a lot of time in bed — well, really, quite a few surfaces — having mind-blowing sex.
But that wasn’t all. They took walks on the trails. They played board games he hadn’t played since he was a boy. He marveled at her talent as he watched her paint, then again when he tasted the meal she insisted on making for him. To make her feel better about her scar, he showed her all of his. He told her the stories that went with each one, including the granddaddy of them all — the one that ran nearly the length of his right calf, where Fire Breather had crushed his leg.
And now, they were making their way up one of the trails astride a horse, Lily’s first time on horseback. It felt so right, his arms around her as they swayed with the movements of the horse’s gait. He had something to tell her, and it was all he could do to wait until they reached the top of the trail, the point at which you could see for miles and miles out across the Sierra Nevada.
When they rounded the final curve before the lookout point, Lily gasped. "Oh, Connor. It’s breathtaking."
He slid off the mare’s back then helped Lily down to her feet. They walked hand and hand toward the edge of the cliff. "I thought you would like it."
"I do. Thank you so much for bringing me here." She shaded her eyes and looked out at the expanse of beauty before them.
All the beauty he wanted to look at was her. Sometime in the past week, his entire outlook on life had changed. And he had this beautiful, amazing, brave woman to thank for it.
"I wish I had my painting supplies. The view here was made to be painted."
"We can come up here again."
She glanced at him. "That would be nice, but I won’t have time before I go home."
He swallowed and rubbed his sweaty palms against the front of his jeans. "You could always stay longer, maybe find more inspiration for paintings."
She smiled. "I do okay with my paintings, but I’m afraid I can’t afford to stay at Pleasure Ridge for as long as I’d want to capture all the natural beauty here."
"You could stay somewhere else."
She met his eyes, a thousand questions in hers.
His heart rate kicked up a few notches. "I don’t want you to go, Lily." With a deep breath, he reached into his pocket for the package he hoped would show her how he felt better than any words he could ever cobble together.
* * * *
Lily’s heart was surely going to beat out of her chest. What was he reaching for? What did she want him to be reaching for?
It turned out to be an envelope, which Connor extended as he walked toward her.
"What’s this?"
He lifted the envelope toward her hand. "Open it."
Lily took the envelope and opened the flap. Inside were several cash bills. "I don’t understand."
"That’s equal to the portion of your stay here on the ranch that would have come to me."
She felt her forehead scrunching as she lifted her gaze to him.
"I don’t want what happened between us this week to be marred by the taint of my being paid," he said.
Lily lifted the envelope toward him. "But you need this for your mom."
He took another step toward her and gripped her shoulders gently. "I don’t." He smiled. "I got another job today."
"Today?" They’d been together all day, except... "The call you got when the horse was being saddled?"
He nodded, and the happiness in his eyes lifted her heart. "It’s a ranch foreman position only about half an hour from where I live."
"Connor, that’s wonderful." Already, she could tell such a big difference in him. That haunted look that she’d seen hiding in his eyes was gone. And truth be told, she wanted to be around to see what this new life brought him. What it might bring the both of them together. Down the road, it was possible they might not work out. But something inside her said that wasn’t true. That as absolutely insane as it might be, Connor was worth giving them a chance.
She stepped away from him and turned to look out across the vast vista stretching out toward the horizon. "You know, tomorrow is my birthday. This week was my birthday present to myself." She glanced toward Connor, saw a pinched look on his face, like he already knew she was going to leave. "But I’ve decided I’m going to give myself another present."
"What’s that?"
She turned to face Connor. "Us a chance."
Slowly, a smile tugged up the edges of Connor’s mouth. And then he rushed forward and lifted her into his arms, spinning her in a circle, causing her to laugh.
He finally returned her on her feet and smoothed her hair back behind her ear. "I love to hear you laugh. I’ll do my best to make sure you laugh often."
He left her without words, so she showed him how she felt by lifting onto her toes and kissing him. "My friends will be so jealous when I tell them that I got a cowboy lover for my birthday."
"What do you say we go back to the cabin and let me make sure I live up to that title?"
"I’d say that’s a very good idea."
* * * *
Thank you for purchasing this novella. I hope you enjoyed it. Watch for more Pleasure Ridge Ranch stories coming soon, and be sure to check out the first story of the series, In the Cowboy’s Bed.
Visit me online at www.avaflynnromance.com for all the latest news on Ava Flynn titles.