by Sofia Hunt
He pictured her in her bed, naked, the cool sheets sliding across her soft skin. Someday, it’d be his body doing the sliding, inside her, deep inside, claiming her as his and purging all others from her mind.
Soon. Soon he’d come for her.
Chapter 4
Whoever coined the phrase pleasant dreams had never dreamed of Riley and Jonah all night. Pleasant didn’t come close to describing the erotic fantasies invading her sleep. Mitzi wanted nothing to do with those cowboys, yet her body had different ideas.
Fuming at her body’s uncontrollable attraction, Mitzi turned on the water spigot near the barn and waited for the bucket to fill. Once full, she lugged it toward the open doorway.
“A little cooperation from you would make our lives easier.” Riley Backstrom spoke from behind her and caught Mitzi off-guard. She dropped the bucket and soaked her red boots. Just what she needed to start off the morning—wet feet and an argument with Riley.
“I told your better half I don’t need a bodyguard.” She stopped in her tracks, swinging the now-empty water bucket against her leg. Mitzi’s feet squished inside her boots.
“Your father says you do, and he’s paying the bills. Ours and yours.”
“Admit it, Riley Backstrom, you don’t like the arrangement any more than I do.”
Riley lounged against the fence, his arm rested on the top rail. He chewed on a piece of straw and studied Mitzi with heavy, lidded eyes. “What makes you think that, darlin’?” He did a lazy assessment of her body in her tight western shirt and even tighter blue jeans.
“You do a piss-poor imitation of Jonah’s accent.” Irritation rippled through her and settled in the pit of her stomach along with something more unwelcome.
“It’s not Jonah we’re talking about here.” He smiled his rare crooked smile, the one that lit up those deep chocolate eyes and was guaranteed to make her panties moist. It worked. She’d gone from bone dry to squirming in a split second. Her feet weren’t the only things that were wet.
“You don’t like me much.” Part of her wanted his denial. She licked her lips and stared at his. She wanted them on her, everywhere and anywhere, as long as they did their wicked deeds and left her satisfied just like before. She’d never gotten over their one night together. How pathetic was that?
“I don’t hate you. Exactly.” His dark eyes, ever watchful, revealed nothing.
She jerked her head upward and met his dark gaze. “Then why do you avoid me?”
His mouth quirked. “You hate me.”
“No, I don’t.” She wished she did, but try as she might, her body and heart weren’t playing fair.
“I’m glad we’ve gotten that straight. Neither of us hates the other.”
“Hate’s a strong word. Mutual dislike is more accurate.”
“That’s about right. Unfortunately, I have a job to do, and you aren’t making it easy.”
“I don’t need you two dogging my every step. Besides, I believe in people earning their money.” Mitzi waited for his reaction to her pointed insult.
He raised one eyebrow and shrugged. “It’s a tough job, but somebody’s gotta do it.”
“I don’t need you or your crony.”
“Oh, but you do.” He stepped into her space, too close for comfort. She stood her ground, refusing to let him get a rise out of her. A small scar ran across his chin. She wanted to touch it, run a finger along the ridge of his nose, across his sensuous lips.
“You got another letter. What did it say?” Riley put a finger under her chin, forcing her to look up at him. She hated being put at a disadvantage like that. Her nostrils breathed in the earthy scent of him, a combination of hay, horses, and soap. He’d rolled up the sleeves on his faded flannel shirt, and his biceps bulged with raw strength. His broad shoulders and chest filled out the shirt nicely. Her fingers itched to dive under that shirt and through his chest hair. He released her chin.
Mitzi’s gaze slipped lower to tight blue jeans slung low on his hips and a big belt buckle under which was an even bigger bulge between his legs. He wasn’t immune to her any more than she was to him. She remembered what Riley’s big cock felt like as it plunged into her over and over again until he took her over the edge and into the most incredible oblivion.
Riley snapped his fingers in front of her face, flinging her back to the present. His intense gaze indicated he’d known exactly what had distracted her. “Hey. What was in the letter?”
Mitzi met his gaze, her face hot with embarrassment. “It said, ‘I’m watching you.’”
“I don’t like the sound of that.” His jaw tightened.
“To me it sounds like a line out of B movie and just as original. It’s all a farce of my dad’s invention to keep me in line. He’s probably in cahoots with Ethel Hagart.”
Riley seemed to ponder that for a moment. “And what if you’re wrong?”
“I’m never wrong.” At least Mitzi hoped she wasn’t.
* * * *
“That she-devil is driving me fucking crazy.” Riley ran his fingers through his hair and popped the top of a cold one. Frustration clouded his judgment and wound him tighter than a bull in a bucking chute.
Jonah glanced up briefly from the saddle he was oiling. “Sounds like a personal problem to me.” He rubbed the saddle with big, lazy circles of his sponge.
“She’s not sending you over the edge?” Riley wiped sweat off the bridle, hung it on a nearby nail, then leaned back against a stall. He tipped his hat back on his head and rubbed his eyes.
“She’s a little challenging.” Jonah’s mouth twitched.
“Try a lot. She’s making this job hell. She takes every opportunity to ditch us. When she doesn’t ditch us, she finds other devious ways to torture us, like spending three hours in the mall shopping for handbags. All the time she knows good and well I’m waiting outside. Damn, just put a bullet in my head. It’d be less painful.” Riley shook his head and paced in front of Jonah. He wrung his hands and wished he could ring her neck instead. No amount of money was worth this crap.
Jonah chucked his sponge toward the open trailer door and dropped into the lawn chair. Cleaning tack had never interested him for long. He seemed deep in thought. Riley waited him out.
Finally Jonah spoke. “Do you think they’re real?”
Riley jerked his head up and barked out a strangled response. “Real?” He remembered too well how real they felt in his hands, how hard and perfect her nipples were, how they looked after he sucked on them and made them wet with his saliva. Damn. He sank down onto the trailer steps and stared at the sky.
Jonah chuckled. “Aw, man, drag your big head out of the gutter. I’m talking about the threats, not her tits.” His buddy’s eyes narrowed. “But while we’re on the subject, are they? Real?”
Riley sighed. “There’s nothing artificial about that woman.”
“Awww, man, I knew it. Why don’t you just fuck her again and get it out of your system?”
“Are you crazy? No thanks. I barely escaped with my soul the last time. Maybe you should. You keep bringing her up.” Riley couldn’t take back the suggestion once he’d uttered it, even though he damn well wanted to.
“Oh, man, I can’t do that to my best buddy.” Jonah rubbed his chin in thought. “Even though the more irritated she makes me the more I want to take her for a wild ride.”
Riley bit back his gut response. “Be my guest.” It didn’t set well with him that his buddy or any other guy might be taking Mitzi for a ride. Which was crazy. He didn’t have any claim on the woman, and he’d only bedded her once. Sure, it’d been the hottest sex he’d ever had in his entire life, but the power of that one time made him keep a safe distance. If the spirited filly ever realized his vulnerability, she’d exploit it for all she was worth.
“You don’t really mean that.”
“I do. Have at it.” He avoided Jonah’s eyes.
“I just might, given the opportunity. I’d tame our little chestnut.” Jonah grinned
and puffed his chest out.
Riley snorted and rolled his eyes. “Buddy, you have no fucking idea what you’re dealing with.”
Jonah narrowed his eyes and studied him. “You’re jealous.”
“Of you? With her? No way in hell. I’m worried for you. She’ll crush your balls under her boot heel, rip your heart out of your chest, and you’ll still be begging for more.”
“Sounds like my kind of woman. I wonder if she rides double.”
Riley looked up. Their eyes met, each deep in their own private, carnal thoughts. “Now there’s a thought.” He found himself oddly intrigued. He and Jonah shared women over the years, but none like Mitzi. “It’d take two of us to break that little filly.”
“Who said anything about breaking her? I want her bucking and twisting when she comes out of the chute.” Jonah grinned at the thought.
The problem was, so did Riley. He’d tried to bury his memories of Mitzi with the bodies of several women since, and he kept coming back to her. Always her.
He had it bad, and there didn’t appear to be a damn thing he could do about it.
Chapter 5
Damn it, the little spitfire had disappeared on them again. Pissed as hell, Riley grabbed a flashlight, Jonah on his heels, and headed out the door.
“Shit, where the hell is she now?” Jonah growled in the dark. Her truck sat next to her trailer. They tried the door of her trailer. It was unlocked with no one inside. Her purse sat on the bed.
“No signs of a struggle,” Riley noted as his heart slammed against his chest.
“She’s jacking us around. Again.” Even as he said the words, Riley caught a glimpse of worry in Jonah’s blue eyes.
“Check the barn. I’ll check around the arena and stock corrals.”
“Wait a minute.” Jonah pointed toward the tall, slender figure sashaying toward them.
“Where the hell have you been?” Riley fisted his hands and attempted to corral his temper.
Mitzi tossed her auburn hair and smiled at them. “I checked on Rowdy. He had a touch of colic earlier today.”
“Why didn’t you wake one of us before you went out in the middle of the night?” Riley’s patience stretched to the point of breaking.
“I didn’t want to bother you.”
“Of all the stupid-assed—”
“You’re not my keeper, Riley Backstrom. I don’t answer to you or my father.”
“You need a spanking.” Riley advanced toward her. His hand itched to connect with her bare ass once he stripped her and threw her over his knee.
Alarm flashed in Mitzi’s eyes. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“Wouldn’t I?” Riley stepped into her personal space, so close her perfume filled his nostrils. Mitzi backed up a step. The sexual tension between them crackled and popped. Even Jonah seemed to feel it, because his eyes smoldered with their own fire. He stepped in between them.
“While spanking Mitzi does sound enticing, we need to talk. All three of us. In there.” Jonah pointed toward the trailer.
Whirling around, Mitzi flounced into her trailer, both men hot on her heels. She poured herself a glass of wine and tossed a couple bottles of beer in their direction. Riley throttled down his temper and sat as far away from her as he could get in the small space. He’d come within an inch of smacking that shapely ass of hers. Who knows where that would’ve led considering the heavy hint of sex in the air between the three of them.
“About the threats.” Jonah steered the conversation back to safer ground as he settled on the bench seat opposite Mitzi.
“They’re bogus. Made up by my dad.” Mitzi folded her arms on the table in front of her.
“Has he made any contact since the note a few days ago?”
Mitzi shrugged. “Maybe.”
“Maybe?” Riley’s temper flared again. “Like what kind of maybe?”
“I had a few hang-ups on my cell from an unknown caller, nothing serious. Just the usual crap. You know, the heavy breathing. A few words.”
“What were the words?” Riley clenched his hands on his thighs, better than around her neck.
Mitzi actually squirmed. “Oh, I’ve been watching you. You’d look good naked. That type of thing. He even mentioned a few things I’d been doing so I’d know he was watching.”
“And you didn’t think that was information we should be aware of? This asshole has your cell number.” A spanking sounded better and better to Riley.
Mitzi filed her nails and yawned. “No, not really.”
“How can you still think this is your dad’s doing?” Riley snorted. Of all the stubborn, mule-headed reckless women...
Jonah flashed one of his peacemaker smiles and patted Mitzi’s hand. She jerked it away. “Mitzi, humor us. Let’s just assume for a minute, the threats are real.” He looked to Riley. “What kind of guy are we looking at?”
“Someone who follows rodeo. We know that for a fact.” Riley grouched from his corner.
“Another cowboy?” Mitzi snorted her disbelief.
For once Riley agreed with her. “I can’t picture one of the guys doing that.”
Jonah shook his head as if they were both idiots. “Are you kidding? What about Brent Black for starters? And Walter Craig? Jack Jameson?”
“Okay. Okay.” Riley held up his hands. “Let’s make a list and narrow down the possibilities.” He snagged a notepad and pen sitting on the dinette table. “Walter’s wife travels the circuit with him. He’s so pussy-whipped, I can’t see him breathing without her permission.”
“Yeah, but that’s just the type who’d have a secret life because he’s been so oppressed by his woman.” Jonah sipped his beer and put his booted feet on the couch. Mitzi glared at him. He just grinned back.
“Hmmm. Good point.” Riley scratched Walter’s name on the notepad with a few notes.
“Then there’s Larry McGuire. Hell, he’s never been the same since Mitzi dumped him last year. He quit the circuit and everything. I hear he’s living out of his trailer in Arizona and drinking his life away.”
“I didn’t do that to him. He already drank too much when I met him.” Mitzi’s pouting red lips tempted Riley to kiss some of the attitude out of her. He rubbed his sweaty palms on his thighs.
“Mitzi, this is a guy you most likely know and have known for a while. Who gives you a creepy feeling when you’re around them?” Jonah helped himself to another beer.
“Besides you two?” Mitzi smiled sweetly at them.
Riley glowered at her. To hell with kissing the attitude out of her, he’d rather go straight to the main event and fuck the attitude out of her.
“Come on, kids. Let’s play nice together.”
“I’d rather not play at all.” What a liar he was.
“Like I would play with you?” Mitzi tapped her fingernails on the table.
“Stop that. It annoys the hell out of me.”
“You two sound like an old married couple. Let’s concentrate on the stalker. Mitzi, give us some ideas. This guy is likely someone you know.”
“There is no stalker.” Mitzi continued to glare at Riley, who glared right back. Sexual tension hung in the air like a dense fog on Puget Sound.
“Just humor me, then we’ll get the hell out of your hair for a while.”
Mitzi turned away from Riley. “Fine. Lots of guys. Larry Maguire, for one. He’s never forgiven me for dumping him. Jack Jameson. Walter Craig. Beau West.”
Jonah scratched the names on a piece of paper. Not one of them surprised Riley in the least. “Any others?”
Mitzi hesitated, chewing on her full lower lip. Riley bit back a groan. “Just one.” She shook her head. “It’s stupid. There’s no way it could be him.”
“Who?” Riley leaned forward.
“Scott Trimble, my dad’s foreman. He’s always given me this weird feeling.”
“What kind of weird feeling?”
“Like he’s always watching me. But it can’t be him. He’s married to my dad’s ranch.
He works twenty-four-seven and never leaves the place, and it’s too far away for him to make quick trips here.”
“Maybe someone is doing it for him.” Riley’s suggestion brought an unladylike snort from Mitzi.
“That man is so controlling, he’d never allow someone else to do his dirty work for him.”
“Then we’re back where we started.”
“Which is nowhere.” Jonah finished his second beer and grabbed another. “Maybe I’ll just get shitfaced.” Jonah’s typical answer to all his ailments.
“Not in my trailer. I’ve had enough. You’re wasting my time.” Mitzi stood and pointed at the door. “Both of you. Out. You figure out who my stalker is—like there’s even a real one—and earn your money. Don’t bother me with this garbage.”
Riley got to his feet, pissed as hell. He stomped by her and out the door. He turned to find her standing in the doorway. “Lock your damn door and don’t leave that trailer again until morning.”
She slammed the door in his face. He heard the lock click. At least he’d gotten the last word. A small triumph, but with that woman, he’d take it.
Chapter 6
Mitzi was bored with being good. She’d spent two weeks behaving herself, and she couldn’t tolerate one more minute of captivity. Her boredom had morphed into way too many sleepless nights fantasizing about Riley and Jonah, separately and together. Pleasuring herself only went so far. She needed the real thing, but much to her disgust, the real thing consisted of Riley and Jonah. The arrogant, controlling cowboys had not only taken over her life, now they’d taken over her dreams.
Maybe a few hours boot-scooting with the locals would give her some relief from all the sexual frustration she’d bottled up inside. Regardless, she couldn’t stand another minute cooped up in this trailer with her overactive imagination.
She peeked out the curtain to see if her jailers were standing guard. She’d had enough of those two following her everywhere. Hell, she half-expected them to follow her to the showers and the bathroom.