by Soraya Lane
He shook his head, dipped down to press a slow, lingering kiss to her lips. “No, Chloe, you did it,” he murmured against her mouth.
“And I never doubted you for a second.”
She sighed as he kissed her again, arching her body so she was pressed tight to him all the way from her pelvis to her breasts. For once she didn’t have to stand on tiptoe, her heels making up most of their height difference.
“I’m so pleased you have your ranch back,” Chloe told him. To start with she’d thought he was an idiot, a guy with too much trust fund money to appreciate what he had. Now she realized that he’d just made a stupid mistake, and she doubted he’d ever do anything so reckless again.
“You’ve got no idea,” he muttered. “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to thank you enough.”
Chloe stepped back and held her purse out to him. “Here’s your money,” she said.
Ryder let out a low laugh. “It’s yours.”
“No,” she protested. “It’s too much. We had a deal and…”
“It’s yours. You saved my ranch, Chloe. You deserve every goddamn penny.”
A vehicle approaching too fast made her turn, taking Ryder’s hand and tugging him back toward the entrance of the bar. It slowed just in time, but it took her a moment to recognize that it was Nate’s truck, the lights blinding in the dark. The driver’s door opened and Nate’s eyes locked on hers.
“You’re smiling. Does that mean you won the game?”
Chloe nodded and Ryder hugged her protectively to his side. “You’re a bit late to be backup crew. Parker already lost it in there.”
“I bet he did.” Nate’s scowl was replaced a smile now. She knew he’d been pissed at his brother, but angry didn’t suit him anywhere near as well as happy did.
“Will you get a ride home with your brothers?” she asked, taking a step away from Ryder, wanting to put some distance between them.
“Ah, no,” he muttered, sliding his arm back around her and trying to tug her back in again. When she resisted he moved in front of her so she had to stare at him. “Aren’t we heading out to celebrate?”
She shook her head, forcing herself to look at him. “It’s over now, Ryder. We always said it was only until we both got what we needed, right?” Her voice was softer than usual, her uncertainty audible.
“Fuck that.” He took her hand and linked his fingers with hers. “You’re not going anywhere yet. Come on.”
“You lovebirds coming or not?” Nate called out. “We’re just heading home for a few quiet beers.”
“Chloe?”
She wanted to say no, knew she should be saying no. They’d made a deal and she’d made it because she didn’t want to get hurt. Because she didn’t need a man right now, needed to stay focused on her goals and building a future for herself with no complications. But she did want Ryder, no matter what she tried to tell herself.
“We can talk about this tomorrow,” he said, running one hand gently down her face and pulling her forward with his other hand at the same time. “Let’s just pretend like our expiration date isn’t until then, huh?”
Chloe nodded, squeezing his hand. What harm was there in one more day?
Chapter 18
Ryder poured Chloe a glass of wine and carried it over to the sofa. She’d kicked off her shoes and had her feet curled up, leaning into a cushion and chatting with his brothers like it was completely normal for her to be holding court with the pair of them. He chuckled as he joined her—trust Chloe to be able to charm his brothers so quickly.
“I take it you’ve given them the blow-by-blow account?” he asked.
Chloe shook her head, her long blond hair falling over her shoulders and resting on her breasts. Ryder shot Nate a dirty look—his brother’s eyes had dropped instantly to her chest. The smile he received in return made him scowl, but it was over fast, with Nate focused on Chloe again, only this time it was her eyes he was looking at.
“I was waiting for you before we gave them the lowdown.”
Ryder had to give his brothers credit—they had every right to still want to throttle him, but they’d treated Chloe like a long-lost friend and they’d given him a break, too. He went to scratch his face, then cringed. Maybe it was the bruise around his eye that was reminding them to go easy on him.
“I hope it was me you were waiting on.”
Ryder and his brothers all turned at the deep voice and saw their grandfather standing in the open doorway that led from the living room to the hall. He was dressed in a wool sweater and slacks, despite being told to stay in his pajamas in bed, his silver hair brushed and his eyes bright. They were hoping he’d stay at home longer this time, but Ryder guessed it would be a few weeks at best before he ended up back in the hospital.
“Granddad, what are you doing out of bed?” Chase asked, the first of them to jump up and go over to him.
Clay shrugged off Chase’s hand and slapped his grandson on the back instead. “I heard a lady’s voice and I thought, what in god’s name am I doing stuck in here when there’s a woman to meet.” His chuckle made them all smile. “If I don’t have long then what’s the point wasting it on my back?”
Ryder smiled when Chloe uncurled her feet and stood up, holding out her hand when Clay came near. She stepped forward and clasped his hand, laughing as he pulled her in to plant a kiss on her cheek.
“You must be Clay. I’ve heard so much about you.”
Clay let go of her hand and sat down in the armchair Chase had vacated. “It’s nice to meet you, Chloe,” he said. “Now tell me if you had a successful night? Are you celebrating already or have you not played this Parker fellow yet?”
Chloe sat back down, closer to Ryder this time, their thighs pressed together. “I won the ranch back and I fleeced him out of his cash, too.”
Clay laughed like Ryder hadn’t heard in a long time, his shoulders shaking first from laughter and then from the cough that took over. They all waited, knowing he wouldn’t want a fuss. Ryder glanced up and saw Clay’s live-in nurse hovering in the hallway—help was on hand if they needed it.
“Your lovely grandsons invited me back for a few drinks to celebrate,” Chloe continued, ignoring the fact that Clay was so obviously sick, her smile and eye contact with him unwavering. “I was just about to tell them how I did it.”
“Did you have a winning hand?” Clay asked. “Or did you bluff and make him sweat?”
Chloe grinned. “Sounds like I’m talking to a poker aficionado.”
“Takes one to know one,” he replied.
Ryder raised his eyebrows when he realized Chase was staring at him, his brother as surprised as he was that Clay was up to chatting with Chloe so late at night. It was like having her around had brought the old man back to life.
They were watching Chloe, all eyes fixed on her. And then it hit him—how the hell was this his last night with her? All this time, hanging out with her and having fun, knowing that it was only short term, and now … no. He wasn’t letting her walk away without a goddamn fight, that was for sure.
“He probably had a better hand than me,” she confessed, taking a sip of her wine and glancing up under hooded lashes. “But I kept my cards, made him think I already had the winning hand from the start, and he fell for it hook, line, and sinker. I bluffed and he folded.”
“Bullshit,” Nate said good-naturedly. “Parker’s legendary at the card table.”
Chloe’s low laugh made Ryder smile straight back at her. “Is it about now that I confess to playing poker since I was big enough to walk?”
They all laughed and Ryder jumped up to get Clay a drink when he started coughing. “Water?” he asked.
Clay frowned. “Whiskey, son. How many times do I have to tell you boys that I drink whiskey, not goddamn water?”
They all exchanged glances, but it was Chloe who spoke.
“Well, get the man a whiskey, someone,” she drawled, making them laugh all over again.
“My grandson tell
s me you were studying law?”
“She’ll be back in law school soon, Granddad. Now that her bet paid off.”
He watched as Clay looked at Chloe. “Is that right? You blackmailed my grandson into some sort of deal to pay your tuition fees?”
Chloe looked guilty. “Yes,” she admitted. “Although blackmail isn’t the exact word I’d use. More like we came to a mutually beneficial agreement.”
Nate went and got a few more beers, grinning while he walked. “Darlin’, that’s blackmail through and through, no matter how you try to sell it.”
“And it’s damn fine blackmail,” Clay continued. “Ryder deserved every penny he lost to you and then some.”
Ryder held up his hands, knowing he should be offended but liking the fact that Chloe was holding court with his family. A roomful of King men was intimidating at the best of times, let alone during the grilling they’d been giving Chloe. And besides, he knew it wasn’t blackmail—they’d helped each other and it had all worked out great.
Chloe laughed. “I’ll be heading back to law school as soon as I can,” she told his granddad. “I had to finish partway through the year due to some, ah, financial hardship, but the university was very understanding. I had good grades, but if you can’t pay your tuition it turns out all the brains in the world can’t help a girl.”
“I think we need to drink to Chloe,” Ryder said, grinning at her. “For saving my ass,” he toasted.
Chloe held up her glass and took a sip, curling her long legs back up beneath her. “It’s time I put my card-playing alter ego back in her box.”
“Why?” Nate asked. “Seems like you did a damn fine job out there tonight.”
“Been there, done that,” she told him. “It’s a dangerous game to get used to.”
“Yeah,” Chase said with a laugh, stretching his foot out to kick Ryder. “Let’s hope this idiot’s learned his lesson, too.”
“I’m sorry,” Ryder said, eyes trained on his grandfather. “It’s all turned out for the best, but I want you all to know how sorry I am.”
Nate grunted and Chase held up his drink, but it was Clay he was waiting for, his acceptance what he needed.
“All’s right in the world,” Clay said. “And with that I’m heading back to bed.” He swallowed the rest of his whiskey down and stood, waving Ryder away when he jumped up to help him. “It was a pleasure to meet you, Chloe. Don’t be a stranger. These boys need a woman like you around to straighten them out.”
Chloe smiled up at Clay and they all said goodnight. Once he’d gone, it was Nate who spoke up first.
“So speaking about having you around,” he started, “are you leaving now you’ve won, or has Prince Charming here convinced you to stay?”
Ryder could have killed him. This wasn’t a conversation he wanted to start with his two brothers listening.
“Nate, tell me about the gorgeous brunette you were talking to earlier,” Chloe asked, catching her bottom lip between her teeth for a moment while she stared at Nate. Ryder exchanged an amused glance with Chase. “You got pretty worked up when you saw her at the bar.”
Nate wasn’t laughing anymore, his expression serious. “She was no one. Just a girl I know.”
Chloe raised her eyebrows, her smile teasing. “Sure. Whatever you say.”
Nate grunted and tipped back his beer bottle, draining half of it in one long pull. “I get it. You don’t ask me about her, I won’t ask you about this douchebag over here.” His laugh was husky. “You don’t need to prove anything to me, I already believe you could cut me off at the knees if I played cards against you.”
“And with that, I think it’s time for me to call it a night, too,” Chloe said, stretching her legs out and twirling her hair between her fingers. “Thanks for making me so welcome.”
“Stay,” Ryder blurted out, not caring that his brothers were listening. “Don’t even think about packing up and heading back to Shelly’s. It’s late and you’ve been drinking.”
He couldn’t read Chloe’s gaze, but he sure as hell hoped she wasn’t about to walk out that door before he had the chance to thank her properly for what she’d done tonight. And try to convince her that she didn’t need to flee Dallas quite so quickly just because she had money burning a hole in her back pocket.
“Well…” She glanced at his brothers, then looked back at him again. “I guess you’re right.”
Ryder didn’t need any more encouragement to be convinced. “Damn right I am. We’re off, boys.”
Nate grinned. “You can stay here, you don’t have to go running off to the guest house.”
Ryder had no intention of answering his brother—they could tease him all they liked and not get a rise out of him right now. “Thanks for the offer, but we’re outta here. I just won the place back, I think it deserves me staying there a night, right?”
* * *
The room seemed cooler than usual when they entered and Chloe went and sat on the bed. She listened to Ryder’s boots echo out on the wooden floor in the kitchen, before the door was nudged open and he appeared in the room. She wrapped her arms around herself, wondering if maybe it was just her feeling the cold. Goose bumps ran the length of her body, her heart thudding when Ryder came and sat beside her, his thigh pressed hard to hers.
“Something’s already changed between us, hasn’t it?” he asked, angling his body so he was facing her, reaching out to wrap his fingers around her chin and tilt her face toward his.
“Yeah,” she managed, suddenly finding it hard to look into his eyes when she usually loved gazing back at him.
“You don’t have to go,” he said.
Chloe’s smile was sad. “Yes, Ryder, I do. I can’t stay now.”
“Because you’re scared of Parker?”
No, because I’m scared of you. That’s what she should have said because it was the truth, but she didn’t.
“We had a deal. You didn’t want this to be anything serious and neither did I,” she said. “What happened to you wanting me just as your mistress?”
Ryder stroked her face, his touch so soft that it was impossible not to lean into it. “You’ve done something to me, Chloe. Screwed up my brain or something. And you were never just my mistress.”
“How? Why?” she murmured, knowing as she asked that she should have stayed silent.
He shook his head and leaned in to kiss her. Chloe had every intention of turning her face away so they couldn’t connect, and instead she was reaching out for him, cupping Ryder’s skull to lock him in place. Her lips moved in time with his, drinking in the taste of him, committing to memory what it was like to have Ryder’s arms around her, to be on his bed.
She didn’t need him, or any man, but it wasn’t about needing right now. It was about wanting something she already had and not wanting to let it go, no matter what she told herself. So much for putting her Band-Aid theory into practice.
“We can’t do this,” she whispered, trying to convince herself and failing.
“I want you, you want me,” Ryder replied, gently pushing her back onto the bed, her head falling down into the feather-filled pillows. “Nothing’s changed.”
“Everything’s changed,” she managed. “After I won back the ranch—”
“Stop talking,” he commanded, catching her wrists and pinning them above her head.
Chloe wanted to argue with him, but even more she wanted to feel his lips on every stretch of her bare skin, to have him inside of her. She could think of plenty of reasons why she should have said no, yet here she was lying beneath Ryder, her moans of pleasure impossible to swallow.
Chloe wriggled to let Ryder push up her dress, gasped as his mouth closed over her stomach, his kisses erotic as he plucked at her skin with his wet mouth.
“You can’t bribe me with sex,” she muttered, back arching as she shoved her dress down lower and his tongue darted inside her bra.
Ryder’s head popped up and his grin was wicked. “No, but it’s a damn good way
to say thank you.”
His mouth closed over the top of her breast and she relaxed back into the bed. He was right—this was the perfect way for him to say thank you. In the morning she could go and never come back, figure out how to tell him, and herself, that what they had was over. Tonight she could just enjoy being a woman in bed with a man, one who knew exactly how to touch her to send her over the edge again and again.
“If you make this good,” Chloe gasped, locking her legs around Ryder when he dropped his body over hers, “I’ll stay the night.”
“Sweetheart, I’m gonna make this so good you’ll never want to leave my bed.”
“Cocky bastard,” she grumbled.
She didn’t need a man and she never had, but Ryder? Damn. For the first time in her life she could have settled down, could have finally let someone in close enough to give a shit about her, and yet here she was spending one last night in Ryder’s arms. She had to protect herself, and the last thing she needed was to fool herself into thinking this was more than just a fling. One with lots of sex and plenty of hanging out together. Because even if she did let herself fall for him, stayed in this fantasy bubble, one day it would end. It always did, she knew that.
“Stop thinking,” Ryder demanded, pulling back to look her in the eye. “There’s nothing to think about, not while I’m at the helm.”
And that’s what scared her, letting Ryder take control even a little bit. It wasn’t something she was used to doing and it made her feel helpless. She let him slip her dress off completely, yanking her panties, too. Then he stripped fast, discarding his boots, jeans, and T-shirt in record time, then covering her body with his.
Ryder locked eyes with her, gazing at her with a tenderness she’d never experienced before. It was like he was reaching out to her, telling her he felt the same way she did, although she doubted he’d have any idea of the emotions running through her mind right now.
She wrapped her arms around Ryder, her legs around his waist as he entered her. There was nothing rough this time, none of their usual desperation. This time he was gentle with her, treating her like it was her first time, his strokes long and his gaze never wavering from her as he moved back and forth.