by Leslie North
Guess we'll find out one way or another, he mused. He rose from his last task of the day and wiped the sweat from his brow. The gloves came off, and he slapped the dust off them against the outside of his thigh as he looked off toward the horizon. The sun sank slowly towards the distant hills, casting the Texas skyline in a ruby-red hue that darkened to a glorious amber the closer evening crept.
Trevor replaced his hat. Then he started toward the arena.
6
Sabrina
Sabrina spent all afternoon Googling what a "rescue race" was. By the time she reunited with Trevor that evening, she had a pretty good grasp of what all it entailed.
She wasn't sure whether to be thrilled or terrified.
"So, it starts with a team of two people," Trevor began as he roped in Pete—figuratively—for a demonstration. Trevor walked out into the dirt arena leading a saddled Tex beside him. "Three, if you're counting the horse. The 'rescuer' is the first rider and gets let out of the gate at the start of the run. The rider meets up with the 'damsel' on the other side of the ring."
Pete, who Sabrina suspected had begun drinking as soon as his shift was over, dropped a curtsey and giggled as girlishly as his baritone would allow. Sabrina rolled her eyes. She stayed by the fence, though—despite the ease exhibited by the two men, she knew what was coming next.
Trevor swung up into the saddle and steered Tex toward the starting point. "The rider comes in breakneck—as fast as the two partners are comfortable with. Winning teams gallop!" he hollered over to her as he turned around and suddenly spurred Tex into a sprint. The quarter horse lunged across the arena toward Pete.
Sabrina had never seen Trevor ride before. The way the rancher carried himself astride his saddle winded her almost as much as his speed did. She watched the surging motion of the horse and the way Trevor's hips rocked forward into the saddle; he almost appeared to hover above his seat, motionless, even as he leaned his long body dangerously far out over Tex's neck.
"We ride up!" he continued, shouting so she could hear him over the drumming of hooves. "Slow up! Take a sharp turn. Soon as I'm around…"
Sabrina held her breath. Trevor pulled Tex around Pete, and the ranch hand—without so much as a visible flinch to get out of the way of the thundering horse—reached up and grasped Trevor's outstretched arm. Trevor hauled the other man up onto the back of the saddle, and they bolted off together toward the starting point and a sliding stop.
The two men trotted over to her. Sabrina strained herself upright and clapped desperately, overwhelmed.
"Of course, it will go a lot faster with a tiny thing like you on back," Pete said as he swung himself down again.
Tex danced a little beneath Trevor, and the rancher reached down to give the horse a solid pat of approval. "I'm going to run him back and forth a few more times. He needs to burn off some excess energy before I can get him to start heeding me on the turn. Then you're up, Sabrina," he warned as he trotted off.
Sabrina swallowed audibly. She wasn't sure she had what it took not to break for the fence screaming with a ton of horseflesh and steel-shod hooves bearing down on her. "You guys look like you've done this before," she mentioned once she found her voice again.
Pete hung off the fence beside her. "Trevor's always been damn good at the rescue race," he remarked with a low whistle. "He and Marcy used to practice for it together, but they broke up by the time the next competition rolled around. Nice to see he found his inspiration again."
Sabrina's eyes narrowed at the figure trotting around the arena. And just what inspiration is that? she wondered. She couldn't help the way Marcy's name lingered in her brain. She even had an extremely positive conversation with the other woman earlier that week….
Was she actually starting to feel jealous?
"Hold my earrings," she muttered, unhooking the silver horseshoes and thrusting them into Pete's hand.
"These things are earrings?" she heard him ask in astonishment, but she was already over the top of the fence and heading across the arena to her designated damsel position. Trevor pulled Tex up and raised an eyebrow; he seemed surprised to see her taking the initiative.
"You ready to give it a go?" he asked. "I'll walk him the first few times until you're comfortable."
"Oh, I'm comfortable all right!" Sabrina replied, with a little too much enthusiastic volume in her voice. "You boys come at me as fast as you want!" She punched her fist into the palm of her hand. "Let's get this rescue ride on the road!"
If Trevor suspected her of acting strangely, well—he probably thought it was nothing that far out of the ordinary. The rancher turned and spurred Tex to the other end of the arena. Before she had a moment to steel her courage and maybe really think about what she was about to do, the horse came galloping back toward her.
She was so not ready for this.
She threw her arms up at the last instant and clenched her eyes tightly shut as Tex came barreling past her. Somehow, they had managed to avoid a collision. She coughed and waved her hand in front of her face as the cloud of dust settled.
"Good girl." Trevor reined Tex around in front of her and grinned. "You didn't move from that spot. Consider your first test a pass."
"Because I trusted you!" Sabrina seethed. "You were trying to freak me out on purpose!
"Because you do trust me," Trevor corrected her. "Whether you like it or not. I would never hurt you, Sabrina." The tightness around his dark brown eyes softened, and Sabrina's heart gave a little flutter at the expression he fixed her with. "But now you know what to expect when we actually get out there and compete. I don't expect you to be on Pete's level right off the bat. We'll work our way up, and you'll surpass him in no time. I promise we'll take it a bit slower this go-round."
Sabrina cast a helpless glance over to where Pete stood, but the ranch hand was fiddling with her earrings and completely oblivious to the action unfolding in the arena.
There was no one to rescue her but Trevor Wild—and she wasn't certain he wouldn’t trample her in the attempt.
"You almost made it up that time!" Trevor shouted as he trotted off. "One more!"
"You've been saying 'one more' for the last fifty minutes," Sabrina moaned. She was tired, hot, and thirsty, and moths the size of small birds fluttered around the arena's lights. The night sky beyond the practice ring was a dark velvet blue, the winking white stars that dotted it all that kept it from going completely black. What time was it, anyway? Pete was long gone, and she suspected he had left with her earrings.
Worse than her exhaustion was the fact that she hadn't been able to take her mind off kissing Trevor. She had thought she had enough alone time with her thoughts for her feelings to develop into a full-blown infatuation with the rugged rancher, but his bullheadedness now was casting those feelings into extreme doubt. What the hell did I ever see in this asshole? she wondered as he came barreling back toward her. Besides the chiseled face and the dark, dreamy bedroom eyes I mean. Besides the fact that he’s tall and good-looking and good with his hands. Besides the fact that he's the strong, silent type to a T, until he takes it into his head to make my life a living—
Trevor drove Tex around her, and Sabrina reached instinctively for his outstretched hand. He clasped her arm and pulled her up behind him; she had just managed to get her foot in the stirrup he had freed up for her, when her purchase slipped. She fell backward with a cry of dismay and landed hard in the dirt.
"Might as well get someone in here to draw a chalk outline," she muttered as she reached back to rub her bruised tailbone. "I'm pretty sure my ass has landed in this exact spot the last ten times we tried this."
"You've made it up onto the horse plenty more times than that," Trevor reminded her. He pulled Tex up short and slid from the saddle. "You're a good rider. Wouldn't know it to look at you. You've got to hold onto me until we reach the finish."
Sabrina snorted. She accepted his outstretched hand and got to her feet.
"You seem distracted,"
he added. He kept hold of her hand even when she made a move to draw it back. "You're too tense on the pick-up. I need you to relax more."
"Yeah?" she countered. "I seem to recall you saying the same thing about Tex earlier. You gonna ride me around the arena to blow off some steam?"
"You shouldn't talk like that," he growled as he pulled her in against him. "I might take you up on it."
And just like that, the lips she had been fantasizing about all day were hers once more. Trevor swept her up in his arms and kissed her in such a perfect collision that it was hard to imagine they had ever been two opposing forces. It was harder still to imagine that he had ever stopped kissing her out by the bunkhouse. He picked up exactly where they had left off, and Sabrina was all too happy to renew their choreography.
But familiarity with the moves didn't put a damper on the exploration—if anything, it made it all the more exciting. Trevor knew exactly how to mold his lips against hers and how long to hold that electric pressure; he knew exactly when to pull back to change it up and start all over again. Soon she was more breathless in his arms than she had been getting the wind knocked out of her moments ago. Her knees quaked, and she clung to his shoulders. When she felt the first teasing flick of his tongue, she nearly came undone. The memory of what he could do with it whispered across the back of her brain like a password and she opened her mouth to him.
Trevor groaned and shifted himself closer dropping Tex's reins. Suddenly his hands were all over her, sliding up her waist, bunching the fabric of her bubblegum flannel shirt. His fingers found the small of her back and flared along the curve. Sabrina relished the sweep of his tongue, drawing it deeper inside of her, but she still felt unfulfilled. She needed him to claim every inch of her, inside and out, if she had any hope of curbing the wildfire the man from Wildhorse had stoked in her.
Trevor's hands retreated, and his mouth inevitably followed. Sabrina strained a little on her tiptoes in half-hearted chase, but his fingers caught her chin to stop her. "Maybe…" His voice was a husky whisper that sent thrills her. "Maybe you just needed a little inspiration."
"Maybe you're right." She twined her arms around his neck, her heart racing as fast as Tex's hooves. "If I'm relegated to playing the 'damsel,' maybe I need help getting into character."
"You can trust me, Sabrina," Trevor whispered. "If you give up control, and give yourself over to me—just like that—I promise I won't let you fall."
"I know you won't." She flushed and looked at the deep V of his collar.
"Give your instincts free rein," he murmured quietly. "You can do this. I know you can. You don't even have to think about it anymore. Just let your body—" Trevor's hands moved back down her slender waist and took hold of her by the hips—"move how it wants to." He rocked her gently back and forth, simulating the roughness of the ride.
It was the single sexiest motivational speech Sabrina had ever heard, and she would have liked nothing more than to interpret it in all the wrong ways. The moment ended too soon. Trevor's hands slid from her a second time, and the rancher turned to jog off and get hold of Tex once more. Sabrina touched her aching lips, but the pressure applied by her finger pads wasn't enough. It reminded her only fleetingly of how it had felt to let Trevor Wild kiss her.
"Coming back at you!" he called out to her. He swung himself up into the saddle and loped Tex back to the start gate. "You ready?"
"Ready!" she shouted breathlessly. Her body sang with adrenaline, but this time it was a wonderful rush. She felt no fear, no reservation as man and horse galloped toward her. What had once seemed to her like a tangle of legs and hard, deadly hooves, now seemed easier to follow. The world slowed.
It was all familiar. It was all choreography. She could map her team's movements the same way she mapped Trevor's kisses. When his hand reached down to her, she took it and gave control away.
Trevor hauled her up onto the saddle behind him. The moment he let her go to seize hold of the reins with both hands, Sabrina's own hands shot out to grasp his belt buckle and hold on. The three of them completed the turn together and took off back toward the gate.
She didn't know they had made it all the way back until Trevor was sliding off the saddle. He reached up to pull her down with him.
"Did we…did we do it?" she asked breathlessly. She cracked one eye open as soon as she touched the ground. Trevor yanked his hat off and threw it down between his boots. When he wheeled back around to face her, he wore a wide, elated smile—the first she had ever seen out of him.
"Are you kiddin' me?" he exclaimed. "We crushed it! That's the fastest I've ever pulled off a pickup! You repeat that performance, and I think we've got ourselves a winning team here!"
"No way. No way!" Sabrina barely knew if she was protesting or agreeing with him. The rancher's ecstasy was contagious. Her spirits soared even higher when he held his arms out to her. She flew to him without hesitance, without thought. She leapt into his open arms and wrapped her legs around his waist. One of his arms came down immediately to cradle her ass; the other hand slid up into her hair.
For once, the damsel was taking firm charge of her own rescue. She crushed her lips against his, enjoying the hard-packed muscle she could feel tightening between her clenched legs. Trevor's fingers flared possessively around her posterior. Who's complaining about my jeans now? Sabrina thought wickedly, before all thoughts vanished completely from her brain. Once again, she was on fire inside his arms.
Trevor turned them around and thrust her up against the closed gate. He took hold of both her thighs; now that her weight was better distributed, he moved his hips in a slow, steady rhythm against her own. She didn't even think he was aware that he was doing it, but the friction nearly drove Sabrina out of her mind with need. Now the tightness of her jeans was working in her favor, letting her feel through the thin designer denim just how little remained between their desperately joined bodies.
Tex whinnied beside them. Trevor paid no attention, but Sabrina really didn't want their current session to end with another wet horse nose thrust between them. She broke from their kiss and pushed Trevor's shoulder to keep him at bay as she spoke. "Let's shut the lights down and put Tex up in the barn," she suggested.
Trevor gazed back at her wordlessly. His dark eyes were hooded, as if she had only managed to half-rouse him from the dream he found himself in. He let her down slowly, reluctantly.
"We won," she reminded him as she snatched up Tex's reins.
"Yeah," Trevor agreed. His eyes followed her in the darkness as she let herself out the gate. "But we still weren't anywhere near close to crossing that finish line."
They hadn't been back in the stable for more than a minute before Sabrina felt a pair of hands seize her waist.
"Hey!" she protested. She dropped Tex's reins in surprise as Trevor maneuvered her out of the aisle. A clumsy, calamitous half-second later, and the rancher had thrust her into the freshly-cleaned stall instead of his horse.
"You don't get off that easily," he stated. He herded her back toward the shadows of the wall, and Sabrina allowed herself to be cornered. She couldn't help the breathless laugh of excitement that escaped her.
"Well, neither do you…apparently," she teased him in turn. Trevor pinned her wrists above her head and leaned in.
"You have no idea what you do to me," he growled into the hollow of her throat.
"What…about…Tex?" she managed to gasp between heaving breaths.
Trevor freed one hand only long enough to shove the stall door closed behind him. "Don't worry about him. He knows when to stay put and follow orders…unlike some."
Sabrina wondered if she had awakened a side of Trevor even more domineering than his daytime personality. The thought probably shouldn't have excited her as much as it did. The heady scent of fresh hay and the claustrophobic darkness only heightened her awareness of him. They were both sweaty, filthy, and disheveled from drilling in the arena, but Sabrina had never felt more alive. The unbearable tension tha
t had existed between them since they first met seemed about to fulfill its promise.
Trevor's teeth grazed along the vulnerable flesh of her neck. Sabrina raised her hips off the wall, and he pushed back forcefully. "The way you wrapped your legs around me in the arena…" he whispered. He trailed his lips up to her ear.
"You're the one who said I was a good rider," she retorted. "And what else did you say? Oh, right." She brushed her cheek against his and breathed his own words back into his ear. "But you ‘wouldn't know it to look at me.’"
"I knew you were the most beautiful woman I had ever seen the moment I laid eyes on you," he whispered into her hair. The compliment stunned Sabrina, and for a moment she forgot how to be clever. As if sensing his small victory, Trevor took advantage of the moment and cemented himself against her fully. "Anyone with a pair of working eyes would," he continued. "But I can't speak to any prowess otherwise. Not yet."
He was referencing her riding skills yet again, and the double entendre crossing the lips of a man who seemed to pride himself in his lack of spontaneity and imagination sent a dark shiver through her. She couldn't get over seeing this sexually awakened side of Trevor, and she doubted that she would want to any time soon.
"You've kissed me, haven't you?" she whispered against his lips. "I think you should have some idea of this city girl's prowess by now."
"Not nearly enough of an idea," he growled. He took her mouth in a kiss that silenced any further sass, and pressed her back once more into the shadows.
Keeping her breathing anywhere near regular, with Trevor Wild doing the things he was doing to her now, proved impossible. She gasped and clutched the back of his neck as she felt his broad, warm hands slide up beneath her shirt. He thrust his tongue between her teeth in the same instant he pushed her underwire out of his way. His rough, strong fingers forked and caught her nipples between them. He massaged the hills of her breasts, gripping and pushing until it was almost painful, but Sabrina relished his force. Her nipples tightened with arousal, and Trevor groaned into her mouth. The pads of his fingers stroked and teased the pebbled flesh until Sabrina thought she would come undone. She writhed and bucked off from the wall, but he pinned her firmly with his hips and redoubled his pressure.