“I just did,” I stated as I put my hands behind my head and watched her with hooded eyes. The sheet only hid so much…and she was so fucking beautiful.
“I beg to differ,” she said with a derisive snort. “You did not ask me to marry you.”
With a sigh, I sat up so we were somewhat eye level and stared into her incredible blue eyes. “I didn’t ask, baby. I’m telling you. We’re going to the courthouse and getting married in the morning.”
“Exactly! You didn’t ask; you told me!”
I shrugged and yanked the sheet away, then flopped back down, pulling her on top of me. “Same difference.”
“It’s completely different, Kyle! You can’t—”
Her tirade was cut short when I crashed my mouth to hers. She wasn’t able to speak again for quite some time. And by then, she didn’t seem to care.
I fell asleep with the woman of my dreams naked and wrapped around my body and a smug smile on my face.
“We’ll do the big wedding and reception later, if you want,” I assured Maddie as we walked into the judge’s chambers. “But I’m not taking any chances. I love you, and I’m going to marry you before you change your mind.”
Maddie rolled her eyes, but her lips tipped up, and her blue eyes sparkled. “I love you too. And I won’t change my mind.”
“Not chancing it,” I countered with a shrug.
The judge arrived, and we exchanged pleasantries before getting down to business. Fifteen minutes later, I was lifting Mrs. Kyle Kensington into the passenger seat of my truck. I stretched across her to reach the seat belt, then pulled it across her and snapped it into place. My arm brushed against her tits, and it started a tingling that quickly spread to my dick, taking all the blood in me with it. I gave Maddie a quick, hard kiss and rumbled, “It’s hot as fuck that I just kissed my wife.”
Maddie smiled coyly and held up her hand to wiggle her fingers in my face. “I bet the sight of this rock gets your libido going too.”
I licked my lips, and my eyes roamed over her body. Lust clawed at me and made me seriously consider taking her in the back seat of my truck. When our gazes locked again, she looked so eager that I almost caved. Almost. Shaking my head, I closed the door and jogged around to the driver’s side. Once I was in and ready to go, I inserted the key into the ignition and hungrily glanced at Maddie. “I’m not fucking my wife in the back of my truck on our wedding night.” I frowned and faced the front again, putting the truck into drive. “In fact, I’m not fucking my wife at all.”
“Umm.” Maddie sounded bewildered, and a little worried. “You can’t possibly be regretting already.”
“What the fuck?” I slammed on the brakes and turned toward her, grabbing her chin and forcing her to look at me. “I am not now, nor will I ever regret marrying you, Maddie Kensington.” I leaned in and kissed her, pouring my love for her into every movement. When I pulled back, we were both breathless, and I hurried to get the truck moving again, on a mission to get to our hotel as fast as possible. I laced my fingers with hers and rested them on my thigh. “What I should have said,” I clarified, “is that tonight, I’m going to make love to you. My wife. My best friend. My soul mate.” I glanced over at her, and she was smiling dreamily at me.
“I love you,” she said as she brought my hand to her lips and brushed them across the back.
“I love you too, baby.”
We arrived at the hotel, and I quickly parked and checked us in before leading my bride to our suite. I was true to my word and made love to my wife all night long. When we woke in the morning, I rolled on top of her and gave her a deep, wet kiss. When I finally retreated a couple of inches, I stared down at her gorgeous face, flushed with passion. A smirk kicked up the corners of my lips, and I winked at her. “Since it’s no longer our wedding night, I think it’s about time I gave my wife a good ole-fashioned fucking.”
Epilogue 1
Maddie
“Calliope is going into labor!” I shouted to Kyle through my headphones. I paced back and forth in front of her stall, watching over Gil, the vet tech who was caring for my horse while I waited for my husband to arrive. A pain hit, forcing me to bend over and brace my hands on my legs while I took deep breaths.
“Calm down, baby,” he said in a velvety voice, obviously trying to soothe my nerves. “I don’t want you stressing out this much. You’ll put yourself into labor.” He’d been attending to an animal at Rebel K and was already headed home. Thankfully.
The pain passed, and I breathed a sigh of relief as I straightened up. “I don’t think we should have bred her with Southern Dancer. This foal is too big.” My stomach tightened, and I grunted, “Something you have in common.” Kyle had knocked me up a couple of months after we were married, and I started showing after three months. It quickly became evident that this baby boy was going to be big. At lunch with Kyle’s mom one day, I discovered this was something our little one inherited from his daddy.
“Are you all right, Maddie?” Kyle’s tone filled with worry, and I could almost hear his foot hit the gas.
I didn’t want him worrying over me when I was so concerned about my horse, so I did my best to sound completely normal when I answered. “Yep. Just worried about my girl.”
“That makes two of us,” he muttered. My husband knew me too well, and sometimes, it was a real pain in the ass.
“Okay! See you soon! Love you. Bye!” I hung up just before another pain shot through my body, and I gasped for breath.
“Um…Maddie?”
I shipped my head to the side and glared at Rebecca. “Not a word. They haven’t been hurting all that much, and this was the first time they were less than ten minutes apart. My water hadn’t even broken yet. It’s probably just Braxton Hicks.”
“But—” She shut up when I growled at her, but her brow furrowed, and she glared right back at me. “Fine. I’ll back off. But only because it’s going to be so much fun to watch Kyle go ballistic when he realizes you’re in labor and didn’t tell him.”
“I’m not in labor,” I muttered, well aware that I was probably lying to myself but not ready to admit it. “It’s just sympathy pains for Calliope.”
Rebecca snorted. “Sure.”
The pain passed, and I immediately felt much more normal. “See”—I forced a smile—“no big deal.”
Right then, the door to the barn swung open, and Kyle walked quickly into the room. His eyes swept around until they landed on me, and his eyes narrowed. Plastering a serene smile on my face, I ran my fingers through my hair, trying to wipe away any remaining sweat from the contractions surreptitiously. It didn’t seem to work because instead of walking over to Calliope’s stall, he made a beeline for me.
“Maddie.” He frowned and looked me over from head to toe.
“I’m glad you’re here, babe!” I chirped. “Calliope is—”
“Madeleine Kensington,” he snapped. “You’re in labor?”
I sighed and shuffled on my feet. “Not really…I mean”—his probing stare rattled me, and I couldn’t come up with a decent lie—“maybe. Or it’s false labor. Why don’t you check on Calliope?”
My body chose that moment to betray me, and my water broke. The next thing I knew, Kyle had scooped me into his arms and was stalking back to the exit. “Dr. Jennings will be here in five,” he yelled as we passed by Gil. I looked up at him in surprise, and Kyle shook his head, his expression filling with exasperation. “I called him as soon as we hung up.” We reached the truck, and he set me down for a moment to open the door, then lifted me onto the seat and reached across my big belly to clip my seat belt. “Charlotte and Brandt are on their way to the hospital.”
My mouth formed an O as I sat in stunned silence while he looped around to the driver’s side and got in. The ability to speak returned as we were pulling onto the dirt road that led to the front entrance of the ranch. “How did you know?”
Kyle grabbed my hand and brought it to his mouth so he could place a soft kiss th
ere, then he tangled his fingers with mine and rested them on his thigh. “Because I know you, baby. I’ve been in love with you for most of my life, and when you love a beautiful, stubborn rancher, you quickly learn that sometimes my badass ranch manager gets stuck in a place where she thinks she needs to be tough and unruffled all the time. Which means I have to take charge of the situation and force you to admit that it’s time to relax and simply be my wife and the mother of our child.”
“Wow. Good answer, cowboy,” I whispered. Then another contraction hit, the strongest one yet, and I went from being awed by my husband to cursing him in one breath. The cursing only got worse over the next six hours, until I was finally resting in a bed with our tiny little Cohen in my arms.
“He’s beautiful,” Rebecca whispered as she tiptoed to the side of my bed.
I grinned and kissed his fuzzy head. “He’s gonna be a heartbreaker, just like his daddy.”
“I hope not,” Kyle muttered as he walked into the room. “Let’s hope he’s smarter than his old man, and when he finds the right woman, he doesn’t let her go.”
I bent my head back and smiled up at my husband, who was watching me with adoring eyes. “At least he found her again and gave her a happily ever after.”
Epilogue 2
Rex
I walked into the building and was unsurprised to see Peggy flirting with our veterinarian, which made me sigh with exasperation. That girl was turning out to be more trouble than I had anticipated. What I didn’t expect was the blonde bombshell who stood off to my right. My feet seemed to have a mind of their own because they immediately started walking toward her. She was standing next to Locke Creek’s manager, Maddie, and they were whispering and observing my niece as she tried to put the moves on Kyle.
As I approached, I couldn’t help but admire her trim waist, the flare of her hips, and her tight, round ass. I couldn’t remember the last time my body reacted to a woman, but it had decided to get back in the game with a vengeance. When the blonde leaned over to whisper something to Maddie, her straight, shiny hair slid across her back like a silky curtain, and my fingers itched to run through it. I wanted to know what it felt like to wrap a handful around my fist while I kissed her—or bent her over the nearest surface to fuck her from behind.
I was a little shocked at the train of my thoughts. I hadn’t felt such base urges or pictured so many dirty scenarios since I was a kid in my twenties. But it wasn’t necessarily unwelcome. I didn’t have time for a girlfriend or even a steady fuck buddy, nor had I any desire to until this moment.
My lust for her didn’t change that fact, though I was considering asking her if she was open to the occasional one-nighter. Something soured in my stomach at that thought, but I blamed it on the stress I was carrying from dealing with my niece. She was a handful on the best of days and drove me to drink on the bad ones.
When I was only a few feet from the women, I got a better look at the blonde. Her profile showed off her cherub cheek, a cute button nose, and plump lips. And damn…she had fantastic tits. They would overflow from my hands, and it made my palms tingle. Then she glanced my way, and I was struck by her beauty and how sweet and innocent she looked. Fuck. She was clearly a lot younger than Maddie—who didn’t look her age either.
I glanced at Peggy and back at the woman I was practically panting over. Was she older than Peggy? Dread filled my stomach as I wondered…was she younger than my niece? The idea that I might be lusting over jailbait pissed me the hell off, and that anger aimed itself right at the blonde. I closed the last of the distance between us just in time to hear her muse to Maddie, “Is she legal?”
“Are you?” The words popped out of my mouth before I even knew they were on my tongue, and both girls jumped. Their heads whipped in my direction, and I didn’t have a chance to enjoy the blonde’s stunned reaction to me. My heart sank into my stomach. She was young. Even if she was over eighteen, I was undoubtedly too old for her. Still, I had to know. “Well?” I demanded when she didn’t answer fast enough.
That seemed to break her out of her stupor, and she was flustered for a few seconds before she stood straight, thrusting out her distracting breasts and making me swallow a groan. She slammed her hands onto her hips and glared at me.
“None of your business, Mr.—” She broke off and stared at me, clearly demanding my answer. I wasn’t used to people standing up to me, and I felt my eyes widen a little at her tenacity. It was hot as fuck, but I was used to getting what I wanted.
I stayed silent, demanding she answer my question first. After a few minutes of silence, where we each fought to get the upper hand, I decided to give her this one. Narrowing my eyes in warning, I grunted, “Beaumont. Rex Beaumont.” I smiled thinly, making it clear my acquiescence came with a price. “And you are?”
She blanched at my name, but it was so quick I almost missed it. A brazen smile eclipsed her lips, and her brown eyes sparkled with sass. “Too young to serve you drinks at The Onyx. Old enough for you to put dollars in my G-string.”
For a few seconds, I was sure I was about to have a fucking heart attack. She wasn’t serious, right? This sweet, innocent little goddess could not be a stripper. However, I didn’t know anything about her, and the truth was that she could very well be dancing naked for other men, which made my head feel as though it was going to explode. I was grateful when Maddie suddenly walked away, leaving us in relative privacy. “Tell me you’re joking,” I seethed.
Her eyes narrowed to slits, and she tossed her hair over her shoulder. “Why? Are you out of ones?”
I swallowed hard and clenched my hands so tight my fingers ached. “If you think for one—” I cut myself off when I heard Maddie snap at Peggy and knew it was time to intervene before she pissed off Kyle, and he refused to treat our animals in the future. Blondie would have to wait while I dealt with this. “Don’t move,” I ordered. “We aren’t finished here.”
Then I stalked toward where my niece was pouting and most likely gearing up to say something inappropriate. “Peggy, stop pestering Mr. Kensington and go out to the truck.” She pushed her bottom lip out even farther, and I rolled my eyes. “Now, Peggy.” She blew out an irritated breath and started to stomp away like a petulant child. If she was going to act like one, then I was going to treat her like one. “And don’t think we won’t be talking with our dad about your behavior,” I called out. She sent me another glare before slamming out the door.
Sighing, I turned back to my friend and apologized.
“Just how old is your niece, Mr. Beaumont?” asked Maddie.
“Eighteen going on thirty,” I grumbled. Then perked up when I realized I had the perfect opening. “Just how old is your friend…?” I trailed off and waited.
Maddie considered me for a moment, likely trying to decide whether to give me the information her friend obviously hadn’t wanted to share. Then she glanced over at the girl before looking back at me. Her expression was one of curiosity when she finally answered. “Rebecca Granger, Kyle’s assistant”—she smiled, her eyes dancing with amusement—“and she’s twenty.”
I kept my expression neutral, but inside, I sagged with relief. Now I could stop worrying that I was a depraved cradle robber and focus on getting Rebecca into my bed. However, I needed to focus on the business at hand first. I introduced myself to Maddie, and as I spoke to her and Kyle, my eyes strayed over to where I’d left Rebecca.
The spot was empty, and I frowned, scanning the room until I spotted her talking to a good-looking, young cowboy. She laughed at something he said, and I had a sudden urge to knock him on his ass. Taking a deep, calming breath, I returned my focus to Kyle and Maddie, but when we concluded our business, I stalked over to Rebecca.
She looked up at me in surprise when I stopped beside her. She was tiny compared to me, and I enjoyed the fact that I towered over her. I told myself it was because I enjoyed having the intimidation factor. But some part of me had to admit the truth. It made me feel strong and protective.
The stubborn glint in her soft brown eyes put up my defenses and mixed with my irritation at her laughing with some guy who wasn’t me, I decided to rattle her cage a bit. Just to see what shook out.
I was almost positive that she was bluffing about being a stripper. I leaned in and whispered, “When is your next shift at The Onyx? I’d like to book a private dance.”
Rebecca’s face drained of color, but she quickly found her balance again and stiffened before muttering, “I’m all booked for the foreseeable future.” Her hands popped onto her hips again. Damn, she was adorable when she did that. “Besides, aren’t you little old to be chasing strippers?”
I frowned and narrowed my eyes. “I don’t chase, baby girl,” I growled. “That’s a game for children. And I don’t have time for games.” I walked to the exit without a backward glance, determined to forget about the bombshell with the golden hair, chocolate brown eyes, and sinful body.
Later, when I was forcing myself to endure an arctic shower, I knew it wasn’t going to be as easy as I’d hoped. I hadn’t stopped thinking about her since the moment I laid eyes on her. Hadn’t stopped fantasizing about fucking her. I closed my eyes and rested my forehead on the cold tile. I was going to have to get that girl under me and get this out of my system. That was all. Then I could move on and get back to my life where I had no time for a woman and even less of a desire for love.
Also by Elle Christensen
The Fae Guard Series
Protecting Shaylee (Book One) – Available Now!
Loving Ean (Book Two) – Available Now!
Chasing Hayleigh (Book Three) – Available Now!
A Very Faerie Christmas: A Fae Guard Novella (Book Four) – Available Now!
When You Love a Rancher: Ranchers Only Series Page 9