by Liz Peters
“Speaking of shirts, I think this belongs to you…” She had it halfway unbuttoned when she reached the edge of the bed, and he pulled her back down onto the mattress and into his arms.
“It’s yours if you want it. You look a damned sight better in it than I do anyway.”
Sam gasped slightly when he pulled her gently off her feet, but she snuggled back against his chest more than willingly when he wrapped his arms around her. She didn’t want to leave, but she knew that she couldn’t stay. There was too much pulling her back home to screw it up for a guy she’d had a fun weekend with, no matter how much every part of her wanted more.
She couldn’t explain why this man had this kind of effect on her. She hadn’t been this off guard around a man in her entire life. It was nice for a change to not have to be on her toes all the time. He made her feel relaxed like she could give up control of what was going on around her and not have to worry about anything as long as she was in his arms.
There was no way she could make this last, though. She’d run through all kinds of ideas, but none of them worked out. They all ended with him thinking she was crazy, her ruining her career or both things simultaneously.
She curled deeply into his chest and buried her face in the curve of his shoulder, mumbling a soft, “Thank you,” into the warmth of his skin.
“You don’t have anything to thank me for, Baby Girl. I should be the one thanking you. I don’t think I’ve had this good a time with anyone. Well, ever.” Sam could hear the sincerity in his voice, and it just made the ache in her chest that much worse.
There were a lot of things she wanted to say to him, but most of them were stupid and came on far too fast. She felt like a stupid girl who’d gotten way too attached to a fling and was just going to break her own heart. That wasn’t going to stop her from keeping the shirt though. It was something she could take home with her to remind her of this weekend at least. She could keep the memories if she couldn’t keep anything else.
Sam wanted to stay here for the rest of the day, but the sun was up and shining brightly in the windows. The rest of the ranch was going to be up and about before too long, along with her co-workers. She didn’t want Reid having to answer too many questions, just like he didn’t want to get her in any kind of trouble with her bosses. The amount of time the two of them had to lay here like this was growing shorter with every breath.
Before another fifteen minutes passed, Sam pulled back, leaning up to press a kiss to Reid’s lips before she moved to get out of bed. “I hate to say it, but I have to go. You have to get to work and I need to get packing. My flight leaves in four hours and my car will be here in less than forty minutes. As much as I hate to go, I think I have to.”
She could hear the groan he let out before he gave up and let her go. Reid pushed himself to sit at the edge of the bed with nothing but a piece of sheet draped over his lap as he watched her get dressed. It was doing nothing to help her willpower to actually leave his cabin. What she really wanted to do was to crawl back in his lap like she had that night out by the campfire and let whatever was going to happen happen. But what she needed to do was get her butt in gear and get out of here.
“Baby girl, at least leave me your phone number. I’m shit at being chummy on the phone, but I’d like to have a way to get in contact with you after you’re gone.” He frowned over at her from the edge of the bed as she pulled off his shirt and replaced it with her own.
She looked over at him, seeing the frown and draped his shirt over her shoulder, leaning down to press a kiss to his forehead before grabbing the pen she saw on the side table and jotting her name and number down on the back of the envelope it sat beside. She didn’t know what the letter inside it was, whether it was important or not, but it didn’t matter. She wanted him to call her, more than she cared to admit.
“Call me whenever Stranger.”
He stood up, pulling her into his arms one last time like he didn’t want to let her leave. His lips found hers again and she tried to put everything she didn’t think she was going to be able to say in one last kiss. He pulled her in so tight she didn’t think she was going to be able to breathe until he let up on the embrace, but she didn’t care. She needed this just as much as he did, maybe even more.
They made it last as long as they could, but everything has to come to an end eventually, even a goodbye kiss. She pulled away reluctantly, sliding her feet into the shoes she’d worn to his cabin last night and shot one last longing look at him.
“Thank you. Really… I’ve had the best weekend of my life.” Sam didn’t wait for him to reply before she slipped out the door and into the morning to do the last thing she really wanted to do.
Chapter Seven
Reid didn’t know what the hell was wrong with him when Sam walked out of the cabin, but it was all he could do to let her go without walking out after her. The room seemed emptier without her, and he didn’t really want to think about what it was going to feel like once he knew she was gone for good.
He had her phone number. At least he’d had enough sense to ask for that, but he didn’t know if calling her was going to make up the difference once she was gone.
Two days. She’d only been here for two days. There had been plenty of other girls who’d been around for a lot longer, but no one had ever left a hole like this once they were gone. She had a whole life to get back to that he had no idea how to be a part of, and after only two days it was crazy to think that she even wanted him to be a part of it.
He shook his head, resting his hand on the envelope that rested on the nightstand next to his bed. It was the last think she’d touched before she left the cabin and walked across the yard to get back to her cabin. He’d watched every last step on the verge of going after her but never quite able to make that call for himself.
His heart sank when he saw the cars pull up into the drive of the ranch. He was normally relieved when the guests left. It meant he could get back to the business of actually running the ranch without babysitting a bunch of know-nothings for three days while they pretended to be cowboys. This time, it just meant that something he wanted was driving its way out of his life.
Reid reached out and shoved the envelope into the drawer, slamming it closed before he went off to shower and start his normal Sunday activities, whatever it took to get his mind off Sam and the way he could still taste her lips on his. His sheets still smelled like her, the scent that caught him off guard every time he sat down and it wafted up to his nose.
The last of the cars were pulling out of the drive. He hadn’t been watching to know which car she’d been in, but she was really and truly gone now. Nothing left to do but get back to the day to day for Rei and try to forget about all of this.
He pulled on a clean shirt and jeans, snagging his boots from where he’d left them the night before and mentally plotted out the rest of his day. The first thing he was going to need to do was to get back on fixing the fence that they’d built the day before so that pasture could be used again. It was probably going to take the better part of the day to get that done, and it was going to be at least something to focus on instead of acting like a love-sick puppy.
Chapter Eight
Two weeks. It had been two weeks since Sam got back from the ranch, and she hadn’t heard a word from Reid since then. Maybe she shouldn’t have been surprised, but that didn’t stop her from feeling disappointed anyway. She’d tried to focus on the upcoming announcement about who would be promoted to junior partner. There were three spots up for grabs and thirty candidates for the positions.
She wasn’t certain how her performance back at the ranch had reflected on her or if it even mattered. Sometimes, she thought they made up their mind about the associates long before they ever went on any of those retreats, but none of them had any way of knowing for certain.
Today was the day for the final announcements, and all she really knew was that the three candidates who were chosen would be getting a phone call at si
x that evening from one of the assistants who worked directly under the senior partners. The entire group of them had been sent home at four. Usually, someone was milling around the office, writing briefs or pouring over depositions, but on a night like tonight, only the assistants would have remained. The rest of the office was cleared out awaiting the final notifications.
Sam couldn’t help but pace the floor in her small apartment. One bedroom, it was all the space she needed since she’d moved here six years ago to start this life. The noises of the city beyond echoed in through her window while she glanced at her phone every thirty seconds. It was 5:45, and her heart was in her throat waiting on something, anything to happen. She would know in fifteen minutes what had been decided, and the only notice she was going to need was the sound of a ringtone.
Sam had given up on being well-behaved twenty minutes ago and dialed out for an obscene amount of Chinese food to be delivered to her place. She was either going to celebrate or drown her sorrows in lo mein once all was said and done. Either way, there was nothing left to do about any of it other than to wait and see what the outcome of all of this was going to be.
She wandered into her room, looking to change out of the clothes she’d worn into work and find something more comfortable. A pair of yoga pants looked like they had her name written all over them, and she couldn’t stop her fingers from drifting over the shirt she’d brought back with her from the ranch.
“Fuck it,” she mumbled to herself since she was the only person in the room at the moment, not knowing why she bothered to even say it out loud. The shirt was comfortable, and it smelled like heaven. It still smelled like Reid, as a matter of fact. Every time she ran her fingers across is she had a flashback to the way his rough fingers slid across her bare skin. She couldn’t stop the shudder that rocked through her at the memory. She hadn’t had the courage to wear the shirt again, at least not until today. Maybe it would be lucky. She was going to need all the luck she could get.
The sound of her phone ringing from the living room shook her out of the daydreams that came of their own accord. Sam ran into the other room, sliding on sock feet across the hardwood floor to grab the phone off the coffee table and pick it up without bothering to read the caller ID.
“Hello?” She was out of breath from running and struggling to keep her balance, but she was bound and determined to get the phone before another ring.
“Miss Crawford?” Sam didn’t recognize the voice on the other end of the line, but that didn’t mean much. It could have been anyone from a telemarketer to the receptionist at her dentist’s office addressing her like that.
“Speaking.” She tugged on the oversized shirt, straightening it up as she blew a stray strand of hair out of her face.
"This is Audrey, Mr. Swift's new assistant.” The young woman on the other end of the phone hadn’t even finished her introduction and Sam felt like her heart was in her throat. She kept reminding herself that the associates who weren’t getting a promotion weren’t getting calls, though her brain came up with a thousand scenarios to explain why she was getting a call and not a promotion, everything ranging from just needing some tweaks on the contracts she’d been preparing this afternoon before she left to them firing her for acting like an idiot during the retreat two weeks ago.
Audrey was still talking, even though Sam wasn’t entirely focused on what she was saying until the words “we’d like to offer you a position as a junior partner at the firm” came out of her mouth. It was all she could do not to scream, but she swallowed it down waiting for the rest of the clearly preprepared speech to be completed before she said anything. It just so happened that the end of that speech corresponded with the buzzer for her apartment going off. She didn’t even bother with checking the intercom to see who was there before she buzzed them in. It was clearly the food she’d ordered before, and she was too busy trying to figure out how to answer the offer she’d been given to figure out how to talk to the delivery guy.
“Yes, of course. Thank you. I’ll be in to fill out the paperwork first thing in the morning if that’s alright?” It was going to be alright. Sam knew the protocol for all of this. She’d watched the process the last time all of this happened a couple of years ago, but there were formalities that needed to be paid homage to.
She pretty much lost out on everything after that. Her brain was buzzing at the prospect of getting what she’d been working so hard for all this time. The knocking on her door shook her back to reality.
“Sorry Audrey, someone is at the door. If everything is in order then I’ll take care of all the details in the morning?”
“Of course, Miss Crawford. See you tomorrow and congratulations.”
“Thank you, Audrey. See you tomorrow.” Sam hung up the phone and went to the door, snagging her wallet from the bag resting on the sofa and swinging the door open without even looking up as she combed through the cash that she pulled from it.
“So how much do I owe you?”
The voice that answered her was an even bigger surprise and she dropped her wallet when she recognized it.
“Just the sight of you in my shirt is payment enough, Legs. You don’t owe me a damned thing.” The chuckle he let out was drowned out by her nearly pouncing on him and planting a long kiss right on his lips.
“I thought you were the Chinese delivery guy.” Her eyes were wide as she registered that he was really here. “God damn it, Reid. Why didn’t you call me?” Sam leaned back but kept her arms draped around his neck.
“Eh, I suck on the phone, Legs. I’m not much for talking, but I couldn’t stay away from you for that long.” He looked a little sad that he’d let her down by not calling, but she was too excited for everything that was going on today to stay upset about it.
“Couldn’t stay away, eh? And why is that?” Sam couldn’t understand why he couldn’t have called, but he traveled all this way just to come see her.
“Because, I love you, Baby Girl, and I should have said it back at the ranch on the day you left. I just didn’t know how you’d react to it seeing as I just met you and all.” He chuckled, but she could see the uncertainty in his face as he admitted to having feelings for her.
Love was a big word, one that would have scared Sam in any other context, but in this one, it seemed to fit. Love. If she thought about and was honest with herself, she had to admit she loved him too. She shook her head and leaned in to press a kiss to his lips.
“I love you too, Stranger. Now get in here before the Chinese delivery guy catches us making out in the hall like a couple of teenagers. We’ve got a lot of stuff to talk about.” She unlocked her arms from around his neck, catching his hand and dragging Reid back inside the apartment, kicking the door closed behind them. There was a lot for the two of them to discuss, but they had all the time in the world to get through it all. At least that’s what Sam had planned.
More Books by Liz Peters
Fanning the Flames Series
Book One
Country Mile; A When Opposites Attract Romance
Book Two
City Minute; A When Opposites Attract Romance
Book Three
Under the Law; A When Opposites Attract Romance
Forgotten Stranger
A Billionaire Boss, Single Dad Mystery Romance
Try Me Again
A First Love, Second Chance Single Dad Romance
Accidentally Into You
A Pretend Boyfriend Romance
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Sam’s target was getting her lips on Reid’s skin, every inch of it that she could manage before the two of them were inside. Her tongue traced the line of the vee at his hip dow
nwards, listening to the groan it dragged out of his lips while he worked on getting yet another key into the lock unsuccessfully. She was pretty sure he’d already tried that same key twice, but she wasn’t about to ruin the moment by stopping to bring it up. Besides, this was exactly what she was going for.
She grinned to herself as she set back to work, this time using one of her hands to free his full length and stroke slowly along his shaft, glancing up at him.
“How’s it going up there, Stranger?” The amusement in her voice was clear, and the need in his was absolutely apparent when he replied to her.
“Not half as well as it is down there, Legs. You look fucking beautiful on your knees, though.” He slid the last key into the door, turning it deftly and twisting the handle to half-throw the door open, just before she flicked her tongue across his thick tip drawing a low moan from his throat. “Now get your sexy ass inside so you can finish what you started…”
City Minute