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But having the words out was enough. He wasn’t going to cry for his friend—not again, and sure as hell not in front of his goddamn sister. But the purging of what happened that day spread a calm over him like a balm to an open, festering wound.
Meadow held him, whispering soft, senseless reassurances. After several seconds, his mind blanked. The lump in his throat cleared away, and he drew a full breaths of fresh air.
Tinged with her personal scent that drove him absolutely crazy.
He gripped her sides, lifted his face and kissed her hard. The passion blazing through his soul on the heels of so much emotion spurred him to take her. To claim and own her.
She didn’t protest, only kissed him back, tangling her tongue with his and digging her fingers into his spine. As she spread her legs, urging him inside, he held her stare—and in one hard shove, filled her with his cock.
“I love you,” he ground out.
“I love you, Colton!”
“I’m never going to stop. You better get used to having me around.”
She wrapped her legs around him, holding him tight. “You can try to walk away, but I will hunt you down and bring you back to me. You belong to me the same way that I belong to you.”
Their gazes clashed, and in one smooth glide, he began to fuck her.
Chapter Twenty-One
The bunkhouse was as noisy as always, but when Colton walked in, the guys quit talking.
He closed the door behind him and faced the room.
“What are you guys talking about?”
No one answered.
He arched a brow and looked Webb in the eyes. “Did you find anything out about Meadow’s horse?”
He gave a slow wag of his head. “I spent some time at the neighbor’s ranch today. Asked if they had anything unusual happen to their livestock recently.”
“And?” Colton moved to pull out a chair and plopped into a seat at the table where the other men gathered, dusty elbows on the surface and mugs of coffee in front of them.
Webb hunched his shoulders. “Nothing at all. When they asked what’s going on here, I made up a story about seeing some tracks we thought were coyote.”
The guys didn’t respond—they obviously knew this already.
Colton pushed out a sigh. “We need to dig deeper. Somebody heard something or saw something. This is Friday night—are you headed to the Badlands?”
“We were planning on it.” Dude got up and reached for his Stetson he’d set on the table. “I’m going to clean up before we head out.”
Colton’s mind worked through the options. All of them had asked around town and spent time patrolling the ranch’s borders for any sign of trespassers, but so far, they were hitting a dead end.
He needed to be in Badlands tonight. He was good at talking to people. If anyone could weasel out information, he could.
Since finding the dead horse, they’d been questioning who would want to hurt the Graceys. He’d contemplated everything from Meadow’s father having an enemy to the culprit being the guy Colton pulled off Meadow in the parking lot at Badlands.
He managed to track him down, and paid him a special visit. After a brief talk, Colton was pretty damn sure that wimpy asshole didn’t have enough balls to fight a housefly, let alone retaliate by killing a horse in the most brutal of ways.
The ranch hands started moving around the bunkhouse. Webb hung back and turned to Colton. “You joining us down at Badlands?”
He heard another question loud and clear—was he going to spend the night with Meadow in the big house instead? He hadn’t slept in his bunk in days since Gracey was carted off by ambulance, and he really didn’t plan to start leaving her alone in the house. Especially knowing what happened to her horse.
“I need to be there. People don’t know me around these parts. They might slip up and say something we need to know.”
Webb eyed him. “But?”
