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Not marshmallows or fingers or lips or fried chicken.
Just fillies.
But then Rowdy steps behind me and slides his hand down my arm. His chest is pressed into my back, and my mind goes blank again.
“Let me show you how this is done.” He lifts my arm, then holds my wrist with both his hands so the metal stick and my marshmallow are just above the flames. “Keep it there, but turn it, like it’s on a rotisserie.”
His breath tickles my ear, travels down my neck, and sends shivers down my spine. “Like this?” I turn the stick in a slow circle and lean into his chest.
“Exactly.” He takes a hand off my wrist and wraps it around my waist.
And the next time I write a kissing scene, there will be fires and marshmallow roasting in it. In my head, I’m already writing the kiss I hope will close the scene I’m in right now.
Chapter 10
Rowdy
The bottom hem of Tessa’s shirt is loose, and my hand slides, uninvited, under it. By mistake, and only for a second. As much as I want to keep my hand on the warm skin of her back, I loosen my hold and step away from her.
I meant it when I told her there wouldn’t be any funny business tonight. I’m a man of my word, and a man who doesn’t take intimacy lightly. I don’t want anything physical without an emotional attachment. As much as I like Tessa, I haven’t known her long enough to reallyknowher.
But the heat of her skin still burns my fingertips.
She moves to her chair and grabs the graham crackers. The wrapping crinkles in her shaking hands as she tries to open the package.
“Was it hard giving up bronc riding when you broke your back?” she asks in a voice only slightly less shaky than her hands.
I’m not sure I know her well enough to answer her question. I still miss rodeoing. It’s difficult talking about why I had to give it up.
“Sorry. Is that too personal?” She takes a hurried bite of her s’more, leaving behind a spot of chocolate at the corner of her mouth.
It’s that spot, and her not being aware of it, that pulls the words from me. “Yeah, it was hard. Mostly because I didn’t break it on a bronc. I got hit on my motorcycle by a drunk who walked away without a scratch.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know that’s why you had to quit. Selling houses does seem less exciting than getting thrown around on a horse, but a lot less painful.” She takes another bite of her s’more, this time leaving behind a string of marshmallow from her lip to her chin.
“Depends on the day, really. Boring can be just as painful as bucking. I miss the adrenaline rush of rodeoing every day.” I wipe at my chin to show her where she’s got something on hers. “You’ve got a little…”
“Here?” She gets part of the marshmallow, but not all of it. The chocolate is still there too.
“Not quite.”
Tessa swipes at her chin again, getting most of it, but not all. I wave her close to me. Our chairs are less than an arm’s-length apart, so I can easily reach her chin. I cup my hand under her jaw and use my thumb to wipe away the rest of the marshmallow.
We’re close enough, even if I weren't touching her, I'd feel her chest rise and fall in a staggered breath. The kind of breath I took every time I climbed on a bronc’s back, before the shoot opened and my blood really started to pump. The kind of breath that shoos every thought out of your head except the ones that run on instinct.
“You’ve got some chocolate here, too.” I trace my thumb across her full bottom lip to the corner of her mouth and wipe the smudge away.
Tessa presses her lips to the tip of my thumb where the chocolate was, then nips it between her teeth.
That’s when instinct really takes over. I slide my other hand under Tessa’s jaw and pull her to me. She doesn’t resist, and our lips meet in an explosion of pent-up desire. I’m back on a bronc, adrenaline coursing through my body, anticipating its every move. The trick to staying on a bronc is keeping your center of gravity. But the way Tessa kisses me defies all the laws of gravity.
We break apart long enough for her to float from her chair to mine, where she sits on my lap. We go back to kissing like a couple of teenagers in the back of a car.
Except kissing Tessa is nothing like kissing the girls I did when I was sixteen. Her kisses are gentle but sure. Soft but intentional. She knows exactly where and how to kiss me. The corner of my mouth, the line of my jaw, the tip of my ear. Every kiss sends my pulse racing.
When she pulls away, it’s with a smile and a breath. “That wasn’t supposed to happen, was it?”
I shake my head. “I think that’s exactly what was supposed to happen since the minute you stepped out of that spring.”
