Page 29 of Wild and Wanted

The faint voice of Cindy Everhart drifting towards them was like a foghorn as their mouths parted, their frantic breathing intermingling as air chugged back and forth. They stared at each other, the overwhelming feeling that things could never go back to what they were before the kiss a clarion call ringing through Clay’s blood.

Ringing in hers, too, if he was reading her right.

‘Sorry,’ she panted, her voice hushed. ‘My mother always has had the worst timing.’

She didn’t scurry away from him, however, staying in his arms, obviously needing to collect herself with the voice still some distance away. Her fell head back against the wall, her eyes shut, her chest rising and falling as rapidly as his. She looked gorgeous like this – thoroughly kissed. Her mouth wet, her cheeks flushed.

‘Stephanie?’

The voice was a little closer this time but again she didn’t move. Cindy hadn’t reached the stables yet and Electra’s stall was at the far end.

A sigh sliding from her lips, Stevie’s eyes fluttered open, her pupils so big that all Clay could see was a thin lip of bluey-grey. ‘I should go.’

‘Okay.’

But she made no move to leave and Clay wasn’t about to back away before she was ready. Hell, the husky rasp of her breath, knowing that he had done that to her, only made him want to go in again.

Keeping his voice low, Clay asked, ‘Will you play it for me? The song. When it’s done?’

Her thoroughly kissed lips kicked up at the edges. ‘Yes.’

‘Promise?’

She nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘Stephanie? Are you in here?’

That one was much closer and Clay reluctantly muttered, ‘Go.’

Easing away, he reached for her guitar and handed it over before he stepped aside to let her pass. Clutching her guitar, she held his gaze as she pushed off the wall and called, ‘Coming, Mom.’

Turning away, she walked the three steps to the stall gate, lifted the latch and pushed it open, not looking behind as she stepped out and turned in the direction of her mother’s voice, the door quietly clicking closed.

Clay expelled a shaky breath as he groped for the wall, his palm flattening as he tried to get his body under control. Not that he was planning on stepping out with Stevie’s mom here, not least because he had an erection that could probably be detected from the moon.

Definitely by moms of daughters wearing purity rings.

‘You’ve done it now, Clay,’ he muttered under his breath as he lowered his head, letting it hang between his shoulder. ‘You’ve really done it now.’

Cindy’s voice, which only sounded like it was a couple of stalls away, drifted in. ‘What are you doing here? With your guitar?’

‘Just tinkering with a song. Horses are good listeners.’

Clay’s mouth spread into a broad smile at hearing Stevie quote him to her mother. He didn’t know why but it unfurled tendrils of warmth in his chest.

As if making out with Stevie hadn’t already made him hot enough.

‘Mom?’ Stevie said, the sound of her voice further away now as she no doubt walked her mother away from the scene of the seduction. ‘You look terrible. Are you okay?’

Clay’s head shot up. He strained to eavesdrop on their conversation, which wasn’t very gentlemanly of him but if there was something wrong, he wanted to know.

‘It’s Granny. She’s had a stroke.’

Stevie’s gasp came to him loud and clear. ‘What? When? Is she…’

‘No, she’s okay, she’s in hospital. The doctor said it wasn’t too bad but she missed the window for that clot-busting medication so she’s weak down one side and her speech is slurred.’

‘Oh, Mom. I’m so sorry.’