Page 96 of Forbidden Protector

"You heard that."

"Whole house heard it."

"I turned down a corner office." She says it like she's testing the shape of it out loud a second time, seeing if it still fits. "For a one-woman office in a county with more cattle than people."

"Regretting it already?"

"Not for one second." She crosses toward me, and something in how she moves has changed since the hangar, since the hillside, since a man's body I watched go still in wet grass three weeks ago. She isn't circling the case anymore. There's no case left circling either of us. "I told him the mountain air agreed with me."

"Did it?"

"Something up here did."

She's close enough now that I can smell her. Warm skin and the shampoo that sits next to mine in the shower. I look at her standing in front of the glass with Broken Sky filling the window behind her, green running up the pasture below and white still holding the peak above it, winter and spring arguing over the same ground and neither one winning yet.

I don't decide anything either. My body decides for me.

I'm up off the couch and she's against the wall before she finishes her next breath. My bad hand is banding both her wrists over her head, easy now, no hitch in the grip at all, six weeks of therapy finally worth something.

She goes rigid for half a second, pure animal surprise, and then her whole body answers it, hips coming forward to meet mine, breath going ragged before I've done anything but pin her.

"Holt."

"Say stop and I stop." My mouth is at that smooth spot below her ear, her throat, the same line I've wanted since a church pew a lifetime ago. "Otherwise I'm not asking."

"Wasn't going to say stop." Her voice comes out breathless and panting, and her hips roll against mine, deliberate. An answer with no words wasted on it.

My other hand finds the hem of her skirt and goes under it, no patience left for slow. She's already soaked through when my fingers reach her, and the sound she makes when I touch her has my cock straining hard against my zipper.

I work her over the thin cotton first, slow circles that have her arching off the wall, and then push it aside and slide two fingers into her, and her knees nearly go.

"You're mine." I say it against her throat. Not a question. I feel her pulse jump under my mouth. "Every part of you standing at that window turning down Salt Lake because this ground already had you. Mine."

"Yours." She gets it out in pieces, her pussy grinding desperately against my hand, wrists still caught easy in my grip overhead. "Holt, don't stop."

I don't. I work her until she's shaking, until her whole body has gone taut and greedy around my fingers. Right before she tips over, I pull my hand back, and she makes a sound of pure outrage that would be funny on any other day.

"Cruel."

"Patient." I keep her wrists caught easy overhead, watching her fight the ache I just built and abandoned. "Ask me nicely and I'll let you have it."

"Please." It comes out of her raw, no fight left in it at all.

"Please what?" I want to hear her say it. "Tell me exactly what you want."

"Please, I want you to put your cock inside me." Her hips roll against nothing, chasing me. "I want to feel my whole body come apart around you."

That's all I need.

I let go of her wrists to get her shirt out of the way, buttons losing the fight fast, no ceremony left in either of us. She gets her hands in my hair the second they're free, both fists, pulling hard enough to sting, and I growl against her collarbone and let her have it.

Her skirt comes off in one motion, my hand working the zip while my mouth stays on her throat, and I get my own jeans open one-handed, weeks of practice making it fast now instead of clumsy. I reach for my back pocket out of habit, and her hand closes over my wrist before I get there.

"No." She's breathless, but there's nothing uncertain in it. "That's what I actually drove into town for this morning. I got an IUD today. Wanted to surprise you. I want to feel all of you, Holt. No barrier. Just you."

I stop moving for a few seconds. "You're sure?"

"I've never been surer of anything." Her hand finds me, guides me to her, and the first press of skin against skin with nothing between us has us both groaning at the same time.