Page 50 of Broken Cedar

Colt fishes another sandwich from the cooler, unwraps it, and eats half of it in one bite.

I ball up my wax paper and tuck it in the cooler. I glance at Colt. He’s looking at the view.

There’s mustard in the corner of his mouth. A small dab, clinging to the stubble along his lower lip. I reach over without thinking. My thumb finds the spot and wipes it away automatically. My thumb lingers for half a heartbeat. Neither of us moves. The air suddenly feels much quieter than it did a second ago.

His eyes lift to mine as he sets down his sandwich. He catches my hand before I can pull it back. His fingers close around my wrist and he turns my hand, pressing his lips to the inside of my wrist, his mouth warm against the thin skin where my pulse jumps.

He pulls me closer. His hand slides to the back of my neck, fingers threading into my hair, and then his mouth is on mine. I climb onto his lap. One knee on either side of his hips. His hands find my waist.

We kiss each other slowly, his tongue tracing the seam of my lips. His hands work my shirt open, button by button. I push his shirt up his chest. Break the kiss just long enough to pull it over his head, and then my mouth is on his skin—his chest, his stomach, the flat plane between his ribs where muscle tenses under my tongue. He makes a low sound and I push him onto his back, straddling him.

His cock is hard against my stomach through his jeans, thick and straining. I pop the button, sliding the zipper down, then his boxers. He lifts his hips to help me shuffle his pants down. Then I stand, yanking off my boots, one after the other while Colt watches me, one hand wrapped around his cock, stroking himself. I shuck off my jeans and then my underwear before kneeling down to straddle him again. I position myself and sink down onto him slowly. One inch, then another.

“Fuck, Hallie.” Colt’s hands find my hips. “You feel—Christ, you feel—”

I don’t let him finish, just kiss him instead. Deep, hungry, my tongue against his, and then I’m moving. Hips rocking back and forth, taking him shallow then deep, finding a rhythm.

His hands skate up my body, dipping under my my bra. His fingers find my breasts, rolling my nipples between them, pinching gently. The sharp pleasure of it has me bucking against him, taking him deeper as a heat builds in my lower belly

“Colt.” I whimper his name.

“I’ve got you, baby.” His voice is rough, tender. His thumb finds my clit and circles. My movements are still slow, languid. My breath comes in soft moans and small gasps. The pleasure builds, a slow wave gathering force until it’s all I can feel, all I can think about.

My fingers dig into his shoulders, my hips rising until just the tip of him is inside me, then sinking back down, taking him deep.

“Colt.” I gasp, his name becoming the only word my mouth knows how to shape.

“Let go baby.” His thumb circles my clit, matching my rhythm. “Let go. I’ve got you.”

The orgasm crashes through me, my body shuddering, my forehead dropping to his chest as the world narrows to a single point of white-hot pleasure that doesn’t seem to have an endpoint.

“I-I…Oh my god.” I whimper against his chest.

Colt finds his release moments later. His hips jerk as a groan tears from his throat. I feel him. Every pulse. Every shudder. Colt kisses me, pressing small kisses to the corners of my mouth, my jaw, the spot beneath my ear that I love. I close my eyes, my face buried into the crook of his neck, both of us trembling in the aftershock.

A burst of static cuts through the quiet, making me jump so hard I nearly fall off him. My heart actually jumps. For one terrifying second I have no idea what’s happening, which is ridiculous because the answer is obviously the radio sitting in the truck bed, but my brain is still somewhere else entirely.

“Colt, you there, mate?” The voice crackles through the speaker.

Colt closes his eyes, like a man who has spent his entire life on a ranch and has accepted that privacy is a temporary luxury.

I start laughing. I can’t help it. The absurdity of it—the fact that we’re half-dressed in the back of his truck in the middle of the pasture and someone is casually checking in is too much. Colt looks over at me, trying and failing to look annoyed.

“What?” I whisper.

“Stop laughing.” He shakes his head, but the corner of his mouth gives him away.

The radio crackles again. “Colt? You copy?”

He reaches for the radio, and I have to bite my lip to stop laughing.

“Yeah,” he says, his voice completely calm. Professional. Like he hasn’t spent the last few minutes being ridden by me in the back of his truck.

“Everything good?”

Colt glances at me. His eyes are warm. “Yeah,” he says. “Everything’s good.”

I don’t know why those words hit me the way they do. He clears his throat and continues talking about whatever ranch business needs discussing while I sit there trying not to laugh. Thirty seconds later, we are both desperately trying to put ourselves back together while Colt gives an update on a pasture gate like this is a completely normal afternoon.