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He entered her with one hard thrust and she gasped, wrapping her leg around his waist. They were both too wound up, too overwhelmed with all the pent-up emotions of the last several hours to take it slow. He pounded into her, and she held onto him for dear life while the wave inside her grew, intensifying, and finally crashing over her so hard she cried out.
Gray followed her a moment later, thrusting once more before his head dropped to her shoulder as he dragged in one ragged breath after another.
He finally set her down and helped her straighten her clothes before righting his.
She couldn’t meet his eyes. She’d never been so…out of control before. It seemed to be happening more and more lately. And all due to Gray.
He’d come into her world and turned it upside down, and she couldn’t seem to catch her breath from one day to the next.
“Mercy,” he said, his deep voice gentle. And hesitant.
He cupped her cheeks, turning her face up to his, and she forced herself to meet his gaze.
“You still mad at me?” he asked, and she laughed.
“Yes. I should make you go sleep with Birdie in the barn.”
He chuckled. “She’s mad at me, too. I haven’t made her ride so much in a long time.”
The reminder of where he’d been that day sobered Mercy, and she stepped away from him.
“What happened?”
“Let me grab something to eat and—” He held up a hand, stopping Mercy from the argument she’d been just about to make. She crossed her arms but didn’t say anything.
“Let me grab something to eat, and I’ll tell you everything. Not that there’s much to tell.”
Mercy sighed, but she went to get him some food.Not much to tell.He’d ridden out to her enemy’s ranch, the man who most likely had put a bounty on Gray’s head, with a dead body strapped to his horse, and he said there’s nothing to tell.
The man was enough to give anyone apoplexy.
But after he told her of the encounter, she had to concede there really hadn’t been much to tell. Though she about choked at the thought of him just riding into that viper’s nest with every gun trained on him.
“So, are you still sure Josiah is the one behind this bounty?” she asked.
Gray took a sip of water and nodded. “There’s no one else who would go to the trouble. Or the expense. There’re cheaper ways to kill someone.”
She cocked an eyebrow at him, and he gave her a half grin.
“I mean it. I think if anyone were coming after me because of any past squabble or out of some desire to build a name by killing me, they’d come after me themselves. I can’t think of anyone, aside from Josiah, who would benefit from paying someone else to get rid of me.” He cocked his head to the side. “At least now we know what the man is after. His creek has run dry, and his ranch is sufferin’. He wants your orchard’s water.”
Mercy sighed and leaned back in her chair. “So, where does that leave us? Looking over our shoulders for the rest of our lives?”
Gray shrugged. “Pretty much how I live my life anyway.”
Mercy frowned. “But you’re in Desolation now. You’re the sheriff. Married.” Hopefully one of these days she’d be able to say that without blushing, but today was not that day. Blast it all. She sighed again. “Things are different for you now.”
Gray’s brow furrowed, and she wanted to reach across the table and smooth the lines from his face. “Apparently not.”
“Well, we can’t just continue on like this indefinitely.”
“We won’t,” he said, pushing himself up from his chair.
“What do you mean?” she asked, following as he went around the house, dousing the lamps and checking the locks on the doors and windows.
“Nothing lasts forever,” he said as he went into their room and sat on the bed to tug off his boots. “Either he runs out of money, men, or patience trying to kill me and calls it off. Or he succeeds.” The rest of his clothing followed, and he sat back against the headboard, bare as the day he was born and not caring a whit.
She slowly divested herself of her skirt and blouse, going even more slowly when she saw him watching.
