You gonna hurt me?” He eased a hip onto a bar stool and hooked his boot heels on the brass rungs.
“I thought bull riders felt no pain.” She tilted his chin up with a fingertip, peeled away the bandage, swathed the wound with antiseptic, then deftly removed the stitches.
He sucked in a breath at the brief sting, inhaling her flowery fragrance. It made him dizzy. It made him hard.
“That’s a myth we knights of the rodeo arena perpetuate to attract women,” he said in a strangled voice.
“So, how’s it working?”
“You tell me.”
She looked startled, but didn’t answer as she turned away to replace her implements in their case.
“You know, we can’t keep doing this,” he drawled.
“Doing what?”
“Meeting only at night like a pair of vampires. When do you get some time off? I’d like to see you by daylight for a change.”
She gave a little strained chuckle. “Why...so you can count my crow’s feet? Soft lighting becomes the haggedout lady physician, didn’t you know?”
Catching her elbow, he pulled her around, positioning her between his spread knees. He tugged the towel free of her damp tangles, then let his fingers slide down the slim column of her neck. He smiled at her startled expression and the way her pulse leapt in the hollow at the base of her throat. No matter how cool she wanted to play it, she was not immune to him.
“I know you’re even more beautiful now than you were as a dewy-eyed kid,” he said softly.
She stiffened. “Don’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“Play games with me.”
“What makes you think I’m playing?” His thumb traced the curve of her collarbone.
“Because that’s what ‘Love’em-and-leave‘em’ King does.”
“Maybe, maybe not.” Bending close, he nuzzled the side of her neck, whisking his mustache over her skin, smiling to himself at the shudder that raced beneath the satiny surface.
She batted his shoulder. “Stop it, Travis. You’re trying to change things.”
“Exactly. Glad you finally figured it out.”
“I thought we had this clear,” she said angrily. “I know you. You’ve got a buckle bunny in every rodeo town from here to California. Maybe you’re just bored, maybe I’m some sort of unfinished challenge from your past, but I won’t be a notch on some cowboy’s bedpost. Especially not yours.”
Hands tightening on her forearms, Travis reared back, his jaw going taut. “I don’t recall issuing that kind of invitation, darlin’. But hang on, I’m sure I’ll get around to it eventually. If you play your cards right.”
“Leave me alone. I’m not interested.”
“Liar. You know as well as I do that something powerful’s going on here.”
“Nothing of importance.” She gave him a haughty glare, the princess withering the peasant with a glance, and his blood began to boil. “Nothing I’d care to trust.”
Her words pricked him in the half-healed wound of old insecurities, the part of him that felt responsible for Kenny’s accident. He must have been crazy to think she could have let that go, even long enough to explore a friendship that was more than it should have been and a chemistry that couldn’t be ignored no matter how hard she tried.
But then, he’d never pretended to be a rocket scientist. Hell, he hadn’t even finished college! There’d never been much he could offer the rich girl, and there certainly wasn’t much now. The lick he’d taken on the noggin a week earlier must have made him loco to think he might ever have a snowball’s chance in hell with a high-society gal like her—then or now.
He smiled, but he knew there was no humor in it. “Miss Mercy Holt, heartless and cold, same as always. Why am I not surprised?”
“Just because I’m too smart to fall for your cowboy palaver? Well, don’t beat yourself up about it.” Features tight with fury, she tried to pull away, but he held her fast, and her voice dripped acid. “I’m sure there’s plenty of empty-headed twits who’ll fawn and sigh over the ‘champeen’ and give you all you think you’ve got coming. You certainly don’t need me for that.”
His smile turned wolfish. “You’re right, I don’t. I’ve got a lot more on my plate than catering to a spoiled little witch who never grew up. ’Course, it might have been interesting while it lasted. Guess we’ll never know.”
She gasped in outrage. “You despicable sidewinder! You sorry—”
“Then again,” he growled, “I hate to disappoint a lady.”
Jerking her close, he covered her mouth with his, consuming her small squeal of protest with a sweep of his tongue. Hurt, disappointed, enraged, he burned his bridges behind him, kissing her unmercifully, holding her against his chest, his body growing hard at the sweet pressure of her against his thighs.
Boldly he explored her mouth, then slid his hand inside the lapels of her robe to cup and lift the lush flesh of her naked breast. Mercy shuddered and clenched her fingers in the black cotton of his shirt, arching involuntarily to fill his palm, and he gentled, rubbing the distended bud of her nipple in slow circles that inflamed them both.
Everything changed in an instant. Summer lightning flared, distant at first, then the thunder was pounding in their veins, and the storm raged uncontrolled, a week‘s—a lifetime’s—worth of wondering and denial unleashed by temper to its full and uncontrolled limits. Gasping, hungry, insatiable—lips clung, hands explored, hearts exploded.
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