Page 43 of Riding the High

“I’m getting my bathing suit!” she says, running from the room before her dad can protest.

“It’s Thursday. Which means it’s hair wash night.” Cole says this with such a serious look on his face I can’t help but laugh.

“Oh no, whatwillwe do?” I reply, feigning shock. “I know … wash it tomorrow? And, excuse me, but you havehair washnights? What kind of prison are you running here, Sheriff?”

“The predictable kind. Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays are hair wash nights. Don’t fuck with the system, Vixen.”

I eye him, registering that he’s being serious. I swallow down my laughter.

“Fuck it,” he says. “My safe word. I’m choosing it. It’sauthority. If I say it, you immediately wait to talk to me first.”

“Authority? Over a hair wash?” I can’t help it. It’s one of those moments where you know you shouldn’t laugh so it makes you want to laugh even more. The stern look Cole is wearing, his hands on his hips, an American Girl doll slung under his arm. It’s too much.

I flop down on my new bed, throwing my head back and letting the laughter take over. When I open my eyes, they’re damp, and Cole looks just as pissed as before. A real contrast to the happy doll he’s holding.

“Cole, please put down … put down the doll if you’re going to look that annoyed.”

“Ginger, you can’t just change everything we do … This was a bad—” He opens his mouth to say more but stops dead in his tracks because Mabel is back in the room, already in her suit and holding her life vest.

“Why aren’t you ready?” she asks, looking between me and Cole before turning and running toward the back door, her little feet thwapping against the hardwood floor as she goes.

“I have no control in my life, apart from between these four walls,” Cole says to me in a hushed tone.

“Let us have a little fun this summer, Cole,” I challenge, “It’s good for her.”

He grimaces.

“Fine,” he grunts in response. “We’ll delay hair wash night, and since this was your idea, suit up.”

“10–4 Sheriff,” I giggle.

He turns to leave before stopping himself.

He tosses me a devastating Cole smirk as he drops Mabel’s doll on my bed and I stand, backing up toward the wall as he approaches. He looks like he may yell … or kiss me … or both?

When he’s right in front of me, he looks down from his imposing full height and places his hands on my shoulders. I gulp, and just when I’m prepared to ask what he’s doing, he brings his face down to hover his lips over my ear. He’s so close I can smell his skin, and his minty breath.

“You good and warmed-up, Vixen?”

I look up at him.Hell, I am now.

“F-for what?” I stutter, which makes him grin.

“For me to beat what I assume will be some sort of a bikini bottom right off that sassy little ass at pool volleyball.” His hands drop from my shoulders, and he backs away.

I let out the breath I was holding.

“You’re burning daylight, woman,” I hear him call down the hallway as I stand there, stunned.

This man just comes near me and I buckle. How in the hell am I making it through this summer?

CHAPTER TWENTY

Cole

Something I never thought about when I asked Ginger to swim with us? Bathing suits. Ginger’s curves usually do things to me no other woman’s do. But it was a lot easier to withstand when I didn’t know what she felt like wrapped around my cock. Thing is, she’s not even wearing anything skimpy like I assumed she might. It’s as though she’s wearing the most modest bathing suit she owns because she’s in the pool with Mabel. But despite the coverage, the hot pink one piece with a halter-style neck and an open back is still hot as fuck. As the last point of pool volleyball is scored, Mabel cheers, “We beat Daddy!” and the two of them high-five. But it doesn’t end there. I’m dumbfounded as they high-five with the other hand too, then clap their own hands together, turn sideways and bump elbows before landing a high ten in perfect sync.

They have a handshake?! When the fuck did that happen?

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