Page 44 of Riding the High

I laugh, incredulous.

“Alright, Mabes. Time to get ready for bed,” I tell her as I climb out of the pool and grab a towel from the pile I placed on the outdoor table earlier. Miraculously, she doesn’t argue, which tells me we wore her out and she might actually be ready forbed on time. Maybe pool baths aren’t so bad after all? I’d never admit it, but it isn’t so bad to step outside my comfort zone once in a while.

Ginger gets out behind me, and I feel like I’m watching her in my periphery in slow motion. The way the water trickles down her skin is almost like it doesn’t want to let go of her, any more than I would if I had her in my grasp. I hand her a fluffy white towel and follow her gaze that rakes over the raisedGin cursive nestled under my ribcage.

When she’s this close to me, there’s no way she doesn’t notice it, and I can see the question in her eyes when they meet mine. I was already in the water with Mabes when she came out, so it wouldn’t have been visible earlier. But I’m not hiding it now. It’s been there since the summer she kissed me. Since the summer she flipped my world upside down and turned into the only woman I’ve never been able to stop from invading my head. A reminder of the summer I thought about her every goddamn night at Grosvenor. How I never said no to her, how I always compared other girls I knew to her. How she was the light in any room she entered. Those ten seconds she kissed me fucked me right up and showed me why I could never let myselfreallyever fall for her. Because I knew in those ten seconds that, if I did, I’d never be able to get back up.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Cole

79 days to go

Istring my umpteenth calf of the day by his hind legs with a quick loop and pull him into the branding area. I’m used to the smell now. In fact, I don’t think I even have a sense of smell anymore. I’m six weeks into this job at Grosvenor Cattle Ranch—the one my dad had me and Wade take on this summer because the Grosvenors were struggling to keep up and “we’re all part of this community together.” We’ve done a round of branding already and we’re onto our second. There are thirty of us moving about, working methodically, not speaking. I wait for Carson, my workmate, to pull his calf in, and spot the long metal rod leaning in the hot embers; the fancy-lookingGI’ve become accustomed to all summer. The end is slightly red, and smoking hot.

That fuckingGhas been staring me straight in the face day in, day out. On every notepad, invoice, over every barn, on the side of every truck, and on the end of that iron.

Each time I see it, I think of her.

I left to come here for the summer two days after Ginger shocked the shit out of me and kissed me when I drove her home. I haven’t fucking been right since.

At first, I blamed being away from home, worrying about myplacement and my last year of school, not having any semblance of a girlfriend for the first time in, well, ever, after I ended things with Lindsay.

But now, I know. I’m hung up on Ginger Danforth, my little sister’s best friend.

I spent the first two weeks being angry at her. She had to fucking do it. She had to kiss me, and it had to feel like that. Like nothing I’d ever felt before. But she’s CeCe Rae’s friend, and she just turned eighteen. Not to mention her dad scares the shit out of me. I’ve only met him three times, and every single one of those times he’s looked at me like he thinks I’m lunch meat when his daughter deserves Wagyu.

And she does. She deserves everything.

“Two more coming in now.” Carson nods to me and, as if on cue, two calves are pulled in. I lift the hot metal out of the resting area, check the end and singe theGthat looks too pretty to be a brand into one of their legs. The sickening scent of burning hair and flesh fills the air in a small plume of smoke, and I wonder if the way Ginger’s lips felt on mine will be branded into my mind the same way thatGnow lives in this cow’s hide.

Something tells me the answer might be yes.

Intense heat against my ribcage wakes me, and the feeling disappears just as quickly as it came when I sit up and grip my side, expecting warmth—but the raised flesh under my fingers is cool. My room is dark and I hear birds already chirping outside my open window. I check the time, 4:45 a.m. I turn and sit up on the edge of the bed. I have an early day today, so I may as well get up and get going. The floorboards creak under my bare feet as I pull on only a pair of sweats and head down the hall to my kitchen, rubbing my eyes as I walk. I expect to be alone but when I reach the living room I realize I’m not.

“Oh, sorry, did I wake you?” Ginger asks, sitting up straighter as her eyes slowly blaze a trail from the deflating morning bulgein my sweats to my face. Suddenly I’m feeling very exposed, but I don’t mind her gaze, I welcome it. Something about it feels charged with electricity.

She’s sitting on my sofa in a matching silk pajama set—little shorts and a crop top that reveals the tiniest sliver of skin at her navel. Her hair is piled high on her head and her feet are nestled in a pair of fuzzy gray slippers. She’s sipping a coffee and watching TV in the dark.

“No, the birds woke me. I didn’t expect you to be awake.”

“I couldn’t sleep either,” she says. “I’ve never wished I had a stun gun more than when those sparrows start chirping at four o’clock.”

I chuckle as I move closer to her, imagining her taking aim out her window.

“Refill?” I ask, outstretching my hand. She smiles up at me, looking so soft and so beautiful before taking her last sip from her mug. She must do it too fast because a tiny bit of coffee escapes her lips and she darts her tongue out to catch it.

“Oops,” she says as I take her mug from her. My cock must like the way her tongue meets her lips because he wakes back up and I question my sanity as I head to the kitchen to pour us both fresh mugs.

Turned on by coffee? That’s a first.

I make her coffee the way she likes it and then fill my own cup.

The sky is just starting to lighten as I re-enter the living room. Ginger’s knees are pulled up to her chest as she giggles over something someone just said onBrooklyn 99. I look at the TV. “Is this a Halloween Heist episode?” I ask, handing her the steaming mug.

“Yep, the one where Holt’s husband joins in,” she answers as I take a seat beside her. We sit just like that for the next half-hour, sipping our coffees as the sun comes up. I sneak glancesat her as she laughs at the parts of the episode we both know so well. I can’t help thinking about how much I like the way Ginger looks in skimpy pajamas on my sofa in the wee hours of the morning, and how nothing about it feels strange or unfamiliar. In fact, the only word that comes to mind iscomfortable. Being with Ginger is oddly comfortable.

It hits me that I think I’ve always been more comfortable with Ginger than most other people, even when she gets under my skin. It also hits me that sitting in the early light with her, drinking our morning coffee together, might just be my favorite way to wake up.

---