Page 23 of Red Hot Rancher

“We shouldn’t—”

“I know.” She planted her lips on his.

His reaction was immediate. Her back hit the wall as his body pressed against hers. She wrapped her arms around him and deepened the kiss. His taste was achingly familiar, one that promised to fill the empty chasm inside of her.

When his tongue stroked inside her mouth, she greedily received him. The delicious press of his growing erection between them made her curse her towel. She should have let it fall when she slipped.

His hands gripped her ass, bringing her closer. She skimmed her hands up to his face, loving the rough scrape of his stubble against her palms and the slide of silky wet hair over her heated skin.

She rolled her hips, reveling in the steel trapped between them. Everything was bigger about Caleb.

His groan resonated through his chest into hers. She rolled against him again, only this time she sought desperate relief for the throbbing ache between her legs. Releasing his head, she gripped his shoulders. Should she wrap a leg around him? Maybe widen her stance so they could rock together? Or palm him and give him at least the same measure of ecstasy she was feeling?

He ripped his mouth free and rested his forehead against hers, his breathing heavy. “We can’t do this.”

“I know,” she breathed. Why again?

“You said that before and now my dick is hard as a rock.” He let go of her butt, moving his hands to her arms.

“It’s harder.”

The intensity of his dark gaze speared her, but he recovered. “You’re not helping.”

She sighed and cupped his face. “Look, I know we have a history, and I should’ve gone about breaking up with you better. And I know your roots are here and here is where you’re going to stay.”

“And there’s no way you’d settle in Moore with a guy like me.”

She frowned and slid her hands to his shoulders. Not touching him while they were this close wasn’t an option. “It’s not you, it’s Moore.”

He let her go and stepped back, glancing down like he was making sure he was still covered. The loss of his heat let the chill flow in like a rushing river. Goose bumps crawled over her arms. She twisted her hands into her towel, but not to hold it up. Her earlier vulnerability was exposed for all to see now.

“If it’s not me, why couldn’t we tell anyone about us back then? I was prouder than hell of dating a girl like you.”

Her heart melted at the same time it cracked with heartbreak. He thought she was ashamed of him? She wasn’t. Her mom was a different story. “If anyone had found out, it would have gotten back to Mom. And you know how she is.”

“Anti me.”

Brigit nodded. “I didn’t want to ruin my chance at being with you.”

“And when your mom found out? We were done, easy as that?”

She stiffened, clutching the hem of the towel harder. “It wasn’t easy. I…” She’d loved him. With all the strength of a seventeen-year-old in love for the first time in her life. “I didn’t trust myself around you. But like Mom pointed out, we were going different directions and there was no way in hell I was staying here.”

He retreated farther, sweeping his mussed hair off his face as he brushed his gaze over her. She shifted her weight. Did he still like what he saw? She’d been curvy like this when they were together, yet no one since had made her feel as sexy as he had.

“I guess we’re back there again. I’m not leaving. You’re not staying. And your mom would still throw a shit fit if she found out I’d touched you.”

She didn’t want to agree, but her head seemed to nod of its own accord. If the reason they couldn’t be together was so simple, why was it so hard to remember?

Chapter 7

“That’s the estimate for a new hood. Add that to the new fender and touching up the paint…” The auto shop employee rattled off numbers that were only rivaled in size by the guy’s booming voice.

Caleb threaded steel into his spine to keep from sinking back into the hard-plastic seat of the waiting room and dropping his head into his hands. He’d never thought the body shop such a depressing place before.

A sheet of paper hung from Larry’s black-smudged fingers. Caleb didn’t want to accept the estimate. He had an emergency fund but it wasn’t big enough to cover this. That meant he’d have to dig into the insurance payout from his house.

Larry was waiting.

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