Page 28 of The Cowboy's Christmas Baby
“If you want me to enjoy myself, you’re going to have to put some serious effort into making it happen,” she replied.
Effortwasn’t the word he would have chosen, although it intrigued him. “I see how this works. You expect me to do the heavy lifting.”
Tate spun around, a trace of vanilla swirling with her as she showed off her dress. “I did the prep work. If I have to do the heavy lifting myself, too, then I don’t need you.”
The thought of Tate doing her own heavy lifting scattered his brain in a hundred directions. “You have a point. How much heavy lifting are we talking about, She-Ra?”
“How much enjoyment do you plan on me having?” she countered, her eyes as saucy as her smile.
And here was where the script diverged yet again. While he greatly enjoyed pleasuring women, most women talked about how much pleasure they planned to give him. He’d once had a woman lick his belt buckle on the dance floor of a crowded bar. The actual sex act had occurred in the alley behind it, where she’d done things to him that he’d never heard of before, and all it had cost him was a selfie.
They’d both been so stupid and young.
He didn’t want stupid and young anymore. Tate might be young, which made him justifiably nervous, but he didn’t believe she’d ever been that kind of stupid. Sex would mean more to her than a chance to lick a retired bull rider’s buckle or give birth to a paycheck.
He wanted to know how serious she was.
“I think,” he said, “that I’m more into showing, not telling. We can leave through the back door. We’ll put Iris in her crib and hope she sleeps through the night. Then I plan to show you. Unless you’d rather stay for the party. Or do your own heavy lifting?”
Tate eased into his arms. The high heels put them at eye level. She kissed him, slowly and sweetly, no mistletoe—which remained in his pocket—required.
“While having options is nice, I’ve never been much into parties. There are also instances where doing my own heavy lifting is overrated. This,” she said, her lips beginning a slow walk across his cheek and down the side of his throat as she spoke, “is one of them.”
Good enough for him. “I’ll grab our coats.”
Chapter Nine
Tate
Tate took offher heels and hung her coat over the arm of a tattered black leather sofa in the front room, then sat down to wait while Miles put Iris, still sound asleep, in her crib. While sleeping with her boss might not be one of Tate’s smarter moves, what was the worst that could happen? She’d get fired?
Because she’d already gotten fired from a job as an elf. It would take a lot to top that.
He joined her on the sofa before she could compile a complete list.
It was all kinds of wrong for a man who’d earned his money riding bulls to look so good in a suit, but he pulled it off with the same confidence he did everything else. Flutters tickled her chest but raised no alarms. Excitement, it turned out, felt a whole lot like panic, but she wasn’t going to have any regrets. She’d consider this her Christmas gift to herself.
He stretched both arms over his head, let out a loud, exaggerated yawn, then dropped one around her shoulders as if he were a fourteen-year-old trying to cop a feel on his first date. “Hey, baby. Come here often?”
Not often enough. Panic wasn’t a concern, but nervousness was. Her heart pounded like crazy, and she prayed her palms wouldn’t sweat. She hadn’t had sex in forever and her lack of practice was starting to show. She discarded the role of high school cheerleader who put out for the whole team, and she’d never pull off hot teacher, so she withdrew a handful of condoms from her coat pocket and went for a brisk, business transaction.
“Don’t read too much into why I have these with me. Maybe insisted I come prepared,” she said, tumbling the shiny foil packets into his hand.
Miles looked at them as if he’d never seen a condom before. Then, he looked at Tate. One eyebrow shot up. “Are we skipping foreplay?”
Tate sighed. “You’re a talker, aren’t you?”
“A talker?”
“Someone who feels the need to discuss every move. Offering up play-by-plays. ‘Ooh, baby. Tell me you like this. Come for me, baby.’ It stems from a man’s insecurities around his performance.”
Miles’s eyes narrowed. “I have never in my life felt insecure about any performance of mine.”
“Oh, I’m not talking about riding a bull,” she said, enjoying his pretense of outrage, and the fact he was playing along. Her heart rate didn’t slow down, but excitement could now take some of the credit.
“Neither am I.”
“Great. Glad we’ve gotten the issue of talk during foreplay out of the way. Not a fan.”
