Page 11 of Mistletoe Cowboy
“You always were bossy,” I murmur, as her emerald eyes snap to mine, checking my pupils. Our faces are inches apart, so close I feel her hot breath on my cheeks and lips. Temptation burns through my veins, my gaze descending to her generous pink lips despite myself.
“And you always scared me half to death,” she snaps back, hands trembling as she works to clean the wound, then apply little white butterfly closures.
“You’re really going all out for me,” I groan, not convinced any of this is necessary but enjoying every moment of it.
She frowns. “Limb probably smashed your brains out, too.”
“Any remedy for that, Doctor?” I tease, voice tighter than it should be.
“Nope. You never used them anyway.” She chuckles, and I long to pull her into my arms, silence her wicked mouth with a kiss.
Instead, I catch her wrist, rub my thumb across the inside where her pulse smolders. “Eight years, and you still remember how to worry about me.”
The air thickens. She swallows, eyes shining. “I never stopped.”
Those three words hang like redemption in the air. Her nostrils flare, pupils dilating as we stare, caught in something too powerful to fight.
“I left to protect you, Sage,” I confess, voice gravel.
She opens her mouth to counter, cheeks flushing, but I cut her off.
“Sassy, let me finish.” I swallow loudly, searching for the words I’ve thought about a thousand times yet never thought I’d actually have the chance to say. “I couldn’t stay away, and so I had to go. Dad agreed. Walter and Ralph—they all said distance was best. What happened between you and me … was a bad way to repay kindness. But I don’t regret a thing, and I’d do it all over again.”
“So would I.” Her voice trembles, eyes swirling with need.
“Why?” My voice cracks.
“Because I’ve always loved you, Silas. Can’t remember a time I haven’t. Though what I want from you is …wrong.”
I tuck a loose strand of amber hair behind her ear, fingers shaking, thumb caressing her heated cheek. “But is it, though?” I ask the question that’s festered in my brain for eight long years.
“I don’t know, Silas. And maybe I don’t care anymore.”
Her words say what I need them to. My breath comes faster as my hand wraps around her neck, drawing her down to me.
The kiss is tentative, slow at first. Like we’re fighting through the awkwardness, the chaos of our minds, the unruliness of our hearts. But then yearning breaks through, and it turns to quicksand, dragging us both under.
Heat shuttles through me as I grow desperate, tongue sweeping into her. Tasting the one flavor I can never have. The only one I want. She returns it with a fury, sliding into me, rhythm setting the pace for something I’ve barely dared to dream about.
Finally, when we have to break away to breathe, our sighs mingle.
“The world can think what it wants. I’m done pretending,” she says, and something inside me breaks—for better or worse.
I pull her into my lap, her curvy legs straddling me as I take her mouth again. Passion burgeons, my heart thudding through my body as my work-hardened hands slip beneath her coat, tugging her button-down hem free. I slide them up the impossible softness of her back, tongue mating with hers. Cock going so hard, I can barely stand the ache.
She’s all I’ve ever wanted or needed.She has to know.
“I’m a virgin, Sassy,” I admit, half afraid the words will stop her in her tracks.
Instead, sorrow and tenderness swirl in her eyes. “But that’s not possible,” she says, fingers sliding over a hint of stubble at my jawline. “You were in the Marines for eight years. How can that?—”
“It is.” I say the words slow, emphatic. “Because no one else but you could ever do, though I know how fucking wrong it is.”
A bittersweet smile captures her lips. “I’m a virgin, too.”
The words put a dangerous sting behind my eyes.
“But how? You’re so beautiful. So sexy. Guys have to be lining up for you.”
