Page 51 of Breaking the Cowboy's Rules

“You cursing me?” he asked good-naturedly.

“I might be soon.” She struggled a little getting off her boots. Her clothes were easy, but she wasn’t quite ready to go naked. Her bra and panties matched and had been expensive and likely not designed for river swimming in who knew what burbling out of the ground. Hopefully, nothing nasty enough to dissolve French designer lace lingerie.

“You are a beautiful sight.” Bodhi strode toward her, clearly more comfortable with his nakedness than she was with hers. “A cowgirl Aphrodite.”

“Hopefully not as fickle or desperate for worship that I smite you.”

“You deserve the worship.” He reached her and held her hand to help her into the water.

It wasn’t nearly as chilly as she’d expected.

“The stones on the bottom are pretty smooth,” he said. “And it’s deep enough in this bend that we can swim.”

He didn’t tease her about keeping her bra and panties on, and he expertly wrapped her hair up in a bun and secured it with the elastic he’d taken from her braid earlier.

“Look at your hair skills,” she teased. “You’ve done buns before.”

“No,” he said, considering. “I haven’t. But I’ve seen Ashni twist her hair up in different types of buns with nothing to secure it thousands of times over the years. She plays with her hair a lot. It’s even longer than yours.”

“Good thing you’re observant.” She’d found the perfect position in the swimming hole—her back to the rocks so the hot water heated her behind and Bodhi heated her in front. “You can use your skills when you have daughters and have to secure their perfect sleeked-back buns for ballet class.”

If she hadn’t been watching him so closely, she wouldn’t have noticed the pain that flashed in his eyes. Or the way he shut down the rush of emotion so fast. He’d done that before. Bodhi Ballantyne had a lot of secrets—maybe even more than her. And he was a lot better at hiding what he felt than she was.

“You don’t want kids?” she asked. She wasn’t fishing. It was a normal question for people in their age range.

“I always wanted a big family,” he said. “I was so close to my cousins, and I figured we’d all settle on the ranch, but then later, I didn’t think it was a possibility,” he said, which sounded strange to her. Maybe he had a medical condition she had no right to pry into. Clearly, it didn’t hinder his sexual performance. Or maybe it did. Maybe he was all mouth no action, like the few men she’d let a relationship get that far with.

Wouldn’t that be poetic justice? She finally found a man who totally turned her on, but he couldn’t… She didn’t even want to finish that thought.

“Because you were still in love with Ash? You thought you’d never find another woman to love?”

Still an attorney with the prying questions.

“Ash is Beck’s,” he said. “She has been from the start. I never once dreamed of changing that.”

Pink colored his cheeks. Anger or embarrassment?

“But you said they were having problems.”

Potentially leading the witness.

“He loves her. Absolutely. She’s his world.”

“But you said he’d been taking her for granted. That she wanted more from him; that he wasn’t ready or able to give.”

“Ash is Beck’s heart, soul, everything.”

“Maybe this could be your chance.” She couldn’t help that her fingers were still on his shoulders, tracing the muscle definition. She didn’t even know muscles like this existed. So why was she trying to push him away? “You said they were high school sweethearts. People change. They mature and want different things. Maybe they’ve grown apart and being together is merely a habit.”

His jaw was tight, and he shook his head, but interestingly, he didn’t push away from her this time like he had when he’d dived into the water. His hands were still on her hips, and he let her play with all his delicious firm skin, muscles and tendons. Why hadn’t she taken an art class or anatomy? Philosophy, history, and economics had not prepared her for a physical, sensual life at all.

“This could be your shot,” Nico mused. Ashni was a lucky woman to have two men in love with her, but there was another possibility. One Nico preferred for a perversely selfish reason. She was still a Wentworth, no matter how far she ran. “Or maybe thinking you’re still in love with Ash is your habit of thought.”

“What?”

“You said you fell in love with Ash as a high school freshman. Love at first sight is a Ballantyne man thing.”

His eyes narrowed, but his hands were still on her hips and his thumbs were tucked into the elastic of her panty waistband. “Yes, but I would never—”

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