Page 58 of A Cowboy in the Streets

Adam leaned across me to grab the seatbelt and buckled me back in with a click. He threw the gear shift in reverse.

“Where are we going?” I asked as we rolled away from my cabin.

“The big house. I have a bathtub.” Then, like he knew I was about to protest, he sweetened the deal. “And Epsom salts. You aren’t the first of us to get dusted, and you won’t be the last.”

I chewed my bottom lip. Getting naked and wet at my boss’s house didn’t seem like the best plan for keeping things strictly professional here at Lodestar Ranch. Then again, I was injured. I could barely lift my arms. Anything that involved hot and heavy breathing fell into the category of things I would like very much to avoid for the time being.

I didn’t bother arguing when we pulled up to the big house and he unbuckled my seatbelt again. I rolled my eyes, but I sat obediently when he told me not to move, then waited until he opened the passenger door and held out his hand before I got out.

“I swear to god if you try to carry me inside the house, I will go boneless and take us both down,” I warned.

He smirked. “I know your legs work, buttercup. Good to know your mouth does, too.”

His gaze lingered there on my lips. I sucked in a breath, making my ribs burn.

“Don’t,” I said. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“I can’t seem to look at you any other way.”

“Well, you have to. Because…you have to.” Because it hurts to breathe when you look at me like that. The sharp feeling in my lungs was mostly the fault of my bruised ribs, but my bruised ribs had nothing to do with the ache in my chest.

“Are you sure?” His hand was so gentle as he brushed my hair back from my forehead. “It might be fun to make Brax’s head spin around.”

“I want to be respected as the head trainer at Lodestar Ranch. That’s going to be hard if everyone knows I’m banging the boss,” I said.

That wasn’t my real reason. Yes, I wanted respect, but my work spoke for itself. I did a damn good job, and I knew it. I hadn’t slept my way into the job and there was no higher position to promote me to. People would gossip, no doubt, but eventually they would find something more interesting to talk about. I would hate it, of course. I had worked so hard to be taken seriously.

Love was worth fighting for. I believed that. But with Adam, I’d be fighting alone.

The second we got inside, Ben came barreling into the foyer with Ted right behind him. He slid to a halt on his socked feet, grabbing the staircase banister for balance.

“James!” His blue eyes were wide and anxious as he looked me over. “You look okay.”

“I’m good, bud,” I assured him. “Banged up a bit, but no broken bones.”

“I wasn’t worried,” he lied, and I arched an eyebrow, amused. “Dad sure was, though. I thought he was going to cry.”

“I was not going to cry,” Adam said, exasperated. His hand went to my lower back, guiding me toward the staircase. “James is going to use my bathtub and then she’s going to stay for dinner.”

“Got it.” Ted was already steering Ben into the kitchen. “Let’s go figure out what we’re going to make.”

I stared up the staircase. That was a lot of steps. The normal amount, probably, but right then it was daunting. My ribs had taken the brunt of the fall, but there wasn’t a single part of me that wasn’t sore.

“Right,” I muttered. “This is going to hurt.”

It was the wrong thing to say. He had me off my feet and in his arms before I could take a single step.

“I told you not to carry me!” My outrage was feeble against the onslaught of squishy feelings from being held against his muscular chest.

“You told me not to carry you into the house. You said nothing about up the stairs. Totally different.”

“You wouldn’t carry Blaine up the stairs. Or Jesse.”

“I would if they needed me to.”

I actually believed him. But I also knew that need was a different standard. Both Blaine and Jesse would have to be on death’s door before they let Adam haul them up the stairs. “I don’t need you to.”

“Again, that’s different. Because in this case, I needed to carry you. I needed to not see you in pain.” He set me down at the top of the stairs and gave me the gentlest nudge. “This way.”

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