Page 16 of Hooking Up

But Carter looked more than willing to take on a few.

“Our first rider is Miss Bella Roberts! This championship barrel racer has been known to ride a bull or two in her lifetime. Ready, Bella?”

She nodded, her hair tumbling around her shoulders. When she raised a hand to wave at the crowd gathered around the bull, her top pulled tight across her breasts, revealing a small opening big enough for Quint to slip his finger inside.

His cock hardened at the thought of all that warmth radiating off her skin. He tried to catch her eyes, but she wasn’tpaying attention to anything but the bull. With a sexy flip of her leg, she straddled the beast.

“Fucking hell,” Carter groaned.

I know the feeling.Quint’s jeans were suddenly two sizes too small. His balls started to throb.

When she wiggled her fine little ass to situate herself on the back, Quint felt his eyes roll back in his head. If he looked around, he’d see every man in the same state. Well, except maybe Asher, who was married with two kids. But a man would have to be dead not to notice Bella.

She shimmied down toward the neck, which pointed sharply to the floor. Around the bull a bunch of foam cubes would cushion her fall, but he’d seen her ride a flesh and blood, pissed-off bull. She’d have to be a lot drunker to land in the foam.

The music started with the first whip of the bull. It swung backward, she compensated with one arm waving in the air. Her breasts pushed out. Her fucking thighs gripping the sides like a champion.

Quint’s need compounded, and he found himself grinding his teeth. The bull started whipping her, and Bella kept her seat, rocking up and down. Hell, an eighty-year-old woman would look sexy on a mechanical bull. The action was sexy as hell. But since it was Bella, every man—and probably a few women—were riveted on her.

Carter nudged his fly, adjusting his own boner. Fuck, this was bad. Real bad.

Quint’s vocal chords ached to yell for the charade to stop, but Bella rode out her full eight seconds. Ten. Twelve.

“Time’s up!” he hollered.

Someone elbowed him in the back. “Hey, buddy, don’t make them stop her.”

He turned to glare at the guy but had no idea which man in the sea of faces had struck him. Twisting back around, he welcomed the blare of the buzzer. Bella’s hair trickled into her eyes, and she tossed it back like a fucking porn star.

To dismount, she lay back on the bull and made a show of rolling into the foam. A half dozen men rushed forward to offer her a hand up, but Quint and Carter were there first, hauling her bodily out of the foam pit and dragging her several feet away.

She focused on Quint and then Carter. “You guys better keep your distance.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to ask why, but then the buzzer sounded and another woman was in the spotlight. She didn’t ooze sex appeal like Bella or even stay on very long. When she was tossed into the foam, only one man was there to pick her up. Another took her place.

“How’d I do, boys?” Bella had another drink in her hand. Where had she gotten it?

Quint’s protective instincts were suddenly a wild animal, pacing back and forth in front of her. He stared down a man, daring him to try anything. When he glanced over at Carter, he saw him standing bodyguard too.

At least he had backup. The strangeness of the situation hit him—they both wanted Bella but in protecting her, they were a solid wall no one could breach. That familiar sense of camaraderie flooded Quint.

“You did fine, Bella,” Carter said tightly when she asked a second time.

“Just fine?” She swigged.

Quint had never seen her drink very much. What was bringing this on? It couldn’t be their encounter earlier and their admission that they’d both kissed her.

She was as effervescent as ever, fizzing with life and energy and liquid sex. “I kicked ass up there. I’m winning those free drinks.” She tipped her glass into her mouth and swallowed the contents in one big gulp.

Again, Quint’s balls clenched, but he ignored it. Someone else tried to put a fresh glass into her hand, but Quint knocked his hand aside. The drink sloshed onto the floor, and Bella pressed her beautiful lips into a pout. Each freckle seemed to beckon to him.

Jesus, she’s killing me.

Too easily he pictured her lips wrapped around his cock. Not tonight, though. When she came to his bed, she’d be totally sober.

“You don’t need any more drinks, Bella.” Carter’s rough tone suggested he wasn’t immune to her pout either. Damn, she was so cute.

And every grind of her pussy against that bull was emblazoned on his memory. He’d be beating off to it for a month.

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