Page 82 of Chasing the Wild
Leaving me to a day spent swirled up in mountain-retreat-luxury. The kind of snowed-in dream I could have only ever dared to imagine. Some kind of faraway wish, the kind girls like me only get to sigh over wistfully in movies. As I reheatmy breakfast, stoke up the fire, and float around this beautiful home, I can’t help the smile that keeps creeping across my lips.
This man might live alone in the middle of nowhere, but his taste is immaculate. Everything from the sleek black finish on his truck, to the finely laid stonework wrapping the fireplace, to the flannel shirts that compliment the flecks of amber in his eyes.
His life is a work of art. This ranch is a giant, awe-inspiring canvas.
And somehow, for the briefest of moments, I’ve managed to steal just the tiniest slice of this paradise and the man who comes with it.
Chapter 23
Steam puffs in two plumes to greet me and big, glossy eyes fix me with a reproachful stare.
Even the horses know I’m a terrible fucking person.
I shouldn’t be doing this. There are a litany of reasons why I’m the world’s worst father and an even worse boss, but holy shit, as much as the word ‘shouldn’t’ keeps resounding in my brain like a goddamn siren… absolutelynothingabout being with Layla feels wrong.
Embedded in the core of my bones, I only feel a kind of warmth and contentment with her in my arms that assholes like me aren’t supposed to know about.
We aren’t the kind of men who get to enjoy soft kisses or whispered words. We’re not supposed to know how the supple glide of delicate skin feels beneath our roughened touch.
Holding out the end of the carrot for Peaches, I rub her neck as her velvety lips and whiskers brush my palm. Thieving the treat on offer, she immediately nudges at my shoulder to demand more.
That’s how I fucking feel too. Like I want to march straight back into that kitchen and demand so much more from the girl I’ve already taken from over and over since last night.
“I goddamn know it, ok,” muttering as my fingers stroke the long nose in front of me. The horses give me their huffs of disapproval. All of them are just as fucking grumpy as I am that it’s only my presence they’ve got for company today.
But I’ve got to somehow keep my sanity and not lose myself to this incessant need to dive into Layla Birch. At least being out on the ranch, among the piled snow and icy winds, there’s not much time for letting my thoughts drift.
I needed to be busy. Needed to keep my hands occupied with something that didn’t involve tearing her clothes off and pressing bruises into her hips.
So, putting myself on ice for the day is about the best option I’ve got, until later, that is.
Because I know the moment I set foot inside that house again, there’s no stopping what comes next. I’m too fucking far gone, having already lost the battle with myself to keep my hands off her.
Now I know how she tastes, how she moans when my cock hits that deep spot inside her sweet cunt. Fuck, her whimpering little noises are my absolute undoing. The way her body responds to me is like a bloom unfurling after the darkness of winter, and that shit is addicting.
I drop my forehead against the warm, earthy scent of Peaches’ neck in an effort to collect my thoughts. She nibbles the seam along the shoulder of my jacket while I’m there because she’s never going to pass up the opportunity to tug and pull at me. Demanding in no uncertain terms to have her new best fucking friend come out and groom her and croon over her and make her feel special.
When the irony is that I’m no fucking better than any of these horses. Just waiting for the moment her lips curve into a smile against my collarbone and those tender fingers slide into my hair at the back of my neck.
Although, somewhere in amongst all the insanity of what we’re doing, I’m painfully aware of my responsibility to put an end date on this.
Two weeks.
Two fucking weeks.
A timeline like that… feels like a precious gift, and a goddamned cursed chalice, all rolled into one.
Get it out of my system. Find a way to fuck away all the longing and wanting of this girl who can’t be mine without completely destroying someone else—someone who is deeply important in my life—even if we aren’t exactly on solid ground yet. What a fitting bargain for the likes of me, who has wound up living out my days on Devil’s Peak.
Even though she’s a drug I keep chasing, and I’m already imagining all the filthy fucking ways I can have her over the next two weeks before it ends, it has to be this way.
Turning my attention to the horse’s stalls, I’m immediately drifting back to that moment in the kitchen, replaying our conversation from earlier. Goddamn, when I was feeding out the cattle this morning, before heading back to cook breakfast for her, there was no avoiding getting lost in my own bullshit inside my head.
Of all the situations, I didn’t anticipatethisbeing the thing I’d nearly lose my damn mind over.
I’ve never fucked anyone without a condom.
In all my years, I've always been careful to avoid a repeat of my past misfortune. After the way things turned out with Kayce, my trust was destroyed, and no matter who or what the women since then were to me—some stuck around for a short while, others were just sex and a release and nothing more—I stuck to that rule hard and fucking fast.
