Page 76 of The Wildest Ride

Without turning to her, he said, “We are. Heat is the only chance you have to recover in time for tomorrow. Our only chance at a decent score.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Right...”

His head whipped around and he pinned her with a look that set off the roller coaster she’d been riding since they’d started the challenge. The man was too much.

With an all-too-sensual curve in his lips, he said, “There won’t be any games when I get you in bed.”

And then she was blushing again and thinking about their kiss again, and the night in her RV, and wanting more. Her throat felt thick and heavy, her nipples hard and sensitive.

And here he was trying to share a sleeping bag.

The man was insane. Honestly.

“No way,” she repeated, her voice catching in her dry throat.

“We lost a lot of time today. You need to be at your best tomorrow if we’re going to make it up. That means warm.”

He wasn’t playing fair. It was like he was inside her, as if he knew exactly what buttons to push to secure her compliance. The one-two punch of guilt and cold competition wormed into her, working its magic until her resistance crumbled. It was completely reasonable to sleep together in the name of the competition. Rational even.

“Fine. Clothes stay on.”

He called her a prude and her laugh bubbled out without her permission. It was hard to hold on to stern around him.

The laughter broke the tension of the moment, or at least that was what Lil told herself as she lowered herself to the ground. One of the sponsors had provided the contestants with long johns, and AJ tossed her hers. She slipped into the now-oversized sleeping bag and wiggled out of her jeans and into the long johns.

AJ just took his jeans off where he stood, and Lil’s mouth went dry as she watched, knowing her eyes should be on anything else but him. He wore boxer briefs, cotton and plain-colored, just like the T-shirts he preferred. His well-muscled thighs were golden brown and smooth and she pictured running her tongue up the length of one toward the part of him so clearly outlined by the fit of his boxers.

“My eyes are up here, Lilian.”

Her cheeks flamed, and she looked away while he laughed, the damage already done.

She snuggled down into the sleeping bag and turned to lie on her side. Lying, her body took the opportunity to voice its complaints over her earlier fall. Her head felt thick and heavy, far too large a burden for her tired neck to carry all night, which would mean she’d have a crick in it for the rest of the day challenge.

Lil didn’t know what was worse: the soreness or her mental moaning and groaning about it. Whining like this, even in her own head, wasn’t her way.

AJ slipping into the sleeping bag, however, chased away all complaints.

She didn’t move, but it didn’t matter. The heat of his body reached out to caress her without an inch of their skin touching. Her breath caught, then started again, heavy and not subtle at all.

He scooted closer, and her heart stuttered. He was going to spoon her. AJ Garza, the world’s greatest rodeo cowboy, was about to spoon her.

He didn’t fully close the space between them, though. Simply slipped his arm between the ground and her head, underneath her neck. Lil sighed. With the simple movement, it was like the screws in her head had been loosened.

He said, “Thought that might be more comfortable.”

He smelled clean, like fresh cut grass and sheets drying in the sun and his body was a solid wall of warmth behind her. It took every ounce of willpower she had not to snuggle back into him and revel in the easy security she felt lurking beneath the surface.

His breath was deep and even behind her and she wondered if he was asleep. They’d had a long day and he’d done more than his fair share for the last part of it. He’d be well within his rights to conk out.

And completely oblivious to the tension that had her own body, abused as it was, feeling about as sleepy as a live wire.

His grand warmth plan was backfiring spectacularly. There was no way she’d ever be able to sleep like this, head cradled on the arm of a man she’d been lusting after all day long. It was too much for anyone.

He’d brought their kiss up enough that she knew he was open for more. All it’d take was a little scoot and neither one of them would be thinking about staying warm or sleeping.

Her skin flushed and the thought crossed her mind that it might just be her destiny to be a human beet around him.

But destiny didn’t have anything to do with the way her stomach clenched. It wasn’t the source of the electric awareness of her skin, or the heaviness of her breasts.

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