Saddled and Spurred: A Blacktop Cowboys Novel (23 page)

“Kyle’s done well for himself since switching from the Extreme Bull Showcase to the CRA. He’s here whenever he gets a break from the circuit.” Maybe by the time branding rolled around, Kyle would be over his snit about Renner’s buying up the land he’d been eyeballing.

“I find it amazing that you’re still friends with the same guys you met in grade school. Seems no one forges those kind of lifelong connections anymore. Mostly because no one stays in one place for very long.”

“I suppose we might’ve all gone our own ways—and some of us have. But it was the damnedest thing, all this ... tragedy hit a bunch of us at once. Hank and Abe’s folks died in a freak accident. My grandparents died of old age. Braxton’s folks split up and moved away. Eli’s dad went to jail. Ike’s mom got breast cancer and was dead within two months. The only ones left with both their parents alive are Devin and Reese. Kyle’s mom was always single, as was our buddy Fletch’s dad. After all that bad shit happened, it was like we became our own family—including our friends’ brothers and sisters. Folks in town called us ‘the orphans’ for a while. We still look out for each other. Probably out of habit.”

“It sucks that you all went through that shit at an early age, but I envy you the friendships. Since my dad was in the air force, we constantly moved. That’s probably why I have such great memories of this place. Wyoming always seemed like home to me.” Renner finished his beer. “Didn’t mean to blather on and get sentimental.”

“It’s okay. Come on up to the house and I’ll get you those numbers.”

After they traded contact info, Renner left.

Rather than sitting around and brood about missing Harper, Bran retreated to his trailer and tied flies until he couldn’t see straight.

T
hey’d been lovers a couple of weeks.

A couple of very incredible weeks that’d flowed from day to night and back to day. Every moment with Harper was filled with passion that threatened to rob him of sanity.

This lust should’ve cooled.

But it hadn’t. Not even fucking close.

Today seemed particularly bad. Every time Bran thought he had a handle on the urge to bend her over the tailgate and fuck her senseless, she’d make a sexy noise or look at him from beneath those incredibly long eyelashes, blowing his good intentions.

It’d gotten to the point he didn’t dare look at her, because if she licked her lips one more time he wouldn’t be responsible for his actions. In the last hour, his overpowering need for her had shattered his focus and he hadn’t heard a single word tumbling out of her mouth. He couldn’t see beyond his mental image of her wrapping those lush, wet, pink lips around the base of his aching cock and sucking him dry.

And it was barely noon. The workday wasn’t over. Which meant hands off until the proverbial whistle blew.

He backed the truck up to the big barn door and practically threw himself out. He blew into the barn, bypassing the stalls and the tack room until he hit the back section with its stockpile of miscellaneous machine parts. He had to do something to make himself look busy. A complicated, manly, mechanical something. He unzipped his Carhartt coat and tossed it to the ground. Since when had it gotten so goddamn hot in here?

“Bran?” Her melodic voice echoed from the doorway.

Screw it. Literally. He had coffee cans of screws to sort. A mindless activity with no purpose—but Harper wouldn’t know that. He dumped the screws on the wooden bench. For the first time ever, he thanked his grandfather for hoarding useless shit.

When he got a whiff of her perfume, or whatever the hell that damnably appealing scented part of her was, he withheld a snarl. And his directive for her to go away or get on her knees.

Either way would relieve him. But he certainly preferred one way over the other.

“Why are you mad at me?” she asked.

He glowered. “I’m not mad.”

“Okay. Then what did I do wrong?”

“Nothin’.”

“Then why are you being—”

“I’m not bein’ anything. Go home, Harper. We’re done.”

“Since when? You told me we had a pile to do today and you’re sending me home?”

“Yep.”

“I don’t want to go home.”

“Tough shit. You’re off the clock.”

Harper shifted her stance. Her feet scuffled against the dirt floor. The sounds should’ve indicated she’d left. But Bran knew she was still there. Waiting. Why in the hell was he attuned to her every breath? He squeezed his eyes shut, gritted his teeth, and counted to twenty as he sorted screws.

He was so busy counting and ignoring his goddamn erection that he didn’t feel her tugging on his sleeve until she was right in front of him.

Sweet Jesus. She was fucking breathtaking. Those brandy-colored eyes set in an angelic face. Her blond hair looked like hell, though, and that only increased her appeal.

Any continued resistance fled.

Bran grabbed the lapels of her coat and hauled her to her toes for a ravenous kiss. A wet, hot, tongue-thrusting explosion of passion as he inhaled her. Losing his mind in her softness, her sweetness, her fire. He kept changing the slant of his mouth over hers, taking the kiss deeper, giving her every ounce of himself as he took every bit of her he could get.

Harper slid her damp lips down and lightly sank her teeth into his chin. Bran peered at her with his heavy-lidded gaze. “What?”

“Am I really off the clock, boss?”

He hated it when she called him
boss
. She knew that. He growled, “I said you were, didn’t I?”

“Good. Then I know you’re not paying me to do this.” Harper grabbed the coat he’d whipped onto the ground and fell to her knees on it. “Unbuckle your belt and drop your pants, Bran.”

Didn’t have to ask him twice.

He kept his eyes trained on her face as she watched his movements. Avidly. When she licked her full lips as he lowered the zipper, he couldn’t withhold a ripple of anticipation.

Harper helped him tug his jeans and boxers down to his knees.

“What—”

She smacked him on the thigh. Hard. “No talking.”

Fuck. That little bit of bossiness and tiny spark of pain was a turn-on.

She connected her gaze to his and placed her hands on his bared thighs, slowly sliding the leather gloves up. The closer her mouth got to his cock, the more it jerked for her attention. She released a throaty chuckle and let her hot breath drift over the cock head. She rubbed the side of her face on his shaft, and he hissed in a breath at the coolness of her cheek on the hottest, most swollen part of him. Her hands circled his hips and she licked straight up the bulging vein from the root to the tip.

Bran’s mouth went desert dry. The woman intended to torture him.

Would he let her? Since he’d made no bones about the fact that he preferred to be in charge?

Yes. He’d let her do whatever the hell she wanted. Although she was always up for any fun and games he suggested, this was the first time she’d taken the initiative.

When her warm, wet mouth enclosed his cock, he lost any rational thought at all.

She chuckled again and the vibration zipped up his spine, increasing that buzz of need building inside his groin.

Bran loved the scrape of her teeth against his shaft. He loved how the long strands of her baby-soft hair tickled his thighs as her head bobbed. He loved the velvety sensation of her tongue lapping every inch. He loved the power of her cheek muscles as she sucked lightly, then forcefully. He loved how she pulled back to flick just the very tip of her tongue beneath the cock head. He really loved the little humming moans she made as she blew him to heaven.

It took every ounce of his control not to clamp his hands on her head and fuck that sassy mouth hard and deep to reach the tipping point.

Harper’s hands went from gripping his hipbones back down the tops of his thighs. Her left hand rested on his right quad, which was almost as rigid as his dick. Then her right hand slipped down the inside of his left thigh to his balls.

The coarse material of her glove rubbing on that sensitive area startled him. “Holy fuckin’ shit.”

She didn’t react beyond keeping the rhythm maddeningly precise.

Slow, fast, fast. Slow, fast, fast.

The contrast of the rough leather stroking his sac and the smooth, wet heat of her mouth sliding up and down his length zapped every nerve receptor in his body with pure pleasure. He groaned. The need for release was equally balanced against his desire for her to never ever stop. He managed a hoarse “Jesus. You’re killin’ me here.”

No verbal response, just another amused chuckle. She stroked and fondled his balls, allowing her finger to slide back to circle his anus as she suckled the head of his cock.

His body was strung tight. Fists and jaw clenched. His balls were drawn up, ready to blow.

Harper kept a solid hold on the reins, knowing the exact moment to let go. She sucked harder and moved faster, bringing her right hand to the root and stroking up his shaft as her slippery, suctioning mouth slid down to meet her fingers.

No fucking way could he hold back.

With a sound akin to a roar, Bran wrapped his fingers around her jaw, forcing her mouth to open wider. He pumped his hips twice and stilled as each hot shot jetted out of his dick.

Her throat muscles contracted as she swallowed in almost the same cadence as the pulses blowing his mind.

Bran’s hands kept her in place. He eased out of her mouth, savoring the sensation of her slick warmth releasing his shaft inch by inch into the colder air. He fell back against the bench and Harper nuzzled his lower belly, stringing sweet kisses from hipbone to hipbone. She looked up at him with a pleased grin.

“I’m the one who oughta be smilin’ like that,” he murmured.

“You are now. You were sort of crabby before.”

“I do like this mood improvement technique of yours, Harper.”

“My pleasure.” She stood and smooched the corners of his mouth. “See you tomorrow.” She turned and quickly walked off. Hell, she practically
ran
off.

He scrambled to yank his underwear and jeans back in place. “Hey. Wait.” But by the time he’d gotten dressed, including grabbing his coat, Harper was in the truck, driving away.

What the hell was wrong with her? Why would she just bail like that?

She hadn’t touched him until he verified she was off the clock.

Stupid rules. Well, tomorrow he was breaking all the rules—hers and the self-imposed ones. He just hoped he could hold off until after chores were done.

Harper wasn’t sure how to take Bran’s chipper mood the next morning.

She’d purposely raced away yesterday, hoping he would chase her. In her fantasy, he’d caught her and taken her up against the pickup in a fast, dirty, hard coupling. Warning her in that sexy, gruff, gravelly voice never to give him head and head out again.

Truth was, she had been teasing him all morning. Building the tension. Whenever he’d glanced her way, she’d purposely licked her lips, figuring that given his obsession with her mouth, he’d crack. His lust would transform him into the take-charge lover he’d promised her he would be. She hadn’t banked on the man becoming moody because she’d made him so horny.

Yet there was power in his reaction. She’d gloried in it.

But it didn’t change the fact that Bran, for all his talk about liking his sex kinky, hadn’t followed through. Granted, they had sex every day. Sometimes twice a day, after working hours ended. It was great sex, better sex than she’d ever had. But it wasn’t all she wanted. Harper sensed that Bran held back in bed. She’d counted on him being an animal. Going all caveman on her ass. She’d given him free rein . . . and he’d reined himself in? So that’s why she’d goaded him. And if she had the chance today she’d push him even further.