Saddled and Spurred: A Blacktop Cowboys Novel (25 page)

She yawned and admitted, “I’m absolutely whupped. You wore me out. I cannot keep my eyes open, Bran.”

He scooped her up and held her to his chest.

“What are you—”

“Ssh. It’s all right. I’ve got you.”

He carried her to his bedroom and set her on his bed. She sighed as he pulled the comforter under her chin and kissed her brow.

“Rest. Need anything before I hit the shower?”

A sitz bath. He probably wouldn’t know what that was. If he did, mentioning it would make him feel guilty, so she merely said, “No.”

She drooled over his perfectly muscled butt as he walked to the door. He stopped and sent a smoldering look over his shoulder. “Still think I’m gonna keep this vanilla?”

Harper managed a laugh. “Definitely not.” Then she closed her eyes and drifted off.

O
ver the next couple of weeks, Bran proved to Harper just how far from vanilla sex he could steer her.

She flashed back to the night he’d bound her arms behind her back with rope and propped up her lower torso, keeping her feet flat on the mattress. He’d sucked her nipples and fingered her clit until she came. Twice. Then he’d just . . . taken her. Repeatedly. His way. With no thought to her pleasure, just to his own. Bran had become wild, not unlike a male animal in rut. He’d wedged himself between her knees. His fingers clutched her with such tenacity as he’d hammered into her that he left finger-shaped bruises on her thighs. At the moment he reached release, he’d pulled out and ejaculated all over her breasts.

Harper loved that he’d marked her in such a primitive manner. Then he used his seed as a lubricant and slid his dick in the valley of her cleavage. He held her breasts so close together that her nipples nearly touched. His rapt face as he watched his cock disappearing between her fleshy globes was heady stuff. It turned her on listening to his labored breaths as he took his pleasure. Made her crazy with lust to see the sweat trickling down the corded muscles in his neck. A tiny orgasm throbbed when he pumped his hips faster and looked into her eyes with such admiration. A sense of power built. She could make this gruff man lose complete control. But she knew he’d never take her past the point where he compromised her trust.

That’s when she’d known this wasn’t just sex. She could love this multifaceted man. Love him with everything she had. And she ached because she would have him for only a little while longer.

Over the next few days they’d gorged themselves, eager to experience every kinky fantasy.

One afternoon he’d shown her the carnal delights of sixtynine, with her head hanging off the edge of the bed and her legs in straddle splits. In that position he could shove his cock so far down her throat she couldn’t taste him when he came. Also in that particular position, he could burrow his lightning-fast tongue so deep into her pussy that she swore she felt the tip of it tickling her uterus.

Then there was the morning he tied her spread-eagle to his brass bed headboard and footboard, taking a full hour to pound into her ass, while he used vibrating objects on her clit. Who knew the stem portion of an old electric toothbrush, the backside of his electric shaver, and the mini massager he claimed he actually used for sore leg muscles could be turned into impromptu sex toys? He’d made her come five times.

Although she loved every kinky, fun, raunchy sexual scenario Bran suggested, or enforced, she equally loved hanging out with him after they put their clothes back on. He hadn’t balked when she’d cooked for him a few times. She’d watched him tie flies—funky ones, ugly ones, beautiful ones. He truly had a gift.

When she asked him about it, he clammed up. At her assurance that she didn’t consider him a dork, he relaxed and almost shyly shared that artistic part of himself. He’d even promised to take her fishing—after they laughed about him being such a jerk the first time they’d met at the fishing hole. His sheepish confession that his rude behavior was because she’d intimidated him came as such a sweet surprise from the always confident cattleman that she’d almost melted into a puddle right then and there.

His honesty allowed Harper to open up as well. Telling him her fears about never getting a chance to pursue her dream career. How being the responsible one in her family had made her feel and act much older than her twenty-four years. He didn’t offer advice. He just listened. Listened and held her, made love to her, treated her like she mattered.

From that point on, their relationship changed, evolving into something . . . more than either of them expected. But Harper wasn’t entirely convinced that the short-term nature of it didn’t inflate the significance of these feelings.

Or maybe she was just lying to herself so it’d be easier to bear the separation from Bran when she left.

They finished chores early the following Friday so Bran could attend an auction outside of Rawlins. When Harper confessed that she’d never been to an auction, he convinced her to come along. They loaded up the trailer and took off.

Thankfully this wasn’t a liquidation auction used to pay off a banker’s debt while the poor family stood around in misery, watching as their worldly possessions sold for pennies on the dollar. The descendants of this estate were eager to unload equipment and household goods, as well as the small acreage. Bran toyed with the idea of buying the land and holding it for Kyle, since it was close by and it was the type of place Kyle had been searching for. But Kyle’s curiosity was second only to his pride, and he would demand to know how Bran had scrounged up that kind of cash on such short notice. So Bran discarded the idea. At this point, admitting to his friends that he could write a check for the entire amount and it wouldn’t affect his financial situation at all would likely piss them off. After all the years of friendship, they’d think he didn’t trust them.

No. Being a braggart was a worse sin than nondisclosure, in his opinion.

After he registered to bid, they walked along the tables piled with stuff. Junk, mostly. Some dishes and housewares, but Bran was distracted, searching for what he’d driven all this way for. Fishing supplies.

The catalog hadn’t given a detailed description of what was for sale beyond the generic wording “fishing items.” But Bran had done some research, and apparently the old man who’d died had spent his life tying flies. So Bran was highly curious about the supplies he’d collected over the years.

Harper wandered off and Bran hit the mother lode about two tables in. Bags and boxes of every supply imaginable. He slapped on his poker face and kept walking, stopping at the next table over to scour the boxes of
Boys’ Life
from the 1950s. Not that he gave a shit about crusty old magazines, but he wanted to keep an eye on other auction patrons who might be interested in the fishing supplies.

A few browsed. No one very closely. He focused on the auctioneer and the next set of items up for bid. A box of glassware, including antique perfume bottles.

Harper had a few of those scattered around her place. If he bid on that lot, in the guise of buying her a gift, it wouldn’t appear that he was waiting around to bid on the rare fly-tying supplies.

The goal at auctions was to hide your interest in the items you wanted to buy. If you didn’t, some bastards would bid against you and drive the price higher just because they could.

He wandered to the auction stand. Not a big crowd, which could be a bad thing. Knowing the order of the auction meant some people didn’t show up until right before their coveted item went up on the auction block.

The bidding started low and stayed low. The entire thing lasted around two minutes. For twenty-five bucks he picked up the entire box of Depression-era glassware.

Bran bid on a scythe and lost. He waited a couple of items and bid on an ugly coffee table and lost.

Since he hadn’t seen Harper for a while, he went looking for her. He froze, watching her leave the concession wagon with an ice cream cone. A vanilla cone.

Was she trying to make a point?

He’d toned down the kink the last couple of days, preferring to take her to his bed and make love to her body to body, face to face. Having sex with her multiple times a day in the past month had allowed him to build his stamina—now he could fuck her for an hour, wringing at least three orgasms from her before finding his own release.

His mouth went dry as her lips enclosed the swirled creamy curlicue in the cone and sucked. Then she licked along one side, turned the cone, and licked again. Another couple of swipes with her hot little tongue and her lips were coated with the sticky whiteness.

Jesus. His cock jerked, trying to get out of his pants.

Harper took enjoyment of her ice cream cone to a whole other plane. When she lapped around the base with the flat of her tongue and then jammed the stubby ice cream entirely into her mouth, keeping her lips stretched around the cone as she sucked, he almost came. Right then.

The woman had no idea she was torturing him.

But she would.

As soon as she finished her treat and wiped her mouth, Bran approached her. She smiled. “Hey. I wondered what happened to you.”

“I bought these. I need to put them in the trailer.”

Just as he expected, she fell into step beside him. “See anything else you want?”

Hell, yeah.

Bran dug out his keys and unlocked the trailer doors. He gestured for her to go in first and he followed a beat later, closing the doors behind them.

“Holy cow, it’s dark in here.”

He set the box on the floor and clicked on the flashlight hanging from a rope on the ceiling.

“Oh. That’s better. What are we—”

Bran’s mouth cut off her question. He kissed her hungrily, her mouth cold and sweet from the ice cream. He broke the kiss and said, “On your knees, Harper.”

She blinked at him with confusion. “What?”

“I saw you licking that
vanilla
ice cream cone and it got me so fuckin’ hard I can’t see straight. Since you caused the problem, you get to be the solution. Now. On your knees.” He undid his belt, pushed his zipper down and yanked at his clothing until his jeans and boxers were around the tops of his boots. He spread his legs as wide as his jeans allowed.

Wordlessly, Harper slid down the wall until she was on her knees.

Without preamble, Bran fisted his cock in his right hand and painted her lips with the wet tip. “You’ve got me so worked up this ain’t gonna be slow and easy.”

She opened her mouth to speak and Bran shoved his cock fully inside.

When she gagged he waited until the reflex passed.

“Put your hands on me, ’cause you’ll need something to hold on to.”

As soon as her cool fingers gripped his hips, he braced his forearm on the wall and curled his left hand around the right side of her face, holding her head in place against the wall.

He rocked into her mouth, over and over. Wetness, heat, darkness, suction. So goddamn good. His responses were primal grunts and groans as he fucked that hot, sassy mouth like he owned it.

He thrust into her so deeply he felt the bite of her teeth at the base of his cock. That familiar static charge began at the top of his head and zipped down his spine to his groin, pulling his sac up. He was done. His shaft contracted, sending out a wave of ecstasy with every surge of seed.

Harper didn’t move beyond sucking and swallowing. But she couldn’t, since he’d pinned her head against the wall.

Bran was easing out, fully intending to return the favor by burying his mouth between her thighs, when he heard the blare of the auction speaker.

“Now up. Lot number twenty-seven.”

“Goddammit! That’s the lot I’ve been waiting for.” He jerked his jeans up so fast he almost caught the tip of his cock in the zipper. He tucked his shirt in and buckled his belt as he strode to the doors.