Montana Darling (Big Sky Mavericks Book 3) (13 page)

He got rid of the damp sweatshirt before bending over his duffle to dig for dry clothes. The buzz of desire zigzagging through her body short-circuited the thinking part of her brain, which let her horny, inner girl take over. She wasn’t going to have sex with him, but she couldn’t look and not touch. That was asking too much. Mia wasn’t a saint, after all.

She took a deep breath and walked to the door of the tent before she could change her mind.

*

Down boy
,
he
silently willed his junk.
Not the place or time, dude.

But, damned, if Mia Zabrinski’s innocent touch hadn’t turned him rock hard and panting. He didn’t dare think about how turned on he’d be if she actually wanted to have sex with him. Now, she was waiting for him to find his underwear, which he didn’t normally wear, and come back with clothes on—not wearing one big, freakin’ woody bouncing around like a divining rod.

When he heard the tent flap crinkle, he gulped hard. “Um, just a minute.”

When he heard the zipper hum closed, he wheeled about—grabbing the first thing handy to press to his groin with some attempt at modesty. “Sorry. Having a wardrobe malfunction here. Are you…what? Did I miss something?”

She stood after closing the zipper and looked him up and down. “I know this is out-of-the-blue and wrong on any number of levels, but if I’m not mistaken your body is telling you the same thing my body is.” She looked down. “Was that a subliminal pick?”

He looked down. Instead of a shirt, he’d grabbed his fire engine red long johns.

If the heat burning in his cheeks was any indication, his blush was a matching shade of red. “I bought these to wear in the mountains last week. On a cattle drive.”

“A man of many talents.” She licked her lips and continued to stare at his nakedness. “May I touch you?”

“Uh…seriously? Is this some kind of lawyer trick?”

Her laugh came out short and brittle. Something in her expression made him realize how conflicted she was about being with him. She wanted something from him, but did she even know what? He guessed not. “We’re over the age of consent. You’re not a client. Nobody’s forcing anybody to do anything, right?”

Maybe a more virtuous man would have shooed her away, but Ryker didn’t have enough red blood cells in his brain to adequately make that call. “Good points. But I gotta tell you, it’s been almost a year for me. And, yes, you’re right. I feel this thing between us. I feel it bad.” Like a horny boy his first time out. “But I’m not sure this is a good idea. We still have this whole land thing to figure out.”

“No land. No talk. You and me. Here. Now. Just this. Okay?” She closed the distance between them and kissed him. Not the closed-mouth, impulse kiss from yesterday. God, no, this was the real deal.

Her lips parted, her tongue touched his, with a confidence and determination that surprised him. Shocked him. She knew what she wanted and was used to reaching her goals.

She put her arms around him, one hand moving to the nape of his neck, fingers shoveling into his still damp hair. Her other hand trailed down his backbone, her fingers shivery cool on his heated bare skin. Strong and curious, the opposite of shy, her hands mapped his back and pressed him closer.

He let go of his long johns to wrap his arms around her. Her sigh felt like a reward for making the right choice.

“You have a beautiful body,” she said softly, her lips nibbling lightly on his ear lobe. “Fit. Strong.” She leaned back to put a little space between their torsos. “I like the Superhero triangle, too.” She curled her fingers in the small, thick mat between his pecs and tugged slightly.

He swore he felt the pull all the way to his family jewels.

“Not fair,” he said. “You have me at a slight disadvantage. You’re dressed.”

“Do you think?” she said, with a wicked grin. “And it’s going to get worse.”

Her right hand dropped between them to touch his yearning, unrepentant body. He nearly swallowed his tongue. “Mia…I…” His bare toes curled against his sleeping bag, which was spread across the mattress on the floor.

She dropped to her knees in front of him. “Or better…depends on your definition.”

A combination of shock and sensual overload robbed him of words. His mouth opened but nothing came out when she pressed her face to his groin and inhaled deeply. His knees threatened to give out. “Holy…my God, we’re really going to do this?”

Her answer involved licking. His entire body tensed.

Her hands reached around to his rock-hard glutes and squeezed. When she took him into her mouth, he grabbed for the only support in reach—Mia’s shoulders. “Oh, God, Mia, I can’t…”
Wait? Stop?
His mind said the words but nothing came out of his mouth except for a long, low groan that bordered on pain.

Emotions he’d repressed for much too long—desire, need, passion, lust—took over. He could tell she was reading his responses when she eased back and used her hand to take him over the edge. He managed not to shout her name when he came, but that didn’t make him any less dumbfounded.

His damp towel was outside, so they both used his soggy swim trunks to clean up, then he pulled on the stupid red long johns that lay between his legs in a heap. Once he was half dressed, he helped her stand and pulled her into his arms.

“Wow. That was freakin’ fabulous. Can we do it again? Only this time with you naked and me inside you?”

She licked her lips and swallowed twice as if buying time before she broke the bad news.

He kissed her before she could speak. Her lips parted, allowing him to deepen the kiss. She felt so small yet substantial in his arms. “I want to explore every inch of you, with my tongue, my touch, my eyes.”

She pressed on his shoulders to ease back. “Um…no…sorry. That’s not going to happen.”

“Why not?”

He could read her panic so he let go. Maybe she didn’t like the claustrophobic atmosphere of the stuffy tent that undoubtedly smelled like sex and guy.

“Can we talk outside?”

“Of course.” He unzipped the flap and followed her out after shrugging on his MooU hoodie—a thrift store score – and a pair of Uggs. “A bottle of water? Wine?”

“Water. Thanks.” Then she pulled her phone out of her hip pocket and checked the time presumably because she added, “And wine, too.”

He had a bottle he’d been saving for something special. Getting a blowjob in the middle of the afternoon definitely qualified.

Since his phone already was plugged into the small portable speakers, he hit play. He’d been working on Mia’s playlist before he decided a dip in the river was the only way he was going to get his horny mind off her hot body. Once the music started, he grabbed the only two glasses he owned. The screw-top lid made opening the wine a breeze. He poured a generous measure into the stemmed wine glass he normally used and gave it to her. He filled the juice glass he’d accidentally stolen from the Main Street Diner all the way to the top.

“Salud.”

“Cheers.”

They drank in silence then looked at each other. He couldn’t say which of them laughed first, but within seconds they both were gasping for air and had tears in their eyes. “What do you say after…?” he asked.

“I’m sure there’s a polite protocol somewhere. I might say thank you and you’d reply, ‘My pleasure.’ And we’d start laughing again. So…can we not talk about it?”

He shook his head. “No. We didn’t talk about the kiss. If we don’t talk about this, who knows where we’ll end up?”

She set her glass on the table and made a time-out motion. “I meant what I said in the tent. We’re not having sex. I’m not getting naked any time soon…or ever for that matter.”

“Ever?”

“Ever. Never. Take your pick.”

He took a big gulp of the excellent cabernet. At fifty bucks a bottle, he figured that one gulp was about five dollars and change. “Why? You like me. I like you. A lot. We’re single. I’ve had all my shots and then some. I could produce a medical clearance if that would help, or I could put my hands on protection in about seven seconds.”

Her smile turned sweet and a little sad. “I do like you. And I can’t tell you how turned on I was just now. Really. I’ve never done that outside of marriage and even then…it wasn’t the same.”

“So, something happened that turned you off sex?”

“No. I’ve always enjoyed sex. Something happened that would turn off any partner of mine who wanted to have sex with me.”

He took another drink. “I don’t understand.”

She handed him her glass then patted her chest with the palms of her hand. She didn’t cup her breasts or do anything suggestive, rather she pressed flat. “I had a double mastectomy. My cancer was Stage 1 and everyone begged me to do a less invasive, less radical treatment, but when my genetic testing came back positive for the BRCA-1 mutation, I decided not to mess around and hope for the best.”

He didn’t know half of what she was talking about, but he knew what ‘mastectomy’ meant. He looked at her womanly shape but didn’t ask the question on the tip of his tongue.
But you have breasts, don’t you?

She took back her glass and swallowed a gulp about the same size as Ryker had a minute earlier.

“I’m a single mom, Ryker. I can’t afford to risk my children winding up in their father’s care. It’s not that he doesn’t love them, he does. But he loves himself, his lifestyle, his young wife and their new baby more. I won’t do that to Emilee and Hunter.”

“So, you took the bullet.”

“Yes. And after a great deal of pleading from my mother and my doctor, I agreed to do reconstructive surgery so I’d feel more womanlike, but these…” She looked down, her expression flat and lifeless. “…aren’t me. They aren’t pretty and I don’t feel more womanlike.”

“How do you feel?”

“Mutilated. Ugly.”

The words stabbed him in the heart. He’d seen atrocities that defined ugly, and nothing Mia showed him could compare. But words, he knew, would never be enough to change her mind. That would require something more elaborate and tangible.

He set his glass beside hers and wrapped her in his arms. “I don’t suppose you’d be able to help me move, would you? Somehow, I’ve accumulated more stuff than I can carry on my bike.”

She looked up, obviously confused by his change of topic. “Um…sure. When? I need to pop into the high school to talk to Serena a minute. I want to make sure she calls me if Emilee skips her textile class.” The way her top teeth worried her bottom lip told him Emilee wasn’t the only weighty dilemma Mia needed to get off her chest.

He released her and pivoted to grab one of the boxes Louise had dropped off for him. “Any time. You tell me. I’ll start packing.” The sooner he was out of this tent and into a real bed, the sooner he could begin his campaign to make Mia love her body again. He had a plan. He’d worked with some of the most beautiful self-loathing models in the world. If he could make them see their inner beauty, he could help Mia, too. “We should be able to do this in one trip.”

“Okay. I’ll come back after I talk to Serena.” He could see her analytical, lawyer mind weighing every angle, looking for a trap.

His plan wasn’t perilous, merely creative. Nothing would happen today. The sort of campaign he had in mind would take time to build trust. And in addition to four walls and privacy, he’d also need the tools of his trade that he’d left in storage in Pittsburgh. That would mean contacting his mother. The expensive wine curdled in his stomach. For Mia, he’d break radio silence. Hell, for Mia, he’d even bargain with the devil.

Same difference.

Once Mia was gone, Ryker made two quick calls. The first was easy. The second? Less so. That call demanded a sacrifice. His pride. He’d been waiting since the first of the year for a call from his mother. Surely, if a mother loved her son even a tiny bit, she would call to check on him, right? She hadn’t.

Calling to ask for a favor isn’t the same as caving in, he told himself.
Screw social. Just hello, here’s what I need,
goodbye. That’s
all this call is about.

He punched in the number.

“Hello?”

His mouth went dry. Her voice never changed.

“Hey, Mom, it’s me. Ryker.”

“Well, this is a surprise.”

“I suppose it is. I need a favor.”

“Which, of course, is not a surprise.”

“Really? Because I call you so often and ask you for so much?” He fought to keep his anger under control. “You can’t say that, Mom. We haven’t spoken in over a year.”

“I meant, you boys never call unless you want something from me. I never hear, ‘Hello, Mother, how are you? What’s new in your life? How’s the family?’”

He wanted to give a shit. He wished he did, but he’d been caught in that trap before. “The last time I asked about your family, I wound up paying for Benny’s braces.”

She didn’t reply for so long he thought she might have hung up—her usual MO when she was pissed off. “What do you want this time, son?”

Son? Really?
He hadn’t felt like her child for so long, he couldn’t remember what being her son was supposed to feel like. “I’m in Montana and I have a new job that requires studio work.” A lie. “I left all my equipment with Big Al’s Storage and Freight on Cliff and Indiana. He was a client of Dad’s. Remember?”