Bad In Boots: Colt's Choice (14 page)

* * * * *

After she called “goodnight” to Mace and walked down the hall past Colt’s office, Elise breathed a sigh of relief. Empty. Phew! She had a reprieve.

As she exited the building and made her way to her car, another disturbing thought wormed its way into her psyche. Colt would find someone else to fill his evening, namely May.

Her stomach churned at the thought and her hands shook so bad she dropped her keys as she tried to unlock her door. Bending down, she retrieved them and started to slide her key in the lock.

Someone reached over her shoulder and a big, warm hand came down on hers. Colt’s distinct scent washed over her, leather, faint spicy deodorant and outdoors. God, he smelled so good. She wanted to lean back against him and keep inhaling.

Instead, she stiffened as he pressed his body against her back and whispered suggestively in her ear, his voice low and sexy, “Did I tell you I give great massages? I’ve been known to make a headache or two disappear.”

Elise fought the desire swirling in her belly. She straightened and turned the key in the lock. “No, you hadn’t mentioned that particular ability.”

As she started to open the car door, Colt’s hands landed on her hips and quickly turned her around to face him.

Before she could respond, he clasped her hips once more and stepped into her body, pressing his erection against the seam of her jeans running between her legs. With the car behind her, his action created arousing friction. Her heart rate jumped into overdrive. Elise fought the excitement flowing though her like an electrical wire overloaded to the max.

Colt’s blue gaze searched her face as if he were looking deep into her soul, deciphering her mood. Without a word, he dipped his head and inhaled near her collarbone while a low growl escaped his throat.

“You’re
sure
you don’t want me to work my magic on you?” he purred into her ear.

Elise’s self-serving, traitorous desires clamored for dominance. She so wanted to let him have his way with her—to work his
magic
as he put it. The very fact he was pressing himself against her, staking his claim in plain sight of any Lonestar employee within eyeshot made her feel special. She caught herself before she asked the question that had been nagging her brain.
Are you going to stay this time?

Laying her hands on his chest, she worked hard to keep her breathing even as she pushed against his hard muscles. “Not tonight, Colt.”

Colt’s gaze met hers and narrowed. He leaned close once more and whispered in her ear. “Take your break for tonight, but don’t think for one minute you’ll put me off tomorrow.” He finished his statement by pressing his erection against her.

She shivered at his fierce, possessive comment and couldn’t suppress the thrill that zipped down her spine at the knowledge he wanted her that much.

When Colt let go of her and stepped back, she let out an unsteady breath and turned to open her car door. His next words made her freeze in her tracks and her heart stutter in her chest.

“Did you know that when you’re very aroused you bite your lip?”

Elise glanced at him and slowly let go of the deathlock her teeth had on her lower lip.

Colt gave her a steely look. “Tomorrow night you’ll tell me why you gave me the brush-off today, Elise.”

* * * * *

The following morning, Elise was on her third cup of coffee as she sat in front of her computer. Last night she spent a restless evening tossing and turning. The pillows and sheets on her bed smelled like Colt. Everywhere she turned in bed, she imagined his touch, his warmth. She’d missed him desperately.

Taking a sip of coffee, she set the cup down on her desk and realized the caffeine made her more jittery than wakeful. Or was it the fact she knew she’d have to face Colt and his determination to know why she’d ditched him the night before. She’d arrived very early this morning and every time the office front door opened she tensed.

She didn’t want to tell Colt the truth because she’d be revealing too much of herself. Not that she wasn’t a giving person, she’d tell him what bothered her in a heartbeat if he gave her the slightest indication his feelings ran deeper. So far he just seemed to be sexually attracted to her…well, okay, he was a bit possessive, too.

When Mace poked his head into her office to say, “Mornin’ Elise,” she jerked, gasping in surprise and bumped her coffee. As the brown liquid sloshed on her desk, she quickly mopped it up with tissues from a box in her drawer.

“Man, Elise, you’re more jumpy than a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs. You okay?”

She nodded. “I’m fine. I think I made up for yesterday by consuming two days’ worth of coffee this morning.” With a grin, she continued, “I’ve already helped hay and feed the horses, made more coffee, took out the trash, cleaned the refrigerator and the kitchen, contemplated washing the kitchen floors, but decided I’d better get my rear in here and work on the website.”

Mace gave a hearty laugh. “I think you just became Mabel’s best friend.” With a wink, he thumbed back toward the front of the office. “Hey, my car needs a good washin’ if you’re still in an energetic mood.”

Elise picked up a wad of paper she’d crumpled earlier and tossed it at his retreating back. “Go to work, you slacker.”

Once Mace had walked off, in her keyed-up mood, the sight of that lone, balled-up trash on the floor drove her nuts. Elise walked around her desk to her doorway and bent over to retrieve the paper missile.

The tip of a dusty, scuffed boot crushed the paper before she could pick it
up. Her heart rammed in her chest as she lifted her gaze up Colt’s jeans,
past the bulge at his crotch, up his white button-down shirt to see his
serious expression.

“Littering, Elise?”

She pushed at his boot and when he moved it, she picked up the paper ball.
Standing, she met his penetrating gaze with a steady one, even as her heart
beat in her chest in a staccato rhythm.

“Just working on my target practice,” she shot back.

Colt took a step closer until his arousing aftershave tickled her nose.
Without his hat on, she noted that his hair was curled and still
slightly damp from his shower. She clamped her hand tighter on the wadded-up
paper to keep from reaching up to touch those damp curls.

He raised a dark eyebrow. “Plan on trashin’ someone?”

She laughed at his pun, then grinned. “Yeah, I’ll spam ‘em to death.”

“Huh?” Colt looked confused for a second before understanding of her computer techie jargon dawned on his face. “Spammers should be shot.”

Her smile faltered when his expression sobered. His deep blue gaze
compelled her as he said, “Come ride with me.”

“This early in the morning?” She shook her head. “Can’t. Got work to do.”

Colt stepped into her, his hard, muscular frame making her own body scream in slow, tortured agony. He pulled the clip from her hair at the same time he laced his fingers with hers.

“It wasn’t a request, Lise.”

Before she could form a reply, he took off down the hall with her in tow. Colt only stopped long enough to toss her clip in his office, let her throw the paper in the trash and retrieve his hat from the coat rack before he pulled her outside toward the stables.

When Elise saw Sam standing there holding Scout’s and Bess’s reins and an extra cowboy hat in his hand, she dug in her boot heels and tried to yank her hand loose.

“I told you. I have a lot of work to do.” She’d be damned if she’d share Bess. She knew it was silly, but she couldn’t help how she felt.

Colt had stopped briefly when she spoke. When she finished, he said in a low, controlled voice, “This isn’t up for debate. You’re riding out with me for a bit.”

Turning, he made his way over to the horses, tugging her along.

Angered by his high-handed manner, Elise jerked her hand free. “I’m not riding out on Bess, Colt.”

“Suit yourself,” he replied as he approached his horse and swung his leg over Scout’s saddle.

“I’m sorry you went to the effort on my account, Sam,” Elise mumbled before she turned and walked back toward the office.

The sound of Colt’s horse trotting behind her made her entire body tense, but she refused to move out of the way or be cowed by the man’s obvious show of anger. Elise let out a surprised yelp when a strong arm reached out and pulled her up onto the saddle in front of him.

With her legs dangling down the horse’s side and the saddle digging into her butt cheek, Elise grasped Colt’s arm as fear of falling raced through her. She shot him a deadly look.

He just shrugged. “You’re the one who said you weren’t riding Bess.”

“Put me down,” she hissed.

Colt stopped the horse and wound the reins around the saddle horn. Thankful he seemed to be listening to her request, Elise tensed when he grasped her firmly around the waist, then swiftly shifted her until she sat facing forward in front of him on the saddle.

At his vise-like hold around her body, Elise let out a huff of irritation and threw her foot over the horse so she sat in the saddle in the appropriate manner.

Retrieving the reins, Colt turned his horse and trotted back to Sam, stopping long enough to grab the black cowboy hat from him and drop it on her head.

As they headed out to the eastern pastures, Colt kept one arm around her waist. His rock-hard chest pressed against her back and the heat where his body met her rear end felt so natural. Elise immediately stiffened, trying to keep from pressing against him. He was angry. And right now, so was she. He’d made her go out with him. Grrrr!

When Colt urged Scout into a gallop and she had to allow her body flexibility to move with the horse, Elise gave up trying to stay away from his hard frame. Instead, she removed her hat and held onto it as she leaned into him.

With the wind blowing in her face and the warm morning sun beating down on her head, she closed her eyes and thrilled in this unique experience of feeling so close to Colt. Even if he didn’t feel the same way, she could imagine he wanted her company just…because.

After a few minutes of hard riding, Colt slowed Scout and Elise kept her eyes shut, not wanting to break the idyllic dream state she was in. But her heart jerked in her chest and her eyes flew open when Colt clasped her breast in his hand, then rubbed his thumb across her nipple. The bud immediately hardened, pressing against her thin bra.

Scout stopped and began to eat grass, while Colt ran his fingers under the curve of her breast before gently pinching her nipple. Elise looked around and saw they were in an unoccupied side of the ranch she’d never explored.

Her gaze traveled to the end of the property where the barbed wire fence stopped and beyond, past the rolling hills to a sprawling log-style ranch house set far back on one of the highest hills.

“Who lives there?” she asked, her voice sounding more breathless than she intended.

Colt pinched her nipple again and pressed his lips to the spot behind her ear, then kissed her neck. Elise’s heart skipped to a fast gallop and she almost forgot her question when he finally replied.

“That’s my home.”

Surprise rolled through her and she stared at the property, taking in as much detail as she could from such a great distance. “
Your home
? I’ll bet you have a helluva view—” she started to say but gasped when he dropped his hand to her sex and cupped her body in a totally possessive manner.

“All I thought about last night was your soft body and the fact you might be out with Josh or some other man instead of me,” he said in a calm, controlled voice as he slowly wound the reins around the saddle’s horn.

Elise felt the tension in his body, then his hard erection against her backside as he gathered her closer and purposely rubbed against her.

“That’s how I was all last night, Lise, hard, wanting and pissed. I swear if I’d have gone home with you yesterday, I’d have fucked you until there was never a question of what man you’d be spending your evenings with.”

The roughness of his words and his intense tone made her heart skip a beat and her breathing turn choppy. Elise let her hat fall to the ground and put her hands on his hard thighs while she turned to look at him. Colt’s mouth landed on hers, aggressive and dominating, his tongue thrusting into her mouth in a mimicry of his words—taking her hard, possessing her. God help her…she wanted to be taken just like that.

She tried to pulled back, to tell him there wasn’t anyone else, but Colt let out a low growl in his throat and said against her mouth, “No talking, Lise, not right now,” before he stole her breath with another kiss while he clasped her thigh in a firm grip.

Elise let out a cry of surprise when Colt lifted her in his arms and turned her body sideways on Scout. The horse sidestepped for a second at the change in the weight distribution, but a calm command from Cold had him happily munching on grass once more as Colt settled her in his lap.

When his lips trailed down her throat, heated and tender, suddenly, she realized that with Colt, the passion he put into his lovemaking reflected his emotions. Colt
was
showing his feelings through his physical touch and through the depth of his need to be the only man in her life. She wrapped her arms around his neck and knocked his hat to the ground so she could slide her fingers through his hair. Pulling him closer, she kissed his jaw, encouraging him to return his mouth to hers. And when he did, she kissed him with just as much intensity.

Another low growl erupted from Colt as he slipped his hand between her thighs and cupped her body through her jeans. Elise broke the kiss and cried out in pure bliss as he used the seam on her jeans to his benefit, pressing it against her nub, while he whispered in her ear, “Imagine I’m sliding inside you, taking you against the wall, because honest to God, I’d be too damn horny to make it back to the bed if we were in your apartment right now.”

The mental image he painted swirled in her mind, making her even wetter. Elise rocked her hips and gripped him close as her body tensed against his hand. Somehow, being up on the horse out in the middle of an open pasture, felt naughty, yet so very natural and right with this man. Colt’s magnetism, his total male virility—he was not a perfect man, but he made her melt like no other man ever had.

Colt nipped at her neck and tweaked her nipple with his other hand. “Come for me, sweetheart.”

His huskily whispered endearment made her emotions turn to sentimental mush. Elise pressed closer to his hand, rocking her hips to the rhythm beating inside her body. The creak of the leather saddle caused by her movements, Colt’s clean scent and the smell of leather and outdoors surrounding her only fueled her arousal. She cried out as her body spasmed against the pressure of his fingers against her.