Body Language: The Boot Knockers, Book 2 (9 page)

“Also, prideful.”

He quirked a brow. “How so?”

“Only the wealthy would be able to afford good beef like this. If you ate this little bite here,” she popped it in her mouth and switched it to the side so she could speak, “you would be flaunting your wealth.”

He couldn’t help but smile at her. Under the moonlight, she was stunning. He’d never seen such perfect skin. And her eyes tonight…

“My family never had much use for the word of the Lord,” he admitted, cutting his beef. “My father’s word
was
the word of the Lord.”

She nodded. “So he was strict?”

“Not overly strict, but we Vince children knew better than to cross him. How about you? Get in any scrapes as a kid?”

“All the time.” She sat back and folded her hands over her stomach. He wondered if she was getting full after only a few bites. They still had baked apples with fresh cream for dessert.

He gave her a look. “I don’t think a girl like you could get into trouble.”

“Well, maybe not that much,” she admitted, dropping her gaze. She instantly raised it, and his heart turned over. “Like your father, mine was a person you didn’t want to deliver a punishment.”

“Do you punish your students?”

“They don’t often need more than a few minutes deducted from recess. Third-graders are able to reason a bit more than younger students. It’s rare that I have to send one to the principal’s office.”

Damian had spent half his school career—what little there was—sitting in the principal’s office. He quickly turned the topic. “A full moon tonight. No wonder Tilly broke out. The moon phases sometimes affect animals.”

She sat forward and started eating again. He watched a bite of fluffy garlic mash disappear between her sultry lips. Hell, she’d given him the blowjob of his life. He’d never gotten so worked up or come so quickly with a woman. And when he’d returned the favor, he’d found her soaking wet.

The rest of the day he’d thought about their encounter. She wasn’t the most skilled woman ever to have her mouth on his dick, but there was something so much more.

Yeah, like those warm flutters in my stomach that shouldn’t be there. At all.

“Tell me about the animals here.” Her expression showed genuine interest, so he talked about the horse herd Hugh and Riggs were cultivating. They’d taken on a few more beef cows in the last month. They were about to drop calves any time, which meant more profit for the ranch.

“That’s amazing. The ranch is a real working ranch.”

He laughed. “What did you expect? A stage performance?”

“Well…” She looked down, and he’d bet anything she was blushing. “Yes, actually. But you’re the real deal.”

For some reason that infused him with pride. His mind touched on Andrew and his incessant texts. To hell with him. He wasn’t sitting under a sparkling sky with this stunning woman.

What the hell? Now I’m getting possessive?

He shook himself.

She groaned and covered her stomach again. “Ugh. I thought I could do it, but that slab of beef has won. I can’t eat another bite.”

He leaned across the table. “You don’t have room for baked apples with fresh cream?”

She moaned, the sound dangerously close to the one she used in bed. His cock shoved against his fly. “Maybe I do.”

“How ’bout we share a dish?”

Her face lit up. Suddenly, he felt himself getting caught up—in the night, the sounds of the peeper frogs and in this woman. He stared at her, breathless.

“That would be nice. But please finish your meal. I need a few minutes to digest before I can fit a single apple.”

His appetite returned full force. He wolfed down the 16-ounce prime rib and most of the mash. Then he sat back to digest more than his food. His emotions were awhirl. It was too easy to forget he wasn’t sitting across from a date, that Ruthie hadn’t really “chosen” him at all.

Yet the way she looked at him suggested otherwise.

After a few minutes, she smiled and tilted her head. “Tell me something I don’t know about you.”

Her words walloped him in the stomach. He almost gasped. She wanted to know him? No, she only wanted to know about the cowboy on the brochure—the one she’d drooled over and wanted to be her guide for a week. She didn’t—couldn’t—really want to know who Damian Vince was.

Hell, he didn’t want to know himself. He couldn’t admit that up until yesterday when she’d walked into his life, he’d believed he was happy. He tapped two fingers on the tabletop. “Ruthie? What I have to tell you might surprise the daylights outta you.”

She leaned her elbows on the table, her face a perfect oval of happiness. “What’s that?”

He closed the gap between them and pecked her on the nose. “I’m starving for that baked apple.” With that he got up, gathered their plates and disappeared into the grub house.

He was such a goddamn coward.

Chapter Seven

The sun beat down on Ruthie’s bare shoulders. Here the sun seemed ten thousand degrees hotter. “I’ll probably burn to a crisp.”

“Good thing I remembered sun block. Check my jeans pocket.” Damian bobbed in the center of the pond, hair darkened with wetness and a bad-boy grin in place.

Rummaging in his clothing felt like a big step in their relationship, but to protect herself from the scorching sun, it was one she was willing to take. After slathering herself with lotion, she shot another look around her. Here at the pond they seemed secluded enough, but she felt odd about being in the open air in nothing but her birthday suit.

“Woman, strip off that sundress and get your pretty little ass in here.”

A hot coal slipped into her stomach, low, and began to burn. She gripped her hem and pulled her red cotton dress up and overhead. Underneath he’d insisted she not bother with a bra or panties, and the entire walk here she’d almost come just from the friction against her slick pussy.

Damian’s eyes burned, and he crooked a finger at her.

She started into the pond. As she dipped in one toe, a shiver rocked her. “It’s freezing!”

“Yep,” he drawled.

“For God’s sakes, why? It must be ninety degrees today.” She wrapped her arms around herself and cringed.

He laughed and drifted closer to her. “This is a spring-fed pond. Water comes from deep in the earth, where the sun don’t shine.”

“Doesn’t shine,” she corrected automatically.

His brow furrowed.

“Sorry—I’m used to correcting people. Don’t mind me.” She took a step up to her ankles.

“Oh, you’re gonna pay for correcting me, Miss Ruthie.” He came steadily toward her, water churning around his torso then hips. When his rigid cock popped into view, she stopped breathing. Water sluiced down his tanned form, creating streaks in the hair on his arms and legs.

She squawked as he reached her. The cold touch of his hands on her bare skin almost sent her into shock. But when he yanked her off her feet and towed her under water, a hysterical laugh of pure joy bubbled inside.

When they came up for air, she released it, whooping at the frigid water.

He floated out to the center of the pond with her, holding her tight. She gave him total control, reminded of the moment he’d held her suspended over the mattress as he drove into her.

His cock prodded the V of her legs.

Gasping, she wantonly rubbed against it, eyes half-closed, enjoying the feel of his arms around her. He pressed his mouth to her ear and whispered, “I want you. But I don’t have a condom out here, so we’ll have to get creative.”

He thrust his cock between her legs, rubbing over her slick folds just as he claimed her mouth. Need rushed through her system. Every hot flip of his tongue ignited her further. Dark pulsations began in her core.

“God, I’m on the edge already,” she whispered.

He groaned and gripped her tighter. “Come on me, baby. I’ll get you off then take you up to the bank and lick your pussy.”

Her clit swelled against his erection, and her movements grew erratic. Damian pulled back enough to stare into her eyes. The passion she saw there sent her flying.

Throwing her head back, she rode the waves of her pleasure. He cupped the back of her head and plunged his tongue into her mouth as he ground his cock against her pussy. She lost herself in the feel and flavor of her cowboy.

When she came down from her high, she collapsed against him, limp.

“Fuck, that was beautiful. Seeing you come apart for me…” A shudder racked him.

She smoothed her hands over his sleek skin. His shoulders were hot in the sun, and she cuddled closer.

Damian made a quiet noise in his throat and began to tow her toward shore. As soon as her feet touched the bottom she tried to walk, but he just continued to haul her up onto the grassy edge like a tiger dragging his prey. He latched on to her neck and sucked until she felt the blood rise to the surface.

Need spiked in her once more. Wrapping her legs around him, she angled her pussy to perfectly receive him.

She raked her nails over his shoulders. “I need you.”

He ground his teeth against the rush of desire so close to the surface. She shifted, and he sank into her.

He was buried in this woman and never wanted to stop. The intimacy of her hot walls clutching his bare cock maddened him. Out of control, he drew back and slammed into her.

She cried out, and he covered her mouth with his. They twisted their tongues in a dance as old as time. When he broke away, breathing hard, reality slammed him.

He could be fired for this. And he couldn’t risk getting her pregnant.

With a monumental amount of effort, he rolled off and glared at the sky. Everything in him screamed to sink back into her sweet, welcoming body. But he couldn’t. Just couldn’t.

Before her sexual haze fled, he prostrated himself between her thighs. Her clean, musky scents drew him like a bear to honey. He sank two fingers into her tight entrance and captured her clit under his tongue.

She bucked, so eager. So gorgeous. He pinched her clit between his lips and flicked the hard bud with his tongue. Juices drenched his fingers, and he worked them faster, angling upward to find her G-spot.

When he hit it, she came. He suctioned her clit and pumped his fingers, drawing out her release. She fisted his hair and guided his mouth. Her uninhibited reaction was a shot to the heart.

She was going to let me fuck her without protection.
She’d been so glazed by lust, she wasn’t thinking clearly and would have given her whole self to him.

And damned if he didn’t want that. He was so fucked.

After he drew the final shudders from her, he raised his head. Their gazes connected, electricity snapping between them. Her eyes were so dark, so filled with some emotion he couldn’t name but had a feeling his eyes mirrored it.

“Lie back,” she whispered. “It’s my turn to pleasure you.” She sat up and pressed against his chest until he stretched on the grass. His cock throbbed with need.

Holding his gaze, she maneuvered until her mouth hovered over his shaft. The hot rush of breath felt incredible but nowhere near the sensation of being inside her without a barrier.

As she sucked his length into her mouth, he tangled his fingers in her hair and gave himself up to her.

“You what?” Riggs’s voice raised a notch and his eyes bugged out.

Damian spun and punched the hay he’d stacked six bales high. It didn’t budge, but dust clouded around him.

“Why would you take that risk, man?” Riggs hooked a thumb in his pocket and waited for Damian’s answer. He never should have confessed about the moment with Ruthie on the bank. But for hours it had been eating at him, torturing him, because he wanted her so goddamn bad.

He swiped a trickle of sweat away with his work glove. “It was the moment. It just happened. And like I said, I pulled out immediately.”

“But you were inside her without protection. It only takes a second of penetration, man.”

When Damian met Riggs’s gaze, he lost a little of his defensiveness. He’d confessed to Riggs because he of all people knew how it felt to get lost in a woman. He’d done it with Sibyll.

Damian shook his head. “She isn’t pregnant. And she’s totally clean. I’d bet my life on it.”

Riggs gave a slow nod. “It’s true we ask for the health checks along with the application. But you can’t risk it again.”

“I won’t.” Fuck, he wanted to. After their encounter on the bank, Damian had taken her back to the bungalow and properly wrapped up his dick before taking her. But something was missing, and that was the instant connection he’d felt with her. In those brief seconds he’d claimed her…

He scrubbed a hand over his face.

Riggs leaned against the hall, staring at him.

A shadow moved over them, and they both looked up to see Paul. He and Riggs’s gazes locked, and Damian tensed to jump between them. But Paul just gave a nod of greeting.

“Well, I’d best get going. Damian, remember what we talked about,” Riggs said.

Oh he would. For how many long nights would he dream of sinking bareback into Ruthie once she’d gone home? Damian paused, and Riggs sent him a pointed look. If Riggs told the boss man about Damian’s slip, he could be fired. At the very least, put on probation and another Boot Knocker would take over with Ruthie.

A growl of possessiveness lifted in his throat.

Riggs gave Damian a nod, and relief trickled through him. He wouldn’t tell, and for that he was grateful. But he still couldn’t bring himself to feel remorse for the action. Nothing had ever felt so right.

Without a word Paul grabbed a bale and tossed it onto the stack. He looped his gloved fingers under the twine of another and heaved it with the same precision born from years of hard labor.

After three more, Damian cleared his throat. “You seem a might tense.”

Paul grunted as he threw another bale. “You could say that.”

“Need to talk?”

Paul shot him a look. His eyes were dark with anger or maybe frustration. “Never thought being friendly would mean more until I took this new job.”

Damian drew a lungful of the dusty air, gathering his thoughts. He could be way off base and reading more into his friend’s problems, but he didn’t think so. “Jack likes to flirt.”

Mid-motion, Paul stopped. Then he jerked his arm in a wild arc. The bale crashed against the wall, hay spilling from the binding. Breathing hard, Paul tugged his hat low over his eyes.

“Look, just tell him to back off.”

“I have.”

“And he hasn’t done it? That’s not right. You can go to Hugh—”

“No.” Paul’s voice brooked no argument. “For all Jack’s damn advances, he’s still one of my best friends.” He raised his gaze, the truth spoken there. He didn’t want to jeopardize that friendship. If he was anything like Damian, he valued each and every buddy he had. Plus, Paul must really respect and like Jack. If not, he wouldn’t have put up with his flirtations, friend or not.

“It’s up to you. Just draw your boundaries and let Jack deal with it. It’s in his pasture at that point.”

Paul twisted away and lifted another bale. “Will do. Thanks for the advice.”

As Damian passed Paul to leave the shed, he squeezed his friend’s shoulder. He wished like hell he had someone to confide in about his own struggles. He’d attempted to share with Riggs by telling him about the no-condom moment.

In the end, Damian kept his own counsel. Just as Paul wasn’t ready to rope Hugh into the trouble between him and Jack, Damian didn’t want his boss a country mile between him and Ruthie.