Chapter 15 Valentina
FIFTEEN
VALENTINA
Rolling over, my hand meets chiseled flesh, the heat of it almost so intense, I pull my fingers from its burn.
As I open my eyes, I’m met with a pair of scorching emerald ones, a twisted, roguish smile playing across the plump lips beneath.
The sight of him so relaxed and teasing arrests the oxygen in my lungs.
I’m unable to do anything but stare at him.
“I think she’s broken.”
I whip my head to the right at the gruff sound of McCrae’s sleep-ridden voice, his own eyes—a contrasting crystalline blue—staring back at me with equal intensity. Instead of a small, teasing smile, he wears a smirk, something dark and devilish, and my toes curl on their own.
A rough, callused hand splays across the skin of my stomach, and I stiffen in surprise.
I look down to the vein laden hand attached to Santos’ body as his fingers tease the edge of my silken panties—lazy but confident strokes, back and forth.
My skin pebbles beneath the tender touch, my nipples hardening to painful little peaks.
“You’re turning her on. Again,” McCrae grumbles, his own hand reaching out to flick one of my pierced nipples as proof. I yelp at the contact, and he looks down at me as if I’m some scared little school girl. “Does the baby need me to kiss her boo boos?”
“God, yes,” I pant. Wait, is that my voice? How did I get here?
Santos chuckles, his fingers dipping slowly beneath the elastic band and running through the small triangle of hair I keep there. “Kiss it better, or I will.”
“You’re always the good cop,” McCrae grumbles before lowering to blow a cool stream of air over my aching peak. It does nothing but make my veins burn hotter, and I fist the sheets to keep from touching him.
Somehow, I just know I’m not supposed to touch him. It’s his rules, and even though it’s torture, I follow them.
Santos growls and then shoves McCrae’s head out of the way before hungrily sucking my nipple into his mouth. I scream out at the sudden intensity, and he licks and kisses the flesh between tugging at the bar with his teeth.
“Good cop and fucking greedy,” McCrae says.
I turn pleading eyes to him. “Touch me, McCrae. Please. I need you. I need both of you.” I know I’m not supposed to want him to touch me—and I’m definitely not supposed to ask. It falls outside of our normal relationship. But this feels different. The hunger in his eyes tells me he wants me.
Still, he doesn’t move. Instead, Santos’ hand dips lower, his warm hand skimming over my clit before pinching the small bundle between his thumb and pointer finger. I moan, my eyes rolling back in my head.
“More,” McCrae growls.
Santos does as he demands, his fingers plunging into my heat as if he’s been there before, spreading my already wet lips open and fucking me with his middle and ring finger. It’s an expert’s touch, one reserved for long time lovers, with a familiarity I’ve never known but revel in.
His arm pumps, slow at first, then faster and faster, his licks and bites on my breasts becoming more and more frantic. I watch him, eyes half lidded, my gaze bouncing between his glistening lips around my nipple, and his veiny arm filling the space between my spread legs.
I moan, opening wider for him, and release my grip on the sheets to anchor my fingers into the flesh of his back. He hisses but drives faster, spurred on by the pain.
“That’s it, baby. Take my fingers like the good little slut you are,” Santos mumbles around my nipple, and I arch into him, yanking his head up.
I thread my fingers through his hair, searching for his lips, but he denies me, burrowing his head into my neck instead.
He licks and sucks at the flesh, and I lose myself to the sensations.
The noise filling the room gets louder, wetter, sloppier. I love it, my hips nearly unhinged as I make room for Santos.
“Yes, more,” I beg. He knows exactly what I need—just like he always does. He removes his fingers, shifting his position so his cock bobs between my legs. I groan at the sight of him, hard and dripping precum as he lines himself up.
“Mmmmm, baby,” he groans, and I look up just in time to see him licking my cum from his fingers. “Fuck. McCrae, you want some?” It’s not a question, and he doesn’t deny it as Santos extends his hand. McCrae takes the offering hungrily, his throat working as he licks Santos’ fingers clean.
It’s enough to make any girl come undone—the sight of two impossibly strong, masculine men devouring my cum like it’s their last meal.
McCrae chuckles. “You want us to kiss.” Again, not a question.
There’s no point in lying. “Always.”
Santos lowers his hips, the tip of his cock already stretching me slightly as he works himself inside. My legs tremble as I try to focus on how amazing it feels to be pulled tight around his beautiful cock and to see the two men I’m obsessed with leaning in to kiss each other.
“Fuck, I can never deny you.” McCrae grabs Santos’ head, yanking his face from my neck and wrapping his hand around his throat. Santos groans at the man-handling, and I grow impossibly wetter.
McCrae kisses him, his hand still wrapped around his throat, his other pinching open his jaw to give him better access to his tongue. I watch their tongues tangle, their teeth mashing against each other.
They break the kiss for a moment, and Santos spits into McCrae’s mouth, his tongue licking hungrily around his lips. They seem lost in each other, and I’m glad to just watch, even as my body’s pinned down by Santos’ half-sheathed dick.
“Fuck her, Santos. Our girl’s waiting,” McCrae whispers against Santos’ lips before wrapping his hand around the back of Santos’ head and taking his mouth once more. As he does, Santos pistons his hips, driving into me with such intensity, I scream.
He fills me so completely, I’m unable to distinguish my body from his, and I press wet, hungry kisses along the column of his throat.
I kiss higher and higher, desperate to join my tongue with theirs as Santos drives into me at a maddening pace, but before I get there, McCrae pulls back.
His eyes bore into mine, and Santos lowers his head once more to my neck, focusing wholly on tearing me in two.
The bed rocks beneath us, the steady thump, thump against the wall like a drum, and McCrae continues to stare into me, hungry but never moving closer.
“She needs you,” Santos growls into the crevice of my throat.
But McCrae just shakes his head. “No. You’re enough.”
I wake, hot, sweaty, and hornier than ever. It would be just my luck to feel McCrae’s angry gaze burning a hole in my face at a time like this—just like the dream, he refuses to come any closer than he must.
“I know you’re awake,” he bites out. Dream McCrae was way hotter but no less obtainable, now that I’m thinking about it. It’s like my subconscious knows I’ll never get closer than arm’s length with him.
I don’t open my eyes. Maybe if I keep them closed, he’ll go away.
“We need to talk, Valentina. Get up.”
“Are you my dad?” I hiss, snapping my eyes open to glare at him. Just as I expected, he’s staring at me, his arms folded across his chest as he leans in the open doorway. He looks dirty, like he’s already put in a full-day’s work, and I grab my phone to check the time. “It two in the afternoon?”
Fuck, was I really that drunk?
“Yes, I’m aware. The working folk around here have been up for hours.”
I roll my eyes. “You and Santos, you mean, right?”
“If you got up and took an interest in your ranch, you might know.”
“Yeah, I’m useless, I remember.” I throw the sheet off my body, not bothering to cover my nearly naked bottom half.
“Fuck, V.” McCrae tosses the jeans I slung over the chair by the door at me, and I catch them reluctantly. He seems genuinely uncomfortable with my t-shirt and underwear, and it only erodes what little self-esteem I have.
If he finds me so repulsive, why bother?
“I’m sorry I said that. I shouldn’t have.
You’re not useless.” McCrae’s voice takes on a soft quality, something I’ve never once known him to be with anyone but me, and my anger flares anew.
I used to think his gentleness with me was something special, something that meant he cared about me more than anyone else.
But now, I’m not so sure. Does he really think I’m so weak that I can’t handle him unless he’s this softer, quieter version?
Why am I not enough?
“What do you want, McCrae?” I walk into the bathroom, brushing my teeth while I wait for him to continue.
Finally, he sighs, pushing off the doorway and walking farther into my room, even though his shoulders stiffen. He’s repulsed by me. I’m so pathetic to him, it makes him sick.
“We need to get rid of Santos.”
I whirl on him. “What? Why?”
His icy glare cuts me to the core, like he’s trying to read what’s really on my mind, but I refuse to back down. I stare back, my neck sweating as I force myself to maintain eye contact. “He’s responsible for your accident.”
“McCrae, don’t be stupid.” I push past him.
“I’m serious, V.”
“I was high and drunk, not to mention depressed.” The last part, I whisper, slipping on my boots, but McCrae’s harsh intake of breath tells me he heard it just the same.
“The truck was tampered with.”
“What?” I stand.
McCrae nods, crossing his arms in that way that makes his biceps bulge. “I had it towed to the mechanic this morning, and they said it was a wonder you made it as far as you did. The brake line looks like it was cut.”
I stare at him, his words closer to a foreign language than English. I hate myself for not understanding the basic concepts—it’s no wonder he doesn’t want me. I’m useless and stupid, not a flattering combo. Even I know that.
At the risk of sounding even more stupid, I say, “It couldn’t have accidentally come from the dealership like that?”
“Well, yeah, but—” McCrae huffs, and I just wave my hand to cut him off.
“What do you have against Santos? He’s a hard worker and seems to be learning fast.”
“You would defend him,” he bites out, and I bristle, feeling cornered by the one person I’ve always trusted to understand me.
“You’re jealous, McCrae.”
“I’m not Valentina. I’m just trying to protect you—it’s what you pay me for.” And with that, he leaves, the firm reminder of our relationship laid out between us.
He doesn’t want me; maybe he never did. He sticks around because I pay him. If I didn’t, he’d leave, just like everyone else.
“How are you feeling?” Santos leans his head out of the first stall as I walk into the barn.
I jump back in surprise, clutching my chest. He shoots me a lopsided grin before opening the stall door and stepping out.
It’s now I realize he’s shirtless, the black band t-shirt tucked into his back pocket like a rag.
I blink rapidly, drinking in the miles of dark tanned skin covering abs and pecks that are more rock than they are muscle.
Sweat gleams between the chiseled ridges and valleys of his chest, pebbles on his taut shoulders like droplets of sunshine glistening on a golden horizon.
He turns around, closing the gate behind him, and his back muscles are nearly as pornographic, rippling with each movement.
They lead to a very round, very firm ass I’ve never realized filled out his jeans the way it does until this very moment.
Am I still high?
I try not to stare, but I feel like a starving animal in a desert. I don’t actually want him. It’s just the after-effects of my drug-induced dream.
He chuckles, the sound like rocks tumbling in a glass. “Do I need to make an HR complaint? You’re my boss, after all.”
“You’re not that hot.” I scoff, turning away and walking toward the horse in the opposite stall to cover the sudden heat burning in my cheeks.
“So you think I’m hot?” He sounds insufferably smug, and I don’t know how to rectify the situation.
Santos acts like he has something on me, knows some secret I don’t, and it’s enough to make me not want him to know I find him attractive.
It’s only more power he wields, and I don’t like anyone having power over me.
“Can you show me?” I motion to the stall.
“How to scoop shit? It’s pretty self-explanatory, isn’t it?”
I turn on my heel to leave. If I wanted to be ridiculed, I’d have followed McCrae around more.
Santos grabs my elbow, far gentler than I remember him doing last night. “Here.” He hands me the fork and opens the gate. “Just slip inside.”
I do as he says, and he follows me in, closing the gate behind us. All of a sudden, the stall feels too small, the oxygen thick, and I struggle to breathe deeply.
A white horse eyes us, its giant orbs flicking around the stall as it moves in the opposite corner. I realize it too late: I’m locked in a stall with a giant animal that could kill me, and panic starts to crawl up my throat.
“It’s okay. He won’t hurt you.” Santos’ breath fans across my neck, stirring the small hairs there, and I shiver. He smells like sweat and horse manure and something fresh, like pine soap.
“Animals hate me,” I say breathlessly, my eyes fixed on the giant beast, my body focused on the beast behind me. I feel completely and totally trapped.
“Why would they hate you, Valentina? You should be more confident. They can sense that kind of thing.”
“If you really knew me, you’d say differently.
” I sound pathetic, but I can’t help the words from slipping out.
Santos remains silent for several seconds, and then I feel him move just a fraction closer, as if drawn forward without realizing it.
His hand rests lightly on my lower back, heating my skin, before he nudges me forward.
“Just talk to him. Stay in his eye sight at all times—never go behind him or under him. Work opposite of him and then kiss to him to get him to move around until it’s all raked into a pile in the middle. Then, you can get the wheelbarrow and scoop it all out.”
“How do you know all this?” I look at him over my shoulder, expecting him to look at me like I’m stupid. There’s only gentleness on his face, a teasing smile playing with the corners of his mouth.
“Trial and error. Now, no more questions. Get to work so we can get dinner. I think a tequila sounds good.” He winks, and I groan.