Chapter 46
Delicate – Taylor Swift
Cassidy
Three days after the fire, the ranch house was finally empty of well-meaning visitors.
Not that they hadn’t been welcomed but I could see that Nash, Gunner and Wilder were feeling the strain of being hosts and being pleasant when all they wanted to do was move forward with the rebuild and find out how the fire started.
Mrs. Wright had given Lily and me a leave of absence for a week after she found out about the fire, so I could stay close to Gunner.
She’d been so supportive it had brought a lump to my throat; I wasn’t even aware that she knew about me and Gunner.
The whole town had been nothing but brilliant, bringing food, offering shelter for the horses, manpower for the cleanup.
Even Brad Jenkins had offered to help and his relationship with the Miller brothers wasn’t the best.
Everything was too quiet, though. The ranch, the stables, there was no humming, no chatter or laughter. Just the wind slipping through the trees and the sound of Gunner’s breath, shallow and anxious.
Today, we were alone in the house. Wilder had gone to Telluride for a meet up with some old high school buddies while Nash had taken Lily, the kids and Dorcas to Denver for a couple of days.
He wanted to get them away from all the misery for a while, particularly as Bertie kept going over to Ariel’s grave and bursting into tears.
Gunner had buried her under a Gambel oak tree in a pasture on the far side of the winter barn.
Her favorite spot apparently. He’d insisted on digging the grave himself with an excavator that Calvin had arranged, and only allowed Nash, Gunner and Mikey to help take her there because he couldn’t manage it on his own.
The sight of him on the back of a trailer with his hand stroking her covered body had been horrific and heartbreaking.
Each day since he’d seemed a little brighter, but there was still a heaviness to his shoulders, a stoop to his normally ramrod straight posture.
A dimness in his beautiful chocolate pools that I wasn’t sure would ever leave.
Especially as he didn’t want to talk about Ariel and the fire but keep the agony inside.
He’d even ripped off the bandage on his hand, arguing that all it needed was fresh air.
I was desperate to help him and was just grateful that he wasn’t shutting me out and had agreed to a lazy day.
Most of the cleanup was done and as soon as she heard what had happened, Tally said yes to the job and offered to man the office for the day, reading all the training records to get up to speed.
It had taken a lot of persuasion, but Gunner had finally agreed, on the promise that she called him if necessary.
He had now gone missing, though, and I had a sneaking suspicion he was answering emails.
“Babe, where are you?” I called to no response as I padded through the house.
The kitchen was empty and silent, but for the sound of the clothes being washed in the laundry.
Toys were piled inside Billy’s playpen and Bertie’s reading book was on the table making me smile.
Devastation was outside yet inside all seemed normal.
Life carried on. The beauty of this family was pulling together through adversity and the more time I spent with them, the more I wanted to be a part of it.
It was as I pondered the future that I heard a sound up the stairs, so headed that way.
I found Gunner in the shower, water pounding against his skin like rain on steel.
His massive frame was hunched slightly, hands braced against the tile, muscles coiled with barely leashed tension.
He needed me and I needed him, so I undressed quickly and quietly.
He didn’t turn when I stepped into the steam, just let out a breath that was more growl than sigh.
“I’m not good company right now,” he rasped, his voice hollow as it echoed off the white tile.
“I don’t want good company,” I said softly, my body already aching. “I want you.”
When he turned, the look in his eyes nearly dropped me to my knees.
No softness. No hesitation.
Just dark, raw hunger.
“You sure? Because I’m not in the mood to be gentle today, sweetheart.”
I stared him dead in the eye. Determined. “Absolutely certain.”
He stalked toward me like a predator, and I didn’t flinch. I offered. My body, my trust, my everything.
He backed me into the cold tile, his hands already on my wrists, slamming them above my head.
“This what you want?” he growled, voice tight with restraint. “Because I’m about to ruin you.”
“Yes,” I whispered. “Do it.”
His mouth crashed onto mine, hard, biting. There was nothing gentle in the kiss. Just teeth and tongue and the bruising kind of need that makes your heart race and your knees weak.
“You want rough, baby?” he asked, lips dragging down my neck. “I’ll give you rough.”
“Gunner,” I gasped, but it came out like a moan.
He grabbed my ass and lifted me effortlessly, slamming my back against the shower wall. His cock, hard and hot, pressed between my thighs, and I hooked my legs around him on instinct.
“Hold on,” he warned.
He drove into me in one brutal thrust that knocked the breath out of my lungs. It wasn’t slow. It wasn’t careful. It was everything. The weight of grief, love, anger, and lust poured into every punishing stroke.
“Fuck,” he snarled. “You take me so goddamn well.”
I clawed at his shoulders, needing more, and he gave it. Gave it like he needed to bury himself so deep I’d never forget what we were. What this was.
His hands gripped my hips hard enough to bruise, slamming me down onto him again and again until I couldn’t see straight.
“You’re mine,” he panted against my throat, teeth scraping the skin. “Say it.”
“I’m yours,” I choked, loving the way his control frayed with every word I gave him. “Yours.”
He bit down, not too hard, just enough to make me cry out and that did something to him. His hand came up to my throat, fingers wrapping around the column of my neck, not squeezing but claiming.
“You like this, don’t you?” he asked, voice hoarse with arousal. “Being taken like this. Like you’re my good little woman.”
I whimpered, so turned on I couldn’t breathe. “Yes. Fuck, yes.”
His rhythm turned savage, relentless, primal, the kind of fucking that scraped every nerve raw and set it alight.
“I’m gonna break you in half,” he groaned, “and you’re gonna thank me for it.”
I was already thanking him, with every ragged moan, every time I tightened around him. He shifted, angling his hips, and hit that spot so perfectly I screamed.
“Gunner, I’m…oh God…”
“No,” he barked. “Not yet. You wait. You come when I say.”
He pulled out abruptly, spinning me around to face the wall before I could protest. I was still reeling when he kicked my legs apart and slammed back inside, this time from behind.
The new angle was brutal and perfect.
One hand tangled in my hair, yanking my head back, the other gripping my hip so tight I knew I’d wear his fingers for days.
“You like being used like this?” he growled into my ear. “Like a good little toy for me to fuck?”
“Yes,” I cried. “Use me, please.”
His fingers slid through my desire, rubbing rough and fast. Unyielding and just what I needed. How I liked it. “You’re gonna come so hard you forget your own name. You’re gonna scream mine until the whole goddamn town knows who you belong to.”
“I’m yours,” I sobbed, aching, frantic, lost in him.
“Come for me, Cassidy. Now.”
I shattered.
Violently. Completely. My whole body convulsed around him as pleasure detonated through me, my cry echoing off the tile.
He followed with a roar, jerking into me hard, emptying himself with one last vicious thrust.
He held me there, chest to my back, both of us trembling in the aftermath. I could feel the moment his dominance melted, replaced by that quiet, aching tenderness only I ever got from him.
He kissed my shoulder, softly this time, his breath shuddering.
“Too much?” he asked, pulling out slowly, reverent now. “Did I hurt you?”
I turned in his arms, cradled his face between my palms. “You healed something I didn’t know was broken.”
Relief flooded his expression. Then he kissed me, soft, lingering, with none of the desperation from before. Just love. Raw and real.
Skin still tingling, heart still full, he whispered, “The only thing that settles me lately is the sound of your voice. I don’t know how to be without you now.”
“You don’t have to be,” I whispered back, kissing the curve of his jaw.
Later, tangled in the sheets, Gunner traced lazy circles on my hip, his other hand curled around my back like he still couldn’t let go.
The contrast from the storm in the shower was jarring in the best way. Here was the other side of him, the quiet, steady kind of love that came not in words, but in gestures. The kind that stayed.
“I love you,” he whispered into the silence, like a secret he’d kept too long.
My heartbeat thudded, breath catching. “Not falling?”
He shook his head slowly. “Not falling. Gone. Head over fucking heels, Cassidy. There’s no coming back for me.”
I pressed a kiss to the center of his chest, right over the place I knew his heart beat strongest.
“I love you too,” I whispered, my voice shaking with truth.
“I know,” he said with that cocky little smirk. “Hard not to, with a dick as beautiful as mine.”
I burst out laughing, full and unfiltered. It felt like something broke open in me. Something healing.
When he laughed too, I knew we were okay. We were more than okay as we held onto each other, the sound of joy filling the room.
“Oh, I have something for you,” he said after our laughter died down. “Wait there.”