47. The Not-Pouncing Horse Riding
THE NOT-POUNCING HORSE RIDING
EMBERLEIGH
I don’t leave him. I feel him hot inside me, his sticky essence coating me. Since I’ve never let anyone do that before, I’ll blame temporary insanity if asked.
I roll my hips and slowly undulate as he begins to soften. I can feel us. I can feel everything about our connection. He sits up fully, pulling my legs to lock them around his back, and takes my mouth. It’s hungry but somehow tender. He’s sated and relaxed.
Our position pushes his pelvis against my clit, his wiry chest hair abrades my nipples in a part-pleasure, part-pain kind of way, and I can feel it wanting to build again. Three is glorious but it’s a marathon, not a sprint. I pull back to look into his eyes, slowing my already small movements.
“Did you arrange a horse ride just to get in my pants?”
“No.” He pushes little wisps of my falling bun off my face. “But if I’d have known you were going to pounce, I would’ve done it sooner.”
“I didn’t pounce.”
“And I quote ‘I’m in control.’ Certainly didn’t have any problem giving you that, baby.”
“Giving me. You didn’t give me anything.”
“Oh, yes, I did. Barely, by the way. But your tits were bouncing and your face… Well, I had to concentrate on not coming just so I could watch both.”
I smile. His mirrored one is the sexiest I’ve ever seen.
“You are one sexy, gorgeous man. You know that?”
“Now I do.”
“Whatever.” I look away, not in shame or hiding from him, but thinking. “So what was this about? The not-pouncing horse riding.”
He grows hotter and thicker inside me, and he bucks watching my face. “Keep moving and I’ll tell you.”
I agree and leverage to keep the connection between us. He holds my eyes, placing a big palm under my ass to guide me. The other he cups around my face.
“I’m sorry. I was an ass. You were right.”
“What?”
“That’s what I brought you out here to say.”
“What was I right about?” I rock, focusing as much as I can, not wanting to miss a moment.
“Everything you said… about me being harsh today. And I’m sorry for this morning, for teasing you and toying with you and not leaving you sated.
For this afternoon, the accusations, the inability—or the unwillingness—to comfort you.
For you being scared and me not protecting you.
For you taking it all on yourself and for me not being someone who would lift that burden.
For you thinking that you could ever be alone. ”
I’m overwhelmed. I’m floored. I’m full and I want to be closer, though I have no idea how that’s possible.
“Best apology I’ve ever gotten.” I’m a little breathless, but I lift and reach between us to wrap my hand around him and squeeze the base of his shaft. “Not saying I want you to piss me off, but with this kind of apology, I can probably handle it.”
The talking stops then. We finish after a languid and long second round. And he cleans us up with napkins from our picnic.
We feast on the sandwiches and fruit Brighton cobbled together from Pop’s pantry. We have bottled water and watch the sun begin sinking over the Hill Country, before he packs us all back up.
Once he has me back up on Brooks, we take off for the barn, enjoying a slow gallop that emphasizes all the places I’m sore and will be more so tomorrow.
He shows me how to brush down the mare and dismantle her saddle.
I’m too short to lift it, but not so short I can’t slide it off.
He laughs as I stumble under its bulk and steps in to relieve me.
We lock Brooks and Wandy up, feeding them cookies and carrots, and walk home hand in hand to find Pop sound asleep in the recliner and Colt just as asleep in his crib.
I grab a blanket and cover Pop, hoping he doesn’t wish we’d woken him.
When I get down the hall, I grab the knob to my bedroom door, but look over my shoulder. “Thanks for an amazing night, Braxton.”
He pulls in close, his warm chest flush to my back, and whispers, “Yeah, baby, definitely amazing. But it’s not over.” He takes my earlobe between his teeth and nips there. The shudder that runs through me elicits a rumble from his chest. Whether it’s a groan or a chuckle, I can’t tell.
“I need to—”
I don’t get to finish because he kisses my neck below my ear. “What? You need to what?”
“Get cleaned up.”
“Well, after you do, come meet me in bed.”
I nod, feeling his stubble at my neck, and let myself into my room.
I grab a quick shower and scrub the smell of sex and horses off my skin.
I throw on sleep shorts and a tank and am just rounding the corner when a thought occurs to me.
I’ve been radio silent all day, at least since the banana incident.
I grab my laptop and pile onto the bed to check messages and emails.
There are way too many, but that’s what I get for running a business—poorly, I might add—and dropping it at every challenge.
One of my clients has been trying to reach me.
They are a mother-daughter duo who own a boutique named Toffee.
They sell mostly jewelry, but also have a few articles of clothing.
Their whole experience is catering to women like my mother.
Money is no object, unwilling to go to the mall, where exclusivity and privacy are paramount.
And that privacy has just been threatened by a data breach that includes their mailing list and client records, including credit card numbers.
Hell hath no fury like a rich person who is slightly inconvenienced and has no card numbers on file.
I begin by typing out a message on the cloud service. Then try calling from my computer. No answer.
I open up my folder of crisis communications templates, find what I’m looking for and begin to craft several press releases.
I create several social media posts, delicately dancing around the data breach issue, mentioning our cooperation with authorities where we’d been victimized, putting my client squarely on the side of their customers, as having been targeted, not as an untrustworthy business who betrayed the confidence placed in them.
I send an email packet with the schedule and post data for all their social media channels, the press releases, and talking points.
And, then, and I can’t fathom how I didn’t prior to this, I order a new phone, set to be delivered in the morning. I move everything from my phone’s cloud storage to a secondary backup. Old habits die hard. I’ve had storage in two places since I turned eighteen and got off my parents’ cell plan.
Colt may have survived Banana Gate, but my phone did not. The idea that the pictures and videos of him may not have either would’ve killed me.
The click of the door knob catches my attention.
Braxton
It’s after midnight and long after Emberleigh went to grab a shower. Had it not been for Pop messing with the security system and the beeps waking me, I’d have slept through the night and woken up pissed and alone.
Instead, I simply woke alone.
I turn the knob to her door to find her worried face lit by her laptop screen. Her sleep clothes hug every curve and swell and leave nothing to the imagination.
“Did you get an offer so good you couldn’t pass it up?”
She shakes her head. “Client in trouble. Think I got it handled, but they will probably give me an earful for the nearly ten-hour response time.”
I extend my hand, meaning for her to offer her laptop, but instead she drops the lid and slides it under a nearby pillow and accepts my own with hers.
“Probably skipping that run in”—she looks at her empty wrist and then around the room—“four or five hours. I know I won’t regret it if I get up and do it, but I’m not eighteen anymore. Four hours of sleep doesn’t do what it used to.”
I slide my hand from hers and run it from her neck, down her spine, leaving it at the small of her back as we walk to my room.
I walk to the crib side of the bed and turn her, holding her face, and kiss her deeply.
I pull back what few covers are left there and hold them until she slides in.
I join from the other side and pull her into me.
“Come here.” Flat on my back, one arm propped behind my head, I hold her as she folds into me. It’s as if she was made to be here.
My hand glides to rest just above her ass. My fingers draw little patterns under the waistband of her sleep shorts.
It takes next to no time for her to fall sound asleep. Guessing the adrenaline of the day, mixed with the subsequent crash, two showers, and outdoor sex took it out of her.
My lips tip up at the corners. Hell of a day, no doubt. But the evening has been great and unless she snores like a freight train, the night will be too.
At four, Colt stirs, and I grab him, taking him to the kitchen to make him a bottle. He’s hungry and needs a diaper change but easily falls back to sleep. I pile him into bed with us. When I wake again, it’s because little fingers scratch and fly at my chest.
The sun is up, and I’m late. And I don’t give a single fuck because I’m the most content I’ve ever been in my life.
On one side, my son is alive, healthy, and babbling.
He gums his fingers before flinging them onto me.
His whole body wiggles and the relief that provides after yesterday can’t be underestimated.
At my other side is the woman I could—if I haven’t already—fall for. Gorgeous, smart, sassy, and fierce.
The last is the best descriptor of her… fierce. As protective of Colt as a mama bear, willing to get in my face in any area where she or he may be compromised or where I can be stronger, astute on behalf of her clients, and as intense with her family as I can fathom.
It’s cheesy to say she makes me want to be a better man.
But it’s true. For the first time in my life, I want to have this life.
This one, where I come home to my family.
Where being responsible isn’t about horses or the ranch.
And where I fall short, I have no doubt she’ll demand I step up.
Not because Emberleigh is bossy, but because she deserves it and, quite frankly, I owe it to myself to be this man.
The relaxed satisfaction I feel in my life must be written all over my face, instead of what’s normally etched there.
“Morning,” she rumbles.
“Don’t know if I’ve ever seen you this beautiful.”
She dips her eyes, before flicking them back to me. “What’s got you so happy?”
I look down at my dick. Morning wood is gone, but it doesn’t hurt to verify.
She follows my gaze.
“Just to say… I’m in a great mood, but I could be in a better mood if you keep staring at my cock.”
Her eyes snap back to mine, but there’s playfulness there. Fierce mama bear hasn’t come to the fore yet. This must be raw, real Emberleigh.
“Seriously beautiful. May need to wake up every morning with you just to see it. Or maybe just because it’s the best morning I can remember, and I want another one.” I lean down and plant a kiss on her soft lips. “What had you working so late last night? You passed out before I could ask.”
“Sorry. I was wiped. Client in crisis. New phone will be here by noon. I have a feeling it’ll be a long day.” She stretches, arching her tits toward me in that little tank. She notices my attention. “They’re small.”
“They’re perfect. And they’re mine.”
The smile that beams from her is worth another four in the morning disgusting diaper.
“Hate to leave, baby, but need to get after it. Need me to take Colt today so you can work?”
“If you do, I can come get him when things settle in.”
“Done.” I kiss her again and then flick a nipple with a rakish grin before turning to Colt. “Come on, buddy. We’ve got a ranch to run and horses to feed and water.”
My great mood lasts until the clock chimes eight when my phone pings with a new incoming text from an unknown number.
What I see there chills my blood
The corresponding message fuels the fires of my rage.
Me: Problem. Can we meet?
Eli: Sure. Busy morning. Can you come my way?
Me: My family is being threatened. Not leaving the ranch.
Eli: What the hell?
Me: {forwards text of message}
Eli: What. The. Fuck?
Me: Should I call the sheriff?
Eli: Afraid so. Let me know when he can be there.
Eli: Think Exton has the resources to trace the text?
Me: I’ll ask. Be smart, Eli. This gets uglier and uglier, and I’m not comfortable with the way it’s going.
I dial Exton and get voicemail so I tap out a text.
Me: Got a threatening text. Can you trace it?
Exton: Depends. May be harder to do officially. You opposed to unofficially?
Me: I’m opposed to this fucker threatening my family. How we find out who it is isn’t my concern.
Exton: Roger that. Call when I get out of this meeting.
“Pop?”
“Morning, Brax.”
I catch Cyler’s gaze before speaking into my phone. “Calling the sheriff. Eli’s heading this way. Got a death threat this morning.” I watch Cyler’s face blanche of color as I hear Pop move through his house.
“Where are you? Where is Colt?”
“He’s with me at the office.”
“Where’s Em?”
I don’t correct his nickname.
“At home.”
“Is she safe there?”
“Don’t know. I’d have said yes until this morning.”
“Want me to head her way or yours?”
“Hers. My pistol is in my nightstand.”
“Got my own and will take it. You need a safe. Do that this weekend. Not going to let Colt be a headline in the newspaper.”
“Yes, sir.”
We disconnect, and I look at Cyler. “Remember when ranching wasn’t all droughts and death threats? Good times.”
His bark of laughter would be better if he weren’t white as a ghost. “Should we make that the new marketing tagline?”
Me: Got your pistol?
Brighton: Is this our new “good morning”? Don’t know that I’m a fan.
Me: I wish. Where’s your firearm?
Brighton: In the glovebox.
Me: Not brilliant in this heat.
Brighton: Get that, but I’m not Annie Oakley, so…
Me: Beg to differ, but keep it close, please.
Brighton: You’re scaring me.
Me: You’re fearless.
Brighton: I eat death for breakfast.
Brighton: What’s going on?
Me: More to come. Just be smart.
Brighton: Yup.
“Cyler, you willing to be at the barn today?”
“Braxton?”
“You’re no babysitter, but you’re a good shot. You’re a hell of an employee, but you’re not expected to defend lives. But I’d like an extra set of eyes, and frankly an extra mag of ammo, here today.”
“Death threat?”
“This morning. I can watch my back and Colt’s. And if Bright ever hears I sent backup, there will be hell to pay. You and I both know we’ll never live it down if she thought we didn’t trust her aim.”
“I can handle external death threats easier than any threat from Brighton.”
“You and me both!” My smile is genuine. “Make yourself scarce around the stables, but keep your head on a swivel. Something is off.”
“On it, boss.”