Chapter 13
STEVIE
Stevie didn’t know how long it took for all the disparate parts of her body to come back to her and form a cohesive human being again.
All she knew was she was enjoying the bliss of floating in a bath of warm, fragrant oil while small tremors of pleasure still quaked through her system, prolonging the sensation of total and complete gratification.
Masturbating – ugh, what a horrible word – had never felt like this. It had been quick and surface, not this drifting through the ether, every part of her body aglow as if it was being stroked all over with velvet gloves.
No wonder Yolly had tried to get her to throw her purity ring into the lake at their weekender a hundred times over. Why wouldn’t her sister, the person who had loved and understood her most in the world, want her to have this experience?
Surely that was a sister’s duty?
At some point she opened her eyes, her limbs leaden with a malaise she couldn’t shake.
Didn’t want to shake. Slowly, she tuned in to her surroundings – a tin roof overhead, the poke of hay beneath her, its earthy scent infusing the heavy, still air.
She was on a haystack in a loft, on a ranch in the middle of Wyoming.
About the last place she ever expected to lose her virginity.
Not that she had, of course, but she’d learned and experienced more about her body in the last half an hour than she had in her entire twenty-two years of life. And she would never forget this. Not as long as she lived.
‘Hey.’
As she tuned in some more, her head lolled to the side to find Clay propped up on his elbow looking down at her, watching her, a smile warming his face.
A very smug smile.
‘I think you might have passed out there for a while,’ he teased.
Stevie laughed. ‘I think I did too.’
But the laughter soon died and the malaise vanished as she remembered the intensity of her orgasm. Had she been too… much? Were the other women he’d been with more… dainty? Maybe that smile was amused rather than smug?
‘I’m sorry, was I too… loud or… crazy… or greedy?’ God, she’d just laid there and taken it, spread out on the blanket like some kind of starfish.
Why hadn’t she… participated more?
‘No.’ Clay shook his head. ‘You were perfection. And you should never apologise for taking what you want.’
God… she had wanted. She’d wanted Clay in an utterly irrational way. She still did. How else could she explain lying here so brazenly with her shirt open, bared to him like this and not giving a single damn?
Lifting a hand, she traced it along his jawline to the fall of hair at his temple, pushing it back, her fingers delighting in the glide of it over her knuckles. ‘Is that what you do? Take what you want?’
How freaking liberating.
He shut his eyes as her nails gently stroked his scalp, and Stevie drew in a shuddery breath at Clay luxuriating in her touch.
When he opened them again, she was bathed in liquid amber light.
‘Yes,’ he finally responded. ‘Wherever possible.’ He turned his head into the caress, his lips brushing the inside of her wrist as he murmured, ‘You don’t? ’
She gave a half laugh. ‘No. I ask politely.’ Yolly had been the bold one.
Gathering her hand, he kissed her palm before bringing it to his chest, his gaze holding her captive. ‘You don’t have to be polite with me. What do you want, Stevie?’
Oh God… her entire body quaked at the possibilities. ‘Can I… touch you?’
He groaned and fell back against the blanket, sliding his arm under her shoulders and scooping her to him, her head finding his chest, their hands still joined, every inch of Stevie’s body smooshed into the side of his.
The steady thump of his heart was like a metronome below her ear, his scent a mix of soap and hay, and Stevie revelled in how solid he was, how… masculine.
A fact backed up by the significant bulge she could see testing the strength of his fly.
Stevie thanked the universe she was already lying down because the mere thought of what was behind that zipper was making her all swoony.
‘Is that a yes or a no?’ she prompted, raising herself up on her elbow to look at him.
He smiled, his gaze drifting to the slight curve of a breast not fully covered by the open flaps of her shirt before picking up a strand of her hair and watching as he wound it around his finger. ‘You are touching me.’
Stevie rolled her eyes. ‘That’s not what I meant.’
His gaze slid to hers. ‘Where do you want to touch me, Stevie girl?’
There was a challenge in his eyes which emboldened her – to a point anyway. She wished she could say the words but she wasn’t quite there yet. Instead she glanced down his body, zeroing in on his erection before returning to meet his eyes. ‘Where do you think?’
Her cheeks flushed at her daring, but she held his gaze.
‘You want to touch my cock?’
His voice was rough, a physical scrape along every one of Stevie’s nerve endings which revelled in his easy use of the word cock. ‘Yes.’ She swallowed, her throat dry as the dust in the cattle yards. And then, suddenly stupidly anxious about her boldness, she added, ‘Please.’
You don’t have to be polite around me. That’s what he’d said. But it was so damned ingrained and she was nervous, and that always made her reach for the familiar.
Thankfully he chuckled at her manners and his hand holding hers captive against his chest loosened, allowing her free rein.
With her pulse fluttering madly, her hand skimmed down his body, her breath expelling in a rasp as she reached pay dirt, her fingers tracing the rigid thickness encased in its denim prison.
Clay groaned and when she squeezed him, he sucked in air through clenched teeth, his hand pressing over the top of hers, flattening it against his solid outline.
Glancing at him, she asked, ‘Doesn’t that hurt?’ He was so hard and had been that way for a long time now – was that some kind of… strangulation risk?
He grimaced. ‘I’ll live.’
It didn’t sound terribly convincing but he ought to know, right? Returning her attention to their hands, she went to explore further but his fingers tightened around hers, preventing any movement.
She sought his eyes, finding them squeezed shut. ‘Can I…’ Her voice drifted away not sure she could say the words out loud now he was clearly rebuffing her advances.
‘Maybe next time,’ he muttered, his voice rough.
Their eyes met as his finally opened and he smiled at her gently and relaxed his hand a little. ‘I’m hanging on by a thread, Stevie girl. I almost blew my load in my jeans just now and I’m still not sure that won’t happen if I let you have your way down there.’
Stevie supposed she was meant to feel turned off by his admission but if he thought the idea of her being responsible for his lack of control – this big, bad cowboy who broke wild horses for a living – was a turn-off, then he was wrong.
She, Stephanie Everhart – super virgin – was pushing him, Clay Calhoun – highly experienced lover of women – to blow his load.
In his boxers. Stevie had never felt more buzzed in her life.
Not even those times on stage with Yolly when they’d been in the zone, and they’d known through their weird sister telepathy that the audience was theirs.
Reluctantly removing her hand to his chest, she smiled down at him. ‘You did, huh?’
He hooted out a laugh as his fingers tangled in her hair again. ‘Oh God, I’ve created a monster, haven’t I?’
Stevie grinned. He certainly had – a very impatient one. ‘I don’t mind, you know. If you…’ Gah, was she really going to say this word? She cleared her throat but chickened out. ‘C… come,’ she said instead, although even that felt foreign sliding from her mouth. ‘Too quickly.’
He laughed again, although Stevie wasn’t sure if that was due to her eagerness or the way she’d fumbled the words. ‘Yeah, well, I do. Clay Calhoun is known for his stamina and, as your teacher, my ego insists on nothing less.’
Her teacher. The thought was utterly titillating. He was her teacher and she was his willing student but… ‘Time’s a tickin’, Clay.’
The big hunk of cowboy merely grinned. ‘And anticipation makes everything better. I have a lot more planned for you.’
Stevie wanted to say anticipation was overrated but her abs betrayed her, tightening at the promise in his eyes.
Lordy.
‘Like what?’ she demanded, hoping she didn’t sound as breathless as she felt.
‘Like kissing you a helluva lot more. Everywhere. All over.’
His eyes drifted south then, to the gape of her shirt, the hand that had been toying in her hair, lowered, the back of his knuckles brushing the exposed curve of her breast, and Stevie shivered at the touch, her nipples turning hard as nickels.
‘Like going down on you,’ he murmured as he raised his gaze to hers and locked. ‘Showing you how much this cowboy likes to eat.’
The image of that – him going down on her – slammed into her brain with maximum impact, squeezing through muscles deep and low, trapping her breath in her throat.
‘I want it so that when we finally fuck,’ he murmured, his thumb stroking over a nipple as he rolled the F word around his tongue, ‘you want me beyond all reason.’
Stevie swallowed. Hard. ‘I already do.’
And that was the truth of it. Maybe a more experienced woman would have kept it to herself but Stevie had always worn her heart on her sleeve.
Even knowing that this thing could only end one way – her leaving and him staying – knowing that cliff edge was coming, it was still the truth.
And she wanted to sail right off that cliff Thelma and Louise style.
With clear eyes and a full heart.
Who knew, if nothing else she might get some more songs out it. She’d already written one, and it had certainly worked for Taylor Swift.
Withdrawing his hand from her breasts, he smiled. ‘Trust me on this.’