Chapter 17
I was right. An aching dick was much better than an aching back.
But god damn.
I woke up with James’s sweet body flush against my torso. Her face pressed against my chest and one of her legs was hitched over my hip like she was trying to climb me like a tree. My very hard, very achy dick was notched snuggly against her belly.
Morning wood with James was a very different thing than generic morning wood. This wood had purpose. Intent. And with the object of its desire plastered against me, I doubted it was going to dissipate on its own.
Still asleep, James made an adorable grumbly sound, like something annoyed her. She shifted slightly, and I realized the thing that had disturbed her slumber was probably my very hard dick poking her in the stomach. Before I could rectify the situation, her hand slipped between our bodies and grabbed my dick. Full on grabbed it.
The sane part of me knew she had only meant to push me away, that she wasn’t really going to jack me off in her sleep, but the desperate, achy part of me hoped for the best.
She squeezed, her dainty fingers flexing around me, the thin cotton of my boxers doing nothing to shield me from the warmth of her hand. My hips bucked involuntarily, and she came fully awake. Her eyes popped open.
I could feel every muscle in her entire body clench as she assessed the situation. She released my dick and gave it a friendly little pat, like it was a puppy she had accidentally stepped on. “Sorry about that. Sorry—oh, god.” She lurched away from me and buried her face in her hands.
I blinked, trying to make sense of what had happened. Come to terms with what definitely wasn’t going to happen. “Did you…did you just pat me?”
“Gahhh.” She rolled, taking the sheets with her until she was a burrito, and slid off the bed. “Don’t look at me.”
I propped myself on one elbow and peered over the side of the bed at the pathetic lump of sheet and woman on the floor. “James.”
“Don’t laugh.”
“I’m not laughing.”
“You are. I can hear it in your voice.”
The lump moved as James inchwormed across the floor. I swallowed a chuckle. “I’m going to shower. When I come out, we are never to speak of this again.”
When the bathroom door closed behind her, I gave into it. I rolled onto my back and laughed. Once I started, I couldn’t stop. The floodgates opened. I laughed about her patting my dick and rolling to the floor. Somehow that segued into remembering our first meeting, when we fell into each other’s arms and mashed our mouths together. Holy shit, my dad was right. Fucking hilarious.
The bathroom door flung open, revealing James, clutching a towel to her presumably naked body. Her dark hair lifted and swirled around her shoulders at the breeze from the door. She stared at me with wide brown eyes, her pink mouth comically gaping open.
“I didn’t want to miss it,” she said.
“What?” I asked, seriously confused.
“You. Mr. Resting Grump Face. Laughing.” With a smirk, she closed the door. “It looks good on you!” she hollered. A second later, I heard the shower turn on.
Damn. My cock, which had gone to half-mast during the whole sheet-burrito situation, stood fully at attention. For a moment I let my imagination drift. If James weren’t only my employee. If she were my girl. We would have booked the single room on purpose and gone to bed naked. She wouldn’t have rolled away when she grabbed my dick. She would have kept going.
I touched myself, thinking about it. One stroke. Then another.
Maybe she would have laughed, that sound I loved so much, and pressed sleepy little kisses to my neck and chest. Her body would be so warm from being snuggled under the covers with me all night. I stroked faster as I imagined her taking over, rolling me to my back, gliding down on my cock. Smiling down at me, her dark eyes looking at me like they had when she caught me laughing. Happy, with a hint of mischief.
My chest squeezed tight. My balls drew up. My hand moved faster.
What would her eyes look like when I made her come? What sounds would she make? Would she collapse onto my chest and whisper in my ear words I’d never heard from a woman’s lips? Only you, I only want you—
Hot ropes of cum spurted against my stomach as I thrust my hips up against her imaginary pussy. I came harder than I ever had with a real pussy, much less with my own hand. The shower cut off with a metallic squeak.
Fuuuck.
“You banged her, didn’t you,” Zack said, like it was a statement of fact rather than a question.
My gaze shot to the back of James’s head, searching for signs that she had heard my dumbass brother. “Keep your voice down,” I hissed. “And no, I did not.”
James and I had arrived at the makeshift staging area bright and early, to-go cups of coffee in our hands, to mingle with contestants and trainers. When I had spotted Zack’s horse trailer, James had insisted we go say hi. Sure, I had agreed, thinking it might actually be nice to spend some extra time with my baby brother. A critical error on my part.
Zack studied me with narrowed eyes. “I don’t believe you. Your face is…soft. No scowl.”
“I’m having a good day.” Or I had been before this stupid conversation.
“Not to mention—”
“Then don’t,” I cut in. “Don’t mention it.”
Zack quirked an eyebrow. “Not to mention, you’ve been avoiding eye contact with her this whole time, but the second she turns her back, you’re eye-fucking her like a total perv.”
Of course I couldn’t make eye contact with James. Not after what I did this morning. If I had taken myself in hand, imagining her naked and wet in the shower? Fine. If I had thought about her plush pink mouth on my dick? Totally understandable and no one’s business but my own. But I had jacked off to feelings.
What the actual fuck was that about?
It was embarrassing. No way in hell was I going to open up to Zack about it. He’d have Brax on the phone in ten seconds flat. I didn’t need that shit in my day.
“All we did was sleep,” I said. “And if you say one goddamn word to her about this that makes her uncomfortable, I swear to god—”
“Nah. Only brothers are fair game.”
Zack glanced at James, who was conversing with Essie Price and another couple of barrel racers, her hands moving with animated gestures. Networking like Brax wanted because she was a professional. Zack’s gaze lingered on her ass—tactfully avoiding Essie’s because both of us knew without being told that she was off limits. What Zack failed to realize was that James was, too. At least as far as he was concerned. I could literally feel my blood pressure spike.
“Can’t blame you for the eye-fucking,” Zack said. “Those jeans are doing mankind the highest service.”
I shoved his shoulder. “Eyes off,” I growled.
Zack smirked. “Ah, there’s that scowl I know and love.”
His phone buzzed, and he tugged it out of his pocket. His smile was replaced with a frown as he looked at the screen. Then his thumbs flew as he texted a reply. “Shit,” he muttered. “Shit, shit, shit.”
“Problem?” I asked, though the answer was obvious.
“Yeah. Rex was supposed to partner with me for the roping event, but his little girl fell off a swing and broke her arm. He’s with her at the hospital.”
“Shit,” I said. He looked at me and I knew exactly what he was going to say next. “No,” I said preemptively.
“Come on, man. I need you. The ranch needs you. I’m riding one of ours today. When I win, it looks good for Lodestar.”
James looked over her shoulder at us curiously. After a quick survey of our expressions, she ambled over. “What’s going on?”
“My roping partner had to bail,” Zack explained. “And Adam here won’t do me a solid and step up.” His expression was the picture of wounded brotherly love. I rolled my eyes.
“Oh.” James bit her lip and peeked up at me from under the dark sweep of her eyelashes. “Maybe he doesn’t know how?”
Wow, way to slip a knife right in my gut.
“I know how,” I said through my clenched teeth. “What is it you think I do all day? Those cows we have aren’t for beef, you know.”
James was great at training horses for show reining and rodeo events, but ranch horses were still a good portion of our income. Horses that were intended for actual work on cattle ranches. That was my specialty. Teaching them how to take a pull and track a cow. I was damn good at it, too.
“Well, sure,” James said. “But that’s not the same thing as doing it in front of thousands of people, is it? I mean, you don’t even know the cow. It might not be so easy to rope as the ones you’re used to at Lodestar.”
Know the cow?I shot her a look that promised murder before I turned to my brother. “You got a horse for me to ride?” I asked him.
He whooped and slapped his thigh with his hat. “Hell yeah, I do.”
When I looked back at James, she was grinning smugly. Like maybe she had never doubted me at all. My suspicions mounted when Zack winked at her.
Dammit. I had been all set to spend my afternoon watching events, not participating in them. That was where I was comfortable. Unlike Zack, I didn’t crave attention. He could keep all the applause. I just wanted to do a job I was proud of.
But like a million men before me, I found myself agreeing to do something stupid to impress a girl. Suckered by a pretty face.
I could still back out, but I wasn’t going to. Because I didn’t want to let my brother down, but even more than that, I wanted to hear James scream my name.
In more ways than one, but this was the only way it was going to happen.