Chapter 22
Cole
“I s it technically the weekend?” Lauren asked as she laid on my sofa later with her hand on her belly. “I ate way too much of what I wanted at dinner tonight.”
I smiled as I took a seat at the end of the sofa.
She hadn’t really eaten that much, but Lauren mentally kicked herself every time she ate more than a salad and some yogurt.
She was getting better at switching up her diet and adding more protein, but old habits die hard.
If she could see her body through my eyes, she’d never complain about eating a few more calories than normal ever again.
I had to admit that Millie was an amazing cook. Everyone had pitched in to help, but she’d supervised the entire dinner.
“Friday night,” I told her, amused. “It’s the weekend. The pot roast was good protein, and mashed potatoes are a vegetable.”
She snorted. “And exactly how are we justifying the chocolate cream pie?”
“We’re not,” I answered. “Sometimes you just have to eat something just because it tastes good, and that pie was worth it. We’ll ride tomorrow and get some fun outdoor exercise.”
I’d just finished settling Daisy into my barn.
Lauren and I hadn’t really discussed our weekend plans.
She’d brought an overnight bag without a single question about where she was sleeping.
I knew exactly where she was sleeping.
There was no fucking way she wasn’t going to end up in my bed.
Yeah, she’d made it clear that she was ready to explore the sensual side of this relationship.
Fuck knew I wanted the same things.
But there was always a chance that she’d change her mind and decide she wanted us to get to know each other better first.
If she wasn’t quite ready for sex, she was still going to sleep with me.
There was no way in hell we were going to end up on separate floors of this house tonight.
She belonged with me .
Lauren suddenly sat up and cuddled against my body, like she’d sensed that I wanted her closer.
I wrapped my arm around her, smirking because I knew that was probably a ridiculous thought.
“What are the plans for this weekend?” she asked as she laid her head on my shoulder.
“Doing whatever we feel like doing,” I informed her. “I was thinking about driving into town in the morning to get a cinnamon roll and a coffee at The Mug And Jug if they’re still open in the mornings. I haven’t done that since I was a teenager.”
Our father had certainly never brought his sons into town for anything good, but I had a few fond memories of Asher hauling me into Crystal Fork in the mornings for one of those cinnamon rolls and a coffee.
After Asher had graduated from high school, he’d gotten himself a job as an entry-level welder in Billings, so he’d started to make his own money.
I’d gotten a job stocking shelves at the grocery store to save for our future, but I wasn’t able to make nearly as much money as Asher back then.
We’d enjoyed hanging out in town after we’d both started earning a little money of our own.
We’d been too old and too big for our father to keep us at the ranch.
It had taken a while after our father’s murder for the rumors to start about us killing our father.
Luckily, we’d been a lot closer to getting the hell out of Crystal Fork by the time the really vicious gossip had started.
Years ago, The Mug And Jug had been a morning hangout place that served coffee and cinnamon rolls in the mornings as well as being the local bar at night.
“Everything is exactly the same there,” Lauren told me with a sigh. “Joy’s bakery is still making those cinnamon rolls for Silas. The only thing that’s different is his coffee maker. He’s gotten quite fancy. He makes all kinds of gourmet coffees now. He wanted to keep up with the coffee trends.”
I smirked. “Has anything really changed in Crystal Fork?”
She shook her head. “No. It amazed me that I had been gone for over a decade, and almost nothing was different when I got back. Honestly, there’s something about the sameness of this town that’s actually comforting.
I like visiting the same stores that I went to as a kid.
I know that the gossip sucks and that a lack of change isn’t always good, but there are a lot of things I love about this town.
More than a decade in the city was enough for me.
If I want a few more amenities, we’re close enough to Billings.
What about you? Do you miss living in Austin? ”
I thought about telling her that Billings wasn’t exactly the big city, but she was right. It did have a lot more amenities than Crystal Fork, and it was the biggest city in Montana.
“The only thing I really miss is the variety of different restaurants I had there,” I told her honestly. “I don’t miss the crowds, the noise, or the traffic. Being surrounded by people all of the time gets old when you were raised in a small town. Maybe it suits some people, but not me.”
I’d pushed up the sleeves of my sweatshirt earlier, and Lauren was lightly tracing the outline of the tattoo on my forearm.
“What does this mean?” she asked softly.
“How do you know that it means anything?” I questioned. “Maybe I just like the design.”
She shot me one of her I-know-you’re-full-of-shit looks before she said, “It means something. I don’t see you getting a tattoo if it didn’t mean anything to you. As far as I know, it’s the only one you have.”
“Freedom,” I replied honestly. “Asher has one, too. We got them after we moved to Austin. We didn’t have a lot of money, but we didn’t skimp on the tattoos. The symbolism meant something to us. I went with the soaring hawk, and Asher got the wolf. Once we got the tattoos, we never looked back.”
“It must have been hard for you two at first,” she said in an empathetic voice. “You were both so young, and you were raised in a small town.”
“We adjusted,” I explained. “Asher easily got a job as a welder, and he got me into a less skilled job at the same place. We both enrolled in college soon after we got there. My brother had already taken some classes in Billings, but I was starting from scratch. It wasn’t easy finagling work and school, but it all worked out.
We started our tech company from nothing.
It was a small business until it turned into a whole lot more. Our timing was good.”
“It wasn’t all about the timing,” she admonished. “Your ambition was legendary. You and Asher made sure that you filled a need that wasn’t there in the tech world at the time. It took you both years of hard work to build that monster company. I wish you’d stop downplaying all your accomplishments.”
I chuckled. “If I don’t, I’m sure you’ll be the first one to remind me of everything I’ve accomplished.”
It never ceased to amaze me how Lauren never missed a chance to tell me that she thought I was a great guy.
She pointed out all of my accomplishments and my strengths.
I couldn’t say that I didn’t like that kind of admiration from her, but I wasn’t always sure I deserved it.
She shifted positions and swung her leg over me, straddling me with her hands on my biceps before she looked down at me and met my gaze.
“Is it really so bad that I’m really proud of everything you’ve done and the man you’ve become?
” she asked. “It’s not exactly a secret that you give a lot of your money away to charities.
You came from the worst possible background, yet you still want to make the world a better place. I’d say that’s pretty remarkable.”
I gripped her ass and grinned up at her. “Every filthy rich person donates to charities. Tax advantages, angel.”
She rolled her eyes adorably.
“What am I going to do with you?” she asked in an exasperated voice.
“Kiss me,” I suggested hopefully.
The sensual smile that formed on her lips with just a hint of those dimples had my cock as hard as a pike in an instant.
“You’re impossible to resist, Cole Remington,” she said as she lowered her head.
I reached up and buried my fingers in her silky hair. “I don’t want you to be able to resist,” I replied right before I pulled her mouth down to mine.
Christ! I wanted this woman in a way I’d never wanted another female.
One kiss.
One sensual look.
One small inkling that she wanted me, too, and I was completely fucked.
It took less than two seconds for the sweet embrace to get heated.
We were both breathing hard by the time we came up for air.
Lauren swept the hair back from her face as she caught her breath. “Sometimes I don’t understand how any of this is happening,” she said as she looked down at me. “You’re the hottest man I’ve ever met, and you’re every woman’s fantasy, Cole. How is it possible that we’re here together right now?”
“I ask myself that question every single day, angel,” I answered huskily as I ran my hand down her back and cupped her gorgeous ass. “And I don’t give a shit about being every woman’s fantasy. I only care about being yours.”
She moved her hips against my hard cock restlessly. “I don’t even want to question it anymore,” she said in a shaky breath. “I just want you to take me to bed and teach me every dirty, beautiful, and pleasurable thing that I never knew that I was missing.”
Fucking hell!
She had no idea how much I wanted the same thing, but…
I took her face in my hands and forced her to meet my gaze. “Make sure that’s exactly what you want, angel. Once I’ve been inside your beautiful body, you’re going to be mine. There’s no going back for us.”
She shook her head. “I’m never going to want to go back.”
Okay, I was done.
Lauren and I had already had the sex talk, and I knew she’d been on birth control for years because of her previously heavy periods.
There wasn’t another damn thing we needed to say to each other about that.
I rose from the sofa, picked her up, and wrapped her legs around my waist.
The way she clung to me and panted next to my ear made my dick twitch impatiently.
But my cock would have to wait. Lauren had gone through her entire adult life without a satisfying sexual encounter.
I planned on making up for that lack of satisfaction.
I lowered her feet to the floor once we entered the master bedroom.
I yanked the sweatshirt over my head as I said to her impatiently, “Strip.”
If I took her clothes off, we were going to get to the main event a hell of a lot faster than I wanted.
I saw a brief moment of uncertainty on her face as I tossed my shirt on the floor.
“There’s not a fucking thing about your body that I don’t love,” I told her. “And I’ve felt up almost every inch of it.”
She nodded before her hands went to the hem of her sweater.
She lifted the garment without an ounce of hesitation, revealing one of the sexiest bras I’d ever seen.
Her sweater dropped on top of my sweatshirt, and I was mesmerized as I watched her boldly flip open the button of her jeans.
I removed my jeans and my boxer briefs, but my eyes never left Lauren as she slowly lowered the zipper of her jeans.
Watching her shimmy out of that denim was the hottest thing I’d ever observed in my entire life.
Especially when I saw that her barely there panties matched that sexy bra she was wearing.
She shrugged sheepishly as she reached for the front clasp of her bra. “I like pretty underwear. Especially now that I can afford the nicer stuff.”
Pretty?
The lingerie was a little more than just pretty.
The red scraps of lace and tantalizingly sheer fabric were cock-hardening fantasies.
I swallowed the damn lump that had formed in my throat as Lauren’s breasts were freed and she shook her arms out of that sexy bra.
Those breasts were a perfect handful, and her nipples were pert and an alluring, dusty shade of pink.
Everything about Lauren was perfect.
She was curvy and soft exactly where a woman should be curvy and soft.
“You’re fucking beautiful,” I growled before I ripped the covers back from the bed, picked her up, and almost tossed her onto the mattress.
Lauren ran her eyes over my body, and I saw her visibly swallow. “You’re…huge.”
I grinned as I got onto the bed and crawled toward her. “You’ll learn to appreciate that.”
I was a big guy, but not the kind of huge that women complained about because it caused them pain every time they had sex.
Lauren simply had nothing to compare me with, and I kind of liked that, if I were being honest.
“I’m not sure we’re going to fit,” she murmured.
“We’ll fit,” I said as I kissed the corner of her mouth. “You’ll be so damn ready that you’ll be willing to beg for my cock, beautiful.”
Hell, I promised myself then and there that I wouldn’t fuck her until she did exactly that because I’d know she was ready.
Lauren wound her arms around my neck and pulled me down for a real kiss.
The second she moaned against my lips, every damn thought flew out of my head except for my need to satisfy my woman.