5. Chapter 5
Kayla
Caroline knows something is different.
We’re in her office at the lodge going over the corporate retreat schedule when she says, casually, without looking up from her laptop, “You seem different lately.”
“Different how?”
“Lighter.”
“I changed conditioners.”
She looks at me over the screen. “Kayla.”
“I’m fine. I’m good. The retreat schedule looks solid. Do you want the vendor confirmations by Thursday or Friday?”
“Thursday.” She closes the laptop. “How’s the housing search?”
“Ongoing.”
“You found something?”
“I found a temporary situation.”
“What kind of temporary situation?”
“The kind where I have a room and a bathroom and I’m not sleeping above a garage.”
Caroline watches me. She is doing the thing she does where she already knows more than she’s letting on and is giving me the opportunity to tell her myself.
“I’m staying at Ty Harlan’s ranch,” I say.
Her expression doesn’t change. “You’re staying at his ranch.”
“In a guest room. It’s temporary. He has space and I needed somewhere.”
Caroline nods slowly. “And I also heard something about you dating him now?”
“We’re...” I trail off. “It’s new.”
“Mm.”
“Don’t ‘mm’ me.”
She smiles. “Ty Harlan is a good man. Quiet. Reliable. He shows up to community events and doesn’t need his name on anything.”
“I know.”
“And he’s attractive.”
“I hadn’t noticed.”
“Kayla.”
“Fine. He’s attractive. Can we discuss vendor timelines now?”
“One more thing.”
I wait.
“If you need anything, you tell me. Not as your boss. As your friend.”
“I know. I appreciate it.”
“Good. Vendor timelines. Thursday.”
We go back to vendor timelines, but Caroline calling Ty a good man stays with me longer than it should.
Mostly because I agreed before I even thought about it.
Tuesday evening. I’m at the kitchen table with my laptop when my phone rings.
Not a text. A call. The number I stopped saving eight months ago.
Dylan.
I stare at the screen. He’s never called before. It’s always been texts. Careful, measured texts designed to sound casual while reminding me he still exists. A call is different. A call is escalation.
I decline it. I set the phone on the table. Thirty seconds later, it buzzes with a voicemail.
I don’t listen to it. I delete it.
My hands are steady. My heart rate is slightly elevated. This is not fear. This is annoyance. This is a man who will not accept no and I’m sick of it.
Ty comes in through the back door. He’s been at the barn. He sees my face.
“The ex?” he says.
“He called this time.”
Ty sets his gloves on the counter. He doesn’t move toward me. He doesn’t pick up my phone or ask what the voicemail said. He just stands there and waits.
“His name is Dylan,” I say. “We dated for a year and a half before I moved here.”
“Okay.”
“It wasn’t bad at first. He was attentive. Ambitious. He had opinions about things, which I liked because I have opinions about things and I thought we were compatible.”
Ty leans against the counter. He’s giving me his full attention.
“Over time, his opinions became expectations. Where I should work. Who I should see. How I should spend my time.”
Ty’s jaw shifts. “He tell you what job to take?”
“Among other things. He framed everything as planning our future, except somehow it was always his future.”
“What happened?”
“I moved to Montana.”
Ty nods.
“He didn’t handle it well. He thought I’d come back after a few months. When I didn’t, he started with the texts. Every few weeks. Nothing threatening. Just... persistent. Like if he’s patient enough, I’ll realize I made a mistake.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“The calling is new. That bothers me.”
Ty is quiet for a moment. “What do you want me to do?”
There it is. Not “I’ll handle it.” Not “give me his number.” Not “you should call the police.” What do you want me to do. Five words that give me the decision.
“Nothing,” I say. “I can handle it.”
“I know you can.”
“If it gets worse, I’ll tell you.”
“Okay.”
He pushes off the counter. He opens the fridge. “You eat yet?”
“No.”
“I’m making chili.”
“That sounds good.”
He starts pulling out ingredients. I watch him move around the kitchen, calm and unhurried, giving me exactly what I need, which is normalcy. No panic. No interrogation. Just chili.
“Ty?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you for asking what I wanted instead of deciding.”
He looks at me. Something crosses his face. “That shouldn’t be unusual.”
“It is for me.”
He holds my gaze for a second. Then he turns back to the stove. “It won’t be anymore.”
I believe him.
Friday. Caldwell invites us for another visit. Not dinner this time. Afternoon coffee on his porch. He wants to introduce Kayla to his housekeeper’s famous apple cake and talk more about the east acreage water management.
We drive over together. Ty’s hand finds my knee in the truck and stays there. I don’t move it. I don’t want to move it.
At Caldwell’s, the conversation is easy. I ask about Margaret. He shows me a photo from their mantelpiece. She had kind eyes and she was smiling at the camera like she knew something nobody else did.
“Fifty-two years,” Caldwell says. “And I’d do every one of them again.”
Ty’s hand is on my back. Not for Caldwell. Caldwell is in the kitchen getting more cake. Ty’s hand is on my back because he put it there.
I lean into it.
On the drive home, the sun is going down behind the mountains and the valley is gold and I am sitting in Ty Harlan’s truck with his hand on my knee and I am not pretending anything. That’s the problem. I stopped pretending days ago and I don’t know when it happened.
“That wasn’t fake,” I say.
He glances at me. “What wasn’t?”
“Today. None of it.”
He’s quiet. His thumb moves once against my knee.
“No,” he says. “It wasn’t.”
We drive the rest of the way in silence. The good kind.
At the house, we make dinner together. We’ve stopped discussing whose turn it is. We just cook. He does the protein. I do everything else. We move around each other in the kitchen like we’ve been doing it for years and it hasn’t even been three weeks.
After dinner, we’re on the couch. His arm is along the back behind me.
My legs are tucked up and my shoulder is against his side.
We’re watching another renovation show because I have educated him on the importance of television and he bought one three days ago without telling me.
I came home from work and there it was. Mounted on the wall.
He said “it was on sale” and I said “you bought a television because of me” and he said “I bought a television because you were right.”
I’ve been thinking about that for three days.
The show ends. The credits roll. The room goes dim.
I look at him. He’s already looking at me.
“Ty.”
“Yeah.”
“I want you to know that what I’m about to do has nothing to do with Caldwell.”
“Okay.”
“Or the arrangement.”
“Okay.”
“Or the house.”
“Kayla.”
“Yes?”
“Stop talking.”
I climb into his lap.
His hands go to my hips immediately. Like he’s been waiting. I put my hands on his chest and I can feel his heartbeat under my palms, steady and hard, and I kiss him.
His mouth opens against mine and his tongue meets mine and his hands tighten on my hips and I press myself against him and feel him getting hard beneath me. I roll my hips once. He groans. Low. The sound vibrates through his chest into my palms.
His hands slide to my thighs and I rock against him and we kiss until my lips are swollen and I’m breathing hard against his mouth.
His fingers find the button of my jeans.
He undoes it slowly, giving me time to stop him.
I don’t. His hand slides inside, under my panties, and his fingers find me soaking wet.
He groans against my mouth. “Fuck, Kayla.”
“Bedroom,” I say against his mouth.
He stands. He lifts me off the couch like I weigh nothing, my legs wrapping around him, and carries me down the hallway.
To his room. He kicks the door open and sets me down on his bed and stands over me and I look up at him in the dim light from the hallway and he looks like every fantasy I’ve been trying not to have since I moved in.
He pulls his shirt over his head. I take in his chest, his stomach, the breadth of his shoulders. I want my hands on every inch of him.
He comes down over me. He kisses me and his hand slides under my shirt and up my ribs and his palm is rough and warm and I arch into him. He pulls my shirt off. He looks at me.
“You’re beautiful,” he says.
“Don’t go soft on me.”
“I’m not soft.” He presses his hips against mine. He’s right. He’s not.
I laugh and he kisses the laugh off my mouth and his hand unclasps my bra and then his mouth is on my breast and I stop laughing. His tongue circles my nipple and I grip the back of his head and pull him closer.
He works his way down my body. Kissing my ribs, my stomach, the skin above my jeans. He pulls them off along with my panties and I am naked on Ty Harlan’s bed and he’s kneeling between my legs looking at me with an expression that makes my whole body flush.
“Ty.”
“Give me a minute.”
“To do what?”
“Look at you.”
“You’ve been looking at me for weeks.”
“Not like this.”
He puts his mouth on my inner thigh. Then higher.
His hands grip my hips and hold me still and his mouth finds me and I grab the sheets with both fists.
He’s slow. Thorough. His tongue traces me with a focus that makes me writhe against his mouth.
He slides two fingers inside me and I gasp and say his name and he doesn’t stop.
He pays attention to everything. When I arch, he follows.
When I pull his hair, he presses closer.
When my thighs start shaking, he wraps one arm across my hip and holds me down and works me until I come hard against his mouth, my back bowing off the bed, his name coming out of me like I’ve forgotten every other word.
He kisses back up my body. I reach for his belt. I undo it and push his jeans down and wrap my hand around him and he closes his eyes and exhales through his teeth.
“Lie back,” I say.
He looks at me.
“Lie back, Ty.”
He does. He lies on his back and I straddle him and his hands come to my hips and I can feel him hard against me, thick and hot, and I reach between us and guide him inside me.
I sink down slowly. His hands grip my hips hard enough to bruise and his head drops back against the pillow and the sound he makes is low and raw and it goes straight through me.
I start to move. Rolling my hips, finding a rhythm. His eyes are on me. Dark. Intense. He watches me ride him and his jaw is tight and his hands flex on my hips and I can see him holding onto his control with everything he has.
I want to break it.
I lean forward, my hands on his chest, and I change the angle and grind against him and his whole body tenses.
“Kayla.”
“Mm?”
“You’re pushing.”
“I know.”
I roll my hips again. Slow. Deliberate. His fingers dig into my thighs.
“Keep doing that and I’m going to take over,” he says. His voice is rough.
“Is that a threat?”
“It’s a promise.”
I lean down and kiss him and roll my hips one more time and something in him snaps.
He moves fast. His arm wraps around my waist and he flips me onto my back and he’s over me, between my legs, still inside me, and his hand pins my wrists above my head and he looks down at me.
“I warned you,” he says.
“You did.”
He starts to move. Hard. Deep. His free hand grips my thigh and hitches it higher and the angle makes me cry out. He doesn’t slow down. He thrusts into me with a controlled power that takes my breath away because this is the man underneath the quiet.
So this is what it feels like to be ridden by a Wylde Mountain cowboy.
God help me.
“You feel incredible,” he says against my neck. “You have no idea how much I’ve wanted this.”
“Tell me.”
“Since the Roundup. Since you walked up to me with that clipboard and told me what to do.” He thrusts harder. “I wanted you before I knew your name.”
I moan. His mouth is on my neck, my jaw, my ear.
“You’re mine,” he says. Low. Possessive. “Tell me you know that.”
Heat rolls through me. “I’m yours.”
He groans and picks up the pace and I wrap my legs around him and hold on.
His hand reaches between us and his thumb finds my clit and he works me while he fucks me and I am going to come again and I don’t care about anything except this man and his hands and his voice in my ear.
I moan with every thrust, gasping for air.
“That’s it,” he says. “That’s my good girl.”
I shatter. My back arches off the bed and I clench around him and he follows me over, driving deep one last time, his whole body rigid, my name on his lips.
We lie there. Breathing. His weight on me, heavy and warm. I don’t want him to move. My fingers trace lazy lines across his back and his face is pressed against my neck and I can feel his heartbeat slowing against my chest.
He pulls back enough to look at me. His eyes are soft now. The intensity is gone, replaced by something quieter.
He kisses my forehead. Then my mouth. Slow and gentle.
“Stay here tonight,” he says. “Not the guest room.”
“I wasn’t planning on moving.”
He rolls onto his back and pulls me against his side. I put my head on his chest and his arm comes around me and I listen to his heartbeat and feel his hand drawing slow circles on my shoulder.
“That wasn’t in the arrangement,” I say.
“No.”
“We’re really bad at the arrangement.”
His hand moves slowly over my shoulder. “I’m okay with that.”
I smile against his chest. “Me too.”
I close my eyes. His chest rises and falls under my cheek. His hand keeps moving on my shoulder.
I fall asleep in Ty Harlan’s bed and it is the easiest thing I’ve done since I moved to Wylde Mountain.
I wake up at six fifteen. The other side of the bed is empty.
For three seconds, I panic.
Then I smell coffee.
I get up. I pull on his T-shirt from last night because it’s right there and because I want to. I walk to the kitchen.
Ty is at the counter. Jeans. No shirt. Coffee made. He’s looking out the window at the cattle. He turns when he hears me.
His eyes move down my body. His shirt on me, hitting mid-thigh. My bare legs. My hair messed up from sleep and from him.
“Morning,” he says.
“Morning.”
He pushes the blue mug toward me. Full. The right amount of cream.
I take it. I turn toward the table and he catches my hip. He pulls me back against him, his chest against my back, and wraps one arm around my waist. His face drops against my hair and he breathes in and his hand slides down to my ass and squeezes once, slow and deliberate, before letting me go.
“Sit down,” he says. Like nothing happened. “Eggs in five.”
My legs are not entirely functional. I manage to sit at the table. He goes back to the stove.
No awkwardness. No retreat. Just coffee, eggs, and a man who apparently intends to keep touching me whenever he feels like it.
I am surprisingly okay with this development.