Chapter 4
four
Knox
I hold the binoculars to my eyes with my left hand, because I know for certain I will need to keep my right hand free.
Billie is down the mountain, in the paddock of her parents’ ranch, exercising a mare, a tan cowboy hat perched on her head.
She’s in those painted-on jeans and a sweaty white tank top, and it pains me that I’m not closer.
Right in front of her to memorize the luscious jiggle of her tits as she trots in an oval on the back of the horse, leather reins in her hands.
Hands that I can still feel curled in the front of my shirt.
The effect of her mouth, her touch, lingers two days later.
I can feel her nubile body against mine. The tremble of her breath and thighs. The innocent yet curious play of her tongue. The softness of her back as I stroked it. How she arched into me, letting the kiss overwhelm her. Trusting me to overwhelm her.
She wasn’t the only one who was overcome, though.
No, I could have lost myself in her indefinitely—and a slip-up like that would be unacceptable. I don’t carve out space in my life for other people.
Other people are the root cause of every misery I’ve ever experienced.
I was abandoned on a church doorstep as an infant.
Neglected in the system all throughout my youth.
Betrayed by so-called friends and locked up in prison for trusting the wrong people.
My so called “found family.” Five years in the pen only validated my disgust with humanity and I want no part in society any longer.
My solitude keeps me from getting hurt. Experiencing loss. Being disappointed in someone’s character when I mistakenly thought them to be worthy of trust.
Yet, even in the midst of my resolve, I crave her mouth again.
It’s an unending hunger.
I’ve been at this window so often jerking on my cock, I had to lay down a towel to soak up the abundance of spilled sperm.
And Jesus, here I go again, unbuttoning my jeans with a strangled grunt.
I press the binoculars to the window and watch her dismount the mare.
She takes off her cowboy hat and shakes out her loose hair, my dick swelling at the erotic sight of her, sweaty in the sunshine, the ripe slope of her tits glistening with light.
I moan into my closed mouth, remembering how she kissed so eagerly.
How her tongue tasted like strawberries.
How she mewled when she realized I had an erection for her.
God, I would love to go back in time and suck those nipples.
Their taste would be singular. Like nothing else on this planet. I know it in my bones.
You can do anything you want to me, if you cancel out the debt my parents owe on the ranch.
How did I manage to turn down that offer?
I still don’t know where I found the strength.
But I suspect it was my fight or flight instinct.
I can’t fight the way she…draws me so deeply. Infatuates me.
Therefore, I sent her running.
Two days later and the obsession has only deepened, however, instead of reversing itself. I never should have kissed her. Spoken to her. Smelled her. She’s gotten into my bloodstream now, and apart from bleeding myself dry, I don’t think I’ll get her out.
Take the offer.
Fuck the brat.
Scratch the itch before it drives you mad.
As I fog up the window with my pants of lust, my hand in a rigorous stroke of my shaft, I am no longer sure there is a choice. I need between those legs. I won’t be able to move on with my life until she’s been underneath me, scratching and screaming.
Until I know what she feels like on the inside.
My vision has doubled and blurred, due to my approaching climax, but it clears momentarily, and I see Billie, back in the saddle, riding her mare out of the paddock and into the surrounding meadow.
I also see the ranch hand who mounts a stallion, checking the surrounding area and over his shoulders, before following her.
Nope.
Absolutely fucking not.
When I jumped on my horse and raced down the mountain after Billie—and the stalking ranch hand—part of me already knew what I was going to find. What I would see when I reached them. But witnessing this man creeping up on her from behind, while she lies unsuspectingly among the wildflowers?
The scene turns my blood icy. And dangerous.
Billie lies on her back humming while the motherfucker dismounts without a sound, the fly of his jeans jutting out. He appears to have been driven mad by her appeal, just like me, his eyes unnaturally wide and unblinking as he prowls toward her in the high grass.
Is it possible that Billie knows the ranch hand is coming?
Have I stumbled upon a rendezvous?
My intuition says no. That she’s wildly unfamiliar with men. But the possibility makes my throat feel singed, as though I’ve swallowed a handful of fireplace embers.
Before he can come within ten feet of Billie, however, she jackknifes and turns around, her expression turning fearful.
Not a rendezvous.
I didn’t think so.
“What are you doing here?” Billie calls warily, and I watch as she slips that switchblade from her boot, keeping it out of sight. “Did you follow me?”
“No shit I followed you,” snaps the ranch hand, sweat pouring down the sides of his face. “You’ve got a few things coming,” he pushes through chattering teeth. “Get your jeans off, keep your mouth shut and I’ll be fast.”
She scuttles backward. “What? Why would I…”
“We all saw you go up the mountain yesterday. Came back all flushed. That mouth swollen from sucking something.” He shakes his head. “You were off limits before, but if you’re going to give it up to the landlord behind daddy’s back, you can give it up for me, too.”
“No!”
He lunges for her.
Billie takes a swipe with her switchblade and grazes his leg, but he snags her wrist to prevent her from doing any more damage—and fuck this, I’ve seen more than enough.
I step out from behind the tree, ordering my rage to quit storming long enough to keep my hand steady, and I put a bullet in the dead center of the ranch hand’s forehead.
Instantly blank, he falls sideways in the grass.
Billie cries out, her trembling hands instinctively lifting to swipe the blood spatter off her face, all while looking around for the source of the fired bullet.
When she sees me standing in the meadow beside my horse, she freezes.
Blinks twice. She stumbles to her feet on shaky legs and I burn to go assist her.
But I force myself to remain stationary.
Breathing in and out like a human being when the sight of her scared is unexpectedly turning me into an animal. A feral and possessive one.
I want to saw into the ranch hand with a serrated knife so he can never be identified.
He dared to touch what’s…
Don’t say ‘mine.’ Don’t you dare.
Billie is standing now, staring down at the body with a hand slapped over her mouth.
Moisture brims in her eyes, but she drops her hand away and takes deep gulps of air, visibly trying to gather her courage.
It occurs to me that she must be as terrified of me as she is of the ranch hand.
After all, I just executed him in cold blood.
I’ve revealed myself as a murderer. She’s probably going to turn tail and run screaming back to the ranch any second.
But then the strangest thing happens.
Something I don’t expect and ruins me on the spot.
She gulps a sob and runs to me, throwing herself against my body, her arms looping tight around my neck.
I don’t recognize the rush of chemicals inside of me.
They nearly knock me off my feet. I’ve never been hugged before in my life.
Not like this. In gratitude. In the pursuit of comfort.
I’m finding it very hard to breathe around the crush of my windpipe.
My arms lift and circle Billie, gathering her close, a cascade of gratification spilling down from the top of my head to the soles of my feet. Needing more, even more, I lift her off the ground and her legs perch on my hips, her face burrowing into my neck.
Oh God. It’s the most perfect feeling. Holding and comforting this girl.
“I didn’t…I didn’t think…” Billie sniffles. “He’s worked for us for years.”
Maybe I will give in to the impulse to carve the fucker up like a Thanksgiving turkey.
“You’ll never know every thought in a man’s head,” I say into her tumble of hair. “Remember that.”
“Especially not yours,” she whispers.
“Especially not mine.” I swallow the object in my throat, for some stupid reason feeling the need to add, gruffly, “But as mean as I am, I’d never cause you harm.”
She nods without hesitation. As if she already knew that.
How?
I don’t fucking know. But I need to experience more of her. I need more of this, despite the voice in the back of my head warning me to break my Billie habit before it’s too late. “Are you hurt?”
“No.” She lifts her head, studying me, her teary eyes causing me to bleed on the inside. “How did you know where to find me? How did you get here in time?”
“I was watching you from my window.”
“Oh.” She brings her gentle fingertips to the bristle of my beard and traces a path up my cheekbone. “Do you do that often?”
It’s the wrong time for my dick to stiffen into iron. There’s no stopping it, though. “Maybe,” I rasp. “I watch everything in my valley.”
She ducks her head, chewing her lip in clear disappointment.
I can’t have it.
“I have changed my mind about your proposition.”
Her chin shoots up, her searching gaze finding mine. “Y-you have?”
“Hmm.”
A corner of her lips ticks up. “I had a feeling you’d come around. There aren’t a lot of options ’round these parts.”