Chapter Nine
Ethan leaned over her and kissed her lips. She wrapped her arms around his neck and hooked her leg around his.
“I think it’s time for your surprise,” she said against his mouth.
He pulled back and looked at her. “It’s a good thing there’s a full moon.” He grinned.
She got to her feet and stood over him. He laced his hands behind his head and watched her, unhurried, giving her his full attention.
She slipped off her sandals one by one, then reached behind her and found the zipper. She grinned. “I hope you like it.”
“I already know I will.” His voice had dropped. “Don’t stop now, darlin’.”
She took a breath, then shimmied out of the dress and let it fall onto him. He moved it aside and looked up at her and went completely still.
She was wearing a lavender teddy, lace over her breasts, the rest of it silky and smooth against her skin, the moonlight catching every edge of it.
“Damn.” It came out quiet, like he hadn’t meant to say it out loud.
“You like?” She stepped back and turned a slow circle in the moonlight.
“Holy hell, Naomi.” He sat up. “Come here, baby.”
She straddled his lap and lowered herself onto him, then leaned down and caught his bottom lip between her teeth. He groaned low in his throat and raked his fingers through her hair, his other hand moving down her back until he stopped.
He pulled back and looked at her. “Are the snaps where I think they are?”
She bit her lip to keep from smiling. “Probably.” She moved his hand to between her thighs where the snaps were.
“Shit.” The word came out reverently.
He cupped her face in both hands and kissed her, deep and unhurried, while his other hand moved between her legs and found the first snap. Then the second. Then the third, each one deliberate and slow, like he had all the time in the world and intended to use it.
He could feel the heat of her against his palm and pulled back just enough to look at her.
He needed her more than he needed air.
Naomi slid down his legs, reached for the snap of his jeans, and unzipped the fly. He knew she could feel his hard cock straining his boxer briefs.
“Get a condom from my wallet,” he murmured against her lips.
She pulled his wallet from his back pocket and handed it to him. He opened it, removed a condom, and handed it to her. She took it, ripped it open with her teeth, then tugged his jeans and underwear down. His cock stood at attention.
“You have an amazing body, Ethan,” she said, her eyes moving over him slowly in the moonlight. Then she lowered her head and put her mouth over him, sucking until he arched his hips off the blanket. His fingers tightened in her hair as she worked him, and he bit down on a groan.
Ethan sat up, lifted her, and kissed her hard. “I want you to ride me.”
“Yes, I want that too.” She rolled the condom down over him, lifted her hips, and impaled herself onto him.
Once she settled they both went still for a few seconds, catching their breath, looking at each other in the moonlight.
Then she started to move. His hands went to her hips as he lay back down and watched her face, open and beautiful above him.
She tossed her head back and rode him hard.
Ethan sat up again, kissed her deep, then rolled her onto her back and settled between her thighs.
This time he didn’t take his time. He thrust into her, making her gasp, her legs wrapping tight around his waist as he drove them both toward the edge.
When they fell over together her scream echoed off the mountains and they both laughed, breathless and undone, the sound swallowed up by the wide Montana night.
He rolled to his side and pulled her against him, both of them breathing hard, staring up at the sky.
The stars hadn’t moved. The mountains hadn’t moved. The world had gone right on turning while they’d come apart up here on this rise and he found that quietly amusing.
She laughed softly beside him, like she was thinking the same thing.
“I scared the wildlife,” she said.
“You scared me a little too.”
She turned her head to look at him, and he looked back at her, her hair loose around her shoulders, her eyes bright in the moonlight, and he thought that he was so far gone it wasn’t worth pretending otherwise.
She reached up and touched his face, just briefly, her fingers tracing his jaw.
“I’m happy, Ethan,” she said simply.
He turned his head and pressed a kiss to her palm.
“Good,” he said. “Stay that way.”
She smiled, then looked back up at the stars and he did the same, her tucked against his side, the Montana night wide and quiet all around.
He thought about what he’d said to her on the sofa. That he was falling for her.
He was past falling.
He just wasn’t ready to say that out loud yet.
****
Naomi hadn’t lied to herself. She was happy.
Genuinely, quietly happy, unaware of what she was missing until now.
After her marriage fell apart, she decided she was done with love.
It cost too much and paid back too little.
She’d believed it right up until she couldn’t anymore.
She couldn’t imagine her life without Ethan now. It was that simple and that terrifying.
He shifted slightly beside her, and she raised up to look at him.
“Ready to head back?” he asked.
“Did you bring me up here for sex?” she teased.
“Yep.” He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear without apology. “Caught me.”
She laughed and he looked at her for a moment, his expression shifting into something quieter.
“Hey.” His thumb traced her cheek. “Stay with me tonight.”
She looked at him. “Are you sure?”
“I wouldn’t have asked otherwise.”
“What about the men seeing me leave in the morning?”
“They can get their own girl.” He chuckled when she laughed. “Besides, you can head over before anyone’s up. I’m awake by five.”
She looked at him in the moonlight, this careful, steady, impossibly handsome man who’d brought her wildflowers and driven her out under the stars and asked her to stay.
“Okay,” she said. “I’ll stay.”
After they both dressed he jumped down from the truck bed and held his arms up for her. She put her hands on his shoulders, and he lifted her down, setting her on her feet in the grass.
She thought it was the most romantic thing.
They folded the blanket together and he tossed it behind the seat, then helped her in and drove them back across the dark property toward the ranch. The lights of the barn came into view, and she watched them grow closer and felt nothing but content.
It was past eight. They had the whole night ahead of them.
She didn’t need anything elaborate. No more surprises, no more starlit hillsides. She just wanted to lie next to him in the dark and listen to him breathe and wake up beside him in the morning.
Sometimes that was everything.
Once they arrived at the house he parked, hopped out, and came around to her side. He opened the door and put out his hand. She placed hers in it, stepped down, and they walked to the back door together.
Inside he didn’t slow down.
“How about we just relax for the evening?” he asked over his shoulder.
“I’d like that.”
“Come on then.” He took her hand.
He led her from the kitchen, but she stopped in the doorway of the living room and forgot what she was going to say.
It was everything she’d imagined and more.
Log walls, warm and golden in the lamplight, a stone fireplace that ran floor to ceiling on the far wall with a heavy wood mantle above it.
Wide plank floors covered by a large woven rug in shades of rust and brown.
An overstuffed sofa faced the fireplace.
The furniture worn that meant they’d been sat in for years, bracketed by two recliners.
Bookshelves built into either side of the fireplace, packed full.
Antlers above the mantle, a few framed photographs she wanted to get closer to.
The whole room felt like him. Solid, unhurried, and exactly what it was supposed to be.
“Ethan.” She stepped inside slowly, turning to take it all in. “This is stunning.”
“It suits me.” He moved to the sofa and dropped onto it, stretching his long legs out, watching her look around with that quiet expression she was coming to love.
She crossed to the fireplace and looked at the photographs on the mantle. His brothers, younger, on horseback. His parents at what looked like a ranch celebration of some kind. A younger Ethan, maybe sixteen, holding a trophy almost as tall as he was, grinning in pride.
She picked it up. “Is this from barrel racing?”
“State championship,” he said it without pride, just fact.
She set it back carefully and turned to look at him on the sofa.
“I love your home,” she said simply.
He held out his hand.
She sat beside him, and he pulled her against his side, then reached for the remote.
“What do you want to watch?” he asked.
They found a movie and settled in, her tucked against his side, his arm around her. She made it through most of it before her eyes started losing the battle.
He must have noticed because he reached over, turned off the lamp, then stood and pulled her gently to her feet without a word. He led her down the hall to the bedroom, pulled the comforter back, and nodded for her to get in.
She stripped off her clothes and crawled into bed.
He climbed in beside her and wrapped his arms around her. She laid her head on his chest and listened to his heartbeat slow and steady beneath her ear.
Falling in love with him had been too easy.
****
Ethan entered the barn and headed toward the arena where he knew Naomi was training.
He heard her before he saw her.
Her voice, low and steady, talking the horse through something. He came to the arena doorway and stopped.
She had Vader moving through the pattern at a good clip, faster than last week, the gelding’s turns tightening up with every run.
She sat him beautifully, balanced, and quiet, her hands light on the reins.
The horse was starting to trust her. Ethan could see it by the way he moved, less tension in his neck, his ears relaxed and forward.