Chapter 12 #2
"Isn't it?" I stand up and he does too. I’ve got anger and hurt and want all tangled up in my chest until I can't tell them apart.
"You flirt, you charm, you bring me caramel apples and look at me like—like you want me—” Oh my gosh!
Did I just say that out loud? “—and then casually mention you'll be gone in a week? "
"Kinsley—"
"No." I step closer, his breathing shifts, and heat radiates off him. "I'm not some buckle bunny you can sweet-talk for a weekend. I'm not going to fall for your act just because—"
"Because what?" His voice is rough, demanding.
"Because I'm stupid enough to think this could be different, that I'm not just like every other woman to you.
" The admission tears out of me. The worst part is that I care what he thinks.
I shouldn't, but I do. I'm here for six months and then I'm moving on to my next client. His leaving shouldn't matter at all.
But it does. And I hate myself for it.
He narrows his eyes. "You think this is an act?"
"I think you've perfected the art of making a woman feel special right up until you ride off into the sunset." I wrap my arms around myself. "And I'm mad at myself for falling for it." I’m throwing all my mother’s damage at him, using her words like walls to keep him out.
"You're wrong." His hands come up to frame my face. "You're so dang wrong."
"Then what is this?" I whisper.
For a heartbeat, we just stand there, breathing hard, staring at each other like we're standing at the edge of a cliff.
"This," he says roughly, "is me losing my mind over a woman I can't stop thinking about."
His mouth crashes against mine, hard and desperate. This is pure need, raw and honest, and overwhelming. His hands gently tangle in my hair, tilting my head back so he can deepen the kiss, and I respond without thinking, my arms wrapping around his neck.
He tastes like sweet tea and promises, like everything I've been trying not to want.
When his tongue sweeps across my lower lip, I open for him with a sound that should embarrass me but doesn't—not when he groans low in his throat and presses me back against the kitchen counter.
The granite is cool against my back, but Wyatt is all heat and strength caging me in, while his mouth works magic against mine.
Every rational thought scatters like sparks off a forge.
I thought telling him about Ford would leave me raw, but his kiss is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.
My soul reaches for him. It’s unnerving how deep he has gotten, how far I’ve let him in already.
I have walls for good reasons, and he crashed right through them.
When we finally break apart, we stare at each other like we can't quite believe what just happened. I feel the unsteady beat of his heart where our chests are pressed together.
"That," he says roughly, "is what you do to me."
I'm dizzy and breathless and completely undone.
My lips feel swollen, my hair is a mess, and every inch of my skin is humming with awareness.
This is what I've been afraid of—this complete loss of control, this overwhelming need that makes me forget every lesson my mother ever taught me about protecting my heart.
But seeing the way he's looking at me like I'm necessary to him I can't force myself to care about the consequences.
"Wyatt," I whisper, and his name feels different on my lips now.
"Come with me," he says suddenly, his hands still framing my face like he's afraid I might disappear. "Next weekend. I've got a sponsorship event in Jackson Hole—private jet, fancy dinner, the whole deal. Come with me."
The invitation clamps around me, tight as a rope gone taut. Jackson Hole. Sponsorship events. His world.
"I can't," I say automatically, even as part of me wants to say yes more than I've ever wanted anything.
"Why not?"
"Because..." I struggle for words, for all the rational reasons this is a terrible idea. "Because I work for your family. Because it's complicated. Because I’m not impulsive. I don’t jet off for a weekend with a guy I just—."
"Kissed?"
“I was going to say met.”
He leans down and presses a kiss to my temple. The move is so achingly sweet my knees buckle. “I know you were.”
I shake my head because I’m not quite sure what to do with him.
"Come see my world," he says quietly. "Let me show you what it's really like. It's not all parties and belt buckles. There's business involved, strategy."
"This is crazy," I whisper.
"Yeah," he agrees, his smile soft and devastating. "It is."
I see my own want reflected in his eyes, see the same desperate need to hold onto this moment even though we both know it's dangerous.
He's offering me a chance to see what it would be like to be with him, to matter to him, to cross from ranch world to rodeo world and back again. He’s offering his world.
I'm going to say yes.
I shouldn’t. But we passed the wouldn’ts and the shouldn’ts with that kiss. For a heartbeat, I wonder if this is what addiction feels like—a wild, ferocious need for something you know isn’t good for you.
"When do we leave?"
His smile is two parts relief and one-part confident roughie that makes me want to kiss him again. "Friday."
And just like that, I've said yes to the cowboy, yes to the danger, yes to the kind of man who can destroy me.