Chapter 25
LENNON
Amos blocked the doorway, his beefy arms crossed over his broad chest, his face impassive.
“Come on, Amos, don’t you think you’re taking this too far?” I wheedled. “We’re supposed to be doing a gymkhana out by the stables. Jeremiah is probably over there now.”
“Jeremiah told me to keep you here until he came and got you himself.” He eyed me suspiciously. “What kind of trouble have you gotten yourself into, city girl? You steal somethin’?”
“Do I really look like a thief to you?” I demanded.
“What’s that?” Amos placed one hand behind his ear and cocked his head like he was listening to someone. “The ancestors say yes.”
I pointed at him. “Rude, but fair.”
I sighed. I didn’t want to stay in the kitchen all day. Where was he?
After Jeremiah had found the most recent postcard in my bag and I had confessed to going to my cabin alone, he’d practically put me on house arrest. It had been less than twenty-four hours of this nonsense, and I was ready to find my stalker and turn myself in.
Maybe I’d be less cranky about it if his overprotectiveness extended to our sleeping arrangements, but noooo. The three locks on the door that separated his living quarters from the rest of the lodge were good enough. I had slept alone in Hannah’s room last night.
Apparently I want to fuck you, Lennon did not mean I want to fuck you right now.
Just as well, I supposed. How did one go about deflowering a man like Jeremiah, anyway?
I’d lost my virginity at sixteen to a senior I liked well enough, although we’d never seriously dated.
I was freshly emancipated and wanted to get it over with before my big move to New York.
Virginity didn’t seem like the kind of thing I wanted to drag around with me to photo shoots. I wanted to be an adult, not a kid.
Bishop had been nice enough. Mostly I remembered his Star Wars sheets and the Chewbacca poster on the ceiling above his bed that I’d stared at the entire time. It was like losing my virginity to a Wookiee.
Jeremiah deserved better than that.
Jeremiah deserved better than me.
I was a good person. I believed that. I didn’t lie, cheat, or steal. I never took my bad day out on strangers on the street, and berating waitstaff was as unthinkable to me as murder. I tied the weight of my soul to how I treated people, not the purity of my vagina.
But it didn’t matter if I was a good person, because my life was absolute shit.
For as long as I could remember, I had been on the run from something.
Mom’s handsy boyfriends, landlords with hidden cameras, photographers who promised the world if I took off my top.
And now I had run from Benny’s mess straight into my stalker’s trap.
What had I done to deserve that? Nothing. But Jeremiah didn’t deserve it, either.
He had waited thirty-eight years for this. He deserved to be with someone who wasn’t a walking disaster. Someone who would still be here after the first frost. Hell, why not shoot for the stars and make it someone unlikely to get him killed.
That someone wasn’t me.
I should walk away, but I wasn’t going to.
And miss seeing my carefully restrained cowboy come undone?
Hell, no. Every cell in my body longed for him.
Even my teeth ached from it. He was the first person to ever truly feel like mine, and I was going to hold on to him with both hands for as long as I could.
So maybe I wasn’t such a great person after all.
“I really think I could have survived the ten-minute walk from the lodge to the stables without being kidnapped or murdered,” I said.
“Only someone completely unhinged would think they could get away with attacking me in broad daylight with a whole team of Tier 1 operators running around. You didn’t have to come get me. ”
He shot me a look. “Stalkers don’t tend to be the most reasonable, rational people.
Both of those postcards came in the middle of the day, when we were right there and could have seen him.
He’s cocky. I don’t like that. He thinks he can get away with everything, and so far he’s been right. That makes him reckless and dangerous.”
Jeremiah didn’t hold my hand as we walked down the dirt path to the stables. Instead, he kept one hand resting lightly on the back of my arm, like he was afraid someone might snatch me up if he let his guard down for even a second.
“Anyway, if I hadn’t come to get you, I couldn’t do this.”
He pulled me against his side and lowered his mouth to mine.
It was the kind of kiss that was just a kiss.
A kiss that didn’t go anywhere. A kiss that didn’t ask for more.
The kind of kiss a husband greeted his wife with after a long day of work on all those happy family sitcoms from the 1950s.
The kind I had never experienced before in real life.
Strange to have it now, with a man I wasn’t even technically dating.
“If he’s so cocky and unhinged, what’s to stop him from doing something truly insane, like snatching me from my bed in the middle of the night?” I asked as we continued on.
“Nothing. That’s why you’re staying with me at the lodge.”
“Maybe I should stay in your room,” I suggested innocently. “Just in case.”
He raised a sardonic eyebrow at me. “No ulterior motive, Miss Graves? You’re not after my virtue, are you?”
I smacked his stomach. My hand practically bounced off his abdominal muscles. Jesus. He laughed at the look on my face.
“I am absolutely after your virtue, cowboy, and I’ll tell you why.” I stopped walking and tugged his arm until he did, too, and turned to face me. “Do you watch horror films?”
He shook his head.
“Well, I do. I love them. And one thing I’ve learned after literally dozens of slasher films is that virgins tend to survive the massacre.
The slut standing next to them is the one who dies first. That’s me.
” I pointed at my chest with both index fingers.
“I’m the slut standing next to the virgin.
And since I have no intention of ending my slutty ways, the only solution is for you to stop being a virgin. Fortunately, I’m here to help.”
For a moment he stared at me like I had lost my mind. Then he threw his head back with a howl of laughter. “Lennon,” he gasped. “Fuck.”
“Do you want me to die, Jeremiah? Because that’s what happens to sluts in slasher films.”
“You’re not going to die. I promise you, there’s no safer place for you to be than right by my side. And if you want to share my bed, all right. But I’m not rushing this.”
Shit. I was no better than a teenage boy pressuring his girlfriend, whining the whole time about not wanting to use a condom. “Right.” I bobbed my head excessively to make up for being a trash human. “Of course. Losing your virginity is a big deal. It should be special.”
“I told you. It’s special because it’s you. That’s all I need. If it were just about me, I’d take you up against this tree right now.”
I eyeballed the tree in question. It looked sturdy enough. “Then why are we waiting?”
He gave me a quizzical look, then dropped a kiss on my forehead. “I thought it was obvious, Lennon. I’m wooing you.”
The gymkhana was set up in the large arena off the main horse barn.
It was kind of like the field day we had in elementary school, except the games and races were played on horseback.
As I had now had a grand total of three riding lessons with Jeremiah, I did not expect to win.
But it looked like fun and I was down to try.
Jeremiah didn’t stick around for the event.
He turned me over to Liam and Holly like I was being sent to the principal’s office and disappeared with Mateo.
Whatever they were up to, it was about me.
That made me nervous. Benny’s problems had nothing to do with the stalker postcards, but I didn’t need federal agents and mafia kings added to the mix. One problem at a time.
I would rather have Jeremiah with me, but Liam was a close second. The man was built like a fortress. Nothing was getting past him. Despite his ocean-blue nail polish—courtesy of Blair—there was a mean grumpiness to him. I got the feeling he would enjoy a fight.
“We’ve got the egg race, the bucket race, and musical saddles.
” Liam took up a ridiculous amount of space with his legs akimbo and his arms loosely at his sides.
“Holly is going to be no more than two feet from you at any given time. She’ll be your shadow.
Even if someone managed to get past me—to be clear, they fucking won’t—she’ll be right there.
Nothing bad will happen to you on Holly’s watch. ”
Holly gave a toss of her black hair. Her smile reminded me of a serial killer. Not that I had ever met one in real life, but if I had, that was probably how they would smile at me right before they put the knife in my chest.
I turned back to Liam with a dubious look. “Has it occurred to you that Holly might be the bad that happens to me?”
He didn’t respond. His gaze was already tracking the field, searching for threats. Ignoring the one standing right next to me.
Holly grinned. “Come on, city girl. Are you ready to play?”
I spun back to Liam. “You heard that, right? That was clearly a threat.”
He gave the tiniest shake of his head.
I sighed and trudged forward.
Holly was going to kill me.