Chapter 10 Melody
Melody
The next day at the flower shop, I can’t stop smiling. A few of the customers pointed out how happy I look. And I am happy. Over-the-moon-can’t-believe-this-is-real happiness.
With the cowboy I thought I hated. Life sure is funny. My cell phone rings and I snatch it up, thinking it might be Jonas. It’s my sister Valentina, instead.
“What’s up?” I ask.
“Grandpa and I will be passing through Lucky River tomorrow and want to have lunch with you.”
“Sure. Let’s meet at Bear’s Diner.” I’m surprised she agrees to that since she’s a strictly five-star restaurant person. And her new husband is very image conscious to boot. He wouldn’t want her to be seen at a diner.
Unease works its way up my spine, but I dismiss it. Maybe my sister has just missed me and I’m reading too much into it. “I’ll bring Jonas with me. I want you to meet him,” I tell her.
“Who?”
“Jonas Richford. He’s my cowboy.” My forever.
“Okay.” She doesn’t sound enthusiastic, but I expected that. Out of all my sisters, Valentina was the one my mother lectured the most about the separation of classes. The haves versus the have-nots.
“Then I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I put the call from my mind and putter around the shop making flower arrangements until it’s time to close for the day. After I lock up and step out, I’m surprised to find Jonas waiting for me.
He has a big smile on his handsome face. “Marshall and Raven came home early because they missed the kids.”
I grin back at him. “Well, isn’t that interesting?”
He nods. “I figure it’s only polite to let them have some time alone as a family before we go over there and get our things.”
“You’re right. That is polite. I suppose you and I will have to find something to do.”
“Way ahead of you, honey.” He swings open the truck door. “Get in.”
I climb in and he drives us to his ranch. “We’re not going inside?” I ask after he parks and strides toward the barn.
“Nope, not yet.”
A young ranch hand leads two saddled horses over to us. “They’re ready to go.”
Jonas nods at him, then helps me up onto the horse. I’ve ridden plenty of times but can’t say I’ve taken to being on horseback the way Raven has.
We ride out with me following his lead. The sky is kind of overcast, a hint at the storm the weather forecaster warned is on the way tomorrow.
The rhythmic sway of my horse is oddly comforting. Or maybe it’s because I’m spending time with Jonas.
As we ride, I catch the scent of freshly cut grass. March is my favorite time of the year because I feel that this month signifies new beginnings right before summer brings the heat and the endless hot nights.
We pass a pasture with wildflowers growing along the fence line. The land appears to stretch out forever.
Finally, Jonas stops his horse and dismounts. I swing down from mine, nearly falling when I accidentally trap my foot in the stirrup.
Jonas catches me before I faceplant. “Look at me being graceful,” I joke. “I’m always the clumsy one.”
“No, you’re perfect,” he corrects gently.
I look deep into the eyes of my rugged, kind cowboy and wonder how I ever thought of him as arrogant.
“I brought you out here.” He sweeps his hand wide to indicate the land. “Because it’s my favorite place. I stood here as a teenager about a year after I came to live with the Richfords. It’s where I first began to dream that my future could be different than my past.”
“It’s beautiful. Very peaceful.”
“The only thing this land needs is you. Just like I do. Am I crazy for wondering if I asked you to marry me if you’d accept?”
The significance of his question doesn’t register for a second. Then my heart pounds. I thought this man was my adversary but I was so wrong.
Jonas mistakes my silence and steps closer to take my hand in his.
Vulnerability flashes in his eyes. “I understand your hesitation. I don’t know who my biological family is.
I don’t know if they’re good people or not.
I don’t know if health issues run in my family line.
I’ll never know any of that I’m a man with unknown DNA. ”
I shake my head. “Your DNA is this Texas land. It’s the Richfords. Nothing else matters.”
“Then…you’d say yes?”
“You didn’t ask.”
Still holding my hand, Jonas drops to one knee. “That day when I thought you were trying to steal my truck, my life shifted. I thought you were beautiful. I thought you were interesting and funny. You mesmerized me and I spent years trying not to fall for you.”
He pauses for a breath. “Then I realized I already did that on day one. You were trying to steal my truck but ended up with my heart. Will you keep it? Will you marry me and build a family and a future on this land?”
“I will. I so will,” I fling my arms around his neck, and he stands to swing me around. “And I don’t want to wait too long to get married, either. Enough years have already passed.”
“I know. I regret that,” Jonas says.
“Me, too.”
“Call me husband,” he says, kissing the side of my neck.
“Husband,” I say softly and he kisses my lips tenderly.
“Let’s ride back and tell the family, then move your stuff to our ranch,” he says.
“Hold on a second. We can tell the family, but we can’t move in together.”
He frowns. “Why not?”
“We can’t for-NI-cate before the wedding.”
He laughs his ass off at the reminder of the lecture he got from his former schoolteacher the day we met.
“I still have your handcuffs in the dash of my truck.” He’s still chuckling over the memory.
I pretend to be firm. “I’m serious, Jonas. If we don’t have sex until after the ceremony, that will make it special.”
“It’s already special.”
“I’ll be more special.”
“You’re fucking with me.”
“No, that’s precisely what I’m saying. I’m not fucking with you until after.”
He looks crestfallen and I can’t hold back my amusement any longer. “I’m kidding.”
“Well, that’s a relief. I thought I was going to blue ball it until the wedding.”
“I wouldn’t do that to you.” I glance at the front of his jeans. “I find your cock rather appealing.”
“Want him to come out and say hello?”
“We’ve already met and he talks a lot.” I laugh as I grip the saddle’s pommel and swing into the saddle. Then I nudge my horse around to head home.
Jonas easily catches up to me and smirks. “You liked everything he had to say, I remember that.”
I laugh again and we race back to the barn. The same ranch hand leads the horses away.
“I’ll call Marshall and tell him we’re on the way.” Jonas stops walking abruptly.
Marshall and Raven along with Jonas’s brother Kurt are waiting for us on the porch.
“Why didn’t you go on in?” Jonas asks.
“I wasn’t sure if Melody wanted her stuff left here or at her apartment in town.” Raven gives me a warm hug as she speaks.
“You can drop them here. But how did you know where I was?”
She grins at me. “I had a feeling. And I’ve been hoping I was right about something going on between the two of you.”
“Jonas proposed earlier.”
“He did?” Raven squeals with delight and hugs me again. “I’m so thrilled! He’s a good man just like mine.”
She looks over where Jonas is in conversation with his brothers as they unload the stuff. “Have you introduced him to your family yet?”
I hear the trepidation in her voice. She knows how my family feels about people they think aren’t on the same financial or societal level.
“Not yet, but I’m having lunch with Valentina and Grandpa tomorrow, so he’ll get to meet them when he joins us. He has to take care of some chores here first before he can meet me in town.”
I glance at Jonas and he smiles at me. Everyone around us fades away and it’s just the two of us.
“Honey,” Raven calls out,” we should go.”
Kurt frowns. “Why? They just got back. I thought we could have dinner together.”
“That, Mr. Clueless, is why Sunny isn’t your woman,” Marshall says.
“What?”
“They want to be alone,” Raven says.
“Jonas and Melody?” Kurt laughs, then looks at Jonas and stops laughing. “She’s serious?”
Jonas nods and puts his arm around my waist. “We’re getting married.”
“Never figured that would happen,” Kurt says, shaking his head like poor guy.
“I’ll call you later,” Raven says.
Jonas and I stand in the driveway until they’re out of sight, then he picks me up and tosses me over his shoulder.
“What is this?” I smack his shoulder and pretend to be outraged.
He slaps my ass. “I’m taking you inside so we can for-NI-cate.” He carries me into the bedroom and tosses me onto the bed.
I motion him forward. “Then leave your clothes on and fuck me.”
“Any way you want it.” Jonas unzips his jeans and pushes his underwear out of the way to free his bulging cock. Then he climbs onto the bed and pulls off my panties. “Sweet and gentle?”
“I want you to be quick and rough.”
He arches an eyebrow. “Whatever you say.”
In one swift move, he’s inside of me, filling me with his cock. I love the rough feel of his jeans on my thighs. I push my hands beneath his T-shirt to dig my nails into his back. “Harder. Make me scream,” I say.
Jonas reaches between us to take my clit between his fingers as he’s pumping me. With each forward rock of his hips, his fingers clench my bud. The sensation is powerful, overwhelming.
“You thought I was going to come first?” he whispers in my ear. “Not happening. You’re going to come and come again. Why? Because that turns me the fuck on.”
“I won’t,” I taunt. “I won’t let you make me come.”
“You can’t do that because you’re only fighting yourself. My cock feels good inside of you. Think about all those times before we were together that you wanted me between your legs.”
I get wetter and clench my teeth, trying to fight the sensations he’s giving my body.
“You wanted me to eat you the way I did. Didn’t you like feeling my tongue between your folds? I did. I liked how you tasted. I liked squeezing your ass. I’m going to take you like that again soon.”
“Please,” I whisper.
“I did, I will and I am. Pleasing you. Don’t fight it, honey. You know you won’t win against yourself. Give your body what it wants. Let your pussy have what it needs. I feel you tightening. You’re squeezing my cock like a good girl. There it is…come to me.”
I scream his name and claw at his back as I come. Jonas thrusts deeper and faster as he finds release then he shudders and collapses on me.
After a few minutes, I nudge him in the ribs and he rolls off to settle beside me. “Did I hurt you?”
I can barely move I’m so insanely satisfied but I shake my head. “No, I’m good.”
“Why’d you want it quick and rough?”
“I just wanted you to ravish me,” I say sheepishly. “Before we got together, there was one night that I saw you at Marshall’s place. The two of you had been out working and you were dusty and sweaty…your jeans were tight and it popped into my head…”
“What did?”
“What it would be like if you saw me and stormed over to me and just took me exactly as you were that day. I wanted a one-night stand. A steaming hot cowboy night with you.” I grin.
“So that’s been your fantasy for a while now, huh?”
“One of them,” I admit feeling suddenly shy.
“What’s another?”
“I can’t tell you that. It’s kind of wild and embarrasses me.”
“Nothing we do between us is embarrassing. You just tell me what you want when you’re ready to and I’ll bring it.”
“I will,” I promise, then bury my face against his warm chest. I love how strong, how solid he feels. I love how this cowboy turned my life upside down in the most perfect way. The cowboy night I wanted turned into a cowboy forever.