Chapter 19 #2
I turned back to the bed, rummaging through the clothes until I found the necklace he had picked out.
The black leather cord was softer than I remembered as I wrapped it around my neck, leaving the turquoise stone dangling between my breasts.
If he was concerned about the amount of cleavage my blouse had shown, this shirt was bound to make him feral.
Looking back in the mirror, I snagged my phone from my bed and posed in front of the mirror. I snapped a selfie and sent it to Gabe with a quick note about how much I was going to make him pay when I returned home.
His laughing emoji came through first, followed by a quick,
Gabe: You look good as a cowgirl. Tori wants to know if those are cat socks you’re wearing, and Reid wants to know if Hudson has a cowboy hat.
I laughed, my chest surprisingly light.
Liv: Yes, and yes. Tell Tori I’ll bring her some.
A text from Hudson flashed on my screen.
Woman
Blunt and enough to let me know he was tired of waiting on me.
Don’t be rude, I texted back before I told Gabe I’d talk to him later.
Hudson: Get your fucking ass out here. Is that better?
This man was going to be the death of me in more ways than one.
Liv: Watch the language.
Hudson: Wouldn’t want to turn you on and have to bend you over this fence before we leave… Wait, maybe I would.
Liv: You’re relentless.
Hudson: Only for you, honey.
That nickname made my hands go clammy, and I knew if I didn’t get out there, he’d mess me all up.
I put my phone in my back pocket, wondering when I started caring if an outfit like this got messed up—a week ago, I would have gladly dropped it in a mud puddle to avoid wearing it—and when I’d started carrying my phone in my pocket like I was just another person.
Not an Icinda who carried her phone in a two-thousand-dollar handbag.
My eyes flicked to my suitcase, where the clothes I’d brought still sat neatly laid out. An instinct to change, to put on my old skin and rebuild my walls, hammered at me. The phone pinged, and I took it out of my pocket.
Hudson: Do I need to start counting? If I have to come in there, I’m throwing you over the hood of my truck and having a treat before we leave.
I stared at his words, and the need to cling to them, to him, to the freedom he brought me pummeled the instinct to flee, and a laugh bubbled up my throat.
Liv: Don’t threaten me with something I might enjoy.
He sent me a devil emoji, and my laugh grew. I giggled the entire way down the stairs, tugged on my boots, and was still giggling when I ran out of the house. He was resting on the fence behind the barn, and I ran to him, feeling so free and weightless that I jumped into his arms.
“Whoa, didn’t know being laid out on the hood of my truck would turn you on that much,” he teased.
“You turn me on, Hudson. Everything you do and say and…”
He kissed me, holding on tight to me as my legs clung to his waist. That kiss was so much more than just a kiss. Laced with emotion that drilled its way into the deepest parts of me, it was a proclamation of his love for me. Of what we had and who we were together.
A tear slipped down my cheek, followed by another. I swore the damned things were out to torment me. I had gone for so long without them in my life, and now they wouldn’t stop.
Hudson pushed my face back and sat me on the fence, concern shadowing his eyes.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, wiping my tears away.
“I don’t know.” I rubbed my cheek, looking away from him. “I think my eyes are broken. They won’t stop leaking. I’m going to be a sappy mess for the rest of my life. How will I run business meetings if I’m crying in the middle of them?”
He tossed his head back and laughed before leaning it on mine. “I think that’s the least of your worries.”
Sniffing, I closed my eyes, letting his voice soothe me.
“What’s really wrong, Olivia?”
I fisted his shirt to bring him closer, fear building inside of me. “I don’t want this to end.”
He stepped between my legs and tipped my head up. “Then don’t let it. It doesn’t have to end, Olivia. I never said anything about this ending.” His brows scrunched. “You’re the one who keeps going back to it.” His thumb draped down my cheek, and I leaned into it.
Nodding, I smoothed his shirt out, enjoying the taut muscles below.
“Olivia.” I looked back up, meeting chestnut orbs that threatened to drown me with the expanse of emotion they held. “I won’t let you go this time.”
But he would because he had to. The truth was there in what he hadn’t said. That he would if I told him to.
Hands going to my waist, he lifted me from the fence and placed me on my feet.
“You look sexy as fuck.”
“Language,” I said with another sniff.
He dragged me to him, kissing a trail where my tears had been. “No more tears. No more thinking about what awaits on Monday. No more worries. Understand?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s go have some drinks, and you can remind me why we rarely went dancing when we were in school.”
“I don’t dance.”
“I know. You look like one of those toy monkeys with the cymbals when you dance.”
I shoved him, my mood lifting. “That’s not nice.”
“I know, but it’s the truth. Maybe I’ll just keep you in a corner so nobody can see how sexy you look. I thought that skirt you had on earlier was killer, but this is guaranteed to get me into a few fights.”
The masculine possessiveness should have ticked me off, but it sent a shiver through me that went all the way to my center, warming my belly.
He wrapped an arm around my neck, plucked his baseball cap off, and plopped it on my head.
“Hey, my hair!”
“Damn, that’s cute.”
I frowned, trying to pull it off. “I’m a thirty-seven-year-old woman, Hudson. I don’t wear baseball caps.”
“Maybe you should, cause you look sexy as fuck in my hat. I should put my cowboy hat on you, but if I did, we’d probably never leave because the idea of you in boots and my hat has me uncomfortably hard.”
I pushed him with my shoulder, but he didn’t loosen his hold on me.
“As a matter of fact.”
“Hudson,” I warned, but he had me hoisted over his shoulder before I could finish.
I was sure the hood of his truck still had my body print on it when we finally drove away from the ranch.