14. Three Days Until Bonding
Chapter fourteen
Three Days Until Bonding
Laurel
It was past midnight by the time Carrson got home last night. I woke up and checked the clock as he slipped into bed beside me. Then I rolled over, put my head on his chest, and let the steady beat of his heart pull me back under.
Now the morning sun brightens the room. I don’t want to get up. Sam and I stayed up discussing my predicament. We went round and round trying to find a solution.
There was none.
I peel back my eyelids to find Carrson’s side of the bed empty, but there’s a note waiting for me, folded in half and left on his pillow. I open it.
Kitten,
Didn’t want to wake you. I’m going to work out with some of the Brothers. Meet me at the stables at ten.
Carrson
PS You’re cute when you sleep.
I grin and hold the note to my chest, my cheeks warm from that last line. A quick dash downstairs to get breakfast, followed by a shower. has me ready to go by ten.
Sam pointed out the stables behind the main house yesterday, but we didn’t go inside. The smell of sun-warmed hay hits my nose as I enter, clean and earthy along with undertones of leather and horse.
Carrson stands with his back to me, his dark hair glinting in the shafts of light that stream through the large open wooden doors.
His sleeves are shoved to his elbows, and the muscles in his forearms shift as he works the brush down the flank of a massive black horse.
It’s so tall and broad through the chest that Carrson looks almost ordinary beside it.
The animal leans into his touch, whinnying softly while Carrson murmurs something too low for me to hear.
I stop just inside the doorway, watching him. Those hands have brandished a knife. They’ve carried me when I couldn’t walk and pulled me close when I was scared. Now one rests lightly against the horse’s side while the other moves in slow, patient strokes.
The sight stirs something in me. This gentleness he only trusts to show an animal and to me. Every time I think I’ve found the center of him, another part waits to be discovered, and I fall for him all over again.
One step farther into the stable and he hears me, turning so I see his profile. The angle of his nose. The way his hair curls at the nape of his neck.
I walk toward him, stopping a few feet away from the horse.
“I hope this one’s not mine,” I say.
“Why?” Carrson asks with an amused smirk. “You scared?”
I peer up at the beast. “If I have to use a ladder to get on him, probably not a good idea.”
“Come on now,” Carrson says in his soft Southern drawl. “He’s not so bad.” He waves me over with his free hand. “Meet Maximus. He’ll behave.”
“And you?”
“I make no promises.”
Carrson takes the brush and places it in my hand.
His fingers close over mine, turning my wrist until the bristles rest flat against Maximus’s side.
Then he steps in behind me, one hand guiding mine while the other settles lightly at my hip.
The horse’s flank is warm beneath the bristles, solid muscle shifting under short, sleek hair.
“Long strokes. Follow the direction of his coat,” Carrson says near my ear. “Not too fast. Let your hand do less.”
“That’s not usually your advice.”
A low laugh moves through his chest and straight into my spine. “Someone’s feisty this morning.”
He guides my hand down Maximus’s side. I lose track of the motion when Carrson inhales and his chest presses into my back, then eases away, leaving me suspended in the space between breaths.
The horse lowers his head and nickers, content.
“See?” Carrson says. “Maximus likes you.” His mouth finds the soft hollow below my ear. “I like you too.”
The brush stops mid-stroke as I tip my head back and lean into him. My blouse sits low on my shoulders, leaving the skin bare as he trails kisses down my neck.
“Mmm,” I whisper huskily. “The feeling’s mutual.”
I shift my hips back, pressing into the hard length of him that’s been building ever since he stepped behind me. Carrson lets out a groan that vibrates in my ear. Both his hands go to my waist, and he pulls me into him.
“Careful, mouse,” he says. “I may get distracted and forget why I brought you out here.”
“Why did you?” I ask, already breathless from his touch.
“I wanted to take you for a ride.” His teeth graze my ear, drawing a shiver from me.
“A ride?” I ask, giggling.
I yelp when his hand gives a light spank to my ass.
“Horses,” he says, but he’s laughing. “Not me.” Then his mouth is back at my ear as he whispers, “You can ride me later.”
The words send heat rushing through me, all the way to my fingertips.
Like I handed him the excuse he’s been waiting for, Carrson’s hand glides down my leg.
I’m wearing a skirt with sheer tights. He slips his hand under the hem and moves it between my legs, circling right where I’m already aching for him.
My legs go weak, overwhelmed by the sensation of his hot mouth moving down to my shoulder, the way his fingers find a rhythm that makes it hard to stay standing.
Within minutes, my body is vibrating, coiling, begging for release.
“Carrson,” I gasp his name, breathless. “I want to come.”
“Mmm.” Carrson runs his tongue over the lobe of my ear. “I think I can make that hap—”
A voice comes from behind us. “Mr. Ashford?”
We both freeze. Maximus gives an impatient toss of his head, as though he too has grown tired of being ignored.
Carrson lets out a low breath before stepping back.
I turn, my face burning.
A man in his fifties stands several feet away with a saddle thrown over one arm and an expression of determined professionalism that tells me he saw exactly enough to understand what he interrupted.
“Sorry,” he says, looking somewhere above my head. “Didn’t realize you were busy.”
Carrson reaches down for the brush, angling his body to hide the bulge in his pants. “You needed something?”
“Maximus should be saddled if you’re taking him out.” The man clears his throat. “And, ah, I brought a smaller horse for Miss Turner.”
Carrson glances at me, amusement alive in his eyes despite the color in his cheeks and neck. “Perfect. We’re ready to ride.”
He lets the last word linger just long enough that I know exactly what he means.
I pout and shove lightly at his arm, which only makes him laugh.
I step back while the men saddle and bridle the horses. Carrson doesn’t ask whether I know how to ride until he’s already bending in front of me, linking his fingers into a step.
“You do ride horses, don’t you?”
He asks as though it has just occurred to him that not everyone grew up with a stable behind the house.
“A little,” I say, thinking of summer camps with docile ponies and counselors who never let go of the reins as they led us around in slow circles.
I put my boot in his hands, and he hoists me up with ease. I swing my leg over my horse, a sleepy-looking mare with a coat the color of rust, then grab the pommel as I wobble in the seat.
Carrson grips my calf, steadying me. He mounts Maximus and moves several steps ahead, giving me room to follow. I shift in my saddle, unable to find a position that eases the lingering ache between my legs.
Carrson glances back over his shoulder and catches me. His smile turns wicked. “Enjoy the ride.” He winks.
He guides Maximus through the open stable doors, setting an easy pace that lets my mare fall in behind him.
We take a trail through the woods that curve along the lake, which is a dark mossy green on this November morning.
The farther we ride from the stables, the less I think about the ache Carrson left in my body.
The forest draws me in instead. Many trees have lost their leaves.
They crunch under our hooves, but the magnolia and the pine cling stubbornly to dark leaves and spiked needles, refusing to shed their winter coats.
After a while, the trail narrows into two ruts before disappearing altogether.
A branch snaps somewhere to my right.
I look just in time to see a dark shape slip between the trees, tall and narrow enough that my mind turns it into a man. For an instant, I catch what might be the hook of a nose in profile. Then the branches shift, breaking the outline apart.
“Carrson,” I call ahead. “Did you see that?”
“What?” His head swivels toward the trees, his hand going toward the dagger he always keeps strapped to the inside of his ankle, but the woods are empty now.
“Probably a deer,” I say.
Carrson watches for several more seconds before facing forward. Maximus continues walking, but one black ear remains angled toward the trees behind us.
I twist in my saddle, searching the shadows as we move away. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.” He tosses the words over his shoulder without looking back.
We ride deeper into the woods.
The first sign of anything man-made is a stone pillar half-swallowed by moss.
A second stands several yards away, leaning toward the first as though it’s tired.
Between them hangs the rusted skeleton of an iron gate, sagging open on broken hinges.
Pavers appear beneath the fallen leaves.
An old drive wide enough for carriages, though roots have shoved through and leaves have gathered in the low places.
Carrson slows Maximus while my mare trails him through the open gate.
Then the house comes into view.
It sits beyond a sweep of overgrown lawn, pale stone gone gray with rain and time. Even in ruin, it’s beautiful. Tall windows rise beneath a steep roofline. A wide porch curves across the front, its columns stained dark near the ground where moss has climbed over them.
Carrson turns in his saddle and watches my face. “Welcome home, Laurel.”