CHAPTER ELEVEN
Evangeline
Our lips collide, Jonah’s hunger matching mine. All the yearning I’ve pushed back over the years explodes through me. I’m here with Jonah Cooper, and it couldn’t feel more right.
Holding my face bracketed in his hands, he looks into my eyes until I feel like he’s reading my very soul. “There you are,” he murmurs. “The Angel I’ve been waiting for.”
I swallow against the unexpected tightness in my throat. With my brothers, sometimes I haven’t always felt seen. But Jonah sees me. I feel like he’s stripped away the layers and still likes what he finds.
I wrap my arms around his neck, bury my face there, and hold on tight. He strokes my back, nuzzling with nose and lips along my forehead, my temple, behind my ears. Then the tenor of his touch shifts, becomes more purposeful, more arousing.
Sitting up, blanket around my shoulders, I straddle his hips.
With my hand under the thermal material, I find smooth skin and a sprinkling of hair over taut muscles.
He sits up, pulling off his shirt, then mine.
We both smell pretty earthy, but I don’t care.
I love the sensation of his calloused hands on my breasts.
He feasts, his mouth moving over my throat, my neck, the swell of my breasts. It feels like we’re swirling in a maelstrom of sensation. Hands, mouths, fingers all moving, tantalizing, soothing.
I slip my fingers through the hair on his chest, stroking the cleft of muscled pectorals. The hollow of his neck tastes salty. He tightens his hold and uses open-mouthed kisses to feast on my breasts while I grind against his impressive erection.
“Oh yeah,” I murmur, then shift to reach under the elastic waistband to take hold.
“Jesus,” he grinds out. “Keep doing that and I’ll come in about three strokes.”
“What’s wrong with that?” I ask innocently.
“Not gonna until you’re there too,” he murmurs. We get rid of the remainder of our clothing and he moves down my body, his eyes never leaving mine.
“Uh-uh, big boy. Not doing that when I’m going on day three without a shower.”
“I don’t mind.”
“I do.” I catch my breath when his fingers stroke through my slick folds. I’m so sensitized to his touch, like him, it’ll only take a few strokes and I’ll be there. “Oh my god, Jonah. You’re really good at this.”
He surges in my hand as I stroke him. Then he stills. “Fuck. I don’t have a condom.”
I can’t stop a giggle. “You’re finally where I want you and you have to go and be responsible again.”
“It’s not funny, woman. And don’t move,” he says sharply when I do just that. “I want to fuck you blind and I’m right on the razor edge of doing just that.”
All desire to laugh evaporates. “Oh my, yes, that sounds exactly right. You don’t have one in your wallet?”
“I stopped carrying around a condom years ago.” His voice sounds like gritty sandpaper.
All the while we’re talking his hand is moving, fingers stroking, winding me tighter.
“I’m on—” I break off when he dips a long finger inside me and every cell in my body focuses on the delicious sensation. “I’m on the pill,” I manage to get the words out. “And clean. I mean, I’m clean.”
He strokes again and I convulsively grip his erection, my thumb spreading the bead of moisture over the crown.
“I’m clean too.” He uses his bandaged hand to stop me from stroking him. “Are you sure?” he rasps.
“Yes. Absolutely. Very sure.” Am I being clear enough? I’m not sure because I can’t think.
“Thank god,” he growls.
Then he’s there, exactly where I want him. He thrusts, strong and deep, until he’s embedded to the hilt. He holds himself still, gaze locked on mine in the pearly light. “There’s no going back from this, Angel. It feels too right, we feel too right.”
“Love me, Jonah,” I murmur.
“Forever.”
He pulls back and I tilt up my hips, urging him to thrust deeper. He obliges, angling perfectly so he’s rubbing against my clit, over and over again until suddenly I’m there, soaring, spinning, spiraling until he follows with a harsh groan.
Jonah losing control is intoxicating. He collapses against me, face buried in my hair, and I have the pleasure of trailing my fingers along the ridges of his spine and over his butt.
We lie like that, enjoying the afterglow, until he rolls over, taking me with him so I’m lying on his chest. We’re still joined together, our legs tangled.
I push up and he brushes my hair back from my face.
“I love you, Angel.” The words are quiet, like the prelude to a song. “I’ve been carrying you inside me since our first kiss.”
My heart thunders in my ears. I kiss a corner of his mouth, then the other, then dead center, before pulling back a scant inch.
“I love you too, Jonah. I tried not to, but you wouldn’t let go of my heart.”
***
I follow Jonah along the path. I love the way he walks, his long, rangy body all loose-limbed and easy like an old-time cowboy. His duty belt hugs his hips and he wears the heavy pack like it weighs nothing, courtesy of exceptionally fine shoulders.
Okay, I’m head over heels and stupid with it. Another exceptional part of his anatomy? His butt.
“Did you know your butt is perfectly rounded for a man?”
He stops and turns back. “My butt is perfectly rounded? You’re checking me out when we’re supposed to be on the lookout for armed poachers?
If they cut down from Devil’s Canyon, they could be anywhere around here.
Get with the program, woman.” His voice is serious, but the up-tilted corner of his mouth gives him away.
“You’re distracting. Not my fault.”
He dips his head for a kiss, pauses, then kisses me again. I could do this all day. The sun is shining brilliantly, filtering through the aspen leaves overhead as if the weekend storm had never happened.
“What do you want to eat when we get back to the ranch?”
We’re walking side by side now and he gives me the side-eye. “Don’t even start with that. That protein bar tasted like cardboard. I don’t even know if it was digestible.”
“I’m going to ask Hayes to make tacos. And salsa. And a vat of guacamole. He makes the best tacos. God, I’m hungry.”
“You’re torturing me with thoughts of tacos.” After a moment, he says, “We should be meeting up with Team Two soon.” After hiking to the top of the slope behind the line shack, he’d managed to contact the command center, but hadn’t wanted to use the radio again to conserve its already low charge.
“You said Team One is heading for Devil’s Canyon. Are they looking for Abel and Denny?”
“Everyone’s looking for them. If they’re there, they’ll find them. They want to locate the bear trap. It’s a crime scene and needs to be processed.”
“With the weather we’ve had, I’ll be surprised if they can get much. Shell casings, maybe.”
He nods. “I forgot to mention, Brooks told my boss the horses made it to the ranch. Dusty has a cut on his flank, but otherwise they’re in good shape.”
That eases one worry.
There’d been no sign of Abel and Denny. They could be lying low, waiting for us to let down our guard. Or maybe they’ve given up and retreated off the mountain. Jonah is carrying the rifle and he has his sidearm, but I’ll be happy once we meet up with reinforcements.
We’re dropping in elevation and the temperature has warmed enough that I’ve stuffed my coat into my backpack.
We take a water break at the edge of a meadow sheened with the color of early wildflowers. Movement snags my attention and I grip Jonah’s arm.
He goes on alert. “What?”
“There’s something up ahead.”
With my hand in his, he pulls me off the trail. There’s not much cover and we crouch behind a fallen tree.
“It could be the team,” I say quietly, still searching for anything that doesn’t belong.
“Or it could be the assholes,” Jonah mutters.
“It was up there, near that boulder with a flat top.” I point across the meadow to where the trail winds around a cluster of boulders.
He hands me the rifle. “I’ll go check it out. Stay here.”
“If it’s Abel and Denny, they could shoot you.”
He palms his sidearm. “Not if I shoot them first.”