Chapter 32
Vivi perched cross-legged on the grass, glaring at a goat like it personally owed her enlightenment. This was her daily glow-up exercise—part meditation, part silent therapy, and apparently part standoff with barnyard livestock.
Her chest still throbbed from Boone's words—the ones that had landed so hard they’d left a dent.
She was hurt, sure. But mostly she was mad at herself because she'd barreled in without thinking, tangled herself in his world like an overzealous whirlwind and made his life harder than it already was.
She hadn't weighed the consequences before jumping in with both feet. She never did.
And now, sitting in a field with a goat staring her down like it knew all her sins, she realized she was the one who needed to forgive herself first.
She exhaled, imagined Boone's face—tight-shouldered, frustrated, impossibly gorgeous—and tried to let go of enough of it to get through five minutes of meditation without combusting.
She closed her eyes and tried to pretend the goat wasn't silently judging her.
Her thoughts drifted to him anyway, the way they always did now, uninvited and entirely too comfortable with the route.
The memory of his jaw tight with frustration made her chest ache—and her pulse do something completely unhelpful in her lower belly.
She imagined sliding into his arms, pressing a kiss to that jaw, the one that could scowl and melt her all at once.
Her hands rested on her knees, but she couldn't stop fidgeting, curling her fingers like she could will him closer. He'd been right to hold the line. She loved that about him—the steadiness, the refusal to let things slide just because it was easier.
The goat snorted.
Vivi smirked despite herself. Maybe meditation wasn't about inner peace so much as imagining setting fire to your problems—or the man responsible for most of them—in the most deliciously satisfying ways possible.
She opened her eyes, took a slow breath, and decided that tomorrow she was going to storm into his life, boots first, with her full glow-up power and a plan to set both of them on fire.
Plan decided, she snapped her lids shut, closing out the world, and muttered something that vaguely sounded like chanting while the goat bleated.
Suddenly, boots grinding gravel sounded and startled her right out of her trance.
"Jesus," she squeaked, scrambling and whipping around to find Boone standing behind her. She pressed a hand to her chest. "You can't sneak up on a woman doing her spiritual thing."
Boone raised a brow, hands on his hips, and looked her over the way he always did—like he was trying to decide whether she was a problem or a phenomenon.
"What the hell are you doing? And why does it look like you're trying to communicate with a goat?" he asked. “Neverminded, it probably has something to do with Glow time.”
"In fact, it is," she said. "Glow wanted me to do five minutes of meditation. If livestock interrupts, embrace the wisdom of barnyard Zen."
A rare grin spread across his face—the slow one that hit her somewhere below the ribs every single time—and she felt her resolve do something structurally unsound.
"Barnyard Zen," he repeated. "You're telling me you literally talk to goats for self-improvement?"
"Precisely. They're excellent listeners. Very nonjudgmental and highly skilled in patience."
The goat headbutted her mid-sentence, nearly knocking her sideways.
Boone released an unguarded laugh and stepped closer, hands shoved into his pockets, close enough that she caught the scent of him. Sun-warmed skin, a trace of soap, something underneath that was just undeniably him. Her chest did its usual idiotic thing.
"I'm sorry about last night," he said, and the laughter was gone. His voice dropped to something quieter. "About how I said what I said. The words—yeah, I meant them. But not the delivery. You didn't deserve that."
"Is that really how you feel or are you apologizing because Lady Rea made you?"
"Both," he said, closing the gap between them. "I love how passionate you are about things, Vivi. The way you throw yourself into the world—into people and ideas, into every corner of a place you were never supposed to stay. I wish I had that fire."
She let out a soft laugh, shaking her head. "Well, if you had my passion and I had your structure, we'd be the perfect person."
He tilted his head, that grin turning wicked. "Nah. A perfect person would be boring. Now, the perfect team? That’s something I could work with."
Her stomach did that ridiculous twisting thing, and she almost leaned forward just to see what he'd do.
"Team, huh?" She let her voice drop slightly. "You really think this team could handle a little chaos?"
His eyes darkened—that specific, devastating shift she'd catalogued more times than she'd admitted.
"Chaos? I think we could handle a hell of a lot more than that," he said, taking a seat on the grass beside her and folding his long legs to mirror her pose, which was both absurd and unbearably endearing. "I might even say I'd like a little chaos with you."
She swallowed hard. All her flirty confidence dissolved into something warmer and more frightening.
Bleat. Bleat. Bleat.
"The goat approves," she whispered.
"Goats or not," he said, letting his hand hover just near hers—close enough to feel without touching. "I think this glow-up exercise just got a lot more interesting."
For a moment the wind moved through the field, the sun dipped low, and the soft sounds of the ranch settled around them, and the world shrank down to exactly this—the two of them and the kind of crazy that made her pulse race instead of panic.
His hand brushed her cheek, just enough to send a spark crawling all the way down to her core.
"There's a rodeo in Springville this weekend," he said. "Thought maybe you'd like to come with me."
"The rodeo?" she asked, trying to keep the warmth out of her voice and failing completely.
"Thought I'd bring you into my world a little. Horses, bulls, dust and a hell of a lot of adrenaline." His mouth curved. "And all the romance you can handle."
She felt that flutter, that involuntary oh of realizing he wanted her there. Not just here, not just in his orbit by accident and rental agreement. There. In the thing that mattered most to him.
"Is this a date?"
"Well, I'm not asking you to go with me for a colonoscopy," he repeated her comment from the other day, and she laughed loud and real and didn't try to stop it.
"I guess I deserved that."
"You also deserved flowers for me being a dick last night," he said, eyes settling on hers with a steadiness that always made her feel like the only person in the world. "But my Nan once told me flowers die and Chanel bags last forever."
Vivi shook her head, smiling. "You don't take me for a Chanel kind of girl, do you?"
"Nope." His voice was certain and warm. "Memories last longer than flowers or handbags. So I figured a memory at the rodeo where we’re laughing, screaming at bulls, and getting into a little mayhem would be more our speed. Fun, messy, and completely unforgettable."
She bit her lip. A memory shared with him in the place he felt the most seen. She could feel the beginning of something real, the careful way he was letting her in, and the butterflies in her stomach were doing backflips.
"I'll go," she said. "I'll make a memory with you."
"So, you, me, and the rodeo?” he asked, tilting his head. "Think you can handle the rodeo champ that is Boone Callahan?"
"Are you really asking if I can handle a professional rider? Because I think we already established that I'm the pro in that arena."
He ran his palm up her thigh, stopping just shy of her core. “We did, didn’t we. Now I’m asking if you can do it in reverse.”
“I guess you’ll just have to wait and see.”
His hands slid to her hips and he lifted her like she was but a feather and placed her on his lap, so that she was straddling him. “Why wait?”
“A girl can’t give up all of her secrets.” But as she said it, she pushed down against his groin.
Boone groaned, arching up and the friction was incredible.
Boone’s hands cupped her face, thumbs brushing along her cheekbones and finally brushing it under her chin, tilting it back so he could plant gentle kisses along her jawline, then kissing her on the lips.
It was sexy and heartwarming and so damn perfect. Then he wrapped those arms around her and kissed her like it was the only thing that mattered in this moment. She would have believed him if he’d said he was trying to steal her soul.
He held her there, gently tracing the curve of her jaw with soft kisses. When he finally pulled back, Vivi couldn’t stop the teasing grin slipping across her face.
“Do you want to ride me, Boots?”
“Just a teaser,” she whispered.
“A teaser it is,” he murmured, pressing a trail of soft, possessive kisses along her jawline and neck. “I’d do anything to see you smile. Anything to keep you from crying again.”
Vivi’s breath hitched, heart hammering as she craned her neck, lips capturing his in a kiss that said everything she couldn’t voice. It was desperate in a wild way that was all hunger.
Boone groaned into her mouth, hands sliding up her thighs to her hips and pulling her impossibly close. He traced slow, purposeful patterns over her sides, her ribs, until he cupped her breasts, heat searing between them.
“You’re so perfect,” he rasped, lips grazing hers, teeth nipping gently.
She couldn’t resist teasing back, reaching up and threading her fingers into his hair. “Perfectly reckless?”
“Exactly,” he growled, sliding his hands lower, brushing the waistband of her shorts. “And yes. Very, very reckless.”
Her moan was a shiver against his chest, and she pressed closer, letting her own hands explore him, testing limits, teasing responses, learning every angle.
Boone slid his hands down her stomach, under the beltline of her yoga pants and beneath her thong. She gasped against his mouth, the tension building, heart and heat tangled into one as his fingers didn’t waste time touching and exploring.
She arched her back, angling her hips so that she achieved the maximum angle and connection.
And then she rode his hand hard—harder than she’d ever ridden a man before.
It bordered on pleasure and pain. So erotic and all-consuming she couldn’t think or process what was happening—she could only feel.
His hands. Oh, his hands. The way his thumb pressed against her pleasure point, his fingers swirled against her favorite spot. And then he hit them all at the exact moment and—bingo!
She fell into him fully, completely, letting the sun, the afternoon heat, and Boone take over every part of her that had been holding back.
She fell and she fell hard. She was just afraid she’d fallen too far to pick herself back up.