Chapter Six

“Meadow! Get. Out. Now!”

She jerked. Flailed with a splash.

Throwing a look at the shore, she saw him standing there, wide shoulders set in anger. His fists were curled at his sides.

She was really messing with him and she knew it.

She was playing with a loaded weapon.

Pushing off her toes on the sandy floor of the pond, she cut slowly toward shore.

Forest had sent him here, and it was hard not to think her big brother had done it for her.

He always talked about Colton, building him up to be this amazing specimen of a man and the best friend anyone could ever ask for.

One time, she asked him if he was trying to hook her up with Colton, but before he could answer, he had to rush off.

They never spoke again.

A glance at the man on the shore revealed that she wasn’t imagining the feel of his eyes on her. When she was swimming, she felt that dark, dark gaze caressing her body.

He hadn’t spoken a word to her—only watched.

Meadow had hopes that he’d join her in the pond. Sex in the water always looked so amazing in the movies, with the lovers’ arms locked around each other and their mouths melded in a never-ending kiss.

It would be the perfect place for her first time.

But he just watched.

It made her feel all tingly, knowing he was there. She felt sexy and womanly in ways she never did when other men looked at her.

She stopped in the water, knees bent so the ripples lapped at her throat.

“Meadow.” He bit off her name in that grating way that felt like a stroke over her skin. “What the hell are you doing?”

She raised a hand out of the water and slicked the wetness off her forehead. “Isn’t that obvious?”

“Get out of the water.”

A shiver coursed through her at the burning command in his tone.

She crossed her arms. “Make me.”

A challenge lived in his eyes, blazing hotter than the sun.

She resisted the urge to bite down on her lower lip. She spent so much time alone, interacting with her horses, that getting a rise from a human felt exhilarating.

He took a step toward the edge. “Quit acting bratty and listen to me.”

“You don’t hold rank over me on this ranch.”

When he sent her a long look, another shiver of delight brushed against her senses, along with a small quiver of apprehension. Push this man too far and he might stop talking to her altogether.

“If you insist.” Holding his stare, refusing to let him look away from the challenge she was throwing down, she emerged from the water. Her toes curled into the bank, and she walked out, not hiding a single inch of her body.

It was the first time she’d ever, ever showed a man her entire body.

Giving herself to one who didn’t want her made her fingers twitch to cover herself. She clenched her fists to keep from doing that.

When she walked up to Colton, his jaw was doing that tick thing again. The tendons looked about ready to snap.

He stared down at her, frozen. Only his eyes moved with something she couldn’t interpret.

“You should get in the water with me. Cool off.” Her voice didn’t sound like her own.

His eyes glittered like coal that would only get harder and harder and never turn into a diamond.

Without a word, he turned and walked away.

In a few steps, she caught up to him, threw her arms around his waist from behind, her cool, wet skin plastered to his broad back.

He stilled. Then in a swift move she never saw coming, he spun her around into his arms and dropped to the ground with her. Cradling her on the way down, he slammed his mouth over hers.

Her first taste of a real man stole her breath. She didn’t even think to act coy or seduce him—she gave up all control to him.

He plundered her, his hard mouth moving against hers before he swiped his tongue between her lips and took complete control.

Moaning, she opened to him, tasting desire and man and all the things she’d spent years aching for after a promise of saving herself when all she wanted was to feel this.

To feel loved.

Cherished.

Wanted.

His kisses set her on fire. In seconds, her body went from cool to blazing. When he skated a hand down her side, skimming over the curve of her breast, she writhed closer and gripped his shoulders.

Tearing from the kiss, he glared down into her eyes. “You don’t want this.”

“I do want this.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying, Meadow.”

“I want you, Colton.”

He let out a low growl that raised all the hair on her body with the primal sound of it. Then he cupped her breast, swiping his callused thumb across the tip until she cried out.

His lips hit her throat and moved downward, between her breasts. When he drew one into his scorching mouth, she arched. Ohhh, this was so good. Too good. She was going to climax just from his sucking. This was nothing at all like pleasuring herself in the dark of night under the sheets.

She cupped his head, moaning and rocking to get closer to him. Too soon, he ripped his mouth roughly off her breast, the sting just as much of a turn-on as the smacks he’d delivered to her ass last night.

Thrusting his hand between her legs, he cupped her bare pussy. She was already dripping wet for him. Her insides clenched.

Holding his stare, refusing to let him stop before he gave her what she wanted—needed—she whispered, “Please.”

“Fuck!” He stroked a fingertip over the seam of her pussy, burrowing through her sensitive folds, through the wetness until he reached her throbbing clit.

* * * * *

Colton swiped his fingertip across Meadow’s stiffened clit. Her body rolled upward, her hips rocking in the air with untamed desire.

Unable to tear his gaze away from her beautiful face, he strummed her clit again and again, driving her hard and fast toward the end she’d asked him to deliver.

She’d stripped away his control when she threw her naked body against his. The second he felt her body heat seeping through his clothes, and her shivering in his arms, he lost it.

This was the result.

He’d face the consequence later.

Her wide, unblinking eyes burned with passion she’d tamped down for too many years when she should have had a trail of partners she left in the dust before he came along.

He was not going to be her first—he was just going to make her come, then walk away.

Cock battering his fly, he circled his finger around and around her clit, pressing down before releasing and watching her pupils dilate wider.

She opened her mouth to say something, but he cut her off, slamming his mouth over hers and plunging his tongue inside.

He tasted her need. Hell, he smelled it. The honeyed scent mingled with the breath of mountain air and the earth he spread her out on.

Forcing his thigh between hers, he nudged her wider for him. She gasped into his mouth, but he wasn’t about to let up until she was shaking apart with his name on her lips.

Slowly, he dipped his finger inside her soaking wet opening to the first knuckle. She took him easy, so he slid it the rest of the way inside her tight sheath.

Fuck! His balls throbbed. He was going to blow just from fingering the woman like he had fingered his date in the back of his granddad’s minivan senior year of high school.

Her body tensed. Breaking the kiss, he searched her face and saw the strain in her features. When he lowered his mouth to her breast and took the sharp nipple into his mouth, she let out a rough cry.

Withdrawing his finger, he ground his thumb into her clit. Her body responded by flooding his hand with juices that he was damn well going to taste after he walked away from this.

That’s as far as I’ll go.

He told himself the same thing about the spanking—numerous times. Yet here he was, pushed to the limits, finger-fucking Forest’s little sister on the bank of a pond.

She arched her back, forcing her hardened nipple deeper into his mouth. He delivered a sucking pull followed by swipe of his tongue. At the same time, he slid his finger into her sweet pussy again.

A gasp escaped her. Then she stopped breathing.

With a pulse of her hips, she let go, mouth open on a silent cry, her eyes squeezed shut in the most beautiful display of pleasure Colton had ever seen in his whole goddamned life.

Her pussy walls clenched around his finger, and he couldn’t stop pounding into her while grinding her clit into her body, forcing more and more pleasure out of her.

He would wring out every last drop.

That would have to be enough.

When she collapsed to the ground, he released her straining nipple and withdrew his hand from between her legs.

Doing a pushup overtop her damn near stole the last remnant of his control, but somehow—somehow—he managed to shove to his feet.

She lay there panting, eyes wide and luminous, body twitching. Her skin wore the red marks of his roughness with her. Fact was, she probably didn’t even realize it.

Yet.

Once she went home and looked in the mirror, she’d see, and she would hate him.

He already hated himself.

Hands clenched into fists, he battled the urge to pull out his stiff cock and finish the job.

He could never sleep with her. This was the last time he’d ever lay a hand, tongue or any other body part on her.

He’d made a promise to his best friend to watch over Meadow. While he’d stretched the promise, and maybe skewed it a little, he wouldn’t violate it. This would have to be enough.

Walking away from that woman was one of the hardest things Colton had ever done in his life.