“Then why didn’t you come find me?”
“And say what? You took off in the middle of the night. You made it pretty clear that you wanted nothing more to do with me.”
“I was wrong. I was a dumb kid, and I was scared. I brought shame on my family, Colt. Everyone in town looked at me like I was worthless, and after I lost the baby, I couldn’t stand the pity in their eyes. ‘There goes Lemon Winchester. Such a shame that girl was so wild.’”
Colt shakes his head. “No one was looking at you like that, and even if they did. Who cares? Aren’t you the one who always told me just to let them talk, they didn’t matter?”
“I thought I wanted more for my life than just being some rancher’s wife. I just … I needed to get out. If I didn’t, I was going to get pregnant again, we’d be married, and I wanted more for my life than that.”
“You wanted more than just being my wife. Let’s be honest here.”
I shake my head. “I grew up the daughter of a third-generation rancher’s wife.”
“I know how you grew up,” he says through his teeth. “I was there for every goddamn step of the way … before you left me, that is.”
“That wasn’t my future. I needed to find myself. I needed to make my own mark on the world.”
“And how’s that working out for you, Lemonade?”
All the wind leaves my sails and I sigh. “Pretty terrible actually.”
“I woulda given you everything. If you’d told me that’s what you wanted, I would have followed you to New York and washed dishes to keep a roof over our heads while you went to art school, but you never gave me the chance.”
I swallow the lump in my throat. The idea of Colton Hayes living in New York is as unfamiliar as a fish out of water … it’s as foreign as me living in New York. I never belonged there. All the noise, the city lights, the confined apartments and traffic drove me mad, and still I stayed because I wasn’t sure I deserved this. I wasn’t sure I deserved to come home. Now I know there’s no place else where I’ll ever belong quite like Winchester Wild Ranch.
“I didn’t want another baby, Colt,” I blurt, and then I wet my lips and soften my tone, because I know this must be hard for him to hear. “Not then. I knew you’d want a whole football team of kids you could teach to ride and work the land. I didn’t know if I could give you that. I still don’t.” I swipe my tears away with the back of my hand.
His brow furrows and those deep gray eyes of his turn mercurial. “You left me because you thought you couldn’t get pregnant?”
I nod.
“Why the fuck wouldn’t you tell me that, Lemon?”
“I made a mistake.”
“You’re goddamn right, you did.” He rakes a hand through his hair and picks up the whiskey. “All this time, wasted, because you got it in your head that I wanted to use you like a brood mare. Is that what you thought of me?”
“Will you shut up and let me speak, please?”
He gives me a sidelong glance that says he’s losing his patience, but he nods and gestures with his whiskey that I should ‘take it away.’
“I screwed up. I didn’t know how to deal with everything that happened, with losing that little baby. I was scared and I ran, and this whole time I’ve been runnin’ in the wrong direction.”
“I don’t know if it’s the whiskey talking or the pollution you’ve been breathin’ livin’ in that big ’ole city that’s messed with your head, but I don’t know what the hell you’re getting’ at.”
“I’m sayin’ I still love you, Colton Hayes. Some days I hate you too, but for the most part my heart still beats for you, for only you.”
Colt’s lips turn up in a sneer and he crawls toward me, but I don’t budge. I ain’t afraid of him.
“You still love me?”
“Yep,” I whisper. “Pretty much that’s what I just said.”
“What about your life in New York?”
“I don’t have a life there. I never did.” I shrug. Ambrose has been holding down the fort just fine without me, and being here inspires me to paint like the city never could. “I always felt like I was walking in borrowed shoes. Ambrose can run the gallery for me, and I’ll send my paintings via courier if I have to. I don’t want to give up on something that I worked so hard for, but I also don’t want to be without you, Colt. I suppose the real question is—do you want me?”
“All the time.” He reaches out and draws me to him, pressing his body against mine. He’s hard all over and I’m no longer so worried about my panties being wet. “I want you all the goddamn time. There’s never been anyone else but you, Lemonade. There never will be anyone else but you.”
Colt lowers his head and leans in. His hand strokes the back of my neck while the other slides over my hip to cup my ass cheek. I smile because he always was an ass man. He presses his lips to mine and the second our mouths meet we both lose control. My hands are in his hair, he grabs the globes of my ass and squeezes. I moan as my fingers explore the hard planes of his muscled body. His hard-on pushes against my stomach and we fall back on the worn floorboards. I no longer care about the bed, or the fact that this cabin may not survive the storm. I only care about his hands on my body, his lips on mine, and him inside me.
I slip my hand into his boxers and take his heavy cock in my palm. He groans as I slide from base to tip. Colt makes light work of my bra, slipping it off and cupping my breasts in his huge palms. He pinches my nipples. Pleasure arcs through me. I grab the waistband of my panties, desperate to get them out of the way. But Colt places his hands over mine and pulls away from my lips. “When you give a gift to a man, Lemonade, at least give him a chance to unwrap it himself.”
I giggle and let my hands fall by my sides. He hooks his forefinger into the elastic and draws me closer. I stumble into him and Colt steadies me. Then he glides my panties over my hips and thighs, following them down. He lifts one ankle and slides the thin fabric off my heel, then follows suit with the other. I expect him to stand and lead me to the bed, but in one swift movement, he grabs hold of my ankle and throws it over his shoulder, burying his face in me.
I gasp and jerk back, but he holds me firm and pulls the other leg over his shoulder, stands, and shoves me up against the wall. The wood is rough and cold at my back, but it makes the warmth of his mouth and breath on me so much more potent. I slide my fingers through his hair as he eats me out. My whole world just explodes as he licks and sucks my clit, and then I come so hard I see stars.
With trembling limbs, I climb down with Colt’s help, and he has to hold me to keep me from toppling over because my legs have turned to Jell-O.
“You taste just as sweet as you always did, Lemonade.”
“And you kiss even better than I remembered,” I whisper breathlessly, and I try hard not to think about all of the women he might’ve practiced on since he first went down on me. Daisy-Mae said he didn’t date, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t find solace with other women, just like I tried to with Stavros.
“Shit.”
“What?”