Resisting the Rancher (Redwood Falls 3)

The strength of his hold was so exquisite she was practically melting under his sexual heat. But then, in a move that caught her off guard, he put one hand under her knees and the other behind her back and lifted her in his arms.

Balancing her, he began opening the front door, his intent unmistakable. “Wait,” she yelped, “the monitor.”

He bent down and she scooped it up, and that easily, he had her balanced again and within seconds they were inside and he was pacing toward his bedroom.

Once in his room, he shut the door with his foot and dropped her to his bed. As she scrambled to her knees, he went back to the door and twisted the lock before turning and facing her.

She balanced on the center of the bed with the monitor in her hands as he walked toward her. Without breaking stride, he took it from her fingers and set it on the chest of drawers. With that, he sat down on the bench at the end of his bed and began stripping off his boots and socks as if he fully expected her to stay exactly where he’d dumped her.

She stared at his back, unnerved, not knowing quite what to do. She wanted to be with him, and yet, there was just something so wrong about it all.

Without really thinking it through, she slid off the bed and began walking toward the door. He was on her in two seconds flat, grabbing her around the waist and lifting her off the floor, her back to his front.

He swiveled and dumped her on the bed again, snapping his fingers and pointing at her. “Stay there.”

Stay there? Stay there? Like a damn dog? “That’s romantic,” she bit out sarcastically, coming off the bed and heading toward the door once again. Holy hell, she didn’t know any other way to react. She wanted to be in his arms again, it wouldn’t take much to be wooed or sweet-talked into whatever the hell he wanted. But damn, he needed to try a little harder than, ‘stay there’.

In the process of unbuttoning his jeans, his head snapped up as she tried to pass him once more. His arm shot out and stopped her. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

“Listen here, Mr. McIntyre,” she drawled in her best Louisiana twang, “it takes two people to be in agreement before we do that,” she said, tipping her head to the bed.

“You think so?” he asked and waited, staring down with hot, molten eyes.

“Yes,” she answered, hoping against hope that he wouldn’t let her walk out of his room.

He retaliated by lifting her by the waist and tossing her on the bed again, for the third time. This time, he put a knee on the bed and hung over her, his hands planted on either side of her head, making her insides tremble. “Then you need to get agreeable real quick-like, got it?”

Waves of temptation rippled through her. She licked her lips and stared into his deeper-than-deep brown eyes as any and all will to fight him slipped away. She found it very difficult to speak as currents of sensation flooded her with liquid heat as her heart beat triple time. “But I’m not agreeable,” she whispered, biting her lip, knowing she was lying.

His eyes narrowed but his face remained otherwise impassive for the count of two seconds—right before his lips twisted into a wicked, knowing grin. “Yeah? I think you are agreeable.” One hand lifted, as he slowly and methodically began swiping a single finger over her bottom lip.

Fire raced from that point of contact, down to her breasts and all the way to the juncture of her thighs. She held his eyes and slowly shook her head, denying him yet again for the sheer thrill of it. And she was turned on by the cat-and-mouse aspect of it all, there was no denying that. If they were playing a game, then she was quite certain she’d never had this much fun in her life.

“No? Not agreeable yet?” His finger trailed down and came to the hem of her t-shirt. He began lifting it, ever so slowly. “Let’s give you a little time to ponder the situation. Don’t worry about what I’m doing. Just ignore everything else while you think about getting agreeable.” With that, he grasped her shirt with both hands and pulled it over her head, tossing it aside.

His eyes landed on the white cotton bra covering her breasts—and she knew if she was really going to stop this, then it had to be now. If she let this go any further and then tried to stop it, she’d be playing with fire—and playing unfair.

But she knew she couldn’t stop it yet—so that meant she wasn’t going to stop him at all.

Like a man on a mission, he lifted the shirt from his own shoulders and let it drop to the floor. Putting both knees on the mattress, he straddled her hips, one hand beside her head and the other going directly to the snap between her breasts.

When his hand landed there and began to twist, she reached up and covered his fingers with hers. “Jeff—” she whispered, sudden nerves jolting her.

With his name on her lips, he stilled. He retained hold of her bra, but his eyes lifted to hers, his breathing coming deep and ragged. His eyes glinted; his biceps tightened and then pulsed, reflecting the strain he was feeling. “What?” he bit out.

“I—” she paused, having no idea what to say.

When she couldn’t say any more, his hand left her bra and trailed up to her cheek. He cupped it, possessively yet tenderly. “There’s nothing to worry about. You won’t come to any grief in my bed. Nothing’s going to hurt you here, okay?”

She blinked up at him, her heart racing, wondering what the hell she was inviting into her life—and into the life of her child. “Okay,” she whispered.

Just as quickly as his hand had left her bra, he found it again, snapping it open. He spread the material wide, but his eyes held hers, deep pools of paradise she wanted to drown in. “Does that mean you’re agreeable?” he questioned, his tone halfway between teasing and deadly serious.

When she nodded her head, a flare of something hit his eyes, but she didn’t have time to analyze the look as his gaze left hers and dropped to her chest.

She was watching him when he saw her naked breasts for the first time. He inhaled a sharp breath as any residual hint of a smile dissolved. His mouth clamped shut as his jaw clenched. Flecks of red stroked across his cheekbones, his expression turning brutal. Brutal. His gaze became pointed, his nostrils flared as his lips flattened into a firm line. He bared his teeth and braced his body, as if he’d just experienced a vicious hit and was preparing for the next.

He reached down and swiped her right nipple, not just once but repeatedly, his thumb moving back and forth. She sucked in a breath as lights exploded in her head. When the small noise escaped her, his eyes flew up and found hers, holding them, not letting them go as his thumb continued the back and forth motion over her nipple that licked a trail of fire down her spine.

His look turned molten and scorched through her in an additional wave of heat. “You. Are. So. Fucking. Fine,” he bit out between gritted teeth.

She caught her lip between her teeth and tried to hold his eyes, but the intimacy of the moment was too much. Her eyes began to slip closed, and the second they did, he pinched her nipple, almost to the point of pain, and it caused an electric current that zapped from her nipple to the most intimate place between her thighs. “You’re so sweet, baby, let me see your eyes. Don’t close me out.”

Without waiting to see if she’d done as he’d bidden, he dropped his hands to her waist and began stripping the clothes from her lower half. Tossing them aside, he stood to his feet and stripped off his clothes as well, coming back to the bed with a prominent hard-on—a mean and angry-looking hard-on, and a quiver of panic assailed her. He was, indisputably, the largest man she’d ever seen.

Thick and long, his erection jutted out, nothing pretty and soothing about it. The man was on a mission to mate, and she was his target. He looked potent, for sure, and as she had the thought, she stiffened. “I don’t want to get pregnant,” she warned him again.

“You sure?”

She swallowed hard at his question and tried to force her legs together. He grabbed one knee and pried her legs apart. “Be still. I was teasing.” With that, he stroked a finger from her knee to her

ankle before turning away and walking into his bathroom.

He came back an instant later, stroking a condom down his length as he walked forward.

Janet held her breath and waited—halfway between scared shitless and thrilled to freaking death.

****

Prepared and more than ready, Jeff wasted not a second as he climbed on the bed and mounted her, spreading her legs wide and climbing between them. She was small and delicate underneath him, her skin white and pale, her feminine curls almost as golden as the hair on her head.

She was everything he’d ever fantasized about in a woman, and his head was banging a loud, vicious tattoo as it screamed at him to do it.

But he needed to make her come first—that was a given—and a fucking fantasy in itself.

Sliding down, on a mission to drive her wild, he wrapped his arms under her legs as he touched her intimately—on naked pink skin—for the first time. He spread her wide with his fingers, and looked his fill. She was small, even there, especially there, and she was a temptation he couldn’t resist.

He couldn’t go slowly.

He lowered his head and took a swipe with his tongue, and when she jerked off the bed, he held her down with one arm across her stomach. “Be still.”

He took another swipe and she jerked again, this time with an added moan that went straight to his head like a double shot of whiskey. His teeth landed on the tiniest, sexiest little clit known to man. He worked it with his teeth, and at the same exact moment that he slipped a finger inside, his hand on her stomach trailed up and he began a sensual assault on her nipple.

He would make her come—that’s the way it would be.