Resisting the Rancher (Redwood Falls 3)

When Janet got home, she was the proud owner of a six-month supply of birth control pills.

She’d already decided she wasn’t going to hide them from Jeff, or the fact that she was taking them. She did trust him, she supposed. He’d seemed sincere that he would always use a condom if she asked. And he’d been good about it since the night they’d been married and had had the scene.

But why take a chance? Condoms were known to split and she really, really did not want to get pregnant. Kids were hard to raise, and she was only now adjusting to having one of her own, and now suddenly, she had two.

Two kids were enough for any sane woman, or at least for her. Maybe she’d change her mind later if Jeff really wanted more children. But she wasn’t even close to that point yet.

That night, after she’d crawled under the covers, Jeff stood by the bed in nothing but briefs as he toweled his hair dry. He suddenly stopped the movement, an arrested look on his face. “What are those?”

She glanced to where he was looking at the top of her otherwise empty bedside table, where the small case of pills sat beside the lamp. “Oh. Birth control pills,” she said in a voice that implied he should have no issue with them.

“Birth control pills?” he parroted, looking directly at her.

“Yeah.”

His face got darker than dark. “When did we decide this?”

“I don’t guess ‘we’ did—I did. You don’t seem to like to use condoms, so why shouldn’t we try this?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” he drawled with a heat that said he wasn’t pleased. “Because it seems more permanent, maybe?”

“Permanent?” she laughed. “Permanent would be a vasectomy.”

His arms crossed over his chest as his mouth flattened—almost hysterically. “That will never happen.”

“Okay,” she agreed reasonably enough, shrugging her shoulders. “Hence the pills.”

“You should have asked me, Janet,” he reprimanded.

“Asked you?” She shook her head. “I don’t think so, Jeff.”

The lines around his mouth turned into brackets of anger. “This is something married people decide together and you not only didn’t ask me or even have the courtesy of telling me, but you lied about where you went today.”

She took exception to that. “I didn’t lie. I don’t lie. I went where I said I was going. But yes, I left off the fact that I was going to the clinic as well.”

“Why?”

“Because the fit you would have pitched would have been way worse than this, I just know it.”

He seemed to ignore that. “You don’t have to take them,” he announced flatly through gritted teeth.

“I’m going to take them because I don’t want to get pregnant anytime soon,” she enunciated clearly, refusing to back down.

His muscles seemed to tense up even more so. “I wish you wouldn’t.”

“How can you say that? Do you seriously want to keep using condoms? You get irritated every time, I can tell. And I’ve already explained. I’m not ready to have another child yet. We’ve got two already. We’re trying to blend our families and I think that’s enough to have on our plates for now, don’t you?”

Instead of answering her question, he continued to watch her with a dark, almost sinister stare. And then finally, he spoke, his tone grave. “You took one already?”

“Yes.”

“When does it start working?”

“The doctor said we should keep using condoms for seven days, just to be sure.”

“So, let me get this straight,” he said as he dropped the towel to the floor and shrugged off his briefs all in one smooth motion. “You want me to compromise?” he asked sarcastically, even as his erection pulsed and jumped in the air in an all too threatening manner.

As her words from earlier in the day came back to haunt her, she nodded her head as she tried to gauge his temperature. There was something in his speech and movements …

He stood perfectly still as his eyes ran up and down her body where it was hidden beneath the covers, his erection at full attention. “Okay, sweetheart,” he said so mildly that it almost scared her. “I’ll compromise,” he said as he reached down and swiped the covers away in less than a heartbeat, leaving her nudity for him to see. “You keep taking those little pills if it makes you happy.” Opening his bedside table drawer, with speedy motions, he removed a condom, tore open the package and rolled it down his length with a dexterity that left her breathless.

Her heart hammering, feeling like she was on full display, which she was, she reached down with one hand and slowly began tugging the sheet up.

He stopped her in an instant by gripping the material and jerking it from the bed entirely.

Her pulse shot into the stratosphere, from shock, nerves, and dammit, she had to admit, pure sweet lust. As he stared down at her with his full-blown hard-on and a ferocious frown etched between his brows, she slowly moved the pillow from behind her to clutch to her front, as if it could protect her in some way. Every move she made she made cautiously, like she was encountering an animal that scented prey.

He reached down and pulled the pillow away from her and tossed it across the room. And before she could even think about reaching for his pillow, he picked it up and threw it across the room as well.

She swallowed hard. “You’re really mad.”

“I am—but I know I shouldn’t be,” he surprised her by admitting. “But like I said, you keep taking those pills if it makes you happy and I’ll just keep taking what makes me happy.”

As he put one knee on the bed, she scooted farther up the bed, away from him. “Why are you being so unreasonable about this?”

“I’m being very reasonable. I’m compromising.”

“Why are you throwing that back in my face now?” As he put his other knee on the bed, Janet rolled in the opposite direction and planted her feet firmly on the floor, now standing with most of the bed between them. She didn’t particularly want to fight with him while she was stark naked, but it didn’t look like she was going to have much of a choice in the matter.

As he pierced her with his unrelenting gaze, she took a step backwards. “You’re a smart man, an extremely smart man. I can see it. I know you are. How can you justify being angry with me for not wanting to get pregnant so soon? We haven’t known each other long enough! We’ve been married less than a week! It’s insane.”

His features turned molten. His eyes darkened in a sinister way before he backed off the bed and stood to his feet—on the other side of the bed, thank goodness. But then he began pacing toward her, his erection jutting out forcefully and—she swallowed—exquisitely.

He rounded the end of the bed and continued his way toward her. The look on his face portended a blow-up and she tried with everything she had to stay focused on the fight they were having, even on the anxiety that was running down her spine. Because there wasn’t anything decent about wanting to jump the man’s bones when he was so pissed—pissed at her for a reason that was so unbelievable.

He continued his stride toward her as she continued to back up until her spine was

plastered to the sheetrock. He came to a halt directly in front of her, invading her personal space, a merciless look etched onto his features.

As his hands slammed onto the wall on either side of her head, her heart skipped a beat before it began going a mile a minute. She swallowed at the intimidation he exuded. He’d been provoked and he was mad, and she wasn’t all that thrilled either. But where the hell had her fear gone? She should be scared shitless, any normal woman would be, but for some crazy reason, she wasn’t. Maybe it was because she knew how this would end. She’d keep taking the pills, they would have off the charts, unbelievable sex, and even though he was about to rant and rave, she knew he wouldn’t hurt her.

She knew that to the bottom of her soul. So, she took a deep breath and tried to calm him down so they could get to the good stuff—the stuff that was making a trickle of liquid heat run down the inside of her thighs. “Tell me the truth,” she whispered. “What’s all this about? I know you can’t want a baby this soon.”

“You don’t know that,” he bit out as one hand left the wall and landed on her throat.

Her pulse skyrocketed. “You don’t know that at all,” he continued, his thumb pressing into her flesh. “Maybe I want another kid—maybe I don’t,” he said as he twisted his hand and began caressing her neck with the back of his fingers.

When she swallowed, he must have felt the telltale movement because his hand shifted once again and this time, he enclosed her neck with a move that screamed intimidation. Shit. Son-of-a-bitch. This was so not good. Of course, it felt good—it was addictive and exciting—that was part of the reason it wasn’t good. She shouldn’t be feeling these things.

Should she? Even if she trusted him?

And why did he feel the need to exert his dominance this way? And should she let him get away with it? If he were actually scaring her, she wouldn’t put up with this kind of bullshit for more than a few seconds. But he wasn’t scaring her, he was mostly intriguing her—and turning her on—which was so wrong—wasn’t it?

She licked her lips as she stared up into tortured eyes. Why was he so tortured? Why did it make her feel tortured as well? “What’s wrong?” she whispered, her hands going to his hips and holding him lightly while he continued to press against her neck firmly—but just short of impeding her oxygen intake. He knew he wasn’t hurting her and her heart did a tiny somersault. “Why, Jeff? Why are you so upset and what can I do to make you feel better?”