Page 52

“I know.” She placed her finger on his lips. “You are a good man. Honest. Traditional. You fell in love as a teen with a dream. And your cousin fell in love with the same girl who became a woman. You’ve been running through women thinking that you can never love again, but I think you’re selling yourself short, Bodhi. I think that if Ashni and Beck broke up for good, you still wouldn’t make a move because she’s no longer the woman you want.”

“I haven’t let myself want her. That would be a betrayal to my cousin.”

“And to you.” She pressed her palm to his heart.

“I’m not going to fall in love, Nico.” His voice was as harsh as his breathing. She’d definitely gotten his attention. “I can’t. I won’t. This between us is a…”

“Game.” She stood on her toes and tilted her head so that their lips were a whisper apart. “A win-win for us both. I know. You get to help your granddad see that he can still have his future on the ranch with his grandsons as well as helping Beck finally grab his future with Ashni and settle on the ranch.” She pressed kisses along his chest, hardly believing her good luck in finding such a man, such an opportunity. “And I get a break from my past and a fun and sex-filled week of living in the moment.”

“I’m not sure I would have put it exactly like that,” Bodhi objected. “And I’m definitely getting those same things with you and more.”

“You don’t get to make the rules and define everyone’s perspective and experience.” She laughed. He frowned, and she soothed away the lines bracketing his mouth. “I just want you to have a take-away for yourself. You deserve that. Break the spell.”

“Damn, woman, you are wicked smart and so far out of my league.”

“Good thing we aren’t playing baseball.” She sealed her comment with a kiss.

She was nervous. He’d always initiated. She’d always let men initiate. But no more, she vowed. She was going to enjoy each moment with Bodhi. Save them. Take risks. Learn something about herself.

“You slay me,” he said minutes or hours later after they’d come up for air and both of them were breathing heavy, and she could feel that long, hard part of him lodged so close to where she wanted him. “I wish…I wish it were real.”

Did she too?

She didn’t dare let her mind go there. She wasn’t at all who he thought she was. He had a family he loved, sacrificed, and fought for. Her conscience led her to turn on hers. They’d turned on her too, but still. And if he knew what she’d help build over the years, the legacy of misery, death, and broken lives she was mired in with her family, he would be revolted and throw her off the ranch.

She closed her eyes and pressed her forehead against his and tangled her hands in his thick, wet, shaggy hair, holding him to her. He was an extraordinary man, beautiful inside and out. She wished she were only Nico Steel—none of the rest of her name and family legacy of misery and death.

“It can be as real as we want for this week,” she promised rashly. “It’s a game. We both play to win.”

“I want to be honest with you,” he said. “I’ve never had that with a woman. Never. Not even my mother.”

“Neither have I,” she admitted. “With anyone, so we probably should think of our safe word.”

“A safe word?” His humor was back on. “Likecrocodileorasparagus?”

It was such a serious moment. She wanted this so badly—the honesty, the connection, to belong—even as she was lying to him by omission about her name and life before. But still he made her laugh.

“Why asparagus?”

“It’s just such a random word. All of us were at a one-off Halloween haunted house one night up in Livingston with Ash and her cousin Reeva at a former grain silo that was being converted to a B& B and distilled spirits tasting room and restaurant. The code word to escape—meaning they’d stop scaring you and lead you to the closest exit—wasasparagus. Beck shouted it out in the second room, claiming it was for Ash, but she was pissed because they escorted both of them out. Bowen, Reeva and I finished and never let him live it down.”

“Asparagus it is then.” Nico kissed the slight cleft in his chin. “And let’s hope you and I can have the courage to not use it this week.”

*

So much forputting her hair up. Nico loved to swim. He had no idea she’d be so playful in the water. They raced, played tag, and kissed near the waterfall, taking turns warming up and dunking each other.

She floated alongside him, staring up at the dark blue sky not yet turning to twilight. Their fingers linked.

“This has been the best afternoon of my life,” she said softly.

It should have sounded like an exaggeration. And yet her words resonated.

“Competing and winning in a rodeo are definite highs in my life,” he said after a moment, “but spending this afternoon with you has been one of my top ones. Definite best with a woman.”

“We haven’t even had sex yet,” she scoffed.

Bodhi found that the words hurt, offended, especially when delivered in her pragmatic, just-the-facts tone.