Page 5 of Ash on the Range (Red Hart Ranch #6)

CASSIE

A callused hand cupped over my lower face, tugging me backwards, until I leaned into a hard frame I was starting to know well.

“Don’t wake her,” Will murmured. “She works hard, and I don’t think she’s had any help for a long time.

Travis isn’t good at any of the stuff she does, and the boys wouldn't have the first clue how to do what she does. Not that boys can’t do what she does, but…

not these boys, anyway. Eve is…kinda special.

” Will’s voice held a wistful note, and my stomach, that had knotted when he placed his hands on me, plummeted.

“I figured that.” I twisted in his hands, batting them away from my white knit. “How dirty are you, cowboy?” The moment the words fell out of my mouth, I heard the invitation in them.

So did Will.

He took a step forward, crowding me against the bench.

“You wanna say that again, Cassie?” he asked softly, not relinquishing his grip on my waist. His thumbs slipped beneath my knitted hoodie, tracing over the lace beneath.

Warmth met barely covered skin and heat rose in his gaze.

“Take this off for me later, before you go to bed.” It wasn’t a request.

I swallowed. “Alright.” My hands rested on his forearms, tracing the corded muscle there. “Is everyone coming in now?”

He didn’t move, resting his weight against my body, keeping his voice low. “Not just yet.” Those thumbs traced circles over the lace just above my hips. “I wanted to spend a few minutes with you first. It’ll cost me some hard work tomorrow, but you’re worth it.”

His mouth grazed mine before I could think, and then his kiss consumed me.

This was the cowboy I’d been infatuated with for the last week, the one who I'd run away with on the chance of freeing myself from my family and my brother’s overpowering reach.

The cowboy who placed me before anyone else.

For the first time in my life, someone wasn’t telling me who I was or what I needed to do, unless it was by my choice to be here.

And he was intoxicating.

Will’s mouth slanted over mine, his tongue brushing across my bottom lip, but mine were already parted on an easy sigh, granting him all the permission he would need.

And he took that, one hand rising to cup the back of my head as he pressed our bodies closer together.

My heart beat faster, my attention scattering as I sank into the sensation of kissing him back.

Even on our drive across states we took everything slow.

It was like being here brought an edge out in him I hadn’t seen since our first night together.

Even then we hadn’t done more than fool around.

Not that we had time before we were interrupted. But this?—

Will’s kiss was fire, consuming me. A soft breath left me as he squeezed me tight and then drew back, gliding his fingers through my hair.

“Hell, girl. If that’s how you kiss a cowboy, I swear I’ll do anything to come home to that every night,” he rasped.

Dark brown eyes bored into mine as I clung to his shirt. The thought that he was filthy and I was clean struck me, but I didn’t try to get away from him. Somehow, none of it mattered. All I wanted was him closer. I fiddled with the top button on his shirt, flicking at the edges.

A soft laugh tore from him. “Cassie.” His hand closed around mine, stopping the action. “Don’t tease me.”

I looked up at him through my lashes, my breaths fast and shallow. "Who's teasing?”

We never talked about sex, and we only ever took it slow. I didn’t know why. I got the impression that there was nothing virginal about the cute as sin cowboy who every girl at the rodeo loved because he had the looks and the manners to go with the whole package. Everything, except the money.

Good thing for me, that last part didn’t really matter.

I figured working for it mattered, and earning from the bottom up mattered.

And Will—he worked hard. I might be looking at life from a skewed lens, but even though I came from money, that funding wasn’t always as readily available to me as it seemed.

Will’s hands flexed on my hips. “If this was our place…” He licked his bottom lip, and I remembered the taste of him on my tongue. “Smaller, yeah?” He grinned, and I knew what he meant. Red Hart was grand. Too grand. This was a place to stay. Not make our own.

I offered him a shy smile as my legs shook a little. What started out as a simple tease—what he called me out on—fast turned into a deeper conversation. “Smaller is good,” I whispered. “Smaller is really good."

He watched me carefully. “Even for a rich girl?”

It was the first time he called me out on it. His thumbs never stopped their gentle massage, his touch reassuring. So many things had changed today and I wasn’t sure exactly what he was asking.

“I’m not the person you think I am.” I offered him instead a truth of my own, if ambiguous, wishing he’d place those addictive lips back on mine. My head swirled with need for him while wanting to walk away from the house and keep talking. Wishing we’d talked this way for the whole week.

What did we do for a week of travel? That’s right, we slept, curled in each other’s arms, talked of nothing and everything. All the inconsequential stuff. We built trust and for the first time, I felt less like someone’s possession, someone’s trophy, and just…

Was.

Besides Will, I was just there. And I liked being there with him. That’s what I wanted. What I wanted to keep happening. And in one short day, so much of that had changed.

And some of it hadn't.

“Kiss me?” I begged softly. So quiet that I wasn’t sure I spoke loud enough or even at all until his mouth covered mine in the sort of kiss that relocated entire mountain ranges in a heartbeat.

His arms wrapped around me, heedless of how filthy he was to my clean clothes, and when he drew back, I was no longer panicked or restless. My breaths came slow and even, and I rested in his arms, my body soft and languid.

“Better?” he asked, stroking my cheeks with both thumbs.

I nodded, not trusting myself to answer.

Voices filled the room, and the figure sleeping under the sofa shifted, yawning and stretching like I had done before Will walked in.

A moment before we were alone and then the house was full of rowdy voices and clattering feet.

Warm bodies filled the space that echoed minutes before—with my moans, my cheeks steaming to prove the point—as Will kissed me harshly once more and wrapped me against his body.

“Should I be concerned about the longevity of this hoodie?” I mumbled into his arm where I rested my head, watching ranch hands, a few I recognized from our arrival into Red Hart earlier in the day. One or two waved at me and I offered a tentative wave back, looking up at Will.

He watched me, and squeezed my waist. “You don’t need my permission for anything, Cassie.

Not unless you want it.” The squeeze became a pull back against him as his meaning altered a little.

I swallowed a nod to let him know I understood.

He kissed my temple. “You wanna sit down? I think some of Eve’s things are on the table. ”

“Actually, Cassie has been helping me out all afternoon.” Eve appeared magically before us, apparently completely refreshed though even I could see the worry lines that creased her forehead.

Will stiffened behind me, and I knew I wasn’t the only one to notice. “Did you? How’d you go?” Curiosity warred with a need to help in his voice, but eventually he leaned back against the bench, though his arms remained tight around my waist.

I didn’t mind that one bit.

“I was?—”

Terrible. I didn’t understand half of it. I can’t even work a simple job. My mouth parted on the first part of the confession, but Eve beat me to it.

“She’s a natural. Set up an extra spreadsheet, picked up mistakes I haven’t been able to see even though something had been bothering me and I knew it wasn’t right the whole time. Right, Cassie?” She smiled brightly at me, and it was like standing under a freaking spotlight.

I gaped at her in the same manner as a dying fish that flopped out of a fish tank with no hope of ever regaining water again, the opposite of the fish I drowned once in its own tank.

“Uh— sure?” I said weakly.

“I knew you’d fit right in here.” Will pressed his lips to my temple. “I need to help out. Can you grab the laptops and things? There’s an office somewhere…” He looked around and shrugged like one would appear on demand for him.

“I’ll show you.” Travis grabbed Eve by the shoulders, guiding her to the table under duress as Jude strode around the kitchen and pulled out a stack of plates. “We’ve got this.”

“What happened to ‘my kitchen, my rules’,” I asked as an older man with gray shot hair pressed a tumbler of what looked like whiskey into Eve’s hand.

“Thanks, Gage,” she murmured, shrugging helplessly at me. “I guess they’ve got it.”

“This way.” Travis handed me a laptop and charger stack, leading me behind the kitchen, past a second lounge area that overlooked the same view as my room.

“When Eve isn’t about, feel free to work in here.

I share the space, but usually I'm out on the land. Office work isn’t my favorite thing, unless I’m forced to do it.

” He grimaced, and pushed opened a cherrywood door.

The room inside was laid out in paneled wooden walls. A large desk occupied the main space, with several comfy looking chairs placed about it. A few leather bound ledgers sat on one corner., and old volumes with gold lettering filled a bookcase set against one wall.

“Travis, this is…”

“Old, and obsolete, I know.” Travis rubbed a hand over the back of his back. “I hate this room.”

I shook my head, barely daring to take a step inside.

Unlike the rest of the house with its hardwood sassafras flooring, this room was carpeted in a plush wool, so that every foot fall was muffled perfectly.

“No, this is stunning,” I whispered. “It’s the perfect workspace.

I know—” I took a deep breath. “I understand why you prefer to be outside. That is also stunning. But this room is glorious, Travis.”

He shook his head. “Well, it used to be my father’s. For now, it’s yours. Share it with Eve. Get what you need done. It will stop her from staying in the damn room of hers, cloistered away.”

I frowned. “She hides up there?”

Travis’ mouth snapped shut. “Help her anyway you can,” he said in a softer voice, though the tension in his shoulders basically left him vibrating.

The ranch owner turned on his heel and left me alone in the opulently appointed room that should have belonged to him, but didn’t.

And yet again I was left in a place that should have felt comfortable and luxurious for all its beautiful appointments…

But nothing did.

And just like before, it felt like for all Red Hart Ranch’s amazing outlooks that there was something terribly, horribly wrong with this place.