Page 8 of Horned to be Wild (Harmony Glen #7)

CHAPTER EIGHT

T orin strode home through the forest, his pace quickening with every step until he was practically running.

The cool evening air did nothing to calm the fire in his veins, the heat pulsing through him.

He could still feel the ghost of her lips on his, could smell her sweet scent clinging to his clothes.

His cock ached, straining against his jeans with an almost painful intensity.

What the hell had he been thinking? That moment of weakness, that moment of surrender, could have been catastrophic.

The way her body had felt against his, so soft and perfect, the way she’d responded so eagerly to his kiss, had nearly driven him to madness.

He’d wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life, his hunger unleashed like a starving animal finally offered sustenance.

He’d practically devoured her, and then… he’d run away like a coward.

She must be terrified. Repulsed.

I should go back and beg her forgiveness , he thought, then immediately rejected the idea. It would be better for both of them if he stayed as far away from her as possible. At least that way he couldn’t hurt her.

By the time he reached his cabin, the sun had set.

He slammed the door behind him and leaned heavily against it, his chest heaving as though he’d run for miles.

The image of her face, flushed and glowing, was seared into his memory.

He couldn’t erase it. He couldn’t forget the feel of her pressed against him, the taste of her lips on his.

He paced the confines of his cabin like a caged beast as the memory consumed him for the hundredth time.

Desperate to escape his guilt and his wildly circling thoughts, he stomped outside and switched on the lights under his woodshed and set to work.

He split logs until his muscles screamed and his palms were raw but the physical exhaustion wasn’t enough to calm his mind.

When the last of his logs were split and stacked, he sank onto a sawhorse and put his face in his hands.

“What was I thinking?” he asked Mabel.

The goat had come trotting back shortly after he returned, but instead of coming to his side as she usually did, she’d curled up outside the shed, watching him with what he could swear was a disapproving look.

“This is all your fault,” he told her now. “If you hadn’t gotten us tangled up, it never would have happened.”

Or would it? Would he still have kissed her? If she’d looked up at him with those wide, trusting eyes, would he have been able to resist her? He wasn’t sure. And that uncertainty terrified him.

He closed his eyes, remembering the softness of her lips, her eager enthusiasm, the way her curves had felt beneath his hands.

It had been like a dream. A perfect, impossible dream, and for a moment, he’d let himself believe it could be real.

That he could be wanted. That he could be enough for her.

But he knew better. Annette had taught him that. Allowing himself to forget that would only lead to heartbreak.

With a heavy heart, he stood up and went back inside, leaving the door open for Mabel to follow. Instead she trotted off to her pen.

He sighed and went to bed, hoping that he could find some solace in sleep. He didn’t. The memory of their encounter was on a permanent loop in his brain.

What would have happened if he hadn’t ended the kiss?

The image of his huge, rough hands on her creamy skin flashed through his mind and he groaned. He was far too big for her. Even if by some miracle she was willing, her soft little body couldn’t possibly take him. He couldn’t be with her. Couldn’t touch her.

That knowledge didn’t stop her from haunting his dreams. In his dreams, she welcomed his touch, arched against him, whispered his name with a breathless urgency that made him burn.

He kept waking up with her name on his lips and his cock aching.

He finally wrapped his hand around his shaft and brought himself to a swift, unsatisfactory climax, hoping it would help him regain control.

But his mind kept replaying the kiss over and over again and as soon as it did, he was immediately hard again.

By the time the sun rose, he was exhausted, and his cock still ached. An icy shower did little to cool the heat coursing through his veins, but he forced himself to get dressed, determined to bury himself in work again, to somehow purge her from his system.

When he opened his cabin door, he found Lila sitting in his rocking chair and the shock nearly stopped his heart.

She was holding a covered basket that filled the air with a mouth-watering scent, her hair tumbling in loose waves around her shoulders, and her eyes bright despite the early hour.

She looked entirely too cheerful, too composed—not at all like someone who’d been manhandled and then abandoned the day before.

“Good morning, grumpy!” she said cheerfully, a teasing glint in her eyes as she rose to her feet.

He stood frozen, one hand still on the door handle. He’d prepared himself for fear, for disgust, for awkward avoidance. This bright-eyed, smiling woman left him utterly bewildered.

“What are you doing here?”

“Waiting for you to wake up. I didn’t want to interrupt your rest.”

The words were innocent enough, but he suddenly felt exposed, as if she could see all those erotic dreams that had filled his sleep and could hear her crying out her name as he came.

“I need to work,” he growled, but she put her hand on his arm before he could move away.

“I know, that’s why I’m here.” She lifted the basket in her other hand. “And that’s why I brought you a bribe.”

“A bribe?”

He couldn’t keep up. He stared at her, searching for any sign of discomfort. There was none. If anything, she looked more relaxed in his presence than she had the previous day.

“I brought pancakes as a bribe because I need your expert advice on repairing my porch.”

A wave of relief washed through him, so profound it nearly buckled his knees. She wasn’t afraid. She wasn’t repulsed. She was here, standing on his porch, and looking at him with those warm brown eyes and offering him food.

“Hmph,” he grunted, the familiar sound now laced with something that might have been happiness. “Fine. But I get the first pancake.”

He reached for the basket, and as their fingers brushed, a small, almost imperceptible tremor ran through his hand. The brief contact sent a current of electricity through him, reigniting every sensation from their encounter the day before.

Her smile widened, and the knowing look in her eyes told him she’d felt it too.

He stepped aside to let her in, taking a deep breath of her tantalizing scent as she passed. He knew this was dangerous territory. Every instinct warned him to maintain his distance, to protect himself from the inevitable pain when she eventually tired of him.

But watching her move comfortably through his space, chattering about her plans for the cottage as she unpacked the still warm pancakes, he couldn’t bring himself to care. She looked as if she belonged here, in his cabin. In his life.

She joined him at his kitchen table with a pot of tea and an enormous platter of pancakes.

The first bite of pancake melted on his tongue, as sweet and perfect as the woman who’d made them.

As he watched her gesture animatedly about rotting porch boards, her eyes bright with plans and possibilities, he knew with absolute certainty that he was lost.

But for now, at least, he didn’t want to be found.