Page 49 of Texas Kissing

He began to wind the rope around his hands.

I opened my mouth to speak, but his voice came like a bullwhip. “Don’t you say a fucking word,” he commanded.

I shut my mouth.

He took up the slack and kept winding the rope. I began to slide on my ass across the hay.

“You goddamn, over-thinking, Gucci-wearing, latte-drinking city folk,” he muttered.

My feet met his. I stared up at him and he glared down at me.

“Bull—” I started.

“Shut up.”

“Bull—”

“Quiet!”

“B—”

“You say one more thing and I swear I’ll take you over my knee.”

I went quiet. A dark heat rippled outward from my groin.

He crouched down by my feet, the muscles of his legs bulging. He looked even bigger, looking up at him like this. “Now for once in your life, Lily, shut up and listen.”

“But I—”

“It ain’t all about you!”

We stared at each other.I completely underestimated him,I realized. This man was an unstoppable force...and I’d tried to control him, to put him in a convenient little box. For the first time, I saw how frustrated he was. Not just about the sex but on a much deeper level.

“What happened to that guy I met in Lucky Pete’s?” I asked. “The one who just wanted to fuck me?”

“He stepped out,” Bull growled.

We stared into each other’s eyes and something about the way he was looking at me made my heart lift and pull like a balloon that wants to be released. I felt my eyes grow moist.

“You’reBull,”I protested. “You’re not meant to—You shouldn’t be falling for anyone!”

“Yeah, well, I never met anyone like you,” he muttered.

The barn was incredibly still. I could feel the words bunched up inside me, jostling for space, eager to come out...but releasing them was the hardest thing imaginable. “I think...I’m falling for you, too,” I said at last. And that admission changed everything. It reverberated through me, leaving me humming like a tuning fork. My resistance began to crumble.

Bull’s hands slackened on the rope. “There,” he said. “That wasn’t so fucking difficult, was it?”

I put my hands to my face and shook my head. “I don’t deserve this. I don’t deserve...you.”

“Well now you’re just being dumb.” He hunkered down further and stared right into my eyes. “I’ll tell you what you deserve, Lily, and it’s a goddamn prince in a fairytale castle.” His voice softened. “But will you settle for me?”

I nodded, choking up a little. I was just starting to realize what an idiot I’d been. And how much I’d been denying myself any chance at happiness, ever since Annette died. “Sorry,” I said quietly. I don’t think I’ve ever communicated as much in two syllables as with that word.

He leaned down and brushed my hair from my cheek with a finger. “I’m sure we can figure out a way to punish you.” His smirk had come back and I felt myheart lift and tug, rising a little higher as I relaxed. It felt incredible. I shifted a little and the rope rasped at my bare ankles. I really was tightly bound.

Helpless.

He reached down to the rope, his big hands warm on my bare skin. I drew in my breath.