Page 39 of Wellspring
He tackled Erick back onto the ground and nuzzled below the collar of his shirt.
“Drives me crazy,” he murmured against Erick’s skin.
“Sleeves rolled down, shirt buttoned up, all prim and proper, when I know what’s hiding underneath.
” He popped the top two buttons and rubbed his face against the hair that covered Erick’s chest. Erick didn’t really understand the fascination, but Cade was clearly fascinated.
Erick caught the beaded braid that tickled his skin and gently tugged Cade up until he could claim his lips. “Not everyone turns golden in the sun as you do,” he countered, dropping kisses along Cade’s cheek until he reached his ear. “Staying covered is preferable to burning, no?”
“At least no one else gets to see you all unbuttoned and rolled up,” Cade growled when Erick nipped his ear.
Erick shuddered as the sound vibrated through Cade’s chest above him and spread his legs a little so Cade could settle between them.
He doubted the wisdom of disrobing completely out in the open like this, especially with the infernal bugs that had arrived with the summer heat, but even with layers of clothes between them, Cade’s weight pressing him into the ground made him hope he would eventually get his desire.
He ran his hands down the back of Cade’s shirt to his finely toned buttocks and grabbed hold. “No one but you.”
Cade kissed him, the deep, fierce kiss that felt as though he couldn’t get enough of Erick’s taste, and rocked his hips into Erick’s.
More than willing to take what Cade was giving, Erick gasped when Cade drew back.
“We should bank the fire and move this to the bedrolls,” Cade said, his voice sounding as ragged as Erick felt.
“Surely it is too warm to bury ourselves in bedding.” Perversely, Erick felt the loss of Cade’s warmth as he rose to his feet. “Perhaps we can arrange them side by side?”
Cade banked the fire quickly, so the embers would still be burning in the morning but without the risk of sparks, and turned to Erick. “I have a better idea.” He spread his bedroll out flat, making a bed large enough for two. “Let me have yours.”
When Erick handed it to him, he spread it on top of the first. “A little extra padding, just in case.”
Erick would take all the extra padding he could since he fully planned to feel Cade on top of him tonight.
He sat on the doubled bedroll and tugged off his boots.
That was as far as he planned to disrobe on his own—he’d leave the decision of how much more to take off to Cade.
Lying back, he folded his arms behind his head and smiled at Cade. “Let us practice, then.”
FOUR DAYS later, Cade found what he’d been searching for since they left Wellspring: hoofprints going away from the mess left by a full herd. “Here,” he called to Erick. “They went this way.”
Erick rode to where Cade had stopped Nahnia and peered at the ground before looking back at Cade. “What do you see that I do not?”
“Tracks,” Cade said. “Hoofprints leading away from the herd.” He pointed toward the bluffs that ran along the southern edge of Wellspring’s land.
“Those bluffs are treacherous, full of blind canyons and dry gullies that flood when we get a heavy rain. We generally don’t run cattle on that section of the ranch unless we have no other choice. ”
They also hid Cade’s favorite spot on the entire ranch. If his luck held, the missing cows had found the one watering hole in those hills. If not, they’d be finding carcasses instead.
“Could you not fence that section off?” Erick asked.
“I mean, I suppose we could, but it would be miles of fence line we’d then have to maintain. For the most part, the herd don’t wander that way because there’s not a lot of water, which means not a lot of grazing, but obviously the runaways weren’t that smart.”
It hadn’t rained recently, so the tracks could be anywhere from a few days to three weeks old, but Cade didn’t think Payne would have waited that long to send someone after the missing cows.
Not with everything going on with the JR. No tracker caught every sign, but Cade didn’t see anything to indicate the cows had been driven toward the bluffs—no horseshoe prints, nothing but cloven prints even outside the main trail, so a herd of mustangs (or band of Comanche) hadn’t come through to startle them either.
Whatever wild hair had gotten into the herd, Cade was pretty sure it was natural, not human.
The farther the trail led south, the more Cade’s anticipation grew.
If the tracks didn’t veer off, they would lead straight to the waterfall where he’d imagined taking Erick since the day they met.
He hadn’t dared to hope they’d get there so quickly, especially not with JR’s hands pressing them from all sides.
By late afternoon, Cade had stopped worrying about following the tracks and simply turned Nahnia toward the waterfall.
They’d find the cows on the way or they’d find them there, he was sure, because the tracks made a beeline for the bluff where he could see the occasional glisten of light off water.
“Do you see that?” he asked Erick, pointing toward the falls.
“We’ll make camp there tonight. The cattle should be there, but even if they aren’t for some reason, we can clean up a bit, refill our canteens, and rest before searching more. ”
“I will look forward to the rest,” Erick said. “Zephyr is not accustomed to such uneven ground. Perhaps one of the mustangs would have been less fractious, though I suppose it is best he become acclimated to it. He will not always be riding over flat rangeland.”
“For sure,” Cade said. “There’s more rough terrain than flat rangeland around here, with the bluffs in the south and the hill country to the west. And if you went southwest, you’d end up in the desert, so that’s not any better.”
“I have hopes I may prove myself worthy enough to accompany you on the drive to bring the herd to market,” Erick confessed. “I must demonstrate to Payne that I can do more than train horses.”
“He didn’t argue me bringing you with me on this roundup.” Much, Cade added silently. “You have almost three months to convince him. That shouldn’t be too hard.”
“So long as he continues to include me on the range rotation, I will improve. I have learned much from each of the hands I have shared shifts with. They each have such different backgrounds and skills, and are most generous to instruct me.”
They’d better have been sticking to the skills of a cowboy , Cade thought direly.
If any of them had tried to instruct him on anything more personal…
. Cade stopped himself. That thought wasn’t fair to Erick.
No, they hadn’t made any overt promises, but they spent every moment together they could, and that was all Cade could ask, given the rotations on the range that they couldn’t control.
“If you want, I could teach you how to use my bow.”
Erick smiled. “I doubt I could match your proficiency even with much practice, but perhaps you could share your skill with a whip? It was most useful in redirecting the runaways when we rode together.”
Cade set aside the image of pressing himself along Erick’s back to help him learn how to hold and draw the bow, for the moment anyway.
Maybe after the drive, when things were quieter and the weather kept the herd closer to home, he’d bring it back up.
But Erick was right. In the short term, learning to use the bullwhip would be more useful.
“When we get to the waterfall,” he suggested.
“You don’t want to clip Zephyr with it by mistake while you’re learning. ”
He shot Erick a mischievous grin. “Race you!”
Cade bent low over Nahnia’s neck and gave the pony his head, his hat falling off in the breeze of his pace, only its cord keeping it from flying away. Despite Zephyr’s longer stride, Cade pulled to a halt a length ahead of Erick, laughing.
“Considering you know this land and I do not, I am not certain that was a fair contest,” Erick protested, though his eyes were sparkling. “It is as well we did not wager on the result.”
Cade threw a leg over Nahnia’s neck, slid to the ground, and prowled toward Zephyr’s side, his eyes fixed on Erick’s face. He didn’t want to misread the situation and make Erick uncomfortable, but at the same time…. “What? You’d deny me a kiss for winning?”
Erick dismounted gracefully and raised a hand to cup Cade’s jaw. “I would never deny you a kiss.” He leaned forward to brush his mouth against Cade’s, and Cade couldn’t resist pulling him closer and sliding his tongue between Erick’s lips.
Heat rose between them as it always did the moment they touched, and Cade saw no reason to resist, running his hands down Erick’s back to cup his ass and snugging his leg up against Erick’s balls so he was riding Cade’s thigh.
He released Erick’s mouth to nip along his jaw toward his ear.
“Maybe more than just a kiss?” He nibbled on Erick’s earlobe.
“Perhaps after you demonstrate your prowess with the bullwhip, you could be persuaded to demonstrate your prowess in… other areas?” Erick was altogether too composed in Cade’s opinion, but they had only a few hours of daylight left, and they didn’t need the sun for the “other prowess” Erick was hinting at.
He stole another kiss before he stepped back, just to prove he could, intending to leave Erick as hopelessly turned on as Cade himself was, just from the kiss and the promise of things to come.
He turned back to Nahnia and grabbed his whip from the saddle.
Turning as he shook it out, he looked around the glen for suitable targets.
He couldn’t show off his skill without something to aim at.