Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 83379 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 417(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 83379 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 417(@200wpm)___ 334(@250wpm)___ 278(@300wpm)
“No, it’s okay. Good question.” I pulled my feet from the water and moved back from the edge. Julian followed suit. “I don’t think either of us knows the answer, and we haven’t discussed it. It’s never really come up. But if she met someone or wanted out, we’d figure it out.”
“And if you did?”
“This is land I inherited from my family. I don’t want out.”
He gave me a pointed look. “I meant if you met someone.”
“That won’t happen,” I said without any forethought. It was something I’d never allowed myself to consider, other than this short-lived daydream with Julian.
He scoffed. “Why can’t you aspire to more?”
My gaze shot toward the fence dividing us from the ranch. “Not sure how that would go over.”
“But this is your life to live. Shouldn’t you make it your own?” he said with a good amount of conviction. “You already pissed off your family, so why not go all the way?”
I laughed, then sobered as our eyes met and held.
Even on my farm we were still in the open, even though my property was considered the outskirts of the ranch. Anyone could stand on one of the higher ridges and spot us from a distance. But I also desperately wanted to throw caution to the wind. It was one of many reasons I’d wanted us to get away.
“Julian.” I reached for him, and he crushed our lips together. It was a frenzy of tongues and hands and mouths as we wrenched zippers open and shoved hands down pants.
I drew back, attempting to rein in my breaths, and hovered above him, wondering if I’d ever seen anyone sexier lying in the grass beneath the looming tree branches.
“Please.” He yanked on my arms. “Wanna feel you on top of me.”
When I sank down, he sighed, as if the pressure of my weight against him was everything he needed. I took his mouth as I drove my groin against his, and feeling our bodies aligned like this was un-fucking-believable. We weren’t naked, but it was close enough, maybe the closest we’d ever get, so I wanted to savor it, savor him.
“I can’t get enough of you,” Julian said, cupping my ass and thrusting upward.
“You feel so good,” I moaned against his lips as I skated toward the edge. “Already close.”
“Me too.” Julian circled his hand around both our cocks, and the friction from our shafts rubbing together was my undoing. I had never been so turned-on in my life.
“Right there. Right fucking there. Oh God, yes.” I buried my cries in his shoulder as I came, my jizz hitting his stomach and mixing with his own as he shuddered beneath me.
Afterward, we lay quietly, lazily kissing and catching our breath. I didn’t want to move for anything, but I knew being out in the open like this wasn’t the best idea either.
“Let’s clean up,” I said, finally lifting my head and quickly surveying our surroundings.
“Just a minute more,” he said and pulled me down again for a slow, toe-curling kiss, and fuck, was there anything better than Julian North’s tongue in my mouth?
We were just straightening our clothes and tucking ourselves back in when there was a pop of gunfire. My head snapped toward the ranch. What in the hell? When there were more shots with short pauses in between, I wondered if someone was in the middle of target practice. It would be one of the only reasons a gun would be firing on my father’s ranch, something he frowned upon, especially close to the pastures, which might’ve caused a stampede.
When I glanced back at Julian, I gasped. He was crouched on the ground with his arms shielding his head. Holy shit.
He was rocking and softly swearing to himself, his shirt soaked with sweat. And it was fucking heartbreaking to witness. The gunfire seemed to have abated, at least momentarily, and I approached Julian carefully. I didn’t want to startle him, but I also knew that he was having one of his episodes—one much worse than the couple I’d witnessed before—and he needed something or someone to help get him through it.
“No, they can’t be. They’re gone. They’re just…gone,” he was saying over and over in a broken voice that clawed at my insides. As I squatted down beside him, I realized this might’ve been his nightmare come to life. Had he gone back in time to directly after the roadside bomb?
I froze, my entire body tingling with awareness as I tried to picture what he was seeing in his mind’s eye. And based on his reaction and the story he’d shared, it was devastating.
“Julian.” I swallowed past the lump in my throat, trying to keep my voice level. “Hey, it’s Kerry Carmichael, and you’re in Wyoming at Firefly Farm.” I tentatively touched his knee with the tips of my fingers, hoping to be a buffer between his living nightmare and reality. “We rode out to the pond on the four-wheelers.”