Ecstasy in Elk's Crossing (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (3 page)

“Can I get you another beer?” Katie asked, spreading her arms to indicate the offer was for the entire McGowan clan, all four of whom were sitting at the bar.

“That’s the ticket,” Aaron replied, his tawny gaze warm. “And how about finding a game on the tube?”

The coolers were beneath the bar, and Katie knew that when she bent down to reach into them for the cans of beer, she was allowing the men to get a more intimate view of her cleavage. She didn’t mind. It felt nice to be innocently flirting with such handsome men, knowing that they would keep themselves in check. When the McGowan men looked at her, she felt attractive and appreciated in a way that was different from when other men ogled her.

She put forward the cold cans of beer, popping open the tops with a gadget that her grandfather had made. Without fail, the men thanked her, their smiles lingering just a little longer than necessary.

The dinner rush was over, and aside from the McGowans, only some cowboys from a neighboring ranch remained. Katie’s grandmother, having finished with the dishes, had left for the evening to tend to her bedridden husband.

“Let’s see what our options are,” Katie said, taking the remote and turning on the flat-screen TV behind the bar.

Katie thumbed the remote, thinking she’d find a baseball game, or possibly some NASCAR race. She had quickly developed a fondness for these evenings with the McGowans when the men drank a couple beers and watched a sporting event. It made the evening profitable enough for her grandparents, and she enjoyed the camaraderie the brothers had with each other, and how they interacted with her.

She hadn’t intended on changing to the channel that specialized in movies, particularly classic ones, but when
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
came on, the McGowans all laughed.

“That sounds sort of like us,” Aaron said, slapping his palm down on the polished mahogany bar. “We’re watching this tonight.”

Katie was surprised. The McGowans were a raw-knuckled lot, men who worked long and difficult hours, often in the saddle. She’d watched them concentrating on NASCAR races in almost total silence as the cars jockeyed for position. She couldn’t imagine them being entertained by a fairly campy musical about seven mountain men kidnapping seven brides.

But they did watch it. They watched it carefully, and occasionally made quiet comments to one another about the movie, about the similarities to their own lives, and how the brothers on the screen interacted. Katie kept expecting one of them to complain that the musical was boring, but there wasn’t a single protest. Not even Garrett and Flynn, who were usually the quickest to become bored.

There were differences between the McGowans of Elk’s Crossing, North Dakota, and the men in the movie, but there were enough similarities to make Katie feel fidgety inside. Though she kept her back to the men as she watched the movie, she could feel them looking at her. Were they wondering what it would be like to capture her, as the men had done in the movie, to make her a bride?

The movie had started at seven and was finishing up as the clock neared nine. The cowboys from the other neighboring ranches had all headed for their beds after a long day of heavy labor. In all the time that Katie had been working evenings at the Mountain View Saloon with the McGowan brothers in it, she’d never seen the boisterous men so quiet, so obviously introspective.

When the final movie credits rolled across the screen, Katie reached for the remote.

“Now how about some World Championship Wrestling?” she asked, wanting very much to change the unbidden direction of her own thoughts. Individually and collectively, the McGowan men were disconcerting.

“How about turning it off?” Aaron said in his husky baritone. “I can’t think of anything more pleasant to hear than the sound of your voice. Why don’t we just talk?”

Katie flinched and told herself she was being silly to read into masculine, emotional reactions that she may or may not be interpreting accurately.

“You’re a flatterer,” she said. She turned and faced him. “But I’ve said that before.”

“You’re right. But you’re the kind of woman who deserves flattery. Besides, you only told me what I was. You didn’t say you wanted me to change.” His eyes took on a sudden bright intensity, and Katie had to look away. “I’m telling the truth. You deserve nothing but golden words.”

Katie picked up a damp towel and began wiping the bar. She felt the warmth of embarrassment coloring her cheeks and ears. This wasn’t the light, bantering flirtation that she’d enjoyed for the past month. This was more personal, more serious.

It was Garrett who lightened the mood by saying, “If she gave me a single kiss, she wouldn’t speak to any of you. One kiss and Katie would know that I’m the best kisser of the McGowans. One kiss and her heart would belong to me.”

Blair issued a disrespectful growl and replied, “Does that wet-behind-the-ears whelp really think he knows better than his elders what a woman wants in a kiss?”

“Yes,” Garrett shot back, getting defiantly off his barstool, a teasing grin on his lips. “That’s
exactly
what I’m telling you!”

Katie exhaled a sigh of relief. The McGowans began challenging each other, each voicing the virtues of his own skills at kissing. Katie was pleased that the men were now paying far more attention to jostling with each other than they were to her. With a smile curling her lips, she walked away from the men and set about making sure there wasn’t an inch of the mahogany bar that hadn’t been wiped down.

“There’s only one person who can vote,” Katie heard Aaron say, “and that’s the lady.”

Turning, she asked, “What vote is that?”

“On which of the McGowan men knows best how to kiss a woman.” Aaron smiled and shrugged his wide shoulders in what Katie suspected was supposed to be a gesture of innocence. She didn’t believe in the innocence for a second. “Seems to me talk’s awful cheap. The only real way we’ll ever know is if we have an objective woman taste a kiss and make her decision between good and bad.”

It had never happened quite so distinctly or so swiftly before, but upon hearing Aaron’s words, Katie felt her clit suddenly throb with tension, and the lips of her pussy become creamy with the slick lubrication of excitement.

“Just one kiss,” Blair said, getting to his feet. “One harmless kiss.”

“Harmless?” A slender eyebrow arched. “I find myself deeply suspicious.”

“A kiss from each of us,” Aaron said. “You’ll have to keep your eyes closed so you stay objective. You mustn’t know which of us is kissing you.”

Warning bells started clanging noisily within Katie. What kind of a woman would accept a kiss from all of them? And not knowing which one she was kissing made it all the more scandalous. She was venturing into territory where she’d never before gone, but as frightening as that was, it was also exciting.

It was also innocent, she reminded herself. It was just one kiss from each of them. And like Blair said, the kisses would be harmless.

She looked at Aaron, the eldest of the men and their unquestioned leader. “It won’t be fair,” she said. “I’ll know when you kiss me because you’ve got a mustache. You’re the only one who does.”

“If you’ve got a razor handy, I’ve got an answer to the problem.” Aaron smoothed his downturned mustache with a forefinger. “Never thought the ’stache would keep me from kissing.”

“You can have a kiss,” Katie said to Aaron without being consciously aware that she’d just agreed to be judge to the absurd competition. “I’ll do my best to be objective.”

She stepped around the bar, moving closer to the men, all of whom were now standing. To Katie, the men all suddenly seemed to be much larger than they had been just moments earlier. Though she was wearing her customary four-inch heels, the men towered over her, especially Aaron, the tallest of them all.

“Close your eyes,” Aaron instructed. “You’re not to know who’s kissing you.”

“Just one kiss?”

She felt the pounding of her heart now, the quickening of her pulse, and the tingling of her clitoris. Katie told herself that she wasn’t the adventurous type, that she wasn’t a woman who casually kissed men. The tip of her tongue came out to moisten her lips, and after inhaling deeply once, she closed her eyes.

She heard the thud of boot heels against the floor as Aaron walked until he was standing beside her.

“Keep your eyes closed now,” he said. Then, to his brothers, he said, “Okay, you first. Nobody say a word or she’ll know who you are.”

It’s just a kiss. This is just a little harmless fun
.

She heard the approaching footsteps. She tried to swallow, and discovered she couldn’t. A moment later, broad palms rested lightly on her shoulders, then warm lips were pressed against hers.

Unable to resist, she opened an eye. It was Garrett who had been chosen to kiss her first.

“She opened her eyes,” Aaron announced.

Garrett straightened immediately, ending the kiss.

“I’m sorry! Really I am,” Katie said quickly, looking first at Aaron then over at his brothers. “I’ve never kissed anyone when I didn’t know who I was kissing.”

“That’s the point of this,” Aaron said as he began unknotting his neckerchief. “But since you don’t have the discipline necessary to play by the rules, I think a blindfold will help ensure the confidentiality of the contestants.”

The twin emotions of skepticism and erotic acceptance shot through Katie’s system in a heartbeat. It had been more than a year since Katie had felt anything even remotely resembling passion, but her clit was itching now, and her panties were getting damp with her juices.

With his neckerchief neatly folded, Aaron stepped behind Katie. He put the blindfold over her eyes then carefully knotted it into place. When he put his hands on her shoulders, Katie felt the heat of his body go straight into her blood. She very nearly moaned.

He bent low to whisper into her ear, and when he spoke, she felt the warmth of his breath as he said, “Do you know what a safe word is?”

Katie had read about them in
Cosmopolitan
, but she’d never thought she’d ever need one for herself. She nodded.

“Pumpkins. Say ‘pumpkins’ and everything stops.”

The words and the warmth of his breath against her ear and neck were a caress that caused her nipples to harden and her clit to pulse with an empty hunger.

“Now let’s start this contest all over again. You go first.”

Aaron kept his hands on Katie’s shoulders, and she wished he wouldn’t. As long as he touched her, the heat and strength of him slithered into her body like some wickedly seductive narcotic, distorting her senses, stripping away her willpower.

She heard boot heels against the floor before callused fingers lightly touched her chin to angle her face upward. A mouth pressed against hers. It was a firm, close-mouthed kiss that lasted long enough to be more than just casual.

“Okay. That’s enough,” she heard Aaron say. “Now you.”

Again, boot heels against the floor. A ripple of anticipation went up her spine. Then fingers were again touching her chin to put her at the desired angle. A mouth pressed against hers. Unconsciously, Katie raised her hands, her fingertips running lightly up the sides of a corduroy jacket.

“That’s enough,” Aaron instructed.

As the boot heels receded, Katie confessed, “That was Flynn. I recognized the texture of his coat.”

“I can see that this competition is getting more difficult by the second,” Aaron said with mock anger. “Well, if this is going to be a fair contest, we’ll have to make sure you judge it only by a kiss.”

The blindfold seemed to make all the rest of her senses more acute, more sensitive. Katie flinched, and uttered a soft gasp, when she felt Aaron sliding his powerful arm inside her own. At first she wasn’t certain what he was doing, but then his left elbow was hooked with her left, and his left hand gripped her right arm just above the elbow. The move effectively kept her elbows pulled behind her back, preventing her from reaching out to touch the men who kissed her. It also caused her breasts to press even more snugly against her blouse.

A myriad of emotions were rocketing through Katie. She wondered how much cleavage she was showing now that her arms were pinned back. She felt wicked for allowing what had initially been a rather silly game to transform into a situation where the erotic tension was thick in the air. The pulsing in her clit grew stronger.

“Okay, now it’s your turn,” Aaron said.

The third kiss was very much like the first two, only its effect on her was significantly stronger. Being held by Aaron as she was, and being blindfolded so she couldn’t know who was kissing her, excited Katie beyond anything she had thought possible. By the time, Aaron signaled an end to the kiss, Katie was certain her bikini panties were quite wet. Her nipples had grown hard, and she had no doubt their erect state was visible through her blouse and bra.

“We’ll call that Brother Number One, and the order is random, not by age or alphabet,” Aaron said, a new tension showing in his tone. “And since I’m not a contestant, I’ll clear away the kiss so that you can taste the next one fresh.”

Katie gasped when Aaron, with his free hand, cupped her chin in his palm, angled her face upward and to the side, and sealed his mouth over hers. It was a strong, commanding kiss, and the prickly feel of his mustache made it seem all the more masculine. When the tip of his tongue touched her lips, seeking entrance, she offered only the slightest resistance before accepting. His tongue danced with hers, moving slowly and erotically in her mouth. As she accepted his kiss, Katie suddenly realized that with her hands forced behind her back, they were pressed against the front of Aaron’s trousers.

At last, Aaron straightened and ended the kiss. Had any kiss ever excited her so completely? Katie felt as though her muscles were dissolving, melting like candle wax when heated. She wasn’t at all certain she could withstand another such kiss and not end up falling to the floor.