Laying Down The Law (#4, Cowboy Way) (The Cowboy Way) (11 page)

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Melanie moaned as she sat cross-legged inside the tent beside Brock and popped the last piece of cold fish into her mouth.  The greasy piece seesawed in her throat before finally going down.  “Oh my, God, Brady. This is the best fish I’ve ever eaten. You really caught this?” she asked, licking the grease from her fingers.

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied proudly, his teeth flashing in the lantern light. 

When he opened his mouth again, she knew it was to recount his story to her again for the sixth time, but his jaw opened wider into a big yawn and his breath came out in a tired, but happy rush when it closed. 

“You tired, sport?” Brock asked, casting a hot glance at Melanie that scorched her insides.

“Yes, sir—catching that big fish was hard work!” Brady replied.

“Give me a hug goodnight then, and crawl into Miss Mel’s pup tent and go to sleep.  We’ll go fishing again in the morning before we leave, if you’re up to it.”

Melanie bought that tent and sleeping bag for herself at the hardware store, but Brock rearranged the sleeping stations after they rescued her gear from the woods where she’d dropped it when she slipped.  They took the damp sleeping bags and gave Brady the dry one in her tent supposedly so he didn’t get chilled.  Brady didn’t mind, the prospect of having his own tent had thrilled him. 

Whether their bags were damp or not, Melanie didn’t think there was a chance of her getting chilled in this tent tonight.  The tent was small and Brock put off body heat like a Coleman stove.  That was a good thing, because she only wore one of his spare t-shirts because her clothes were soaked and hanging on the porch rail of the cabin to dry.

Brady scrambled up and duck-walked over to throw his arms around Brock’s neck.  He surprised Melanie when he spun to her and did the same.  Her insides melted as she held him closer.  “Good night, buddy,” she said, as he pulled back.

“Nite, Miss Mel…nite, Dad,” he replied with a smile as he lifted the flap to walk outside.

Melanie gnawed her lip when she heard a coyote howl in the woods.  “You think he’s safe over there all alone?”   

“He’s five feet away,” Brock replied with a laugh.  “The tent zips—he’s safe.”  But his chest expanded and he yelled, “Brady, zip that tent up and don’t come out until morning, okay?”

“Yes, sir!” Brady shouted back, and Melanie relaxed. 

Brock’s eyes glistened as they swung back to hers.  “I can’t thank you enough for suggesting this—for making it happen.  Brady was a different kid today.”

Melanie’s heart squeezed and she put her hand on his face.  Brock’s sexy beard stubble scraped her palm, sending fire up her arm as he turned his face to kiss her palm.  He took her hand, kissed the inside of her wrist then worked his way to her elbow where he dipped his tongue into the sensitive bend and she shivered. 

Yes, she was worried about Brady, wanted to see firsthand if there was any change in him.  She’d been worried about both of them being out here without rain gear.  But the bold and honest truth was she wanted to have sex with him, that’s why she came out here.    It was also why she’d added the box of condoms to her list of hastily packed camping supplies.

But another truth just became clear to Melanie, she didn’t want him to have sex with her to thank her for helping him.  She didn’t want this to be a thank you fuck for the nerdy little bookworm who was helping him, which would amount in her mind to the same thing as a sympathy fuck, which is what she’d have gotten from him in high school.

Brock leaned in to kiss her shoulder, his hot breath brushed her neck and his mouth touched down there making her mewl.  She didn’t want Brock Cooper to
fuck
her at all—she wanted him to make love to her.  Unless he could do that, she didn’t want to have sex with him again.  Melanie tapped his shoulder and leaned away. 

“Brock, we need to talk first,” she said, scooting toward the back of the tent.”

He sat up and looked at her, his blue eyes dilated pools of need. 

“What’s wrong, baby?” he asked with concern.

“I lied.  I can’t do friends with benefits with you.  I can do it with other men, have done it, but it doesn’t work for me with you.  Either this has to have some meaning to it, or I think we should just go to sleep.” 

There, she’d said it. 

His eyebrows crashed together, but at least she had it off of her chest, speaking of which itched between her breasts.  Melanie rubbed the t-shirt against her skin there to scratch.  Her skin tingled all over, and that was her problem, because unless Brock told her where he thought this was going, she was not having him scratch her itch tonight.

When he just sat there staring at her, looking a little angry and a lot confused, Melanie huffed a breath. 

“I’m not pressuring you, Brock.  I’ve just discovered the gratuitous sympathy fuck, which might have worked for me in high school because I wanted you so badly, doesn’t work for me now.”  Anger flared brightly in his eyes now, and from the way his jaw worked in the lantern light, it was obvious he wasn’t on the same page with her and that was fine.  Well, no it wasn’t fine, but she would deal with it.  This new attachment problem was hers, not his.  Emotion clogged her throat as she reached back to fold the corner of the joined sleeping bags down. “I’ll still help you, but that first time satisfied my curiosity, so let’s just leave it at that.”

“I don’t
have
sympathy fucks, Dr. Fox, not back in high school and not now,” he growled, and Melanie’s eyes flew back to his but they were inscrutable.  “If I
fuck
someone there’s always a
meaning
.  I like her, I think she’s special and I want to be with her.  I’m a little insulted you think otherwise.”

“Of course there’s
meaning
—mutual satisfaction—but you didn’t say you don’t have
gratuitous
sex.  Why is that?”  Again he sat staring, chewing on the inside of his cheek.  Melanie rolled and tucked her legs into the sleeping bag.  She wished they weren’t connected now.  She was going to have to disconnect a lot more than the sleeping bags from here on out if she was leaving here with her heart intact.  She laid back and pulled the top bag over her.  “You don’t need to thank me that way.”

“Are you saying you have feelings for me, Melanie?” he growled, and Melanie stopped breathing when he lay on top of the bag, on top of her, trapping her.

God, why did she have to start this conversation?
  Why hadn’t she just used the same excuse that women had used for all time—she had a headache?  Now, she was developing one and he was obviously not going to let her off without an answer.

Damn her mother for tucking that journal into her purse while she was at the house
.  

She’d found it when she dug through her purse for her wallet at the hardware store and sat there reading it, rehashing all those memories—dredging up the teenage angst she’d felt at not being noticed by this man even though she loved him.  Of course the feelings of insecurity, of self-consciousness and low self-esteem had resurfaced with them.  The store had almost closed by the time she finished and that was why she was late getting here.  A thirty-year-old woman, a doctor no less, crying over that angst in the parking lot of the hardware store was just ridiculous.

She should
never
have come back to Sunny Glen and she wouldn’t be going through this.

“Let’s just get some sleep, Brock,” she said, closing her eyes, but he pinched her chin and she opened them again.

Something flowed from him to her through his gaze, a connection was formed, silent communication happened and old injuries were soothed.  His head lowered and his mouth touched down on hers sweetly, gently and with emotion that seeped into every cell of her body.  This was the kiss she’d been waiting for at sixteen, she thought, as it went on and on with gentle nips and sucks on her mouth that sent waves of delicious warmth through her.  He finally drew back a little to meet her eyes again. 

“Because if that’s what you’re trying to tell me, the feeling is mutual.”

Bolts of lightning zipped through her setting off sparks that short circuited her brain.  She had to make sure they hadn’t damaged her auditory nerves too. 

“They are?” she asked, her voice raspy.

One corner of his mouth kicked up, the corner that controlled the dimple and her eyes fixed on the dent in his cheek, her tongue tingled to explore it.  

“What’s not to love?  You’re smart, funny, caring and selfless—I’m a lucky bastard if you care one iota about me, because I’ve done nothing to deserve it.”  Melanie inspected his eyes, his expression, rolled his words around in her brain for sincerity. “I’ve been pretty damned stupid.  If I’d have used my heart back in high school, instead of my eyes to see you, I could’ve saved myself a lot of trouble and heartache the last fifteen years.  If I could go back and give my seventeen-year-old self one piece of advice, it would be that.” 

Something broke loose inside of Melanie, a rush of emotion forced her up from the floor of the tent and she scrambled out of the sleeping bag to throw her arms around his neck.  Brock laughed as she forced him down onto the sleeping bag, grabbed his face between her hands and kissed him deeply. 

This man, those words—the sheer romance of them—Gah
. 
This was the man she’d fantasized about, the man she wanted to make love to her. 

M
elanie had never been more turned on in her life, her body hummed with need as she slid her hand down his tight abs to rub her palm over his erection.  Brock groaned into her mouth, forced his hips against her hand and the need to feel his steely heat against her palm consumed her.  Sliding his zipper down the track, she pushed her hand under the band of his underwear and sighed into his mouth as she gripped him. 

She gasped when he pushed her off of him, rolled her onto her back and he fisted the material of her thin t-shirt.  He sat up and his eyes glittered when he bit his lower lip and yanked hard.  The material ripped and he smiled as with another yank, the sides came apart and his eyes were hot blue lasers as they locked on her breasts. 

Holy shit, that was hot
, she thought, as a tremor rocked her.  A man had never ripped her clothes off because he just couldn’t wait the second it would’ve taken to pull the shirt over her head to see her breasts.  From the look on Brock’s face, his ragged breathing, and the desperation in his eyes that was exactly his problem.

“You have the most gorgeous breasts I’ve ever seen.  Perfect,” he growled, his hand shaking as he reached out to palm her right breast.  His thumb raked over her nipple, fire sizzled through Melanie, and she closed her eyes to groan her pleasure long and low in her throat.  The sound was trapped there when his left hand covered her mouth.  Her eyes flew open and his tight smile made her relax. 

“He’s safe, but only
five
feet away,” Brock reminded, then watched his hand glide down her throat, over her breast to cover the mound.  He kneaded both in tandem, studied them in the lantern-light, tested their weight in his palms, then pinched her nipples and Melanie whimpered as darts of pleasurable pain shot through her. 

Her muscles contracted as his fingers left her breasts to trace the contours of her waist, and his thumbs dragged down her abdomen.  He stopped below her hips, stroked across her pelvis with his thumbs and tension built there.  She moaned, lifted her hips for more, but his thumbs hooked into the band of her panties at either hip and she tensed.

“
No
, Brock—” she hissed, but it was too late. 

With a feral grin and one forceful tug, the material came apart in his hands in a sickening and exciting rip, then he yanked what was left of her panties from under her, held her gaze and brought them to his nose to inhale deeply.  Melanie could see his excitement as his pupils dilated, his nostrils flared and he breathed in her scent before he tossed the scraps aside to ease down beside her now naked body. 

“What am I going to wear out of here tomorrow?” she asked with a laugh.

“Who says I’m letting you leave?  I might be like those hillbillies in that movie this county is famous for and just keep you up here all to myself.  You won’t need clothes for that, I promise.” As his head lowered to her breast, his hair tickled her overly sensitive skin, his breath scorched her nipple and his dark promise danced inside her skull to spark a delicious fantasy of being held captive here by him, having sex when he demanded it or she needed him. 

No worries, no stress, just pleasure. Heaven on earth, but just a fantasy she knew.

That didn’t stop her from indulging it, though, as he sucked her into his mouth, lathed the aching tip of her breast with his raspy tongue, skimmed his other hand down her body across her navel to dip between her thighs and lazily drag his fingers through her wetness. 

She thought he’d stop at the throbbing bundle of nerves there, but he pulled his hand away quickly, and she pinched her knees together.  His hand reappeared and he released her breast with a soft, wet pop to suck her essence from his fingers. 

Melanie’s muscles tensed, her insides clenched and she mewled when he brought the tip of his index finger to her mouth to trace a slow, deliberate circle around her lips with the remnants of her moisture.  He dragged his finger down the valley between her breasts then circled each nipple and her body ignited, her flesh quivered and a knot of tension formed in her pelvis.