“I don’t know what that looks like,” she whispered, and Country loosened his grip then waited for her to tip her chin and meet his eyes.
“You’ve always loved knowing what things look like.” A hint of a grin played at the corner of his mouth.
“It’s my favourite.”
Country took a step back to lean against the railing and pulled her with him. “Can I paint you a picture, then?” Jenna rested her chin on his chest and nodded. Gentry looped his hands under the edge of her coat and splayed them across the soft cotton over her lower back. “I think it looks like you coming home from work and me holding you like this. I think it looks like you telling me how I’m wrong about everything, and me insisting I’m right.”
Jenna laughed, the lump in her throat making it sound more like a strangled cat. The barely-there grin on Country’s face turned full-fledged, and Jenna’s hands started to tingle.
“I think it looks like us getting on the ice in the middle of the night. I think it looks like me trying to figure out what the hell I’m doing with this ranch, and you finding a place where they don’t work you into the ground and then pull the rug out from under you, and talking about it obnoxiously every step of the way.”
“Like, I’m obnoxious?”
“We both are. I’m going to be way worse initially.”
Jenna nodded. “And maybe we become the favourite aunt and uncle.”
“Absolutely. Buy the best presents so Polk looks like a stingy asshole.”
“Not only on their birthdays.”
“Just because it’s a Wednesday.” Country pulled a hand from under her coat and pushed a loose strand of hair from her forehead. Jenna’s teeth started to chatter.
“Can I paint you a picture?” she asked. He nodded. “If you don’t invite me inside in the next thirty seconds, I think I’m going to freeze to death.”
_____
Country smirked. “You’re the one wearing a coat and boots from the Australian Outback.” She had no idea how much he wanted to invite her inside, but he knew Jenna. She’d always been more excited by the chase than being caught. Even as a naive twenty-year-old, he’d been able to figure that one out.
“Don’t flaunt your warm-bloodedness right now.” Jenna pushed off his chest and turned, but Country snagged her arm and reeled her back in. He curled his hand under the edge of her jaw and ran his eyes over every inch of her face.
The past twenty-four hours had been torture. He’d hoped that Jenna would come knocking that night after the broadcast but knew it would likely take her more time than that to come to terms with what he’d told her. He also knew there was a chance she’d walk away again, too afraid to take the leap.
As little as three hours ago, he’d been questioning whether he should’ve forced her to talk everything through right then and there in the booth. Now that she was there in his arms, he had no regrets.
Jenna laughed and lifted up on her tiptoes to kiss him. “Freezing, remember?”
Country kept hold of her hand as they walked inside, and he closed the door behind them. Jenna had barely unzipped her coat before he was stripping it off her. He’d used up every ounce of patience on the porch, and now his blood was pumping fast and hard.
He slipped his hands under the hem of her crewneck sweatshirt, and Jenna gasped as his ice-cold fingers met her skin. He grinned, revelling in the gooseflesh rippling across her stomach as his knuckles grazed her navel. “You smell a little like an indoor pool.”
Jenna laughed and kicked her boots off. “I was at Anne’s. We went in the hot tub.” Country dragged his hands to her hips and over the waistband of her joggers then cupped his hands around her perfect round cheeks.
His hands froze over the soft cotton. It felt abnormally smooth. Uninterrupted. “Are you not wearing underwear?”
Jenna hissed a breath. “I was at the hot tub, remember? My swimsuit’s soaking wet, and I forgot a change of clothes.”
Country clenched, filling his hands with her, and Jenna let out a gasp. Liquid fire seared his middle. He wanted to tear her clothes off right there in the entryway and do everything in his power to draw that sound from her lips again and again. Maybe he hadn’t used up all his patience. Country forced himself to suck in a breath, his hands trembling as he pulled her down the hall toward his bedroom.
As painful as it was, he needed every second of this to last. Especially because some parts of him wouldn’t be capable of heeding that instruction. Not after he’d dreamed of Jenna nearly every night for the past two weeks. Not when he still remembered every curve of her body and the feel of her under his hands again made him want to drop to his knees and weep.
“I like your house,” Jenna whispered, and Country stopped, pressing her against the wall. Jenna trailed her nails over the stubble on his jaw, and she may as well have been carving him open. His skin stretched as tight as a snare drum as he sucked her lower lip into his mouth.
His tongue tingled at the burst of mint. “I like your lip balm.”
Jenna let out a breath of a laugh then slipped her tongue past his teeth. Licorice whined and pawed at the boot room door, but Country ignored him.
“Is that your dog?” Jenna asked. Country nodded, dragging her down the final few feet of the hall and finally making it past the threshold of his bedroom. She tugged on his arm. “Should we let him in? Is he?—?”
