“You sure?” she asks. “It seems kind of silly to give up at the thought of a conversation. You were so willing to put in effort to change things yesterday. Is the idea of talking to someone all it takes to break that resolve?”
I toss my ax aside with frustration. She’s staring at me, the look on her face so utterlyreasonablethat it makes my gut twist.
We both know she’s right, but she doesn’t understand what keeps happening every time I try to do something good. Ever since Laura died, I’ve had a black thumb. Everything I touch turns to shit—the ranch, my relationship with my kids. Hell, even Al is sick now, and I can’t help but think it’s somehow because of me.
“Apparently,” I say tightly.
I drop my gaze to the ground, unable to keep up eye contact with her. It feels like she can see every insecurity, every failure. I may not deserve to have her in my life, but I’d like to at least have her think of me as someone strong.
I don’t want her to remember me as the man who was too scared to save his own home.
Shaking my head to clear it of my thoughts, I stalk past her and pull the back door of the shed open. I’m out of wood, but I’m not out of stress.
She watches me as I walk past her, following me into the shed silently.
“Is this really how it’s going to be?” she asks as I start piling wood into my arms.
I don’t answer her.
She lets the silence stretch for a few tense moments before her patience wears thin.
“I’ve changed my mind,” she says.
I feel her hand on my shoulder before I even have a chance to think through her declaration. She spins me around and knocks the few logs I have bundled in my arms to the side. They clatter loudly against the concrete, but neither of us pay the noise any mind. Mary steps up close to me, pressing herself against my chest, and my mind goes blank.
“I’m done with tact.” The words sound almost threatening, but she reaches up to cup my cheeks so gently that it nearly hurts. “I’m going to talk, and you’re going to listen. You’re a stubborn, grumpy old man, and you’re so set in your ways that you don’t even realize you’re lying to yourself.”
I open my mouth to argue, but she talks over me, holding me still.
“You work so hard to keep things going here, and you exhaust yourself every day trying to make sure that your employees aren’t working themselves to the bone like you are. You’re so hard on yourself, and you blame yourself for everything that goes wrong, but you’re more capable than you realize, Everett.” Her thumbs brush over my cheeks tenderly, rubbing through the stubble on my cheeks. “I don’t know anyone else who could manage half of what you do out here.”
My breath gets shaky, and I’m mortified to realize tears are welling in my eyes. Mary doesn’t pay them any mind as she holds me, and her voice emits the kind of affectionate sternness that I can’t help but listen to.
“You can’t sell,” she tells me firmly. “This land is part of your soul. It’s part of yourfamily. You can’t let something like that go. If you do, you’ll?—”
Her words wind up muffled against my lips, my arms winding around her waist in a desperate attempt to answer her. I can’t offer her words, my tongue thick and clumsy, but like I said, they’re cheap anyway. I’ve always been better with actions, and right now, I need to show her that I believe her. I want her to know that I trust her, that I can’t do this without her.
I want her to know that I need her.
She makes a surprised little noise, but melts into the kiss without hesitation. Her hands wind up through my hair, nails scratching pleasantly against my scalp in a way that sends shivers down my spine.
I walk her backwards toward the workbench, my hands moving of their own accord to slip beneath the hem of her shirt. Her skin is so soft against the roughness of my palms that it almost feels taboo to touch her. She’s all smooth skin and gentle sighs, and it’s such a juxtaposition of the rough edges that I’m made up of.
Neither of us are idle as we stumble across the workshop, both of us tearing at clothes and tracing over patches of skin hungrily.
It hasn’t been that long since I’ve touched her, but it feels like years. Every hitched breath that she releases against my mouth makes my cock throb in my jeans. The little giggle she breathes out when I press her up against the worktable makes my heart stutter in my chest, and I fall to my knees in front of her.
No words pass between us, neither of us able to put together a proper sentence. It wouldn’t mean anything if we did, anyway.
Everything I need to say, I can say with my hands.
I bury my face in her breasts the second her bra is off, groaning at the taste of her. She arches into the touch, hissingwhen I worry her nipple between my teeth. It’s hard to stay gentle when I’m so hungry for her, but I won’t hurt her, no matter how desperate I am to be inside her again.
I pull back only enough to yank my shirt over my head, my focus immediately shifting to the button of her jeans when my hands are free. Her hips move with my hands helpfully, and I manage to work her jeans and panties down to her knees before she starts tugging me up. I follow the pull of her hands in my hair, moaning out a garbled version of her name into her mouth when she kisses me.
“Come on,” she urges me. “I don’t want to wait.”
She spins around, draping herself over the table. My hands fly to her hips when she ruts back against me, every drop of blood in my brain racing south as my cock twitches painfully in the constraints of my jeans. I grind forward against her, leaning down to breathe in the scent of her perfume as she matches my every movement.
