I didn’t need him to be my father. I needed him to be my friend. My big brother. Instead, he insisted on continuing to tell me what to do and how to live my life. Tate even stole my dream of making it to the PBR and becoming a champion bull rider.
Even when I healed from the injuries that kept me out and stuck to more local competition, I still couldn’t escape him. Tate retired and became a fucking bronc rider. Because it wasn’t enough for him to be great at one thing, he had to be great at both. And not just anywhere. Here. At Boulder Ranch. The place I’d made my home.
No matter where I go, or what I do, he’s right there.
Even now, he’s still trying to be Dad. He lives in our house, works on our farm, and does the job Dad did until a tractor accident took him out of this world.
I’m torn between another beer and going to River when Joy takes Tate’s hand. The beat slows. A couple’s song blaring through the speakers. One where you hold your woman close and spin across the dance floor.
Mind made up, I march up to River, snatching her hand just as some other guy reaches for her. Her yelp as I spin her into my chest, going straight to my dick.
“Oh. Hi there,” she giggles, her palms flat against my chest.
“Ready to work up a sweat?”
Her brow scrunches, teeth sinking into her bottom lip, but she nods.
River has rhythm but no idea how to country line dance or two-step. Just the same, I keep her tucked close to my body, my fingers digging into her soft flesh. Another slow song comes through the speakers, Joy and Tate long gone when River’s fingers find their way into my hair. Her short nails scrape over my scalp, and I want to moan out loud, but I hold it in.
This woman makes me feel as alive as being on the back of a bull does.
“I’m very drunk,” she snorts.
I’d noticed, but it seems like she doesn’t have fun often. Like maybe she needed a night to just let loose. A night to just be River Thompson, the woman.
“Can I take you home?” I whisper in her ear, my lips brushing over the shell. A shiver works its way through her body, those fingers sinking deeper into my damp strands.
“Yeah.”
My fingers weave through hers, her gaze drifting down for a moment before back up to my face.
“Just being a gentleman.”
She only snorts, tucking her body closer to mine as we work our way through the crowd and out the front door. My hat pulled from my back pocket, where I tucked it after the first song.
Cool air immediately chills my skin as we step out into the night. It’s April, but the nights still come with temperatures low enough a coat is necessary. A consequence of Lake Boulder and the Slate Ridge mountains bordering most of our county.
River begins to walk in the opposite direction of my truck, her feet overstepping one in front of the other. That giggle breaking free every few seconds.
“This way, Boss.”
Her straight nose wrinkles, but she angles the way I’d been walking. “My car is over there.”
“You’re not driving.”
“Who’s being bossy now?”
I can only look down at her. The banter wasn’t something I expected of her. From the way she presented herself earlier today, I expected a ball-buster. Someone hard and unforgiving, but there seems to be a fun side to her. An easygoing side that she hides from other people.
Opening the passenger door of my truck, she wrinkles her nose again. Only when I look down at the seat do I notice my filthy chaps on it. No one ever rides in my truck with me, so it’s not something I think about.
“Sorry.” Tossing them into the back, I finally release her hand, switching to grip her hip. “Up you go.”
“I didn’t think gentlemen groped their dates,” she snorts, those green eyes narrowed on my face.
Fuck, this woman has my dick twitching in my jeans. Jeans that suddenly seem too fucking tight. No one has ever gotten to me the way she does.
Leaning in close, my front pressed against her back, her breath hitches. My fingers flex against the curve of her hip. The slight arch in her back leaving that round ass tapping right below where my dick throbs against my zipper. The fucker went straight to attention the moment she turned those beautiful irises on me.
