“No,” he says, and the way he says it—slow, certain—puts heat in my cheeks. “You’re not.”
He’s in shadow, hat tipped low, one hip against a hay bale, rope coiled easy in his hand like it belongs there. It does. So does he—broad shoulders sketching a silhouette I could find blindfolded, sleeves rolled, forearms tanned and strong. A strip of moonlight catches the buckle at his belt. My breath catches with it.
“What are you doing here so late?” he drawls.
I take a step closer. Hay whispers under my boots. “I wanted to see you.”
His mouth curves, the kind of smile that starts trouble and ends it, too. “Well, darlin’, you got me.”
He lifts the rope. It’s nothing fancy—just soft, worn cotton that’s seen more fence posts than games. Still, my pulse answers like it recognizes an old song. He reads that in my face. I know he does. He always does.
“Hands,” he says. “Let me see ’em.”
I offer them out, palms up. His thumbs skim each one, slow, grounding. The rough of his skin against mine makes me shiver. He notices that, too. He notices everything.
“You been thinkin’ about this all day?” he asks.
“Since you said my name like a command this morning,” I say, because if we’re being honest, we’re being honest.
He makes a sound that lives somewhere between a laugh and a promise. “Come here.”
Two steps, maybe three, and I’m in his space. He smells like cactus and clean sweat and sunlight trapped in cotton. He hooks a finger into the belt loop of my shorts, tugging me forward that last inch until my knees bump the hay bale and the brim of his hat slides against my forehead. He tips it back so he can see my eyes.
“I’m gonna put this on your wrists,” he says, voice gone slow and deliberate. “Soft. Just enough to remind you you’re mine right now. That all right?”
“Yes,” I whisper, already leaning into him like I can’t remember how not to.
He lifts my hands between us, kisses the inside of one wrist, then the other. The heat of his mouth there says more than anything he could say out loud. He loops the rope with a gentleness that makes my chest ache, wraps once, twice, then ties a loose knot I could slip free of with the slightest tug. The knowledge of that—of the trust, the choice—makes me dizzy.
“Too tight?” he checks.
“No.” I try to sound sassy. It comes out soft. “Cowboys always this careful?”
“Only when we’re invested.” His thumb strokes over the knot, testing. “Hands where I put ’em, sugar.”
He guides my bound wrists up, hooking the rope over a low beam just above my head. Not hung there, not helpless—just stretched enough that I have to rise onto my toes to meet him. My shirt rides up a little. His eyes go dark, appreciative and hungry.
“Look at you,” he murmurs. “Prettiest thing in this barn by a country mile.”
I’m about to tell him he’s ridiculous when he leans in and kisses me, and the thought blows apart like thistle down. His mouth is warm and sure, slow at first, then deeper when I open for him, my breath catching on a sound I’d deny if he didn’t like it so much. One of his hands settles at my hip, big and steady. The other finds the small of my back and eases me closer, like he’s aligning us to some grid only he can see.
He kisses me like he’s got time and intent, like there’s a checklist and it says: taste her until she forgets her name. I forget everything but the slope of his lower lip and the way he smiles against my mouth when I chase him for more.
“Impatient,” he says, amused and pleased.
“Bossy,” I fire back, breathless.
“That too.” He tips my head back with the brim of his hat and trails his mouth along my jaw, down the side of my throat. The scrape of his stubble wakes every nerve I own. He finds the spot that makes my knees go a little loose and lingers there, sucking just enough to make me gasp, to make me arch into him like the hay bale behind me might catch fire from how hot I feel.
The rope hums against my skin when I shift. I tug, testing, and the knot holds—gentle, stubborn. My breath shivers out. He feels it. He slides his hand from my back to the front of my thigh, fingers spanning, thumb slow and certain as sunrise as it traces over denim. Every place he touches turns into a live wire.
“Tell me where you are,” he says against my skin, voice dust and velvet. “In that pretty head.”
“Right here.” I swallow. “The rope. Your hand. The way you—” I break off on a shiver when his thumb presses a fraction harder. “The way you always know.”
“Good girl,” he says, low. The words roll through me like heat. “You keep your eyes on me.”
I do. He steps back half a pace, just enough space to let his gaze travel, greed and reverence sharing the same seat. He takes off his hat and tosses it onto the hay with a flick of his wrist, like we’ve crossed a line where we don’t need the pretty mannersanymore. He drags his knuckles down my side, slow, then back up under the hem of my shirt, fingertips skating the warm edge of my ribs. My breath hitches, and my shoulders press into the rope.
