Page 119 of Colt

A growing certainty is taking root that I’m never going to recover from tonight. No first date is ever going to be this good. I don’t know how I’ll reconcile that sobering fact with the hope I’m supposed to have for meeting my future soulmate.

That’s a tomorrow problem, though. Tonight, I’m gonna let myself enjoy the hell out of everything.

I’m not nearly drunk enough to climb onto a mechanical bull with a professional cowboy, but I do. Colton stands beside me as I, ahem, mount the saddle. Grabbing my hands, he curls them around the leather pommel.

“Give that a nice squeeze,” he instructs, lips twitching. “I know how strong your grip is. That’s the key to staying on, yeah?”

I’m so turned on at this point that I can probably wring out my underwear. So when Colton climbs onto the bull and settles his big body behind mine, putting his hands on my hips to lift me so that I’m tucked tightly against him, it’s all I can do not to rub myself against the saddle in an effort to ease the ache between my legs.

The bull lurches, and I lurch with it, letting out a yelp.

Colton just chuckles, wrapping an arm around my middle to keep me steady. “I got you, love. Just follow my lead, yeah? You gotta move with the bull. Roll your hips, like this.”

He rocks his pelvis in time to the bull’s movements, and I have no choice but to move with him. We roll our hips as the bull crests upward, and then Colton pulls me against him as the bull plunges down.

It’s quite possibly the most erotic, most ridiculous moment of my life.

The bull moves faster. I’m shouting and laughing and praying that I don’t break a bone if—when—I fall off.

Colton, though, lets out a rip-roaring yeeeeehawwww!

Just when I think we’re going to fall off, Colton somehow manages to save the day. He keeps a firm grip on me, the movements of his body assured and rhythmic in a way that has me biting the inside of my cheek to keep from coming right here, right now.

The bull bucks. Colton’s laughter is a loud, booming sound.

“I’m gonna fall!” I yell. “I’m falling⁠—”

“Okay.”

“What? Colt⁠—”

But then he’s tugging me to the right, curling his body around mine as he pulls me off the horse. Bull. Whatever.

My stomach launches into the back of my throat as I fall, squeezing my eyes shut.

And fall.

Laughter tickles my sides. I can’t breathe. I can’t⁠—

We land on the mats with a soft thud. I open my eyes.

No, wait. Colton landed on the mats, his hat a few feet behind him.

I landed on him.

My immediate impulse is to scramble off him. I’m too heavy. This is too…weird. I’m too close now that his hat is gone, his labored breaths moving over my skin in warm gusts.

But then his eyes meet mine, and I recognize the look in them.

Want.

Admiration.

“You stayed on,” he says.

I’m having trouble remembering how to use my tongue and lips to form words. “Only because you helped.”

“Who cares how it happened?” He puts his hands on my hips. “It happened, and that’s what counts.”