Page 9 of Broken Cedar

He looks away, avoiding my gaze. “Lonely.” The word lands harder than it should. Because maybe that’s the problem. Maybe he has always seen things about me that I worked very hard not to show.

I push away from the counter. “You were too.”

His eyes find mine. For a second, neither of us says anything. Then his gaze flicks toward the back door. “I should go lock up the barn for the night.”

“Yeah.” Still neither of us moves.

A small, almost embarrassed laugh escapes him. “We’re not very good at saying goodbye.”

A smile pulls at my mouth. “No.” I think about all the times we stood in the hallway when we were younger, dragging out the last five minutes of the night. All the reasons we found not to say goodnight. “We never were.”

The smile fades. Because we both know what we’re remembering. Colt reaches for his keys on the counter. They’re beside me. I reach for them at the same time. Our hands meet. This time, neither of us moves away. Just for a second. Maybe two. His eyes drop to where our hands touch. Then lift back to mine. “Hallie…”

My name sounds different when he says it. Like a warning. Like an apology. Like a question. He doesn’t finish. He doesn’t have to. We both know what he’s trying to say.

We should stop. We should go to bed. We should pretend today didn’t change anything.

But neither of us steps back. Neither of us leaves. His hand lifts slowly, giving me every opportunity to stop him. I don’t. His palm finds my cheek. It’s warm, rough, familiar. And when his thumb brushes against my skin, I know we’re already past the point where pretending is possible.

“We should—” I start, and don’t finish, because what should we do? Go to bed? Say goodnight?

We both stand there, staring at one another, and it’s like there’s a gravitational pull drawing us toward one another. His palm is rough against my cheek, calluses catching on my skin in a way that sends a shudder through my entire body. His thumb brushes my lower lip, and the touch is so gentle it makes my knees weak.

His face is only inches from mine, and I can feel his warm breath tickling my cheek. His eyes travel down to my lips, then back to my eyes. He swallows, and my heart is doing some weird fluttering thing.

I close the distance. Or he does. I’m not sure. Our mouths find each other in the warm, quiet dark of the kitchen. His stubble burns against my skin as his hand slides into my hair, fingers threading through the strands, holding me to him. I make a sound—a small, broken thing that gets lost between our mouths—and his other hand finds my waist, pulling me against him, the solid heat of his body against mine is almost too much.

My hands are on his chest, then his shoulders, then the back of his neck, pulling him closer. His tongue finds mine, and the taste of him sends a pulse of heat straight to my core.

What the fuck are we doing? This is wrong. This is so, so wrong.

But right now, with Colt’s mouth against mine, I’m too lost to think about the consequences.

His hand leaves my hair, trails down my neck, over my collarbone, then lower. His palm finds my breast through my thin shirt, and the contact draws a gasp from me that he catches with his mouth.

“Colt,” I whisper against his mouth, and it’s half a warning, half a plea. He understands both because he has always understood me better than I understand myself.

His hand continues its descent. Down my ribs. Over my hip. Finds the waistband of my jeans and pauses, his fingertips resting on the button, asking without words.

I nod. Or whimper. Something that communicates yes.

Slowly, so agonizingly slowly, he works the button open, and slides the zip down. His eyes don’t leave mine as his hand slips inside, under the fabric of my underwear. His breath catches—actually catches—when he finds how wet I am.

“Jesus, Hallie,” he murmurs, glancing down, and the roughness in his voice is the most erotic thing I’ve ever heard.

I’m mortified. Actually, clinically mortified. He can feel everything—how slick, how ready, how completely my body has betrayed me—and for a second I want to die, or run, or both.

But his eyes, when they find mine, are dark with a desire so raw it makes my stomach flip. His finger circles once, lightly, and my hips buck against his hand.

“Shh,” he whispers, and it’s not a command, it’s a shared understanding that my mother is twenty feet down the hall, and the walls in this house have never kept a secret. I swallow, my breathing short and shallow as he slides a finger inside me. Slowly. The stretch is exquisite. I bite my lip to keep from moaning, but a sound escapes anyway, a low, desperate, breathy thing that he answers with a groan of his own.

“W-we can’t do this,” I breathe, even as my hips move against his hand, seeking more friction.

“I know.” His finger curls, and I have to press my forehead against his chest to keep from crying out.

“We shouldn’t—oh God—we shouldn’t be doing this.” I mumble, my voice muffled against his chest.

“I know. Christ, Hallie, I know we shouldn’t.” He groans. His thumb finds my clit, circling gently. I clutch at his shirt with both hands. “You want me to stop?”