It wasn’t from wanting things she couldn’t have.

Except it was.

At eight, there was a knock at her front door, but before she could move, she heard a key in the lock.

Only three people had keys. Adam, Dell, and as of this morning, Brady. He had her set of keys, actually, so he could come and go between the kennels and the cabin. She listened as footsteps, sure and steady, came down the hall. “You’re lucky I don’t sleep with a gun beneath my pillow,” she said to the tall, dark, built shadow who appeared in her doorway.

Brady propped up the jamb with a shoulder, and a smile flashed from him in the dark. Imperturbable as usual, the bastard.

“I think we’ve had enough accidental shootings for this week.” He crossed his arms. “But out of curiosity, do you really think you could shoot me?”

She thought she could do a lot of things to him. Smack him for the smugness. Hug him for how hard he’d worked today.

Love him for exactly who and what he was…

“No,” she answered honestly. “I don’t think I could shoot you. But I could throw a gun at your head.”

He laughed. “Now that I believe.”

“Are you here with the handcuffs?” she asked hopefully.

That tugged another rough laugh out of him. “Thought I’d save that for when you’re feeling better.”

Heat slashed through her, pooling low in her belly. “You worked hard today.”

“No harder than you do every day.” There was admiration in his voice for what she did, and then there was a warmth inside her to go with the heat.

“I don’t bring in women from three counties over,” she said. “That’s new.”

Pushing off from the doorjamb, he came forward until his thighs bumped the bed. Leaning over her, a hand on either side of her head, he bent close.

It was dark, but she had enough of a glow from the moonlight outside to see his exhaustion, and concern.

For her.

“I’m okay,” she told him softly. Reaching up, she cupped his face. “Really.”

“Wanted to make sure.” He kissed her softly, tenderly, and she kissed him back. The emotion rocked him, she could feel it in the fine tremor of his body. And suddenly it was all ferocious intensity, and she wanted to show him just how okay she was. She wanted to lessen some of the tension she felt in him, wanted to help him let go. Tugging his shirt up with her good hand, she smiled when he took over and yanked the shirt off in one fluid motion.

“Pants, too,” she whispered, running her fingers down the center of his chest, past his belly button to the waistband of his cargoes.

Almost before she had the words out, he’d stripped down to skin.

And Lord, what beautiful skin.

With his careful help, she shimmied out of her pj’s, then lifted the covers to make room for him. Pulling him over the top of her, she sighed in pleasure, loving the way she felt when his weight pressed her into the mattress. Arching, she wrapped her legs around him, absorbing the groan that wrenched up from deep in his chest.

“Lilah-”

“In the bedside drawer.”

He pulled out a condom and put it on before he came back over her. She rocked again, shifted strategically, and then he was inside her, the sensation taking her breath away.

“Christ, you feel good… ” He let out a long, shaky breath and kissed her jaw, her throat. “So fucking good.”

She tried to rock her hips against him but he wasn’t budging. Not until he was ready, and as she already knew, wasting energy on pushing him was useless, his body was like steel. “Brady…”

“Shh. Give me a minute. Just feel.”

She let her hand roam, she couldn’t help it. His body was smooth and muscular. And scarred. Her fingers traced a few of those scars, memories of long-ago battles he never spoke of, and then she pulled his face to hers to nip at his bottom lip.

Growling low in his throat, he finally began to move, setting an agonizingly slow rhythm, his hips barely grinding in a circle as he did, careful not to jar or hurt her.

She heard herself whimper but not in pain. She was dying with each and every single rock of his hips. She dug her fingers into the cheeks of his perfect ass to try to speed him up, she tried words, she even bit his shoulder, nothing rushed him.

The sensations overtook her. The rush of pleasure at the top of every thrust he made had her orgasm building from her toes. Her eyes wanted to close, but she fought the urge, not wanting to tear her gaze from the look on his face. It was beautiful.

He was beautiful.

And then she was flying over the edge, coming hard. As she gasped and cried out, lost in the pleasure, his vivid blue eyes stayed locked on hers, his expression revealing every flicker of pleasure she gave him as he quietly followed her over.


The next few days were crazy for Brady, shuffling between kennel duties and the flying he did for Adam and Dell.

It was the nights, however, that stuck with him: the long, hot, steamy, tear-up-the-sheets nights.

The best nights of his life.

Three days after Lilah had been shot, he ambled over from the kennels, dirty from head to toe. He’d had a record day, including managing to be felt up by the seventy-year-old Mrs. Lyons. At the front door of the cabin he stopped to remove his boots, going still at the wild laughter from inside.

When he walked through, he found Lilah in bed, surrounded by Jade and three other women.

His gaze soaked Lilah up, the low-cut yoga pants and snug T-shirt she wore, the color on her cheeks that said she was feeling much better, the shine in her eyes that assured him she’d finally caught up on sleep and was no longer in constant pain.

Someone had brought pizza, magazines, fingernail polish, lotions, and a bunch of other frilly shit. There was so much estrogen in the room he almost couldn’t breathe. He stared at Lilah in the middle of the bed, the center of attention, wearing no bra and a bandage from getting shot-

Christ.

She smiled at him and just about melted his bones away. “Hey.”

“Hey right back atcha. Everyone out,” she said, not taking her eyes off him.

No one listened. The talking and laughing continued.

Lilah put her fingers to her mouth and whistled, loud and long. “Party’s over,” she said into the ensuing silence, snagging Brady’s hand. “Except you.”

“I need a shower,” he said inanely.

“Yeah? Well, it just so happens that I have one.”

At this, there were hoots and hollers and whistles. Brady shook his head as the women gathered their things to leave.

“Here.” Jade slapped a Cosmo up against his chest. “You might want to keep that one. Page fifty-seven, ‘Fun with Handcuffs.’”

More laughter.

He turned and met Lilah’s eyes. “Telling tales?” he asked.

She lifted a shoulder. “It might have come up in conversation is all.”

“Uh-huh.” When everyone had left, he stripped and showered until the hot water was gone. He came out of the bathroom for the duffel bag of clean clothes he’d dropped in the bedroom.

Lilah rose to her knees on the bed and gave him the “come here” finger crook.

Raising a brow, he walked forward until his legs bumped the bed.

She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Hi,” she said.

He bent his head and kissed her until they were both breathless, and then he set his forehead to hers. “Hi.”

She smiled and he got hard. Just like that. “Dinner,” he said. “Out. You up for it?”

“Another date?”

“If I say yes,” he asked cautiously, “are you going to tell me you don’t have anything to wear?”

“Hey, you’re the one nearly naked.” She ran her hands down his chest, over his abs, and then played with the edge of the towel low on his hips, the one barely covering him. “And you smell fantastic,” she murmured, and took a bite out of his shoulder. “I could eat you up.”

He was on board with that.

But she got off the bed. “I’ll get dressed. I ordered something new.” She stripped off the T-shirt and then the yoga pants as she walked to the closet in nothing but a teeny tiny black pair of bikini panties.

He groaned.

She shot him a smile over her shoulder. “You’ve seen it all before.”

Yes, up front and personal. Three nights in a row, in fact, and he couldn’t imagine ever getting tired of it. “Put clothes on,” he said in a voice so low and thick he barely recognized it as his own, “or you’ll be dinner.”

Laughing, Lilah slid a halter-style summer dress over her head and slipped her feet into sandals, then twirled for him.

“Pretty,” he said, and tugged her into him so that she fell against his chest. Sliding his hands down he cupped and squeezed her ass.

“Hmmm,” she hummed, face against his throat as she rocked her hips to his. “Either you’re happy to see me, or”-she rocked again, grinding into him, making him groan-“you’re packing again.”

Giving her a light smack on her ass, he pulled away and dressed, then carried her out the door.

“I was shot in the arm, not the leg,” she pointed out. “And I’m all better. I can walk.”

He didn’t set her down until he placed her in the passenger side of his truck.

“Where are we going?”

“State secret.”

She rolled her eyes, but she didn’t ask any more questions until he’d parked outside of a steak house in Coeur d’Alene.

“I needed red meat,” he said to her silence.

“Yes. It’s because you’re a caveman.”

Smiling, he came around for her, but she shoved him in the chest. “Don’t even think about carrying me in there.”

“Some women like to be carried.”

“I’m not some women.”

“True,” he said.

She waited until they were seated and had ordered before she asked, “Are we celebrating something?”

“Yes. The fact that I’m not wearing duck shit today and also that for the first time in days I’m done working before bedtime.”