Kristen Ashley - Play It Safe

Then he said softly, “My Dad was right.”

“About what?”

“Good things come to those who wait.”

My breath clean left me at the same time my nose started stinging.

“Gray,” I whispered.

Gray wasn’t in the mood to comfort a sobbing me and I knew this when he said, “Got work to do, baby, so say you love me.”

I gave him that play.

“I love you.”

He grinned again before he dipped his head, touched his mouth to mine, doing so without cracking me with the bill of his baseball cap then he lifted his head, gave me a squeeze, turned around and walked out the backdoor of the kitchen to go off to do macho man rancher cowboy things.

I sighed.

Then I moved through the kitchen to do rancher cowboy’s stylish girlfriend things.

By the way, Gray had never had it but he loved bleu cheese crumbled on top of a broiled steak.

See? I totally had this rancher’s girlfriend thing down.

Totally.

Four days later…

“Come here,” Gray growled.

I slid him out of my mouth but wrapped my hand around him and immediately started stroking as I turned my head, kissed the inside of his thigh before my eyes went to him and I whispered, “Not done, baby.”

“You’re done.”

“Give me a little while longer.”

“You get longer, Ivey, I’ll come in your mouth. You know I come in you and by you I don’t mean your mouth. Now come here.”

This was true. And at his words I suddenly wanted him in me.

Therefore I started crawling up his body.

The room was dark. I had no idea what time it was. Gray had woken me with his hands then added his mouth then I added my hands and mouth. Except for me and my fans and sequined panties, we’d never done this. I’d adjusted to Gray’s sleeping schedule just as easily as I adjusted to Mustang. A couple of days, I was there.

But if this was an indication that Gray had sleepless nights, I wasn’t going to complain if this was how he worked through them.

I made it up his body, he shifted his legs so they were between mine and I was straddling him. One of his arms curved around my waist, moving me down, the other hand drove into my hair, his hips bucked up, my mouth hit his, my tongue slid inside and he slid inside me.

Oh yeah.

Then he rolled us, mouths and bodies connected, and his hips started moving, fast, hard, driving deep.

Oh yeah.

He was nearly there and intent to take me with him. I loved it when he got this way, driven, on the edge of losing control and what I loved about it was that I made him that way.

Then, from far off in the silence of the night I heard what sounded like a shotgun blast.

Gray’s head shot up and he stilled a half a second then slid out, rolled and angled off the bed, clipping, “Fuck.”

“What was that?” I whispered but I knew. Gray had told me about the shotgun rigged in the barn.

“Dial nine-one-one, Ivey,” Gray ordered, tugging his jeans on.

“What?”

“Dial nine-one-one,” Gray repeated, bent over and snatched up his shirt. I saw his head turn toward me in the dark and he went on, “Now.”

I jerked out of my surprised stupor, rolled to his nightstand and grabbed the phone.

Gray tagged his boots and sprinted out the door.

“Shit, shit, fuck,” I whispered as I dialed in the dark then I jumped off the bed and started looking for my nightie and panties.

“Nine-one-one, what’s your emergency?”

“This is Ivey Larue. I’m at Cody Ranch off of fifty-seven west of Mustang. We have an intruder.”

I had the phone tucked between my ear and shoulder and I was shimmying on my panties then awkwardly pulling my little, red satin nightie over my head, answering the operator’s questions when I saw it.

A weird light dancing through the opened window.

I blinked at it then it hit me what that hue and dance meant. I rushed to the window and saw the barn was on fire.

“Oh my God!” I cried, cutting off whatever the operator was saying and dashing back across the room to my jeans. “Notify the Fire Department. Our barn’s on fire. We have twenty horses in there! Hurry!”

Then I didn’t even bleep it off before I threw it on the bed, yanked up my jeans, zipped them and didn’t bother with the button. Then I raced out of the room, down the stairs, through to the kitchen and to the backdoor where I pulled on my wellies without socks. Then I dashed out the backdoor.

I didn’t hesitate to dash across the back lawn to the burning fire even as I saw Gray leading out two horses, smacking one on its rump and both galloped toward the opened paddock.

Gray saw me and, running back in, he shouted, “Get in the house!”

Then he disappeared in our burning barn!

Gray was in there.

Our horses were in there.

Horses I fed, horses I watered, some of them even nuzzled my neck with their nose.

And the man I loved who for seven years had been taken from me was in there too.

And again, I didn’t hesitate.

I ran into the barn.

Flames licked everywhere and if I gave them a chance, they would terrify me.

So I didn’t.

And it was hot, hotter than anything I’d ever experienced. The smoke was thick. And just the sound of the blaze burning was petrifying. That burn could burn me, that smoke could choke me and just thinking about it could paralyze me.

So I didn’t.

Gray, no longer leading horses out, just opening stalls, racing through them and shouting, “Heeyah!” saw me instantly.

“Get outta here, Ivey!” he roared.

I ignored him, rushed through the barn and did what he was doing. I opened an unopened stall and luckily the horse raced out toward safety without me having to prompt her. Then again to the next stall and again. The fourth stall the horse, one of the ones with foal, was backing against the wall, eyes wide and wheeling, front hooves making short, panicked hops. I remembered Gray telling me not to get behind a horse and there was no way I was getting in front of those hooves so I rushed cautiously to her side, put one hand to her ribs pressing in the direction of the exit, slapped her rump and shouted, “Heeyah!” like Gray.

It took three slaps then she heeyahed.

I got one more horse out before the horrifying sound of creaking wood and the terrified shrieks of penned horses penetrated my brain then, before I could locate Gray, he located me. His hand closed tight around mine and he dragged me toward the opened front doors.

We weren’t out of the barn when the back collapsed and I couldn’t swallow my terrified scream at hearing the booming crash and feeling the force of the wave of air and blast of heat that blew my hair forward.

But we weren’t back there. We were fifteen feet from the doors then ten then five then we were out. The much cooler summer air hit me like a slap and I sucked in its clean as Gray kept racing us away from the barn.

Then he stopped me, yanked on my hand and I looked up at his soot-streaked face.

“We need to get the horses in the paddock. They’re spooked. Be cautious. Don’t approach unless you get a good feeling. Guide them in, herd them in, chase them in, clapping and shouting, whatever you gotta do but stay away if they’re spooked. Yeah?”

I nodded.

He let my hand go and took off. I looked right and left seeing horses all around. I approached one then saw Gray with another one. It was the one he rode often, his horse, a stallion, white with big brown splotches called Answer. Then I watched in asstonishment as, bareback, he swung up then somehow wheeled Answer around and then started to race through the area, herding horses.

I did my bit, dashing around and herding them toward him.

My work was done, all of the horses near the house were in the paddock and Gray was galloping off toward a couple that were further away when I heard the sirens.

But I didn’t look to the sirens. I looked to the still burning barn, the flames dancing high, licking the air. Another section had collapsed.

Then I looked to the paddock and counted.

Ten horses.

Numbly, my head turned and I watched Gray driving the two other horses toward the paddock.

With his horse and those two, that made thirteen.

Thirteen.

Thirteen.

Listlessly, I turned back to the barn.

Seven horses were dying in there or already dead.

Seven.

The sirens got closer, I heard shouts, men working and the red, blue and white of emergency vehicle lights flashed through the dancing light of the flames.

“Ivey!” I heard my name shouted but I stared at Gray’s barn burning knowing which horses were in those back stalls, stalls Gray and I didn’t have time to get to. I’d fed them. I’d moved them to the paddocks. I’d even ridden two of them.

Two hands clasped my arms and pulled me away ten feet but I didn’t tear my eyes from the barn.

Then I was shaken and heard, “Talk to me, Ivey. Gray’s seein’ to business and I gotta know what went down.”

I turned and looked up at Captain Lenny.

Then I told him everything he needed to know.

“Gray’s shotgun blasted.”

Lenny’s entire face went hard in a way that if I wasn’t numb with shock and sadness would have scared me.

Then his eyes shifted to the dancing flames.

One hour, forty-five minutes later…