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  In the blink of an eye, my fingers are buried in her thick blond locks and my lips are on hers. My mind has permanently associated the taste of strawberries with the taste of Layne. Her soft hand strokes my cheek before wrapping around my neck to pull me closer, her body now lying partially under mine. My tongue swipes across the part in her lips and she instinctively opens to me. I greedily take what she offers and relish in the feel of her tongue gliding across mine.

  My hands move to her face and I stroke her cheeks softly as I kiss her. Her chains are falling away, her walls are crumbling around us, and she’s letting me in. Her fingers grip the back of my hair and she moans softly into my mouth. It’s the sexiest sound I’ve ever heard, and the reverberation ripples through my body. Our lips and tongues perform a furious dance as they caress and stroke, but continue to demand more and more.

  This is the best kiss I’ve ever experienced, and it’s only our first kiss. I want it to last forever. At the same time, I want to strip every shred of her clothes from her luscious body and consume it as voraciously as her lips. Slowing our pace, I pull up slightly and slowly run my tongue across her parted lips. Her back arches, pushing her breasts farther into me, and her fingers grip my neck tightly with intense desire. Her tongue meets mine and I lightly suck it into my mouth. Another moan passes between us before I realize it was mine this time.

  Purposely staying as close as possible, I raise my head to meet her gaze. She’s not one to openly share her feelings, but her eyes betray her every time. I’m intent not to let her spook and run from me, which will probably be her initial reaction. “Layne,” I whisper and she opens her eyes.

  At first, they’re dreamy and filled with lust and need. When she begins to realize what just happened, fear starts to fill her beautiful blue eyes. “Layne,” I repeat. “I’ve wanted to kiss you since the first time I saw you. I’ve fought it every day since then. I know you’ve been hurt, but I’m not him. Look at me, Layne. See me here with you.”

  “You’ve wanted to kiss me?” she asks. “Really?”

  She’s still here with me. She’s not running away yet. “You have no idea how badly I’ve wanted to kiss you, Layne.”

  “So, how was it for you? Did it live up to your expectations?”

  “Hand to God, that was the best kiss I’ve ever had.” Doubt flashes across her face and I continue. “You know me well enough by now, Layne. I don’t lie.”

  “It was an incredible kiss,” she agrees. Her cheeks flush and I know she’s about to admit something to me, too. “It was the best kiss I’ve ever had, too. I’ve never had a kiss actually curl my toes before.”

  “Layne, I’d really, really love to curl your toes again. But I’m afraid you’ll regret it tomorrow when you’ve sobered up from drinking a whole bottle of wine tonight.”

  She scrunches her eyebrows in confusion for a second before she chuckles. “I didn’t drink a whole bottle of wine, Ace. I had one glass of it before I knocked it over because the damn fire ants attacked me.”

  “You’re sober?”

  “Completely.”

  “I can’t tell you how happy I am to hear that,” I admit. “Wait. That means you shared your personal life with me willingly, then?”

  Uncertainty clouds her eyes for a moment. “I just thought I should give you the benefit of the doubt if I’m going to ask Frankie to give you a chance.”

  “So you’re the sacrificial lamb, putting your own well-being on the line so you can protect Frankie?”

  “I’d rather it be me who gets hurt again than him,” she admits. “But I don’t think you’re that kind of man, Ace, or I wouldn’t take the risk at all.”

  “Layne?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m going to give you the best kiss you’ve ever had now. Your toes will never be straight again.”

  Chapter Nine

  Layne

  The silky smooth feel of his tongue gliding across mine sends shivers down my spine. His intrinsic taste is every bit as intoxicating as that bottle of strawberry wine, except he’s much more addictive. When his calloused fingers glide across my cheek, a need greater than I’ve ever known consumes me and makes me want to beg for him to touch me everywhere.

  I am safe and secure under the weight of his body, and his lips and tongue move with expert precision and determination. Even when I try to rush him and greedily take more, he won’t allow it. He keeps complete control, drawing out the pleasure, leaving me wanting—no, needing—more. My next breath is dependent upon his kiss, his touch, his taste. What I was intent would never happen again is happening right before me, but I can’t willfully stop this any more than I can willfully stop my heart from beating.

  He shifts his weight and settles his hips between my legs. The sudden friction against my clit causes an intense moan to escape from my throat. His responding growl only amplifies the fire that is about to combust between us. His hips flex and his erection slides across me. My fingers curl into his shirt, my nails scrape across his skin, and my neck arches in response. Ace’s lips move down to my exposed neck as he kisses, licks, and nips at the erogenous area.

  “You taste good everywhere,” he murmurs. “Your lips, your tongue, your neck. I can’t help but wonder what you taste like in other places.”

  His hands find their way under my shirt, and he slowly pushes it up as he slides down. His fingers are sprawled out across my abdomen, heating my core from his mere touch. When the stubble from his faded beard scrapes across my stomach, my hands instinctively jerk to his head and my fingers glide through his light brown hair. He pulls my skin through his teeth, sucking it into his mouth, and then laving the area with his warm tongue.

  “Mmm, the more I taste you, the better it gets,” he hums against my skin.

  He lifts his eyes to look at me. Looking for permission? He has it, whatever he wants to do to me. Town gossip be damned. I don’t care what they think of me, how easy they think I am, or how jealous they are that he’s here with me. Not one of them has walked in my shoes, has felt what I’ve felt, or has been hurt in the way that I’ve been hurt—because none of them is me.

  “Ace,” I beg with one word. A one-syllable, one-word plea.

  Mixed emotions swirl in his eyes, and I can pick each one out as if it were a neon sign. Understanding—that my single word reply says so much more than I can. Relief—because I feel the same need he does. Determination—my carnal craving will be fully satisfied judging by the fire building in his eyes.

  “Come back to my house with me, Layne,” he requests. “You deserve better than a blanket on the ground.”

  “A warm summer night, a soft blanket, thick Bermuda grass, and a sky full of stars shining brightly? What could be better than this?” I ask softly.

  “Are you sure?”

  He searches my eyes again, waiting for some sign that’ll give him a clear indication, while his thumb lightly strokes my cheek. I consider the fact that Bobby is the only man I’ve ever been with and how I feel about that fact changing. While I’ve only known Ace a few weeks, I dated Bobby for a full year before having sex the first time. The differences between the two men make their personalities seem like day and night.

  Then there’s the pesky little fact that I’m only here for a short time.

  Ace isn’t really the New York City type, and I have no intentions of moving here. Long-distance relationships don’t work past the short-term phase, so there’s no point in even attempting that disaster. Not that I’m expecting forever, but then, I really haven’t given any thought to what I expect at all.

  “Layne, as much as I want to hear you screaming my name until it echoes off the mountains all night, I don’t want to rush you and it seems that’s exactly what I’m doing. I won’t take you tonight. For now, I’m going to leave this as the best first and second kiss I’ve ever had—and wait for the rest. And, honestly, I don’t think you’re ready for this yet.”

  “What do you mean?” I just told him about my breakup a few
minutes ago, and I intentionally kept my mental breakdown out of the conversation.

  He rolls to his side but keeps his body touching mine, his hand splayed across my stomach, and his eyes glued to mine. “The equine rehab center isn’t just a place that rehabilitates horses, Layne. It does help them, don’t get me wrong, but they’re very attuned to human emotions. If a horse senses a human’s spirit is broken in a similar way his is, he’s more likely to bond with that human. Frankie has bonded with you because he feels your pain and he recognizes it as his own.

  “Justin is a licensed therapist, and this is a new type of therapy that we’re conducting clinical trials on. I’m a licensed equine specialist, so not the same as Justin. He works with the human patients, I work with the horse patients, and together we try to heal both.”

  The weight of his words sinks in as I think about the time I’ve spent with Frankie. It humbles me to think of when we clung to each other, the feelings I felt were magnified in him. The day in the pasture when he walked up to me, the day in the pen when it felt like he hugged me—it was because the broken heart inside me mirrored the broken heart inside him.

  “So you knew I was broken when you first met me?” My voice is thick with emotion but I manage to get the words out.

  “I didn’t know any details, but I knew you were hurting when you told me Frankie approached you. He’s never done that with anyone else.”

  “And you’re still here, even knowing that ahead of time?”

  “I’ve tried to resist, Layne. For your sake, for my sake, and mostly for River’s sake, I’ve tried to keep my distance from you. But Justin said something that made me reconsider my stance. If there’s something between us we both want, I’m actually hurting myself and my daughter by not giving it a chance. So tell me something, Layne. Are you willing to take a chance on me?”

  “What happens at the end of the summer?” I whisper, afraid of his answer, regardless of what it is.

  “We’ll just go where summer never ends,” he replies.

  If any other man had said that, I would’ve sworn it was a smooth line he used just to try to get in my pants. But with Ace, I know that’s not the case at all. He had every opportunity to take all he wanted, but he stopped on his own. He’s also not one to mince words to spare anyone’s feelings. Every day I’ve spent with him, he’s been bluntly honest.

  That’s my cue to be bluntly honest with myself. Should I allow the pain from my split with Bobby to rob me of my happiness? To taint the rest of my life? When I left his apartment that day, and every day up until now, I’ve been intent on never letting another living soul anywhere near my heart.

  But River found a way in.

  Frankie thawed the iceberg in my chest.

  Ace warmed me from the inside out.

  I don’t want to miss this chance, wherever it may lead. I know I’m still broken and I’m afraid to hope, but something tells me Ace already knows that.

  “Eternal summer sounds perfect to me,” I reply, leaving it intentionally vague. I just can’t bring myself to say it yet.

  His responding smile is understanding, empathetic, discerning. He may not be a therapist for humans, but he seems to be able to read people very well. “Good answer.”

  He leans in for a sweet, chaste kiss. His lips brush against mine, his tongue teases me without fully delving inside. Even so, it’s still every bit as toe-curling and panty-melting as the others were.

  “Don’t forget the inner tube race is the day after tomorrow.” He raises my fingers to his mouth, kissing the tips one by one. “You’re still going to be my partner in it, right? It’s always a lot of fun, and you could use a little cutting loose and having some fun.”

  “Such a sweet-talker. You’ve convinced me,” I retort. “What you’re really saying is you need my help to win the race.”

  “Oh, you’ll help me win, huh?” The amused twinkle in his eye is so sexy.

  “That’s right. You don’t stand a chance without me.”

  “I do love a woman who’s sure of herself,” he winks. “And since you have a day off from babysitting, come by the farm and hang out with Frankie tomorrow. He misses you.”

  “Frankie misses me, huh?”

  “He does.” Ace nods. “And if you come by late in the afternoon, say just before I get off work, we’ll leave from there and I’ll take you out on a real date.”

  “Um, Ace, I’ve seen you when you get off work. I’m not going out with you all dirty and sweaty,” I laugh.

  “I’ll take a shower there before we leave,” he deadpans. “But now you have to pay for that insult.”

  “Pay, how?” I ask tentatively. I’m not sure I really want to know.

  Before I can move, his fingers grip my ribs on both sides and he tickles me—mercilessly. Even through my squirming, squealing, and attempts to break free, his grip never falters.

  “Are you going to take that back now?”

  “Okay!” I laugh, I mean, really laugh. “I take it back! I take it back!”

  “That’s a good girl,” he chides playfully as he stops. “You learn so quickly.”

  “That was said under duress,” I pretend to pout. “It doesn’t count.”

  “You just want me to do it again.” He grins.

  “No! You win,” I laugh. “For now.”

  “So you’ll come by tomorrow?”

  “Of course I’ll be there,” I assure him. “I’d do anything for Frankie.”

  * * *

  We spent a couple of hours looking at the stars, picking out constellations, and playfully arguing over whether the brighter lights were satellites or planets. It was just so easy to spend time with him with no specific agenda. Even the silence was comfortable. There was no need to fill in the space with white noise. No desperate search for something interesting to talk about.

  I watched him walk away, back toward his house. As much as I hated to see him go, he was right when he said I wasn't ready for him to spend the night. As soon as I lock the door behind me, I hear my cell phone ringing from the other room. I race through the living room and straight into the kitchen to find my phone. Anyone calling this late must have an emergency.

  When I finally find it, I don't recognize the number on the caller ID, but it's a New York area code. My first thought is one of my cases is blowing up and whoever was assigned to it needs my input.

  "Hello?" I ask breathlessly.

  "Layne," the familiar voice pleads. "Don't hang up."

  “What do you want?” I ask through gritted teeth. “I thought I made it clear I didn’t want to hear from you ever again.”

  “You did,” Bobby replies sadly. “And I’m sorry, I can’t just leave you alone. We need to talk, Laynie.”

  “Don’t ever call me that again.”

  “Layne, please, we have to talk about this. We’ve been together too long to just throw everything away now.”

  “You threw it all away the first time you slept with Cyndi. Don’t even try to put that blame on me, like you’re the fucking victim.”

  Bobby sighs heavily and I can picture him as clearly as if he’s standing beside me. His eyes are shimmering with tears, he’s trying desperately to hold on to any semblance of self-control, and he’s searching for his next words.

  “Just hear me out, okay?”

  He always says that when he’s trying to think on his feet. In spite of the fact that I loved him for seven years, I hate that I know him so well.

  “Say what you have to say and then leave me alone,” I partially concede.

  “I’m completely responsible for what I did. Betraying you. Hurting you. Lying to you. Making you feel anything but cherished and loved. If there were a way I could go back and change it all, I would in a second. I’d give up anything I have to be able to do that.

  “But I can’t. All I can do is get on my knees and beg for your forgiveness. Beg you to give us one more chance. Beg you to not let what we have wither and die because I made the worst mistake I could ma
ke. Beg you to let me earn your love every single day for the rest of your life.”

  I can’t lie and say there wasn’t a time when I wanted to hear these very words. Or that they don’t affect me now and make me wish for what I always thought we had. Then the pain of finding them together that day comes rushing back. Cyndi’s revelation that she’s carrying Bobby’s baby sealed our relationship coffin. While I’m talking to him, there is a question I want answered, for closure, to move on without another thought of Bobby and Cyndi.

  “You owe me an answer to a question that’s been haunting me. And I deserve the truth, no matter what it is. If you hesitate even one second before answering me, I’ll know you’re lying and this will be our last conversation—ever.”

  “Ask me. I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  “What was it that pushed you into bed with Cyndi?”

  “I was so overwhelmed, Layne. So many things were going wrong at work, and I thought the restaurant would close for good. You didn’t put pressure on me, but I did feel pressured to get married and I wasn’t sure I was ready for it. Then the whole baby thing came up.

  “The thought of being a father and being responsible for another human being freaked me out, but I knew it was something you really wanted, so I agreed to it. But then when it still hadn’t happened after two years of trying, I started to think it wasn’t meant to happen. I snapped under all the pressure and thought I wanted to go back to a more carefree time.”

  He finally stops to take a breath but mine is still frozen in my throat. He really thinks that explanation explains it all away. He believes he’s done this great and noble thing by admitting all his faults. But what he’s done is confirm that he’s been lying to me for a long time. He dares to say he felt pressured to get married and have a baby, but not by me. What a cowardly cop-out. He still can’t tell the truth.

  And I’ve been lying to myself for far too long by thinking a baby would bring us closer, that it would make him want to marry me.