Country Kisses (3:AM Kisses Book #8)(49)

The spring comes up with its steam rising into the sky like a forest full of ghosts.

We get out, and I pull her close to me.

“Come here.” A sad smile comes and goes on my lips. Something tells me if I invite her to Piper’s party this early in the week she’ll get cold feet by Saturday. I’d better leave it as a last-minute invite, vague at that. “Do you know that I miss you a little too much when we’re apart?”

“Oh, come on, stud.” She gives my ear a light pinch. “You know what they say—absence makes the heart beat faster.”

“That’s close enough—and true in my case.” I chuckle into her lips as she blesses me with a kiss. “You kick-start my heart every time you’re around, and when you’re gone, it simply stops beating. It waits for you.” My lips meander over her right cheek. “I’m only alive when I’m with you.”

A breath escapes her as her gaze rides up and down my body before meeting up with mine once again.

“Sometimes, the only time I can truly breathe is when we’re together.” The words come from her so sweet and tender they can only be true.

“Tell me one thing”—my voice wavers for a moment—“do you want this with me?”

“Yes,” she belts it out so fast, so loud it comes back to us as an echo. “Come here, you.” She pulls me in, and we evict our clothes achingly slow until I’m in my birthday suit, and she’s wearing that teeny tiny bikini she happily threatened me with.

“Wear this always.” I run my finger under her strap, touching down over her soft flesh, and she shivers. “Except for now.” I reach back and untie her top, freeing the girls into the wind. I bow down and kiss each one in turn before hitching my thumbs into her bottoms and letting them sail to the ground.

“Wear this. Take this off”—she purrs into me, warming her soft flesh over mine—“you are just a walking contradiction, Cade James.”

“Not me. I know what I want.” I swoop her up and carry her to the spring as she gives a little shriek of excitement. I sit us down at the edge and lower us into the heated bath.

We both give a little howl at the same time.

“You okay?” My lips find hers before I pull back and inspect the situation.

“As long as those tree trunks you call arms are wrapped around me.” She runs her cool, slender fingers down my cheek. “Of course, my previous statement puts me at risk of sounding like a damsel in distress—which I promise you I am not. I may sound sweet and look like a cream puff, but I can kick ass with the best of them.” Her cheeks darken with color, and I stifle the laugh begging to tremble from me. I love her. I love everything about her cute, feisty ways. I love the fact she needs to make it clear she’s not a damsel in distress, and yet, appreciates being tucked in my arms. “Anyway—” she bites down on her lip with that mischievous look in her eye that both my dick and I have grown to appreciate—“you make me feel safe, Cade.”

There they are. The exact words I think I needed to hear. It’s been such an unsafe world for Cassidy, with her father leaving, the brutal attack she survived leaving its indelible mark for the entire world to see.

“I want to be that safe haven for you.” I land my lips to hers. “I’m always here for you, Cassidy—always.”

Cassidy and I indulge in a long, heated kiss, her tongue mingling with mine, hungry and greedy, as if they had just been introduced. I reach over and pull a condom from my pants, and she takes it from me, opening it with her teeth while those beautiful eyes laugh with approval. It’s a rare moment not to catch Cassidy with extreme joy in her heart. That’s one of the things I like about her best. Her happiness is buoyant, unstoppable, and best of all, it’s contagious.

Cassidy wraps her legs around my waist and slips down slowly over me with her eyelids partially closed, her mouth opened as she struggles to catch her next breath.

“Shit.” My head tips back as she falls hard onto my body.

Cassidy and I heat that water up a hundred times hotter than it has ever been before.

Together, we’re building something that can last, something buoyant and unstoppable, something I’m hoping is highly contagious just between the two of us. I think we’re getting close to bringing this home, making it official, sharing that magical word that is about to change everything. There’s no way I’m bringing her to Piper’s party to give my little firecracker of a sister a chance to ruin things between us with her hot-headed emotions. Nope. The longer I can keep Cassidy to myself the better. Besides, she turned a little green when meeting just two of my friends. Meeting a cast of thousands will be far too overwhelming.

I want to protect Cassidy from everything.

I love this girl right here.

Yes, I do.





Two Wrongs Don’t Make a Mr. Right





Cassidy





Bright and early Saturday morning, the day of Princess Piper’s birthday, I get a text from Marley about that interview I’ve been trying to schedule for the last two weeks. It’s for an assignment, but really I just want to pick the ever-loving heck out of her business-minded brain. I love that Hollow Brook is brimming with independent strong women, and that they’re successful in their very own business, makes them that much more of a role model.