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“Well, I’ll be out on the porch if anyone needs me,” Ash says, giving Jackson a pat on the chest as he passes. My brother watches him walk off, a lovesick expression on his face that never ceases to amuse me.
My thoughts come to an abrupt halt as I spot a face I’d recognize anywhere, the man himself strutting my way across the parking lot. Well, not directly my way, but walking toward the front of the grocery store I just left, smiling at the ground in that way he does. Always smiling. Always so damn happy for no conceivable reason. Except… Yep. There it is. Colton goddamn Darling lifts his dark head of hair, locks eyes with me, and scowls. Just like that.
I don’t know why I do it. I really don’t. “Make me,” I spit out, shoving his chest. The next second, there’s a forearm pressing me into the shelves of neatly boxed nails at my back, Noah’s presence looming over me and damn near suffocating. “Jesus,” I mutter, sucking in a breath as his eyes ping between my own, the copper-colored gaze hard and unflinching.
Colton Darling, friend to everyone in town but me, with his pretty boy looks and windswept hair, the dark stubble, and those piercing blue eyes women like Sierra seem to love. I hate blue.
“God,” he spits. “You think you’re so…entitled.” “Sorry?” I say around a harsh laugh. He waves a hand my way. “You. Big Noah King, all high and mighty, waiting for me to kneel in front of you.” Well, that’s a fucking visual.
“I challenge you,” he says unprompted, his voice low. “I’m sorry, what?” I say around a hoarse laugh. “What are we, Hamilton and Burr?” “Not to a duel, jackass. I challenge you to a Shoein’.”
“I’m not fighting you, Colt.” He scoffs. “It’s a friendly competition. No fighting involved.” Right. Friendly. “When I win,” I say, hardly able to believe the words coming out of my mouth, “I want something else. Something more than bragging rights.” Colton waves his hand in the air as if to say go on. My grin is a slow thing. “I want my name tattooed on your ass.” His eyes widen, and he sputters, “No way.”
I have never, not once, been interested in a man. Never kissed one or even wanted to. And of all the men in the world I could have chosen to kiss, hate-fueled or otherwise, it just had to be Colton goddamn Darling.
What. The fuck. Was that? I wipe my mouth and look down at my semi. “What the actual fuck,” I hiss. I did not just get a hate-boner over Noah King. Did I? No. No fucking way. Fuuuck.
I’m not doing a very good job of ignoring my Colton problem. I kissed the man. On the mouth.
“I’m not trying to trick you,” Colton says at my back. “I’m trying to make things right. I know you don’t believe me, Noah, but I never meant to lose you that job.”
“Colton doesn’t handle his emotions in the most obvious of ways. He grew up with three brothers. And they all liked strawberry cream pie.” “So, what?” I ask, keeping my tone as even as possible. “He learned to simply take what he wants?” Like my clients. Hank rolls his eyes. “Good Lord. No. My son,” he stresses, “is so used to putting others first that when there’s something he really wants, he doesn’t know how to ask for it. He’s scared if he does, he’ll end up without a piece at all.” With that, Mr. Darling pats my helmet, like a punctuation mark at the end of his story. “Evening, Noah.”
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“Jesus fuck, what is your problem?” I spit, standing up. “You,” he says, sounding at a loss. “The answer to that is always you.” “Well, don’t I feel special.”
“You just gonna stand there and stare at my ass?” Noah asks. “Or do you actually have work to get back to?” I huff, backpedaling to grab my supplies off the ground. “I wasn’t staring at your ass,” I bite out, heading past the man. “I don’t like your ass.” “Mhm.”
As Colton checks the tools in his bag—we each brought our own—I tug off my jacket. I toss it aside before turning back, finding Colton’s gaze wandering down my exposed arms before he quickly looks away.
I thought victory would taste oh so sweet after all these years with this man at my throat, trying his best to dig in. I wanted to put him in his place. Wanted to prove I was the better farrier. Instead? All I feel in lieu of the victory I was expecting is a sting I wasn’t prepared for in the least. Fuck.
Noah is standing next to the man I recognize as his uncle, smiling. My breath stutters in my lungs at the sight. I don’t think I’ve ever seen that smile before now.
Jackson scowls, and Ash laughs, reaching up to pull my brother down into a quick kiss. It’s so cute I want to fling myself into the fire.
‘I know your heart inside and out. If Noah can’t see it, that’s on him. Not you.’
“If this is about the tattoo, I’m not going to make you—” “It’s not about the tattoo,” I all but yell. “It’s you. It’s always fucking you.” To my surprise, my hand makes contact with the man’s chest, shoving him back a step. His eyes darken, body tensing. “Colt,” he says in warning. “I want to know why you’re stuck in my head. In my life,” I growl, shoving the man again. “I want—”
Noah grabs my arm and spins me bodily into his workbench. I scramble to grab ahold of it, catching my weight, the wooden edge digging into my ass as Noah’s hand grips the front of my throat. He wedges his knee between my legs and drives it upwards, forcing me harder against the table. “I’m going to ask you one more time,” he says, voice dangerously low, his eyes dark in the limited light of the barn. “What do you want from me, Colt?”
“So you say,” I soothe, rubbing his hand up and down over the denim of his jeans. Up and down. “But I’m still not going to touch you unless you beg for it.” “God,” he spits, some of that fire returning. “You’re insufferable. I don’t…” He cuts off, and I still the motion of our hands, waiting for more words that don’t come. “Do you want me to stop?” I ask, entirely serious. “Fuck. Fuck,” he nearly shouts. “Put your hand on my dick already.” “The magic word?” “Please, you fucker.”
“God,” he pants. “I already begged once. What do you want from me? You really need me to humiliate myself further?” “No,” I say firmly, giving his cock a single, smooth stroke. “I want you to know that all you have to do is ask and it’s yours.” He pulls in a breath, his eyes flying open, even as they stare straight ahead at the inside of my barn.
“What are you doing here?” Noah asks, a frown marring his face. “Seriously?” I retort, a frantic edge leaking into my tone. “What’re you doing? You make me goddamn question things, Noah, and then I find you here—what? Getting your kicks with somebody else? Is it all just a fucking game to you? Huh? Was I just a game?”
My heart pounds heavily in my chest, and I do my damndest not to feel the stirring below my belt. Because no. He doesn’t get to have that. Noah fucking King doesn’t get to be the one damn man I’m attracted to. I’m not. I can’t be. Not him. Not him.
“I think you were jealous,” he says at my ear, his hand slipping from the front of my throat to the back of my neck. He holds me tightly. Possessively. “I think I like you jealous.”
So why I lean forward to catch his stupidly full lips with my own, I have no fucking clue. Noah crowds me into the wall, both hands in my hair now, and when the hell did I grab his shirt? I don’t have a single brain cell left to make sense of this. Because Noah’s lips are on mine. Ruthless. Powerful. All-consuming. He’s kissing me. I’m kissing him. And it’s so much more than lackluster.
If he pulls away, I might just die.
This man makes me unhinged. He brings me undone.
“You tell me to stop, and I will,” I make sure he knows, needing him to know. “But you wanna fight this a little? I’m all for it, Colt. I have no problem making you mine.” “I’m not yours,” he grits out. “Will never be yours.” “We’ll see about that.”
Was he attracted to other men? Did he…like that guy touching him before I came along? I dismiss the hypothetical outright, not willing to entertain notions of Noah fucking King and the men he might be attracted to. He’s attracted to you, a little voice inside my head pipes cheerfully. I swat the thought away.
Colt: You’re such a dick. Me: If you want my dick, Colt, baby, all you have to do is ask. I freeze, staring at the text I just fired off. The fuck? Baby? Really? I wish I could snatch the word back before Colton has a chance to see it, but it’s too late now.
“You coming over tonight?” he asks, voice low. I freeze. Absolutely turn to stone, not a single part of my body moving except for my lungs and heart. Noah bounces his foot. “You’re coming over,” he says confidently. “No. I’m not.” “Yes, you are.”
“You want me to stop,” he says, “you say so.” I shake my head the tiniest bit, not wanting him to stop. He can’t. Not now. I’ll fucking punch him if he does.
“Colt, baby,” he says, his voice so quiet I’m not sure I’m meant to hear it. “Anything.”
The man would knock me off my feet if I allowed it. As is, I’m barely keeping it together, everything in me desperate to toss Colton onto my bed and cover every inch of him with my tongue and teeth. I want to mark him, taste him, pull whimpers and pleas from between his lips. I want everything he’ll allow me.
“What the fuck,” I breathe, my fingers tracing over the letters inked at the top of Colton’s right ass cheek. “God,” he moans, the sound barely audible, pressed to the sheets as it is. “When… When did you do this?” I demand. “After the Shoein’,” he says, face turned enough for me to hear him. “I wasn’t about to back out of our bet, was I?” He sounds pained when he adds, “You won fair and square. So…I got that.” That being the word “King” tattooed in beautiful script on Colton’s ass. I never thought… I didn’t think he went through with it. He’s had this for two months? Two months, and I had no
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“I can’t stop thinking about you. You’re in my fucking head. Invading my life. You’re everywhere I goddamn look. Everything I see.”
“And I’m not letting you run anymore,” I husk out. “You’re mine, Colton Darling. You. Are. Mine.”
“Yeah, baby,” I tell him, brushing his hair behind his ear. “Don’t fucking hide.”
“No running,” I remind him, brushing his hair back, letting my thumb stroke down his cheek to his jawline. I pluck up his chin, raising an eyebrow.
“Colton,” he says, the one word causing my eyes to slip shut. “We said no running.” “You said,” I fire back, my hands curled into fists at my sides. “I meant it.” “I don’t know what this is,” I rasp. “You’ll figure it out.” “Oh, fuck off,” I say, turning in his direction, his calm tone pissing me off. “Don’t say it like that, like I’m some sort of…foal who’s just learning how to walk. I’m not that green, King.” “No,” he says, smiling now. “You’re certainly no foal. You’re my colt.” I scowl at the man, and his smile broadens. “What are you so afraid of?” he asks, tone gentle despite his words.
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Me: Gorgeous. I’m not the least bit surprised by Colton’s response, but I laugh all the same. Colt: Oh, fuck you, you possessive prick.
freely. “I like you a whole fucking lot, Colt. Tell me you’re mine.”
“Against all goddamn sense and reason, you made me fall brim over boot, Noah King. And now I don’t know which way is up unless it’s with you.”
“I’m down on my knees, willingly, because I just got you. I just got you, and I can’t lose you. I’m sorry I didn’t recognize your face from back then. I am. But you, Noah…the boy who asked to ride horses at my ranch.” The sound he makes is wounded. Involuntary. “I know you deep in my bones. And I was so fucking scared of that when you showed back up in town. Because I saw that man. I saw you, and you wouldn’t see me back.”
“We never speak of this again. Ever. It’s bad enough I have to be seen with you. No one needs to fucking know about…this.” “Sure,” I agree easily. Colton sighs, looking pained. “Christ. It doesn’t actually bother me being seen with you, okay? Don’t go all puppy eyes on me. It’s just… We’re gonna have to ease my family into it. No one is gonna see this coming.” “Puppy eyes?” I ask, helping Colton to his feet. “You know you have pretty eyes. Shut up.” Colton groans as I laugh.
Remi’s gaze meets mine, and I understand instantly. Oakley. Lawson’s best friend moved down to Kansas a few years back. Our brother took it hard, and I know he’s been having a tough time with the divorce and everything changing, but would he really run off without telling any of us?
“I’m not asking you to move in, Noah. It’s just…it’s the sort of thing people think about in situations like ours, isn’t it?” His lips slowly curve into a smile. “In situations like ours.” “Yeah,” I say gruffly. “You know…boyfriends or whatever.” He looks downright amused at my sour expression. “Does it pain you to say that?” “You know damn well it does. Number one, I’m thirty-fucking-seven, thank you. The word feels ridiculous. Number two…it’s you.”
“You’re beautiful, Colton. And you are mine. Let me admire you.”
