LITMIR.BIZ

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to do something. He couldn’t deny that. But never, not once, had he imagined she would do that.

      Somehow, in the moment, slapping her on the rear had made sense.

      He’d shown up at the ranch, and neither Eli nor Connor had been there. Then he’d run across Kate. Riding her horse around the barrels, so obviously holding back it had made him angry for some reason.

      Probably for the same reason her putting off turning pro made him angry.

      She was selling herself short. Holding herself back. Making herself so much smaller than she should.

      He hated that. It was something his mother had done, always. Accepting defeat. Receding into it. A woman who hadn’t been wanted by her rich lover, so she’d refused to take anything from him. Refused to fight. Curled so deep into herself she couldn’t even love her son, because she couldn’t see her value or his.

      He didn’t want to see Kate doing it, too.

      But then she compounded her sins by being...not the Kate he was used to. When she’d done her second run, he’d been far too aware of how her body moved with the horse’s. And it had been far too easy to imagine her riding astride him as he gripped her hips, as she followed his rhythm.

      Something in his brain was short-circuiting. And that had been confirmed when she’d started running her mouth, and in his mind it had seemed a perfectly acceptable solution to give her a smack on the ass. Nothing more than a sports pat, something to prove he was in complete control of himself. That she was one of the guys, or just a little sister to him, or something.

      It had backfired in a very spectacular way.

      Not only because the contact had felt decidedly unbrotherly on his end but because then she had turned around and kissed him.

      And it had damn near knocked him on his ass.

      More accurately, it had damn near taken them both to the ground, where he would have taken things a lot further than a simple kiss.

      He tried to think back to a few weeks ago. When Kate had simply been Kate, the younger sister of his two best friends in the entire world. A woman he’d known for so many years he didn’t spare her a second glance when she walked in the room. There had been no need to look at her. He had her memorized already.

      No makeup. Long dark hair either hanging down her back or tied back into a braid. And her body... He’d never even bothered to look. Not in a serious way.

      He wanted to go back to that time. Sadly, he couldn’t. Which meant when Kate stormed into the Grange Hall looking furious, he did look at her.

      At the flush of rose in her cheeks that betrayed just how mad she was, at the dangerous glitter in her dark eyes. The way her hair was disheveled, probably from the ride earlier, but it made him think of the kiss. The possibility that it had been messed up by him.

      The kiss had been too brief for that. He hadn’t had the chance to sift his fingers through her hair. Hadn’t had a chance to do anything much other than brush his lips briefly against hers. Because he had come back to his senses and fast.

      He shouldn’t be regretting that.

      He gritted his teeth and tried to focus on what Eileen was saying about the progress sheet made for their rodeo day. Kate, meanwhile, had taken a seat opposite him in the circle, making such a show of not looking at him that it made her anger all the more apparent.

      Okay, so leaving her during her ride and then not taking her to the meeting as they’d agreed had probably been a jerk move. But he didn’t really appreciate the kiss, so as far as he was concerned, they were even.

      Except for the part where Kate Garrett had made his dick hard and nothing would be right in his life or his head ever again.

      So yeah, there was that.

      Eileen called on him to speak and he rattled off the list of riders he’d gotten to agree to be a part of the competition.

      With the venue confirmed, enough riders on board and enough livestock owners willing to have their bulls and broncs involved in the extra day, everything was ready to move forward.

      And he could barely pay attention, because the kiss, the kiss that never should have happened, was still burning his lips.

      Shit, he was the one acting like a virgin, not Kate.

      The word sent a shock of heat through his body. A virgin.

      The odds that Kate was a virgin? Very high. Very, very high and he shouldn’t care or ponder that. He shouldn’t think of Kate and sex or Kate and no sex at all.

      Except he had thought Kate and sex a lot in the space of the past few minutes, and dammit, he needed a distraction. He needed to chop wood. No, that wasn’t good enough. He should go pull a tree down with his bare hands. Anything to expel the extra testosterone currently roaring through his body.

      He could sleep with someone else, he supposed. Kate wasn’t an option and the best way to deal with being horny was to get some. A simple problem with a simple solution.

      He raised his eyes and scanned the room, purposefully avoiding looking anywhere near Sierra or Kate. There were some hot cowgirls in the building. Chicks in rhinestone jeans and pink hats with tight tops and big breasts. Girls who would stay long enough to complete the ride, so to speak, and then get on their way. No hang-ups, no nothing. Just his type.

      Except looking at them right now was just like looking at a sunset. Real nice, real pretty, but he didn’t want to fuck it.

      Not that he wanted to do that with Kate. There was a lot of mileage between a kiss in an arena and full-on...bedroom events.

      But the fact that it was on his mind was a bad sign.

      By the time the meeting adjourned, Jack wasn’t in the mood to stick around and socialize, even if he should. Especially with the pretty cowgirls.

      He didn’t feel like it.

      He stood and made his way out, looking at Kate one last time. Kate, who was still very definitely ignoring him.

      Fine. He walked out the door, and thankfully, no one stopped him. Probably because he looked about as happy as a guy chewing glass.

      He crossed the street to where he’d parked his truck. The days were getting shorter, dusk already lowering itself down to the tops of the mountains and blanketing the town in deep blue. There was something peaceful about it like this. The familiar shrouded in darkness. He’d traveled all over the country during his stint in the rodeo, but he’d never found another place he felt as if he could call home.

      On the road he’d found what he did or didn’t do meant nothing. Because no one who mattered was there to see it.

      Copper Ridge, for all the history, good, bad and ugly, was his home. No doubt about it.

      Eli was here. Connor was here.

       And the Wests are here. And you’re still wishing he’d see you.

      No. Hell no. The old man could rot, for all he cared. He wanted to be a thorn in his side, sure as hell, but he didn’t want attention. Didn’t need admiration.

      “All right, asshole.”

      Jack turned and saw Kate storming across the street, her hands clenched into fists at her sides. She painted a sharply contrasting picture to some of the other women in the group. No sequins, no pink.

      Oh yeah, and she was looking at him like she wanted to kill him with her bare hands and feed his body to the seagulls.

      “What do you want, Kate?”

      “Why did you stand me up?” she demanded.

      “Why did you kiss me?”

      “Because you’re sexy and I wanted to. Now, why the hell did you stand me up?” she asked again, her voice cracking. “I waited for you.”

      “I

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