Vanishing Dreams: Vanishing Dreams (Devil's Bend #2) Read online

  Bless her. The woman thought she could get by without sharing more of herself with him. He’d just have to see about that.

  As though she suspected he wasn’t about to let go of the questions, Katie shocked him by speaking up as he navigated the truck down the narrow road.

  “So, you didn’t grow up in Tennessee?” Katie asked as he pulled the truck into a small alcove, doing a K-turn and then backing the truck closer to the water.

  “Nuh-uh,” he told her, putting the truck in park. “Come on, let’s sit on the tailgate.”

  “Seriously?” she asked as he leaned between the seats to retrieve the blankets he had stashed in the backseat. The ones he’d put there for specifically this purpose.

  “Yep. Come on.”

  Katie met his gaze across the dimly lit truck. For a brief moment, he thought he saw concern on her pretty face. What did she think he was going to do? Jump her bones right there at the lake? Hell, they’d had more than their fair share of chances for him to make a move, and he’d held back all this time. It wasn’t as if he was going to push her to do something she wasn’t ready for.

  Dalton happened to like that about Katie. She wasn’t the type of woman he was used to meeting these days. Most of them were more than willing to get naked and horizontal before he even knew their last name. He knew it was more due to his fame than his incredible personality, which was why he welcomed a chance to spend time with this woman.

  Katie Clarren seemed to care less that he was one of the biggest names in country music at the moment. And Dalton’s ego wasn’t involved in the latter part of that statement. It was a fact. The Billboard charts didn’t lie. Nor did his bank account.

  Exiting the truck, Dalton made his way to the back, lowered the tailgate, and spread one of the blankets on the cold metal bed before moving around to the passenger side to help Katie. The ground was soft beneath his feet, and he didn’t want her to fall — or at least that was his excuse. What he really wanted to do was to touch her, to feel her soft skin beneath his palms.

  When she allowed him to slide his arm around her waist and help her down the slope, he took the opportunity to breathe her in.

  Damn, this woman did something crazy to him, and he had no idea why that was. It wasn’t as if she was all that easy to get to know. In fact, quite the opposite.

  Helping her onto the tailgate by placing his hands on her waist and lifting her up, he took a seat beside her, taking her hand in his and linking their fingers. It was that or stand between her legs, and he knew good and damn well that wasn’t the appropriate way to start what he would consider their eleventh official date.

  Yes, he was counting.

  “You grew up here?” he asked, staring out into the inky black night, catching a glimpse of the gentle waves backlit by the bright moon, crashing against the bank just a few yards away from where they sat.

  “No, I didn’t,” she said hesitantly. “Hey, Dalton.”

  “Yeah?” he asked, turning his head to peer over at her.

  Katie’s long black hair was pulled back in a ponytail, she had tiny little diamond studs in her ears that twinkled every now and again when the moon hit them just right, but what kept drawing his attention was the smooth, sleek column of her neck. He just wanted to press his lips to the soft skin there, to breathe her in, taste her. He wanted to see if she was as sweet as he suspected she was.

  Sweet. That was always the first word that came to mind whenever he looked at her. She looked like the typical girl next door with her thin sweater, short flowing skirt, her tan skin quite the contrast against the off-white color.

  “Are you gonna kiss me?”

  Dalton kept his jaw hinged, not wanting to show his surprise. As much as he’d wanted to kiss her, he tended to keep his desire to himself. Sure, there were the few times he’d given in when the temptation had been too great, but he still tried to keep himself in check. He never seemed to know just what Katie expected from him. But right now, right here, with her posing a question like that, his body was roaring to life once again.

  “Kiss you?” he asked stupidly.

  Katie smiled and her white teeth shone in the darkness. “Yeah. You know, what a boy does to a girl when he likes her.”

  “Is that how it goes?” he joked, all the blood in his body flowing to one particular region, leaving him a little light-headed.

  “That’s what I hear.”

  Innocent.

  That’s another thing he loved about this woman. She spoke her mind, as long as it didn’t have anything to do with her personally, but she was seemingly innocent when it came to so many things.

  She just asked you to kiss her.

  Yeah, well, there was that. Maybe innocent wasn’t the correct turn of phrase.

  Twisting just enough to face her, Dalton released her hand and slid it up behind her neck, his eyes boring into hers as he studied her. He wasn’t sure when the last time was that he’d catalogued when his lips touched a woman’s.

  Maybe this was the first time.

  Leaning forward, Dalton went slow. There was an inferno building deep inside him, one that threatened to consume them both, but he managed to keep it under control.

  Barely.

  However, when Katie’s lips touched his, he lost his grasp on his common sense as well as his self-restraint. And when her arms came up and wrapped around his neck, he damn near lost his mind.

  This was unlike any of their previous kisses. Their lips brushed one another’s briefly, but when he expected her to draw away, leaving him to savor the brief taste of her, Katie surprised him. It wasn’t long before the heat was turned up. The next thing Dalton knew, Katie was straddling his lap, the blanket wrapped around her shoulders, her knees on either side of his hips, his hands on her waist, and his tongue delving into her sweet mouth.

  He growled, unable to help himself.

  Lord, have mercy.

  This woman…

  Fucking hell, Katie’s tongue plunged against his, and that was about when all thoughts fled.

  Chapter Three

  Katie had no idea what had come over her or why she was now straddling Dalton’s lap, eager to slide her fingers into the soft hair at the nape of his neck or slip her tongue into his mouth, but here she was.

  And wow! She wasn’t sure she ever wanted to stop kissing this man.

  His body was hard as steel pressed up against hers, his thighs rock solid beneath her, the chiseled planes of his chest a wall against her aching breasts. And she couldn’t seem to get close enough, although she was practically climbing his body.

  When his big, warm hands gripped her hips, her body caught fire, soaring several hundred degrees, and it single-handedly warded off the chill in the December night air. By the time they came up for oxygen, she was coated in a thin layer of perspiration thanks to her body heat and the blanket, but she didn’t care. If she had her way, she’d lose the skirt and Dalton would lose his clothes, right there on the tailgate of his truck.

  Too bad it wasn’t warmer, because skinny-dipping would be good, too. At this point, she just needed something to quench the incredible thirst she’d acquired for this man.

  “Katie,” Dalton growled, his hand palming the back of her head as he stared back at her. “Damn, darlin’. You sure about this? Keep this up and you’re gonna kill me.”

  “Can’t think of a better way to go,” she whispered breathlessly.

  Katie didn’t want him to stop touching her, didn’t want him to stop kissing her. She was primed and ready, and even though he seemed to have a little more self-restraint than she possessed, she wasn’t willing to let him lead the way.

  “Kiss me again, Dalton. Kiss me again, and please don’t ever stop,” she pleaded, needing that human connection. It’d been too damn long since she’d felt close to anyone like this. And never to this degree.

  “Fuck,” he growled hungrily before crushing his mouth to hers, pulling her closer until she was grinding against the hard ridge of his erec
tion.

  She knew she shouldn’t be doing this, shouldn’t be so aggressive, but shit, she was so damned tired of the good-girl routine. So tired of people believing only what they saw. Katie knew she was so far from good that she couldn’t even see it with binoculars, but no one else did. And she wanted this.

  More than her next breath.

  Katie slid her hands around to Dalton’s back, pushing them beneath his jacket and then under the cotton T-shirt he wore, her palms gliding over the hard ridge of muscles she found there. She moaned into his mouth, her fingernails raking across his skin as though that might possibly bring them closer.

  “Katie,” Dalton said, pulling back.

  “Please don’t,” she whispered. “Don’t warn me that this isn’t the right thing to do. That it isn’t the right time. That it isn’t the right place. You and I both know those are just social niceties, and I’m so far past that—”

  “Are you sure?” he asked again, cutting her off midsentence.

  “More than sure. I don’t want anything else,” she answered, pulling him closer, pressing her breasts firmly against his rock-hard chest while she nipped his lower lip.

  “Oh, hell,” Dalton mumbled before surprising her when he launched to his feet, his hands cupping her ass and holding her astride him.

  Wrapping her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck, Katie held on to the blanket and to him for dear life, not wanting him to drop her.

  “I’ve got you, baby,” he muttered, his lips pressed to hers.

  God, if he only knew how much she wished that were true. And she wasn’t just talking about right here and now.

  Dalton carried her to the passenger side of the truck, but he didn’t deposit her in the front seat as she expected. Instead, he opened the back door of the truck and set her on the edge of the backseat. Not willing to let him go, Katie pulled him, forcing him to climb in the truck with her.

  Only when he said he had to start the truck or they were going to freeze did she let him go. But even as he reached over the front seat to twist the keys in the ignition, Katie worked to release the button and the zipper on his jeans, easing her hand inside before he joined her again.

  “Darlin’,” he crooned.

  “I love when you call me that,” Katie told him as she wrapped her hands around the silky- smooth length of him. Even in the darkness, she could see the pure ecstasy on his face as he stared down at her, his hips thrusting forward ever so slightly as she stroked him.

  “Oh, damn. That feels good.”

  No, what felt good was when he pressed his knee between her legs, grinding against her aching sex. She moaned, unable to control the gentle rumble that started in her chest, but he quickly swallowed the sound when his mouth came down and met hers.

  Katie whimpered; the burning desire to have him right here in the backseat of his truck overwhelmed her, stole her breath. She was sure she’d regret this tomorrow, but right now, getting her hands on him was the only thing that mattered.

  It would seem that they were on the same page, because Dalton managed to shove his jeans down over his hips, freeing his thick cock. Katie gripped him with both hands, stroking slowly, firmly, loving the rumble that erupted in his chest as she continued.

  Dalton’s forehead came to rest against hers as they both fought to suck in air. “This wasn’t exactly my intention for tonight.”

  “Are you sayin’ you don’t want this?” she teased.

  “Oh, darlin’, I want this more than anything. But when I fantasized about this, it wasn’t in the backseat of my truck.”

  Katie met his dark gaze in the shadows. “I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be,” she told him.

  “Me, either.”

  Katie felt the emotion that was behind those two words, and her heart actually trembled.

  “I want to feel you, Dalton,” she whispered, releasing him from her grasp and sliding her hands beneath his shirt, pushing it higher as she went.

  “Then this ain’t the position to be in,” he said, and she heard the smile in his voice.

  Before she knew what was happening, Dalton had resituated them so that he was sitting on the seat, his jeans pushed down to his ankles while she sat astride him.

  “Hold on,” he instructed as he reached around her, searching the floor for… “Condom.”

  Katie smiled at that. Her mind had been elsewhere, so she loved the fact that he’d been thinking about their safety.

  That was, like, the third or fourth time she’d referenced loving something about him in the last few minutes, and part of her was beginning to worry. As much as she wanted to keep herself distanced from him, she knew she wasn’t built that way.

  This might’ve just been sex to him, but to her it was … everything.

  “Work with me, darlin’,” Dalton murmured, easing his hands between them.

  Katie laughed and then shifted so that he could roll the condom over himself.

  “How much do you like these panties?” he asked her, his face serious.

  “I don’t know. Why?”

  The heart-stopping grin he gave her should’ve eliminated the panty issue altogether, but it was then that she realized what he was saying.

  “They’re not my favorite,” she tacked on.

  “Just what I wanted to hear.”

  And then her panties were no longer an issue because Dalton had torn them off her and… “Oh, my God,” she groaned as he guided himself inside her without preamble.

  “Fuck.”

  Burying her face in his neck, Katie bit her lip, fearful that she would draw blood. The pain was … excruciating, but she didn’t want him to know.

  After all, she was pretty sure Dalton Calhoun wouldn’t have touched her if he’d known she was a twenty-three-year-old virgin. Needing a distraction as her body adjusted to his size, she trailed kisses along his neck until she reached his mouth. Plunging her tongue inside, she whimpered as he eased deeper inside her.

  “Katie,” Dalton moaned, his hands moving up to cup her face and pull her head back.

  A tear trickled down her cheek as he stared at her. She prayed he thought she was just emotional, because that was the lesser of two evils.

  His voice lowered. “Have you…”

  Katie was grateful that he’d cut the sentence off. She didn’t want to lie to him, but she didn’t want to tell him the truth, either. Instead, she crushed her lips to his once more as she lowered herself onto his thick erection.

  It wasn’t long before the pain subsided, replaced by an overwhelming, intense pleasure.

  While Katie’s body adjusted to his size, she explored his mouth with her tongue, and Dalton slid his hands beneath her sweater, forcing it higher until he was pulling it over her head. His fingers fumbled with her bra, but it didn’t take him long to release the hook, freeing her breasts. He once again broke the kiss, forcing her to look at him. Their eyes met, held briefly.

  He knew.

  It was right there in his beautiful brown eyes. He knew what had just transpired between them. Thankfully, he didn’t say anything. Instead, he leaned forward and wrapped his lips around one painfully hard nipple. Katie cried out, instinctively latching on to the back of his head and holding him to her.

  “Yes,” she moaned over and over, as she began rocking her hips. Between the intense friction of him inside her and the wondrous suction of his mouth on her nipple, Katie wasn’t sure she was going to actually last long enough to call this sex.

  ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞ ∞

  “Katie.” Dalton released Katie’s nipple from between his lips and slipped his hands beneath her ass, pulling her closer, forcing him deeper inside of her. “You feel so good.”

  Too good. He had to do elementary math problems in his head just to keep from coming too soon.

  But she was fire in his arms, and honest to God, he hadn’t expected this. Not tonight.

  Sure, he’d fantasized about it plenty, but to have her wrapped around him, her pussy milkin
g his cock… It was more than he’d imagined.

  And he never wanted it to end.

  For a brief moment there, he’d nearly panicked. When he had first slid into her slick heat, he’d been met with resistance. She was so fucking tight, almost painfully so. And that’s when a single thought had crossed his mind. Was she a virgin?

  Was he the first man she’d given herself to?

  The idea of being her first nearly leveled him.

  Using his arms, he rocked her forward and back, his cock sliding deeper and then withdrawing only a fraction before he was once again thrusting into her. He was still trying to be gentle, not wanting to hurt her. The tear that had leaked from her eyes had his heart skipping a beat, the thought of hurting her enough to deflate any hard-on. But then she’d begun to move, thrusting her hips forward, sending him deeper.

  She was so wet, so warm. So very, very tight.

  He would’ve much preferred a bed, someplace he could have her sprawled out beneath him so he could have had his way with her, made this last for hours, if not days. But he wasn’t going to complain, because the heat of her was threatening to send him over the edge as it was.

  “Faster,” she pleaded, and Dalton thought his head might explode.

  “If we go faster, this is gonna be over, darlin’,” he admitted honestly.

  “Whatever it takes,” she said with a sweet chuckle. “Just please fuck me.”

  Oh, motherfucking hell. Katie Clarren just dropped the F-bomb. Dalton knew he wasn’t supposed to find that so fucking hot, but he did. Sweet little innocent Katie had a dirty mouth, and he wanted to ask her to talk some more, to tell him just what she wanted, but he didn’t.

  Instead, Dalton eased down into the seat just a little, holding her ass up off his legs, her knees resting on the seat on each side of his hips. “Don’t move from right there,” he instructed, meeting her eyes in the dark.

  “Okay,” she said and he could see her grin.