SAVANNAH ROLLED TO her side and blearily picked up her ringing cell phone. She checked the screen. Guy Lambert. Her manager. She blinked. At not even eight in the morning. A shot of adrenaline made her sit up and slide her finger across the screen to answer the call.
“Savannah, listen, I know I said get out of town a few days and this will all blow over. I may have been too optimistic,” he said. “There are rumblings along Music Row that several new artists are being cut from the label, and your name is at the top of the list.”
Never a man to waste time on formalities. At least he hadn’t dragged it out.
“Oh, God,” she said and slumped back against the headboard of her bed. “Is it all over town?”
“All the rumblings are about money. You know, the label is huge in New York, but this is their first dip into Nashville. So far, their gambles on new talent have only paid off with one star—Genevieve.”
“And we know how she feels about me.” She had every right to hate Savannah. Every right. Still, it hurt. Not the loss of the contract so much as the knowledge that she’d hurt someone besides herself this time.
“Well, that part of the story is still underground.”
“When will you know for sure?”
“I’ve got lunch scheduled for next week. I’ll talk you up, you know the drill. If we can just get them to release your album, there’s a chance. If not, we have to hope when they release your contract, they also release the tracks.”
Savannah blew out a breath. “Thanks for calling.”
“Sorry it isn’t better news,” he said. “How’s Mayberry?”
“It’s Slippery Rock, and it’s okay.”
Okay was maybe too strong a word, but she doubted Guy would care. He was her manager, not her friend. “Hey, do you know what they’re planning to do with the music program?”
“You are not coming back here to volunteer with the rug rats, Savannah,” he said. “We need you out of town until Genevieve remembers she isn’t the grieving spouse, she’s just the embarrassed spouse.”
“No, I know. I just thought if there are money problems it might impact the program. It’s a good program.”
“I never thought of that.”
Of course he hadn’t. Guy thought about making and collecting money, not using it for charity.
“Do you think, if they don’t release me, that I could start something like that on my own?” Savannah wasn’t sure where the idea had come from, but once she spoke it aloud, it was as if the idea had always been in her subconscious. She wasn’t a teacher, but she’d liked volunteering with the music program.
Fostered and adopted kids like her could use an outlet like music.
Guy laughed, the sound harsh in her ear. Savannah winced. “Why would you want to waste your money on kids who won’t appreciate what you’re giving up? Listen, Savannah, I’ll call you after the lunch. Stay out of trouble, okay?” he said and ended the call.
Savannah sat on the bed for a long moment, then swung her legs over the side and pulled her robe across her shoulders.
The program idea was a good one, despite Guy’s dismissal. She had a little money saved from that first song release and the winnings from the reality show. Maybe she could use it to do something good.
Stay out of trouble. Guy’s voice echoed in her mind.
Savannah Walters wasn’t the kind of role model troubled kids needed in their lives.
She smelled bacon frying and her stomach revolted. She couldn’t eat. Couldn’t face her family over the breakfast table. Savannah closed her bedroom door, threw her pajamas and robe on the unmade bed, and pulled on a pair of faded jeans and a yellow T-shirt.
She needed to get out of there.
* * *
COLLIN DROVE THE orchard four-wheeler through the grove of peach trees, happy with the new growth and the shape of the fruit beginning to come in on the branches.
If only raising a teenager was as easy as raising fruit trees.
That wasn’t quite fair. All a tree wanted was rain and sunshine. Teenagers needed a lot more than that, and he’d been so wrapped up in the rain and sunshine part of his life that he had ignored just how much Amanda was being left behind. Not just by their parents, but by the whole family.
Mara hadn’t been back to Slippery Rock, other than a few one-day trips at Christmas, in several years. She blamed the absence on her job with the cyber-security firm in Tulsa where she worked, but Collin knew there was more to it. He would have to dig deeper with her the next time she called home.
Just as he was learning to dig deeper with Amanda.
He had assumed since their parents were always unreliable that it wouldn’t bother Amanda when they came and went, but obviously their most recent disappearance had done some major damage. No surprise since it had followed on the heels of their grandfather’s death a couple of years before, and their grandmother’s decline in health.
Even though they shared an orchard, a dinner table and a grandmother, Amanda had been virtually abandoned since Granddad died. He’d made a promise, on the day Granddad had brought them to the orchard, that neither Mara nor Amanda would ever feel that kind of abandonment. He’d dropped the ball on that, but he could pick it up. He could keep doing the work that would ensure they had financial stability. Financial stability would lead to emotional stability, too. Collin had made promises to the girls all those years ago that went deeper than money in the bank, and it was time he started to make good on those promises, too.
With school out for the summer, he’d put Amanda to work with one of his hired hands in the greenhouses this morning. She’d only grumbled a little and he considered that a fill-in-parenting win.
He came to the edge of the grove, which backed onto Slippery Rock Lake, parked the four-wheeler under a tree and looked out over the blue water.
Promises he hadn’t kept.
Oh, he’d made sure the orchard was profitable, he’d worked with Granddad to learn the basics and then learned more in college, but the important things, the never-leave-anyone-behind things, he’d set aside.
Then he’d gotten all bitchy with Savannah at the farmers’ market last weekend. He’d nearly told her he didn’t want her befriending his sister when, God knew, his sister needed a friend.
Sunlight glinted off another vehicle closer to the shore. Collin leaned forward, wondering if Levi had come to the lake to cool off, but those curves didn’t belong to his buddy.
A quick hit of lust fired in his veins as he watched Savannah strip out of her jeans and tee, revealing a tiny bikini that made the smoldering fire combust into a roaring blaze.
She tossed her clothes over the handlebars of the four-wheeler she drove, ran to the small dock Bennett had built when they were teenagers and dived into the water. She surfaced a moment later, flipped onto her back and stretched her arms and legs out to float over the surface.
Collin gripped his handlebars tightly, telling himself to start the engine and go back to the orchard. His hands remained tight over the rubberized grips as he watched her float. She disappeared behind a tall oak only to reappear near a poplar. In a few minutes she would completely disappear behind the tall fir trees that dominated the forested area on the south side of the lake.
He pulled at his collar. Suddenly the light breeze seemed stifling. Maybe the pear and apple trees could wait while he cooled off in the water, too. He glanced down at the cargo shorts he’d pulled on this morning after the local radio host said the temperature would top ninety. They weren’t board shorts, but they were better than the boxer briefs he wore under them. Or the Speedo that Mara sent him as a gag gift on Valentine’s Day. She’d attached a note—“Go show off your stuff and find a woman already”—and a goofy card with speed-dating jokes on it.
He should continue with his day.
Collin started back down the path, but at the fork where he told himself to turn right for the return to the trees, the four-wheeler turned left.
This was a bad idea, he told himself, but he couldn’t get his hands and body to obey the instructions to turn the four-wheeler around and get back to work. It took only a couple of minutes to get to the dock area.
It had grown over a bit. When they were kids, he and Levi had kept the area free of weeds. One especially enterprising summer, they’d bought sand to make a beach, but a storm blew through and the sand wound up at the bottom of the man-made lake. After that, they’d stuck with weeding and mowing.
And since Savannah hadn’t realized he was there yet, he would turn right around.
“Hey, stranger,” she called, and he wondered how he’d missed her swimming back to the dock. She pulled herself out of the water, muscles beneath her light brown skin bunching and releasing as she did. Water dripped around her, and she lifted a towel to her face.
His mouth went dry. The bikini bottoms were emerald green, held together on the sides by four thin strings that met in the middle in a tiny triangle several inches below her flat stomach. A matching green jewel winked at him from her belly button, making his toes curl.
No woman had ever made his toes curl.
One more reason to turn the four-wheeler around and get away from the lake.
He didn’t need this right now. He had enough on his plate with the offer from Westfall Foods and his sister. He didn’t need raging hormones pushing him to make a wrong decision.
She squeezed water from her hair and then bent at the waist to gather the mass of loose curls on top of her head in a ponytail. Savannah started toward him, bare feet leaving a trail of footprints behind her. She slipped her narrow feet into flip-flops at the edge of the dock and neatly tied an oversize beach towel around her waist like a sarong.
That only served to focus his attention on the green-and-white-striped triangles covering her pert breasts and her nipples making little points beneath the wet fabric.
“I figured straight-arrow Collin Tyler would be hard at work in the orchard, it being a Monday and all,” she said when she reached the four-wheelers. “What are you doing slumming it on a lakeside beach?”
“Saw you from the ridge,” he said, pointing dumbly as if she didn’t know there was a ridge behind them where the orchard began. “Wanted to make sure it wasn’t some kid from town trespassing.”
Savannah nodded, shaking her head. “Figures you’d come down here like the police to throw out someone who doesn’t belong. You know, sometimes people just want to have a little fun.”
Collin blinked. What did that mean? If she had been a townie, not that he’d been in any doubt, she would have been trespassing—an illegal activity. “People shouldn’t swim alone,” he said. Then he considered her words. “And if that was a straight-up slam against me, I know how to have fun.”
“Playing lifeguard is your definition of fun?” Her soft voice sounded musical to him, which was odd since her rigid stance and folded arms screamed that this time she wasn’t flirting. She was annoyed.
When she put it like that, no. But practicing his CPR skills on her suddenly seemed like a good way to pass some time. Not that he would do that. This was just about talking, being friendly so that whatever this was between them moved firmly—and only—into the friend zone.
“Actually, I thought a swim seemed like a good idea. Why are you in such a foul mood?” Not that he could blame her. He hadn’t exactly rolled out the welcome mat since Savannah had come back to town.
Something flashed in her chocolate eyes and, for a split second, Collin thought she must be hurting over something. Possibly over someone. Then the emotion was gone and she shook her head.
“I don’t know how to milk a cow.”
Collin blinked and then tugged on his earlobe as if he could tune his ear the way he tuned his car. There was no way Savannah Walters was upset about not knowing how to milk a cow. She’d never seemed at all interested in the Walterses’ family business.
“Did you say till a plow?”
She folded her arms over her chest.
“Lick a towel?” He couldn’t resist teasing her.
“Milk a cow,” she said, enunciating each word carefully.
“Why would you want to milk a cow?” He was curious now, wondering what had gotten into this woman who used to be the girl he thought he knew everything about, even though he’d never really spoken to her.
She shrugged and wouldn’t look him in the eye. “It’s what my family does. Figured it was time I learned.”
“You’re twenty-seven and you want to learn how to be a dairy farmer? You could have started with something easier.”
“Like what?”
Collin opened and closed his mouth, trying to think of something simpler than milking a cow. Nothing came to mind.
“See? I’m inept.” Savannah sank onto the seat of her four-wheeler, shoulders slumped. “I don’t give a fig about milking cows, but after being raised mostly at the ranch—and why do they call it that, anyway? It’s a dairy farm. No one calls it a dairy ranch—”
Collin interrupted. “Your grandfather raised beef cattle. Bennett is the one who made the switch to dairy. The name stuck, though.”
She blinked at him. “Oh. How did I not know that?” She shook her head. “Don’t answer that, I already know. I was a scared kid who turned into a stubborn, angry, self-absorbed teenager who never bothered to ask questions. Still, I should have picked some of it up, right? I couldn’t even get one of the cows to follow me into the milk barn this morning.”
There was a lot to key into in those few sentences, but Collin stuck with the actual farming bit. He had no business giving anyone personal advice, but he was good at the business side of things.
“No one learns dairy farming by osmosis, Van,” he said, her nickname slipping from his lips as if he’d always called her by her family’s pet name. “If you really want to learn, I’m sure Levi or your father would be happy to show you the parlor.”
She rolled her eyes and the expression was so similar to the Savannah he remembered that he grinned at her. “No one calls it a ‘parlor’ anymore. It’s just a living room.”
“The ‘parlor’ is what they call the milking room.”
She blushed, a pretty pink color that made the light sprinkling of freckles over her nose stand out. Collin swallowed.
“See?” she said. “Inept.”
“Is there a sudden need in Nashville for milkmaids?”
Savannah shook her head, as if his question didn’t matter, but there was an emotion he couldn’t quite read in the depths of her big brown eyes. He had a feeling the question did matter. A lot.
“I’m just feeling disjointed, I suppose. Being back here when I’ve been touring for a while.” She fanned her face with her hand. “I’m going back in for another dip before I face round two in the milking parlor.”
“Here’s one tip. If the cows have already been milked this morning, there’s no way in hell you’ll get anything else out of them until at least midafternoon.”
“Then there’s plenty of time for another swim,” she said, and pulled the elastic from her head, making all that thick hair frame her face.
She looked about twelve with her hair pulled back, but with it all in her face, she was pure siren. Collin ordered his libido to back off.
It didn’t listen.
“Well, are you coming in or not?” Savannah stood, took the towel from around her waist and laid it over the seat of the four-wheeler.
He should go back to the ridge and refocus on his business and his family.
He always did the right thing. He was the one to hide his sisters when children’s services came to the tiny apartment in Kansas City when they were little. The one to call their grandparents when he realized CPS would keep coming back, and that their parents wouldn’t. He worked hard at the orchard so his grandfather didn’t have to hire additional help, worked hard on the football field to get a scholarship, worked hard in college because he knew keeping the orchard growing would fall to him. He was glad he’d done those things. He’d carved out a nice life from the mess his parents began all those years ago.
As much as he had messed things up with Amanda, the two of them would find a rhythm and she would find her purpose.
Taking the morning off to swim with Savannah wasn’t the same as blowing off work for an afternoon at a strip club, but a voice in his head still warned him to turn the four-wheeler back toward the orchard.
The hot summer sun beat down from the sky, and the beautiful woman slipped off her flip-flops and walked to the dock. It was just a quick swim, and then right back to the orchard and he would finish his weekly survey of the trees. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to do the wrong thing just this once.
Collin pulled his old T-shirt over his head and threw it across the handlebars. Ten minutes, and right back to work.
His body cut through the water in a smooth dive, and the cool water instantly made him glad he was off the four-wheeler and out of the sun. He blew air out through his nose and then surfaced, cutting his arms through the water as he stroked toward the middle of the narrow lake.
This wasn’t showing off. It was swimming. Enjoying the late Monday-morning sunshine and heat. If Savannah was impressed with his stroke, there was nothing wrong with that.
Not a damn thing wrong with that.
He came up for a breath and realized Savannah was right beside him, cutting through the water with a strong freestyle. Of course she could swim. Bennett had probably taught her just as he had taught Collin and Levi when they were kids. They swam side by side for a while. Collin’s arm brushed hers a few times, and a little zing of heat seemed to sizzle the water around them.
Finally, Collin flipped onto his back so he could see the clouds lazily floating in the crystal-blue sky.
God, he loved this place. He looked beside him. The company wasn’t bad, either.
Savannah flipped, too, breathing heavily. “It’s been a while since I swam like that.”
He watched her for a long moment, staring at the sky as he had been. Her breasts rose unevenly as she slowed her breathing. Her long brown hair floated around her in long, skinny braids. She looked so inviting. It would be easy to close the space between them and taste those full lips. Feel her body under his hands.
No. Kissing Savannah was a step past bad, straight into terrible.
To occupy his hands he waved them gently in the water, putting a little more space between them. “Me, too. Usually when I come down here it’s to jump in the water and get right back out.”
“Seems like a poor way to spend an afternoon at the lake,” she said. Savannah gently kicked as she floated, sending a few ripples his direction.
Suddenly, jumping into the water with the intention of getting right back out did seem like a poor excuse for relaxation. Well, he was making up for that now, he thought as he spread his legs and arms wide.
He turned his head to look at her again. “Yeah, well, you’re a bad influence,” he said, joking. But he caught that fleeting expression again, a darkness that almost turned the brown of her iris black, and that made him want to draw her to him. He regretted the words. “That was a joke. You’re not actually a bad influence. On me or...anyone else.” He didn’t want to have this conversation looking at the sky, so Collin turned his body around to tread water, but she remained on her back, not looking at him.
“No. I am a bad influence, or at least, I’ve done some things I’m not proud of.”
“We all have. I shouldn’t have said that, and I shouldn’t have implied it at the market, either. You were just talking to Amanda, and she obviously needs someone to talk to.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t exactly make a great impression on you that night at the Slope. Coming on to Adam, then making a ham-fisted play for you.” Savannah changed position to face him, too. “I was doing what I’ve always done. Being the good-time girl. I’m tired of being that girl.”
Savannah blew out a breath. She shouldn’t be talking about this with Collin. She knew that, but she couldn’t seem to stop the flow of words. She did want to change, and she didn’t care all that much about dairy farming or milking parlors, but after that call with her manager she needed to figure out some way to make herself useful. Not just to her family, but to herself.
There was very little chance she would be useful to anyone in Nashville now that her record launch was on hold and the scuttlebutt around town was that the label was considering dropping several new artists. Her name was at the top of their hit list.
Earlier that morning she’d stood in the driveway for a long moment, trying to figure out where she could go. Bennett took her Honda to a repair shop in town, so she didn’t even have a working car. The sound of cows in the barns was her inspiration. Maybe she could finally figure out a way to fit in here.
And she’d wound up at the lake, trying to swim off her aggravation at her own stupidity. Now, as she faced Collin in the cool water, she wondered if she’d been right from that first moment in the bar.
She didn’t belong here in the long run, but would it be so bad if she had a little fun while she was here? Kissing Collin, feeling his hands on her body, would be more than a little fun. They were both consenting adults. Sure, sex was part of what had gotten her into this mess, but Collin wasn’t married or even dating anyone as far as she could tell. No-strings sex with him couldn’t make things any worse.
She allowed the current in the water to carry her closer to him. “Well, maybe I’m not completely ready to put Good Time Savannah into the closet.”
Collin’s pupils dilated, making his light blue eyes darken.
Definitely both consenting adults, she decided when he didn’t kick away from her. Her foot touched his leg under the water, and that zing of heat she’d been trying to resist since she’d seen him beside the dock intensified. She swam a little closer, letting her legs tangle with his.
“I’ve never been interested in being a good-time guy,” he said, and although his voice was rough, the look in his eyes told her to come a little closer.
“It has its benefits,” she said, closing the distance between them. Legs kicking in the water, arms skulling forward and back, they hung there for a long moment. Savannah couldn’t sever the connection between their gazes. She didn’t want to. She wanted him. Wanted, just for a little while, to not be Savannah the Screwup.
Collin was a good man. No woman could be called a screwup if she was with him.
That magnet thing happened again. Savannah felt herself being pulled the remaining inches until she was chest to chest with Collin. She stilled her legs, letting him kick for both of them and locking her arms around his waist. She tilted her head to the side and put her lips on his.
His mouth was softer than she had imagined. He didn’t smile very much, and somehow she’d thought his mouth would be hard because of it, but his lips were smooth. She slid her hands over his back, his skin slick beneath hers, and couldn’t resist sliding her hands over his ribs and chest so she could bury her hands in his hair. Collin’s arms came around her waist, holding her in place as he ran his tongue over the seam of her lips.
She opened for him, and he dipped his tongue into her mouth.
God, she should have kissed him a long time ago. Should have made a bigger fool of herself at the Slope. Should have set her teenaged sights on him instead of that troll Vince Honeycutt.
They slid beneath the surface, but she didn’t care. Even under the water she felt like she could kiss Collin for a year and not get enough of him. He kicked hard for the surface, and when they broke free of the water, leaned away from her.
Savannah leaned forward, but Collin released her. Maybe it wasn’t the same for him. Maybe it was just a kiss, not an earth-shattering, life-changing event.
How stupid could she be?
“If we’re going to do this, it isn’t going to be in ten feet of lake water,” he said, his tongue tripping over a couple of the words and his breath coming in ragged gasps just like hers. He watched her for a minute, but Savannah couldn’t make her voice work. She could only nod.
Collin’s big hand captured hers under the surface and he began a slow kick back toward the dock. Savannah kicked alongside him, feeling as if she were in a daze.
When they reached the dock, Collin pulled himself out of the water before reaching for her hand to help her up. When her feet were on the dock, he pulled her into his arms and this time his lips weren’t soft. They were devouring.
His big hands played the sensitive skin along her rib cage while his mouth nipped at her lips. Savannah put her thumbs through the belt loops of his cargo shorts, holding him close to her. She could feel the thickness of his erection through the layers of his clothes, and the hardness sent a wave of heat between her legs.
“Not here,” he said against her lips.
“We’re not in the water,” she said, pressing her mouth to his once more. “No worries about drowning or man-eating bass attempting to feed on our flesh.”
“God, Van, this isn’t a horror flick,” he said, and a chuckle escaped his throat.
Savannah thought Collin’s chuckle was one of the sweetest sounds she’d ever heard.
“I mean we aren’t getting naked here on the dock. This is private property, but between your ranch and my orchard there are about thirty different people who might decide to go for a swim this afternoon.”
“Where do you suggest we go on a Monday afternoon when we both still live at home? I’m assuming you live at the orchard?” He nodded. “How pathetic are two twentysomethings who can’t have sex because their mommy—in your case sister—might catch them?” Savannah giggled.
“There’s a hunting cabin on the east side of the pear grove that no one uses anymore.”
“Too far.” She couldn’t do this, not if she had to walk or drive to do it. It would give her too much time to think, and thinking would make her second-guess, and second-guessing would leave her with a set of raging hormones. She could get off by herself, but it was never as fun as getting off with someone else.
And that, right there, was the number-one reason to say goodbye and run like hell away from Collin’s fabulous chest and very talented mouth. The last time she’d had sex for the hell of it she’d blown her life up. There was a chance having sex with Collin would blow up in her face, too, but there was a bigger chance, based on that night at the Slope, that it wouldn’t. He wasn’t tied to anyone; he didn’t want ties to her. No one had to know.
She slid her fingers through the belt loops on Collin’s cargos and pressed her lips to his mouth, demanding a response. Collin wrapped one hand around her neck as he devoured her lips. She could feel the coarse hairs on his chest through her wet bikini top, and it pushed the fire in her veins to another level. She wanted to feel his skin against her, wanted to wrap her legs around his waist and lose herself for a little while.
“We’re not going to make it to the cabin,” he said against her lips.
“And we’re not doing this at noon on the dock, either.” Her breathing was heavy, and she tried to push aside the lust fogging her brain to figure out a solution. Her gaze caught on the tree line near the shore, and she remembered a small grassy area where she’d liked to sunbathe.
Savannah grabbed his hand, leaving her flip-flops and clothes on the ground near the dock, but grabbing her oversize towel as they passed the four-wheelers.
She was going to have sex with Collin Tyler, and there were a million reasons to say no, but she was determined to ignore every single one.
It only took a moment to pass through the trees near the dock. She laid the towel beneath the spreading branches.
“I think this is out of the way enough, don’t you think?”
“I’d forgotten about this little area.”
“I guess it wasn’t my secret hideaway, hmm?”
He shook his head. “We’re not going to talk about that.”
She nodded. “No, we’re not.” She didn’t want to talk about past sexual partners or teenaged—or adult—trysts either of them had here before.
His fingers walked up her spine, and she shivered. She was thinking too much again, and it annoyed the hell out of her. Yes, she wanted to change her bad habits, but couldn’t her newly found conscience shut the heck up for the next fifteen minutes?
There was one way to shut it up.
Savannah stepped up on her toes to press her open mouth to Collin’s neck. She could feel the pulse there accelerate. He pulled on the top string of her bikini top and then the bottom string before tossing it to the side. He walked her backward until her back pressed gently into a tree, and she didn’t even care that the bark was rough against her skin. It was merely another stimulating part of this moment with Collin. His rock-hard chest at her front, the tree at her back, and as much time as they wanted to take. The waves of heat rolling across her senses intensified.
God, but she didn’t want to take this slow. She wanted fast and hard and breathlessness.
Savannah buried her hands in the hair at his nape and kissed her way up his neck until her lips met his. His hands found her breasts, and when he nipped at her lower lip, she arched her neck so he could do the same to the sensitive skin there. His thumbs flicked against her tight nipples, and Savannah couldn’t hold back the low moan that escaped her throat.
She had to touch him, had to do more than leave her hands buried in his hair. She loosened his belt and unbuttoned his shorts, letting them fall from his hips. His erection was hard against her hip and she couldn’t resist reaching past the waistband of his boxer briefs to feel his length.
He was warm in her hand, despite the cool lake water. Warm and hard and, God, she couldn’t see him, but based on the feel there was more enjoyment to be had in a few minutes.
She worked her hand up and down his shaft, squeezing lightly as she did.
A lot more enjoyment.
“Do that much longer and this is going to be over before either of us wants it to be,” he said against her collarbone.
Savannah released him, but only to push the boxer briefs past his hips. Collin shimmied them down his legs but before she could reach for him again, he went to his knees on the grass beneath the tree.
Hands at her hips, he pressed kisses to her abdomen, focusing on the little gem that dangled above her belly button. He was close, so close to her core. Her knees nearly buckled when he dipped his tongue into her belly button as if he might drink from her. She fisted one hand in his hair and kept the other firmly against the trunk of the tree, trying to keep herself upright.
With a flick of his wrist, Collin disposed of her bikini bottoms, and she was naked before him. He pressed a kiss below her belly button and then another farther down her belly, and then his mouth was at the junction of her thighs and he pressed a kiss to the curls there.
“So sweet,” he said as he pressed a finger inside her.
Savannah caught her breath and when his thumb found the tight bundle of nerves near his mouth, she forgot to breathe completely. She could only feel. With his fingers and his thumb, he set a rhythm that was as close to torture as Savannah ever wanted to be. She was perched precariously on the fine wire between awareness and blessed oblivion, and she didn’t want it to stop.
Collin’s mouth replaced his thumb, his tongue teasing her, and it sent her crashing over the edge. The orgasm shook her, made her feel weak and boneless, and if Collin didn’t still have his body against hers, she would have collapsed onto the ground.
He kissed his way back up her body, his hands hard against her abdomen, and when he kissed her mouth she could taste herself on his lips.
“More.” She didn’t know where the word came from. She only knew this couldn’t be the end. She wanted more of him, wanted more kissing and touching and, heaven help her, she wanted to feel again that blast of electricity that hit just before he’d sent her crashing into that orgasm.
She pulled him down onto the towel with her. It was barely wide enough for the two of them, but she didn’t care that she was partially on the soft grass. She only cared that the intricate patterns he drew with his fingers on her belly were making that fire in her veins burn hotter again.
Collin grabbed his shorts, pulled out his wallet and the plastic-wrapped packet inside.
“You went swimming with your wallet still in your pocket?”
“Grabbed it when we passed the four-wheelers,” he said as he opened the packet.
“Boy Scout.”
He grinned wickedly at her. “Always Be Prepared has always seemed like a good motto to me.” He rolled the condom over his considerable length, but she didn’t want him taking the lead this time. Savannah pressed her hands against his shoulders and, when his back was on the towel, straddled his hips.
Savannah put her mouth over his nipple, biting lightly, and Collin hissed in a breath. “I’m no Girl Scout,” she said, “just in case you wondered.”
“Technically, I was never a Boy Scout, either,” he said and rolled his hips so that his penis teased at her opening.
Savannah sank down, letting his length fill her. Warmth spread through her. His hands returned to her breasts, kneading and caressing. Savannah began to move, her hips in rhythm with his, sliding up and down his length.
One of his hands moved to her core, and his thumb found her clit again. The stimulation both inside her body and out was too much, and once more she went crashing over the edge. Collin’s hips pumped into her once, twice more, and then he grunted his own release.
Savannah sank down on his chest, and listened to his rapid heartbeat.
It thumped in time with her own. That warmth spread through her chest again, and she slid to the side. Collin’s arms came around her, holding her to him, their legs intertwined. He slid the condom from his length and laid it carefully on top of his briefs.
When she could speak she said, “Wow.” The word felt inadequate.
“Yeah,” he said, his breath whispering through her hair as his fingers traced along her shoulder.
Savannah drew her index finger over his chest, liking the feel of his short, wiry chest hair against her hands. She thought she could lie like this, with this man, forever.
Collin shifted beneath her. “But this should probably not happen again,” he said. And she went cold.
She hadn’t expected a declaration of love, not for a one-morning stand. She wasn’t sure what she had expected, but it wasn’t this...this...blow-off.
“Another lame excuse about me being Levi’s sister?”
He was quiet for a long moment, and Savannah sat up. “You realize this isn’t high school, right?” she asked.
“Yeah. This wouldn’t have happened in high school.”
“Because you never gave me the time of day back then. But then, I guess you’re really not giving me the time of day now, either, are you? You’re just here to get down and dirty so you can keep presenting the perfect facade you’ve got going to the town.” Savannah stepped into her bikini bottoms and then tied her top with shaking fingers. She couldn’t look at him. “God, I’m an idiot.”
Collin grabbed his shorts, pulling them over his hips. He stuck the wadded-up boxer briefs in his pocket along with his wallet. “That isn’t what I meant.” He shook his head. “You’re here on a break from your life in Nashville, and as you saw at the farmers’ market, I’ve got my hands full playing the part of father for my teenage sister.” He grabbed her wrist when she turned away. “I didn’t mean I’m sorry this happened, I just meant I need to keep my focus on what’s real and permanent around here.”
“And I’m not permanent.” The words hurt more than Savannah wanted to admit. She wasn’t here permanently, that was true. Whether her career was over or not, she couldn’t see living in this place where people looked at her as if she were different.
As if she didn’t belong.
“Van,” he said, but she shook her head.
“No, you’re right. I’m leaving, and you have your own things to deal with. You shouldn’t have to add me to that mix.” She picked the towel up off the ground and folded it carefully.
“Savannah, don’t be angry.”
“I’m not mad. I’m not anything.” Anything but sad, she added silently. Because, just once, it might be nice if someone like Collin thought she was worth the trouble of getting to the real Savannah. Whoever the real Savannah was. She stepped away from him. “Have a good afternoon.”
“Savannah—” he said, but she turned to walk back to the four-wheelers.
At the dock she pulled her T-shirt over her head but threw her jeans and the towel into the little basket on the back of the vehicle, started it up and sped back along the path to the ranch.
Savannah brushed her hand along her cheek, angry that she was crying over Collin Tyler. Angry she’d had sex with him. Angry she thought coming back here would help her come to terms with the past. She should leave. Find the place where she did belong.
She stopped the four-wheeler when the path along the lake met the lane that led to the ranch house. Savannah used a corner of the towel to wipe the remnants of her tears from her face. She pulled her shorts over her hips, and did her best to finger-comb her hands through her mass of braids. She wished she had a mirror, just to make sure when she reached the house that she didn’t look like she’d just had sex.
For the first time since she’d first come to Slippery Rock, though, the prospect of leaving held no shine. She wanted to stay. Not because of Collin. Because of her. People here knew her, and some, like Dana, hated her for reasons she couldn’t fathom. More people, she was beginning to realize, just knew who she was, and didn’t judge her for what might have brought her to the Walters family or Slippery Rock. Being famous in a small town was different from the paparazzi attention that came with being famous in a big city.
Maybe she didn’t belong in Slippery Rock right this second, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t belong here in the future.
Maybe, if she worked hard enough, the future could come sooner.