Stranded in Montana Read online

  “Please don’t make me stay here.”

  Her eyes begged the same as her words. At that moment, I realized how much power over me this girl had. I couldn’t deny her—not with the way she was looking at me. But I had to be sure she knew what she was getting herself into.

  “What happened this morning—”

  “It’s okay,” Ivy interrupted. “It really wasn’t a big deal.”

  “Well, it might happen again if we keep sharing a bed. The offer still stands for me to take the floor.”

  Her lips curled at the corners before she said, “I understand. Does that mean I can stay?”

  In the long run, spending more time with her would just make it more painful when it was time for her to leave. I knew that. I knew it’d be better for me to just walk away and let Ivy fend for herself. I was a selfish prick my entire life. Why start changing now?

  “Yeah, you can stay.”

  I guess I’d start changing for her.

  Seven

  Ivy

  After stopping at the mechanic to tell Mike that Jacob would bring me back in a few days to pick up the van, we headed back home.

  Huh. As Jacob flew down the long dirt road and his little house came into view, I wondered when I started thinking about his place as home. Was it at some point during my time there, or was it because the thought of staying at the motel without transportation had freaked me out so much? I told myself it was the latter, but it felt like a lie. Not that it really mattered. I could lie to myself if I wanted to.

  He parked the truck and went around the back to retrieve the luggage we’d taken from my van. As he carried the bags toward the porch, I had the overwhelming urge to thank him.

  “Thank you so much for letting me stay here a little longer. I really didn’t feel comfortable just being at that place.”

  “Don’t blame you.” He let out a chuckle when the bags made a loud thud when he placed them on the porch. “Damn. What do you got in here? Bricks?”

  “Clothes.”

  “How many fucking clothes do you need?”

  “Enough to be ready for a variety of occasions and enough to make sure that I can go for two weeks without hitting a laundromat.”

  “Fair enough.” Jacob left the bags beside the couch and gave me a weird look before he asked, “You got a lot of dresses?”

  “Sure. Why do you ask?”

  He grunted and walked into the kitchen. I followed behind, watching as he methodically started making a pot of coffee, intent on ignoring me. I really didn’t want to nag him, but I also didn’t want to deal with a week of trying to interpret his grunts.

  “Jacob. Why’d you ask if I have dresses?”

  His hands paused and he glanced at me over his shoulder before he shrugged and softly said, “I like dresses.”

  In that case, I’ll wear nothing but dresses for the next six days. Short, long—whatever gets you to look at me.

  I wondered if he would let me take up some space in his closet while I was staying with him. Even having a drawer would be better than keeping all my clothes in the suitcase. I knew my dresses were probably wrinkled, though I doubted Jacob would notice or care.

  “I like dresses, too,” I said with a smile. He didn’t respond, but his shoulders tensed. Hoping to lessen some of his tension, I came up beside him and asked, “So, what now? What are we doing today?”

  “Cutting the grass. Exciting stuff.”

  “I like the outdoors, but yard stuff isn’t my forte. Can I join you in a moral support capacity?”

  Jacob laughed. “You don’t have to join me. Why don’t you settle in while I take care of it?”

  “Really?”

  “You’ll be here for a week. Might as well.”

  “You’re not worried about me stealing anything?” I teased, knowing full well he checked my bag the night before.

  “Nope. You wouldn’t get very far even if you did,” Jacob replied with a teasing grin. It switched to something soft and earnest after a moment and he said, “Make yourself at home, Ivy.”

  “Okay. Thank you, Jacob.” I gave him a smile of my own, watching as he moved to the back door to head outside. “Let me know if you need some help!”

  “I won’t!”

  The door closed behind him and I stood in the kitchen and shrugged.

  “In that case, I’m going to take another bath.”

  I ended up dragging both of my suitcases upstairs first. I took a peek in his closet and was surprised to find it almost entirely empty. Luckily there were a few empty wire hangers on the side with his few coats, so I snagged them and hung up some of my favorite dresses. I chose one to wear for the rest of the day and dug out my toiletries before heading for the bathroom.

  After a long soak in the tub, I felt like myself again. I smelled like myself, at any rate. I left my bottles around the tub and found a spot for my toothbrush beside Jacob’s, smiling at how weirdly domestic it felt to be making myself at home in his space.

  After drying my hair and getting dressed, I went to the window just in time to watch him driving the mower through the backyard. He started out front, so I knew he was close to finished. I went downstairs, hoping to find something in his kitchen I could make to show my appreciation for letting me stay. I wasn’t much of a cook, but I could improvise.

  As I was looking through what he had, I realized I wouldn’t be able to do much without the help of my cell phone. If I cooked at all, which was already rare, I was usually making something from a recipe that sounded interesting. I eyed the leftover stew from the night before, wondering if it’d look like a nice gesture to reheat it for him or if it’d just make me look incompetent.

  I decided to risk it. I took out the pot and put it on the burner, turning the knob to a low setting. I was just giving the stew its first stir when Jacob came barging in, freezing in place when he saw me standing there. I smiled at him, but he seemed to be caught in a state of shock.

  “Did I do something wrong?”

  “You changed your clothes.”

  “Oh, yeah. I took a bath. Was that alright?”

  Jacob nodded before taking a few slow, cautious steps toward me. His eyes stayed glued to mine the whole time and I craned my neck back to look up at him. Once he was close, he leaned in and took a deep breath while my eyes fluttered shut.

  He was smelling me. Smelling my hair. It was strangely erotic.

  “You smell good,” he said, his voice a low rumble. “Vanilla and…”

  “Honey,” I finished breathlessly. “My body wash is vanilla. My shampoo is honey.”

  “I like it. It suits you.”

  I dropped my head and took note of how sweaty he’d gotten while cutting the grass. I tracked a drop with my eyes as it ran down his neck and hit the collar of his shirt. I could smell him as well—sweat and musk and pure male and it didn’t disgust me like the scent of men in the gym. Jacob just smelled… appealing.

  He seemed to realize what he was doing and straightened to full height, taking several steps back before clearing his throat roughly. The intense moment cracked and shattered as he slowly backed to the door, watching me like he was afraid I was going to come after him.

  “I’m going to shower.”

  “O-Okay. I’m warming up the stew you made yesterday for when you’re done.”

  Jacob responded with a firm nod before disappearing and I leaned against the counter with a heavy sigh. Every time it felt like I was on the verge of making some kind of progress, he shut down completely. It was disheartening, but at least I had another week to try to wear him down.

  Whether he liked it or not, I was going to get to know Jacob before I had to leave.

  Eight

  Jacob

  Three days.

  Three fucking days of Ivy prancing around my house in her little dresses smelling good enough to eat. Three days of blushes and shy smiles and waking up with my morning wood pressed against some soft part of her body.

  I was losing my fuckin
g mind. I didn’t know how much more of her torture I could take before I snapped.

  Part of it was my fault. Never should have said that shit about the dresses. Being around her was hard enough as it was, but watching the hem ride up when she bent over or catching a glimpse of her panties when the wind blew in the yard was enough to give me an instant hard-on.

  I was trying to be a gentleman, but I was getting really sick of jerking it in the shower with her ten feet away. Every day the hems got shorter and every night I came closer to rolling her over and mounting her.

  As tempted as I was, I wasn’t an animal. I wouldn’t touch her without her consent and since I had the gut feeling that she was a virgin, I definitely wouldn’t touch her without having some kind of talk beforehand.

  Not that I had the faintest idea what I’d even say. I took a sip of my coffee while I tried to imagine how that conversation would go.

  “Good morning!”

  Ivy breezed into the kitchen like she belonged there and I raised my eyes from the table to check her outfit for the day. I nearly groaned at the sight of her tiny skirt.

  With her back to me as she poured a cup of coffee, I could just barely see the bottom of her pert ass. Fuck. I wondered if she ever wore that skirt in public and the thought made my jaw clench.

  “So, what are we doing today?” she asked as she joined me.

  I doubted what I wanted to do was on the table, so I simply said, “You tell me.”

  “Really?” she asked, brows raised and a hesitant smile on her lips. “I get to pick?”

  “Why not?”

  Truthfully, I’d been doing as much as possible to avoid her the past few days. I managed to get a lot of shit done outside, but Ivy continuously came looking for me, refusing to let me ignore her. Might as well throw myself at her mercy for a day.

  “How about we just stay inside today? Both of us,” she said pointedly.

  She wasn’t easy to pull one over on. Had to give her that. Still, staying cooped up inside with her all day didn’t bode well for either of us.

  “And what do you want to do? No internet out here, remember?”

  “We can just… talk.”

  “Talk,” I repeated with a snort. “Yeah, ‘cause I do that so often.”

  “I don’t know. I think you’re warming up to me.”

  “Do you now?”

  “Yep. In fact, I think you like me more than you let on.”

  “You’re playing with fire, Ivy.”

  “Oh, come on, Jacob. It won’t kill you to talk to me—to let me get to know you a little. I’ve told you a lot about myself.”

  “Only place you’ll get a lot of talk out of me is in the bedroom.”

  I hadn’t really meant to say the words and regretted them as soon as I saw the shock register on Ivy’s face. Shit. I knew I needed to do damage control before she got the wrong idea.

  “Listen, if you want to talk and tell me about yourself, I’m all ears. I might not always have something to say, but I do listen. As for me… there’s not much to tell. My life isn’t that interesting.”

  “It doesn’t have to be interesting,” Ivy said softly. “I’d just like to know you if you’d give me a chance.”

  “You already know me more than most.”

  Which was definitely true. I was a man of few words, but being around me for an extended period of time let her know me more than words could ever explain. I watched her face as she began to understand, her head tilting to the side as she considered me.

  Several seconds of silence passed before her lips parted and she asked, “Will you read to me?”

  “Read?” I echoed with an incredulous laugh. That wasn’t what I expected to hear. “Read what?”

  “Anything. Your choice.”

  I had a fair number of books in the basement, though I doubted she’d have much interest in any of the non-fiction ones I tended to favor. Most of what I had were biographies and books about war. But she did say it was my choice.

  I sighed and stood from the table, trying and failing to ignore the way her eyes lit up as she stood as well.

  “Fine. Let’s go.”

  I took the chair in the living room and made her sit on the couch. I hoped she would nod off after a few chapters and I intended to sneak outside to enjoy the quiet while she napped.

  That wasn’t how it went down, though. I had her rapt attention for hours, and after pausing for a few minutes to eat lunch and have her badger me with a thousand questions about the book, we returned to the living room and I kept reading until the sun went down. I closed the book on the last page, grinning when she let out a sound of disappointment.

  “Why are you stopping?”

  “It’s done, honey. That was it.”

  “Oh. I was enjoying it.”

  “You know, I find it difficult to believe that you’ve got much of an interest in history.”

  “Guilty,” she said with a shrug, a blush creeping up her cheeks. “I just like listening to you speak.”

  So many responses came to mind—all of them about sex. My earlier words came back to haunt me as I considered the ramifications. Would she like me talking dirty to her in bed? I was worried it’d scare her off if we ever got that far, but I felt like the odds of her being into it just skyrocketed. And didn’t that just go straight to my dick.

  “We should eat,” I forced myself to say as I tried to picture things that would kill my hard-on. “You’re probably hungry.”

  I knew I was starving. Not for food, though.

  Ivy jumped off the couch and blocked the doorway to the kitchen, her arms stretching from side to side in an attempt to block me. I raised a brow, wondering if she realized I could just pick her up and move her if I wanted to.

  “Wait a minute. I was thinking about something you said earlier.”

  “Part of the book?”

  Her lips pursed, clearly annoyed.

  “No. You know exactly what I’m referring to.” She paused, tilting her head further back so she could narrow her eyes up at me. “You didn’t mean to say it, did you?”

  “Smart girl. Step aside.”

  “But you did say it. Is it true? Is that where you prefer to talk? Do you mean during or after?”

  “Both,” I admitted with a low warning growl. “Now I strongly suggest you drop the subject and get out of the way.”

  “Or what?” she countered, chin jutting up in defiance. “What are you going to do?”

  With a frustrated growl, I bent and lifted her on my shoulder, all too aware of her exposed ass right beside my face. She squeaked and smashed her fists against my back for the little good it did her.

  “Let me go!”

  “You’re just begging for a spanking, girl,” I growled out, gripping the back of one of her thighs as I carried her up the stairs. “All week with these dresses and skirts just begging me to push them up and turn your ass red.”

  The door to the bedroom was pushed by, so I kicked it open, ignoring her frightened gasp. I deposited her on the bed—doing my damnedest not to look at her and whatever her disheveled clothes revealed—and spun on my heel to walk away.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Outside. I need air.”

  “But you said…”

  I stopped at the doorway and sighed, unable to force myself to keep walking before she at least had a chance to finish speaking.

  “What’d I say?”

  “Aren’t you going to spank me?”

  I whipped around, jaw dropping with disbelief. She was truly trying to kill me.

  “Is that a joke?”

  “No. You can do it if you want.”

  I didn’t think it was possible to be any more stunned. She proved me wrong when she climbed up on the bed on all fours and waited for me. Ah, shit. Her big doe eyes glanced back at me as I approached, my feet moving on their own.

  Just a touch.

  While we’d still been waking up in intimate positions, Ivy had made it a point to wear
shorts every night while sleeping. I hadn’t gotten another feel of that bare skin and I was too weak to pass up the chance.

  Her skirt was already riding up and when she arched her back, it almost went up the whole way. I flattened my palms against her thighs and slowly slid them up. She let out a soft moan and I climbed onto my knees on the bed behind her. I flipped the flimsy fabric of the skirt up, revealing her pink panties.

  “Look at these,” I rumbled as I played with the elastic band of her underwear, hoping she’d understand the severity of what she was offering. “They’re cute. Innocent. Just like you, huh?”

  “I-I’m not—”

  “You’re a virgin.” I slid a hand to her covered pussy, gliding it back and forth across the fabric and chuckling when she gasped and instinctively tried to close her legs. “Like I thought.”

  Ivy huffed. “So what? What’s wrong with being a virgin?”

  “Nothing wrong with it.”

  “Then what’s the problem?”

  I nudged until she rolled onto her back and motioned for her to sit up. I plopped on the edge of the bed, giving her a wry smile.

  “Guess you’re going to get me talking after all,” I said with a humorless laugh. “The problem is this. I like having you here. I like seeing your girly shit in my bathroom and your clothes in my closet. I like having meals with you. I really like waking up beside you.”

  The look on Ivy’s face was one of adoration and it fucking killed me. Was there even a chance she wanted the same thing as I did? That she wanted to be mine? A man could hope.

  “I like being here,” she said softly. “I just don’t understand why it’s a problem.”

  “Because I can’t keep you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Don’t fuck with me,” I groaned. I could handle her teasing my cock, but not my heart. Not like this.

  “I’m not! I’m serious. I like you so much, Jacob. I want… I want to be with you. I want you to be my first.”