Page 44 of Winning His Wager

And Bruce could have driven off with her exactly as he had Meyra just a few minutes earlier. Fletcher’s stomach clenched when he thought about that.

About losing her.

The way his dad had lost his mom…

No. Fletcher couldn’t even stand to think about it. His arms tightened around her, and he pulled her as close as he could get her. “He won’t hurt you again. He won’t get near you. I promise, no matter what.”

She just looked up at him, with those big green eyes that saw straight through to a man’s soul. Fletcher leaned forward.

And then he was kissing her. Hell, maybe he shouldn’t be. Maybe it was the last moment that he should even think about kissing her. But his lips were on hers, and he was pulling her closer, over his chest. And he was holding her.

Because the last thing he ever would want to do was lose her.

27

Holy bananas,Fletcher was kissing her.For real.

Not just her imagining him wanting to, he was in her bed, his arms were around her holding her in place, and he was kissing her like crazy.

And Dylan had never felt like this when a man kissed her before. She just hadn’t. She probably never would, either.

This wasFletcher, after all.

And there was no other man in the world just like him.

It was time she accepted that little fact. There was no other man on earth just like this one holding her now.

She had been kissed before. By a few different guys. But none had felt like this. Like she was exactly what the man wanted forever. But Fletcher was holding her like she mattered, like she was precious to him.

Like…this was where she belonged.

Dylan felt more rocked by that than she had anything in a long time. The last place she should feel like she belonged was right on top of Fletcher Tyler or anything like that.

That was just insane.

This is not what she’d intended at all.

This was all a bet, that was all. That was all. She should remember that. A bet, and a way for her to get away from the inn for a little while until she figured a few other things out.

But his hands were on her bottom, and she was somehow not under the thick quilts that had been in Nikki’s old closet when she’d first moved in.

No, Dylan was straddling Nikki’s brother. Who was practically naked beneath her; sheknewhe just slept in gym shorts and nothing else. The man burned hot, after all. She suspected the shorts were just because she lived there now too. His chest was right beneath her palms.

Her fingers ran over the perfect muscles of his chest. Cowboy Fletcher wasbuilt.

Of course, she had to touch. What woman wouldn’t? He had the most perfect man chest ever. With just the...right amount of chest hair. He smelled warm and male and perfect. She could probably stay right where she was and kiss him all day.

And Dylan was kissing him back. When had that happened? When had she ended up straddling him, anyway? How had that even happened? And…were Fletcher’s hands copping a feel under her top here now?

Dylan stayed right where she was and kissed the man like she had never been kissed before.

Who cares if it was insane? This was right where she felt like she belonged.

* * *

Now…nowwas the time to stop. Fletcher knew that even as she made a little sound and pushed closer. But the last thing he wanted to do wasstop.

Still, he had come into her room in the middle of the night. She worked for him. She’d been upset. Not the best circumstances for what they were on the verge of doing at the moment.