Collision by Cassandra Carr Read Free Book Online Page A

eyes and willed his body
to sleep, but all he could do was replay that kiss over and over in his head. How
she’d tasted, like spring rain and a hint of the coffee she’d had after dinner.
What she’d felt like, with her soft skin and sinewy, athletic body. And how
she’d moaned, as if she’d taken a bite of the most mouth-watering dessert on earth.
Shifting in his seat, he attempted to subtly adjust his cock in his jeans. At
this rate he was going to be insane by the time they got to Pueblo. Time to
enact a plan.
    Turning, he addressed her. “Look, we need to talk.”
    She looked up, her eyes betraying no emotion. “So talk.”
    “We can’t go on like this. We’ve gotta work together and if
it’s like this we’re both gonna lose our minds.”
    Leah sighed and Brady smiled to himself. Already he knew
that meant she was going to give in. “You’re right.” She leveled a hard gaze at
him. “But we can’t have a repeat of last night. We need to remain purely
professional.”
    He nodded, schooling his features into a somber expression.
He had no intention of staying professional with Leah, but didn’t want to spook
her. “If that’s what you want.”
    “It would never work between us,” she insisted. “We come
from two different worlds. Plus, in a few weeks I’m going back to Connecticut
to start training for my season and your tour is continuing. Besides, I need to
concentrate on skating and trying to salvage what’s left of my career.”
    “Of course.”
    “I’m glad you agree,” she said, though she looked suspicious
of his quick assent.
    “So we’ll be friendly. That’s okay. But I have to warn you.
There are these women on tour.” Her eyebrow rose. “They’re called ‘buckle
bunnies’. Basically, they wanna sleep with a bull rider and they don’t care
where, when or how it happens. They can get pretty aggressive sometimes.” He
gave what he hoped looked like a casual shrug. “I just didn’t want you to be
caught off guard if you see them hitting on me. The successful guys get
approached more because we make the most money. Sometimes they come right out
and say some pretty raunchy stuff, trying to get our attention, or they’ll
drape themselves all over us.”
    Leah’s eyes widened and he had to bite back a smile. “You
mean like groupies?”
    “Yeah, I guess you could call them that.”
    “We have groupies too, but they’re not usually sexually
aggressive. Skating is a much more civilized atmosphere, I guess.” She winced.
It was getting harder and harder to keep a straight face. “Not that your tour
isn’t civilized—”
    He broke then, smiling. “That’s okay, darlin’. We’ve been
called a lotta things in our time, but civilized isn’t one of them.” He had her
on the ropes now, he just needed to land the knock-out punch. “So anyway, I
wanted you to be prepared for that.” He waited a beat and then said, “You still
up for going shopping tomorrow? The event doesn’t start ’til Saturday, so we’ve
got all day tomorrow to get you all gussied up for your appearances.”
    “I guess so.” She wrinkled her nose and he took that
opportunity to finally, finally touch her again.
    “Hey,” he said, grabbing her hand and running the pad of his
thumb along the smooth skin. “Dressing comfortably for once won’t kill you. And
I promise I won’t make you get anything you think is butt ugly. Deal?”
    She stared down at their joined hands for a moment and then
at him. “Deal.”
    “Good.” He half-turned toward the front of the plane then,
reluctantly letting go of her hand. He closed his eyes again, feigning sleep.
She had no idea what she was getting herself into. With the subtle seduction he
was about to unleash, she didn’t stand a chance of remaining aloof. After
spending as long as he could stand pretending to sleep, he gave up and instead
shifted in his seat just a bit more so he could watch her without detection as
she stared out the window at nothing. As