She took his hand and dragged him to the bed.

He paused before he joined her, removing his service weapon and backup, placing them both in the bedside table. As he lay down, she sat up, admiring his body all over again. She’d hadn’t seen his bare chest before today. She liked it. He had a scar on his left shoulder.

She quirked a brow and touched it. “Bullet wound?”

“Fell off a horse while working on my friend’s ranch one summer.” He twisted to see the scar. “Broke my collarbone and needed surgery.” He smirked. “Plates and pins are still in there which always makes it fun to go through metal detectors.”

She propped herself on one elbow intrigued by the hints she was getting about his past. “Does that mean you were a bona fide cowboy?”

“I guess.” He flashed a dimpled smile. “Technically speaking.”

A smile tugged at her lips. “Teach me to ride a horse sometime?”

He laughed and caught her hand. Kissed her fingers. “I can do that. We could even visit the same ranch if you want.”

Her pulse raced. That was way more than riding lessons. She was asking for a future together and he’d granted her wish without hesitation. Maybe they really were in this for the long haul. Her heart filled with joy and relief, but she managed to not start blubbering and make him regret his words. She pulled her fingers away from his and ran her hands over his pecs getting a sense of the breadth of him, the strength of his body. The lightly tanned skin and dark pink nipples, then down the center of his ribs and back up. She spread her fingers over his heart and felt it bump firmly against her palm.

Immediately, she thought of Martin and had to banish that memory along with so many others.

She leaned down and kissed Eban’s skin. He tasted clean and warm with the citrus scent of soap that she’d borrowed in the shower earlier today.

She kissed her way up his chest to his neck, pausing to press her lips against the erratic pulse dancing in his throat. She worked her way along his bristled jaw until she finally found his mouth again. He opened and she savored the subtle tang of beer and the raggedness of his breathing.

Maybe she was doing something right.

His hands cupped the side of her face, gently, exquisitely. Then he started work on the zipper of her fleece, easing it cautiously over her shoulders, careful of the butterfly stitches on her neck, before tossing it away. Holding her gaze, he tugged her t-shirt out of the waistband of her jeans and drew it up over her arms and head, again easing the material over her wound.

A shiver rushed over her skin. She felt vulnerable in her plain white bra. She didn’t have much money for frivolous things like lacy lingerie. Everything she bought had to be field-worthy and that meant comfortable and sturdy.