STORY EXCERPT

 “Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.”

Cole Heeney listened to Sasha Berke-Matthews’ mantra and her mother Lena’s voice as the woman attempted to calm her daughter.

“Shush, it’s almost over,” Lena told Sasha.

Cole was pretty sure Lena was right. The roar of the passing tornado seemed to be dying down. It had been a few seconds since he heard any flying debris hit the main house on Rescue Ranch. Glass had shattered somewhere upstairs, and a loud crash had shaken the house at one point. They’d had just enough warning to get all the men, women, and children to the basement before the shit had hit the fan. There hadn’t been time to secure anything, to see to the animals on the ranch, or to reach the hired hands who lived in a small house on the property.

An eerie silence fell in the air as the tornado passed. Cole breathed a sigh of relief as everyone eased to their feet.

“See,” Lena said to Sasha. “I told you. It’s over. Everything’s okay now.”

Cole doubted everything was okay now, but at least the worst of it was over.

“Can we go upstairs now?” Bodhi Utah, one of the third generation of boys growing up on the ranch turned to Cole and asked.

“It should be safe, but let us check things out first.”

They had more than a dozen flashlights between them. Cole took one and assumed the lead as his brother, Cord, fell into step behind him with Dillon Stokes and Korbin Blackwell close at his heels, all in possession of their own flashlights. He heard static followed by the local meteorologist’s voice as Bobby Williams tuned in the battery-powered storm radio for the latest weather report.

Tuning it out, he headed up the staircase to the first floor of the house, sweeping the beam of his light from ceiling to floor. Debris cluttered the front hallway. The main door was standing wide open and barely hanging by one hinge. Just outside the opening, he saw one of the rocking chairs from the porch on its side.

“Guess we know what caused the loud bang,” Cord commented as he moved in to stand beside him. “Window in the parlor is shattered. I’m figurin’ one of the other chairs likely smashed into it.”

“We’re headed to check out the other floors,” Dillon said from behind them.

Cole shot the man a nod over his shoulder as he slowly walked closer to the door to peer out. He shined the flashlight onto the front porch that stretched from the side of the house to the other and slowly assessed the damage.

“One end of the roof collapsed out there,” he told Cord as the beam of his light landed on one of the pillars closest to him. “Supports are holdin’ up the rest so far, but I see a crack in one of them. We’ll need to keep everyone away from it till we can see what we’re dealin’ with.”

That wouldn’t happen until sunrise, which was still a couple hours away.

“Hey.”

Cole turned his light toward the top of the staircase leading down to the basement and found Trent Dickson standing there. “Thought you two might like to know another tornado touched down in town just before we got hit with that one.”

Cole saw a keen knowledge in the older man’s eyes and understood exactly why Trent was telling them this.

“Rylie.” Cord caught on just as fast.

It was the first time her name had been spoken on Rescue Ranch property in years. Three very long years, to be exact. Everyone on the ranch knew how Cole and Cord had felt about her. Everyone also knew how devastated he and Cord had been when Rylie had ended their eighteen-month relationship while they had been on an op with Delta Force overseas. They hadn’t talked to her since, hadn’t seen her since, and had only been back to the ranch, back to Pleasure twice since in an effort to avoid her.

Not that keeping their distance from her had helped either of them. Cole knew his brother still pined for her as badly as he did. There wasn’t a night that went by that Cole didn’t close his eyes and see her beautiful face, hear her musical voice, and burn to feel her touch. There wasn’t a day that went by that he didn’t remember the fights, regret words that had been said, and wish he and Cord had done things with her differently.

Trent dug in the front pocket of his jeans, pulled out a set of keys, and tossed them into the air to Cole. “Go. Take the four-by-four. You’re probably gonna need it. There’s enough of us here to take care of the ranch until you get back.”

Cole hesitated. His heart was already in the four-by-four attempting to make its way into town. His head, however, was telling him to stay put.

“Come on.” Like Cole’s heart, Cord’s feet had already taken him halfway down the hallway to the back door of the house and the truck parked in the yard beyond. “Damn it, Cole, we need to know she’s all right.”

“She’s not gonna want us to come after her.” When Rylie had broken things off with them, she had made it clear she didn’t want to have anything to do with them again.

“I don’t give a fuck what she wants,” Cord argued. “You comin’ or not?”

Cole’s feet moved on their own accord. Rolling with it, he raked a hand over his head and grumbled, “Yeah, I’m comin’.”

ADULT EXCERPT

“Take off your clothes.”

“I would rather you take them off for me, Sir.” She had wanted to sound as calm and cool as he did, but her voice wobbled slightly with the anticipation surging through her bloodstream. She started to look back at him over her shoulder when his next words made her freeze.

“Speak again, and I’ll put a ball gag in your mouth.”

He wasn’t kidding. He had done that to her before. Her belly flipped as white-hot claws raked more juices from her pussy to slicken her inner thighs. Apparently, one request was all he was going to give her tonight.

At least she’d used it wisely. Except, had she really? Her mind was still screaming at her that she shouldn’t be doing this despite what her body and heart wanted.

“I will take your clothes off for you next time,” he assured her, his tone firm and yet somehow gentle at the same time, “but this time you will do as I told you, do you understand?”

Rylie swallowed hard. “Yes, Sir.” She undressed in record time and tossed her clothes aside. As soon as she was naked, she felt him move in even closer, felt him keen behind her, and jolted when something cool and slightly abrasive touched her ankle.

Given what they had come in here to try, it wasn’t hard to figure out it was a rope. He looped it around her ankle and continued up her calf. He wrapped her leg with it, stretching it tight beneath the swells of her ass, and taking it down to loop around her other leg before bringing it back up. He made a harness out of it the same way the demonstrator had done to his submissive on the stage tonight, framing her ass and pussy, then moving up her torso, not leaving a scant inch of flesh bare between each pass.

His hand finally touched her when he reached her abdomen, flattening on her hip to turn her around. He sat on his knees in front of her, his attention fixated on his work. Cord had perched on the foot of the bed to watch, the boyish grin that had tilted his lips now gone, taken over by an unmistakable primal hunger that rocked her insides.

Cole slid the rope beneath her breasts, circling each and lifting them as he brought the rope around her body and under her arms. She couldn’t help but admire his work, the way he had skillfully created a kind of rope-garment that covered her completely in every place except her ass, pussy, and breasts.

He eased to his feet and met her gaze, a hunger that mirrored Cord’s, turning his gray eyes almost black. “Is it too tight in any area?”

Rylie moved her arms and legs, slithering like a snake as she tested the rope. Somehow, Cole had wrapped her in a way that left her full movement of her limbs while enhancing her private areas. It made her more aware of her breasts, pussy, and ass, made them more sensitive and needy.

Remembering he had ordered her not to speak, she shook her head in response. Her obedience brought a small smile to his lips. “You were always so good at obeying in here.”

In here, but not outside of here, not outside of sexual situations. Rylie felt the first slivers of tension shoot between them as he realized what he’d said. She had controlled her life outside of sex. Maybe she had controlled it wrong, but he and Cord had been wrong, too.

“Do you have any idea how sexy you look right now, darlin’?” Cord asked as he got to his feet.

His question snapped the tension away, snapped her and Cole from the past, and brought them back to the present. Rylie was glad for that even as her heart gave another decided bump as four long strides brought him close enough to touch her. She remembered this sensation, the feeling of being like a tigress in a cage. God, she’d missed it, missed them, so much.

Cole stepped back as Cord circled her like a lion preparing to pounce on his prey, intensifying her caged feeling and heightening her anticipation. “Have we told you how pleased we were by your request?”

“No, Sir.”

“We should have,” Cole said, and she swore she heard a hint of apology in his tone. “We should talk to you more, tell you how we feel more, tell you more when you please us.”

“We’re learnin’ that.” Cord stopped behind her, his breath lifting the fine hairs on her ear as he bent his head and continued huskily. “We trained you to be our sub, but you’re trainin’ us, too, darlin’. Unfortunately, we’re men. Sometimes, we don’t learn as fast as women.”

Rylie heard herself giggle at that and felt herself smile. “Permission to speak, Sirs.”

“Go ahead,” Cole drawled.

She met his gaze, held it briefly, and then leaned her head back on Cord’s chest and angled it to look up at him. “Baby steps. Sometimes, that’s what people have to do. Although, this probably isn’t a baby step.”

“Are you tellin’ us to stop? Are you tellin’ us you no longer want this tonight?”

Rylie’s attention snapped to Cole. “No, Sir. I’m hoping it doesn’t screw up the progress I feel we made tonight, but I want this. I need this, Sir.”

Relief moved through his stormy eyes. “So do we, sweetheart.” He moved to the table on the far wall, palmed something she couldn’t see, and then sat on the foot of the bed.

“Come here.” He spread his knees and pointed to the floor between them, indicating where he wanted her to stand.

Rylie’s legs shook as she walked to him, nerves and expectation making her steps slow even as they propelled her forward. The ropes around her body shifted, tightening around her breasts, pussy, and ass and adding an eroticism to the moment she wouldn’t have thought possible.

“There are advantages to already knowin’ what you like, knowin’ you enjoy the sharp edge of pain on certain parts of your body.” He stretched the item he had palmed between his hands and her nipples pulsed. “See, I know you like these, don’t you, sweetheart?”

“Yes.” The word hissed from her lips as he simultaneously fastened the padded clamps to her nipples.