Sunlight blares through the thin curtains, warm and unrelenting, your unspoken alarm. You groan softly, turning your face into the pillow—only to feel lazy kisses being pressed along the sensitive skin of your neck instead. Slow. Familiar. Intimate.
Calloused hands slide around your waist, tugging you closer beneath the thin white sheets as Cade exhales against your skin, half-asleep and entirely unfair.
Cade Eaton. Tan, muscled, and devastatingly beautiful. Those brown eyes that look at you like you’re the only thing worth seeing. Sensual lips. Perfect bone structure. And his hair—ridiculously perfect, even like this. Bare-chested, warm, real, he pulls you flush against him as if morning itself can wait.
“Baby,” he murmurs, voice rough with sleep, “you gotta go back.”
His words say one thing. His body does another.
He kisses just below your ear, lingering there. You shiver despite yourself.
“You’re the worst at letting go,” you mumble.
He hums, amused, mouth drifting lower. “Not my fault you fit here.”
This is the routine. A stolen night. A secret morning. Kisses traded for seconds on the clock. You dress between soft touches and murmured complaints, buttoning your shirt while he watches you like it’s a crime you have to leave. When you finally slip out, you disappear down the road before your father notices you never came home.
You bring it up over breakfast one morning, trying to sound casual as you stir your coffee.
“Dad,” you say, “what do you think of Cade?”
Your father looks up from the paper, brows knitting together. “Cade Eaton?”
You nod. “Yeah.”
He considers it for a moment. “Good kid,” he says slowly. “Why?”
You shrug, forcing an easy smile. “I just think he’s really nice.”
The frown comes immediately.
“No,” he says flatly. “Absolutely not. You are not dating him.”
Your heart drops. “What? Dad—”
“Not one word,” he cuts in, sharper now. “The final answer is no.”
You push your chair back, standing too fast. “But Dad, I love him.”
The words hang there, heavy and fragile.
He doesn’t soften. Not even a little.
That door closes on more than the conversation—it slams shut on your whole world. The one thing you wanted.
You leave after breakfast, shirt still half-unbuttoned, hair undone and wild as the wind tangles through it while you run. The ranch comes into view, wide and open and more like home than the house you just fled.
Cade is out by the fence when he sees you. He straightens instantly, concern flashing across his face.
“Hey—what’s wrong?” he asks, already moving toward you.
You don’t answer. You just run straight into him.
His arms come around you without hesitation, one rolled-up, checkered sleeve brushing your skin as he pulls you close. You kiss him—hard, certain, desperate.
“I’m not listening to him,” you say against his mouth. Another kiss. “I love you. And he can accept that—or not.”
Cade pulls back just enough to look at you, hands still firm at your waist. There’s worry there. Care.
“Are you sure?” he asks quietly.
You nod, forehead pressing to his. “My wild boy,” you murmur. “My wild joy.”
That earns a grin. One of his real ones.
“Then come here,” he says, kissing you again like it’s settled.