Jill Shalvis - The Rancher's Surrender

Yet Zoe's tears were different-she didn't do it to manipulate or twist or hurt. She hated crying, he knew she did. Watching her struggle now, trying to hide them from him as she swiped at her eyes, did something to him, made him want to slay beasts and hold back entire armies. But the only dragon was Zoe's mental block wall and he had no means to tear it down.

He reached out, needing to fix this for her somehow. "Zoe, sweetheart-"

"No." She held up a hand, backed another step and shook her head violently. "No. I'm fine. I… am just fine. I don't want to talk about it."

"Is there anything we can talk about?"

"Look, it's over, okay? My mother dumped me, and I know that. It was dumb to want to find her. Now, can we work?"

And for the rest of the day, she refused to speak about it. About anything that made her feel.

" Hurry up, would you?" Ty knew he was being a jerk but he couldn't help himself. He had docked his jet boat in Lewiston and was waiting for Zoe.

Normally driving the high-powered aluminum-hulled craft gave him great pleasure. It was practical as well as fun, for in this rough territory he could ascend and maneuver the river safer and faster than the roads, and in a fraction of the time.

But today was different. He and Zoe were standing in town, just the two of them, ostensibly ordering tack and supplies for their prospective guests.

Ty could have done it alone. It certainly would have been easier, for Zoe hadn't wanted to come. But he'd insisted, saying that she hadn't been pulling her weight

A lie.

One that even Delia had pointed out to him, reminding him that Zoe did indeed work desperately hard. But not even for Delia and Maddie could he relax about their troubled sister. God only knew how she continued to ignore what was between them, but she did. She had for an entire week now, and he was so full of explosive energy and longing he was going to burst.

It wasn't just that he wanted her in his bed, though he did desperately need to hold her. But he was so certain she was going to be able to walk away from what was between them.

Zoe walked next to him on the sidewalk, doing her best to ignore him. She was giving him the silent treatment now, which quite honestly, he probably deserved.

"If I said I'm sorry, will you speak to me?" he asked. He sighed when she didn't answer, and as annoying as that was, he could still remember how shattered and abandoned she'd looked when she'd read Cade's last note. Picturing it now, he thought maybe he could find the words to apologize after all. "Zoe-"

She came to such an abrupt stop, he nearly plowed her over. "What the-"

She pressed her nose to the display in the window.

Ty glanced up at the jewelry store. A jewelry store? Zoe never even wore earrings.

"Oh, it's beautiful," she breathed, her eyes glued to a small delicate gold bracelet. Then, catching him gaping at her moment of whimsy, she straightened and walked past him.

Ty stared at the bracelet in surprise. She'd never even hinted at a yearning for anything material before. Her longing to belong to the ranch was an entirely different thing. He watched her move on, chin tilted at a defiant angle.

If he thought she would accept it, he'd have bought the pretty chain for her in an instant, but all she wanted from him was his distance.

Sighing with frustration, he followed her. "Soon enough you'll be able to buy yourself whatever you want," he said quietly as he walked next to her.

She let out a little smile and shook her head. "I hope the guest ranch is that successful, but I don't need anything."

"We all need something once in a while, Zoe."

"Really?" She met his gaze. "What do you need, Ty?"

"You," he said simply, stopping, putting a hand on her arm to stop her, too. "I need you."

There on the sidewalk, with the hot Idaho sun bearing down on them, Zoe closed her eyes.

He stepped closer, leaned in enough so that he could smell her soap, her shampoo, both far sexier than any perfume. "I need you so much I ache with it," he told her.

Her eyes flew open, and her gaze slowly ran over him, down to where his need was usually quite apparent.

He let out a laugh that held little mirth. "I'm not talking about that kind of need, Zoe. The need I'm talking about is greater than anything physical."

"Oh."

"You don't believe that."

"I don't know what I believe anymore." She started walking again.

They spent the rest of the day in tense, terse silence.

Zoe's office window drew her for the tenth time, where she peeked into the yard. Unable to get a really good view, she stretched farther, nearly falling out in the process, but then she could see and what she saw made her blood pump. "Oh Lord," she whispered.

"What's out there?"

Zoe jerked back as Delia and Maddie entered the room. They looked surprised to see her leaning out the window, twisted to see something just out of their vision, and she straightened quickly.

"Nothing," she said as casually as she could. "It's nothing." She shut the curtains nonchalantly.

"Hmm." With a lift of her smooth brow, Delia walked over and lifted a corner of the curtain, then tucked her tongue into her cheek. "Well if 'nothing' is the most gorgeous man I've ever seen, stripped to his tanned, toned waist, working in the sun, then you're right. There's nothing out there, and his name is Ty."

Maddie leaped for a view, and the two of them stood in awe for a moment, watching the man as he reinforced the wood railing on the arena. "Wow."

Muscles gleamed with a faint sheen of sweat as he pounded nails. "Double wow," Delia agreed.

"Ohh, for God's sake, you're drooling," Zoe snapped, making them both laugh at her.

"You never did explain that kiss we didn't know about," Delia said lightly.

" Kisses ," Maddie corrected her helpfully. "Remember at the bonfire? Ty specifically said 'kisses.' And they knocked his socks off. What kind of kiss knocks that kind of man's socks off, I wonder?"

"A damn hot one," Delia guessed, grinning as Zoe rolled her eyes.

"Do you really have nothing to do that you can come in here and drive me insane?" she wondered.

Delia smiled innocently. "What happened, hon? You were working outside, helping Ty. Did it get too… uh, hot for you out there?"

It was true, Zoe had been helping outside, in between covert glances at Ty's unbelievably sexy body, until he'd caught her.

He'd come straight to her, dropping his hat and hammer. His gloves went next. "You keep looking at me like that," he'd vowed in a low whisper for her ears only, "and I'm going to take you into your office and remind you whose turn it is to be satisfied."

At the reminder of what he'd done to her in her bed, at how fast he'd driven her to climax with his mouth and fingers, she'd nearly moaned out loud.

He'd half groaned, half laughed. "Don't say I didn't warn you," he threatened softly. "Because I'll be happy to show you what that look on your face does to me."

Now, in her office with her two grinning, meddling sisters waiting for answers, Zoe cleared her throat and wished it was as easy to clear her mind. "For your information, I had to work on the books," she said primly. She reached for Socks, who was snoozing across her desk. He meowed a lazy greeting, rolled on his back and offered his belly for scratching.

"Coward," Delia said to her, moving back to the door with Maddie. "That man is crazy for you. And I think you're crazy for him." She paused and looked meaningfully into Zoe's eyes. "And you do deserve him, Zoe. You, more than anyone I know, deserves a chance at real happiness. At letting a man love her."

Love . Her stomach tightened. "No one said anything about love."