Instant Temptation

CHAPTER 6

Harley walked hard and fast, but still couldn’t outpace her demons. Or the fact that her body felt so…alive. Every nerve ending hummed and pulsed, and little electric zings of sheer lust randomly fired from erotic pulse point to erotic pulse point.

She had no one to blame but herself. She’d known the minute that TJ’s lips touched hers she’d be in big trouble.

Lord, the man could kiss.

He knew just how to work that warm mouth of his, too, how to hold a woman, how to pull her in and make her purr. Hell, she was still purring.

He was following her, of course. Keeping pace but letting her lead, leaving her to her thoughts.

Thoughts she could do without, so she slowed until he was at her side.

Even more devastating than his mouth were his eyes. They were a deep, velvety green, and mirrors to his soul. She turned and looked into them. He had a few fine lines fanning out from the corners. Not from age, but from his easy smile, from squinting into the bright high-altitude sun, from planning and thinking about his clients’ fun and safety, from worry and concern about those he loved.

From following her up a mountain out of that worry and concern.

All those little things he did were just pieces of the puzzle that made up the boy she’d once loved, the boy who’d grown into a man. A good man. A solid, strong man.

A man, despite everything her common sense screamed at her, she was incredibly attracted to.

With a long exhale, she stepped off the narrow trail and up on a huge boulder overlooking the wild, open forestland and jagged mountain peaks for as far as the eye could see. And there, surrounded by three hundred and sixty degrees of glory on earth, she could secretly admit one more thing-she’d never gotten over him.

And it was unlikely that she ever would.

She felt him step up to her side and take in the view as well, still silent.

She’d thought this trip would be easy. Fun. Exciting. She’d spend some time just…being. She could ruminate on her favorite TV shows. She’d talk herself out of her addiction of chewing on her thumbnail. She’d think about her life and how she wanted to move outside her comfort zone and really live it.

Passion included, please.

But she couldn’t think about any of that because TJ was with her like white on rice, the poster boy for Distraction. When she tugged off her pack to dig through it for water, he simply pulled a bottle from a side pocket of his annoyingly organized pack, the scrumptiously defined muscles in his back and shoulders working as he twisted off the lid and handed it to her.

He waited in silence under the churning sky while she drank, a low breeze playing with his hair, the sun reflecting off his aviator sunglasses. The wind gusted harder, playing with the hem of his shirt, lifting it briefly to reveal his abs, making hers clench. He drove her crazy, too, she realized. Crazy with lust.

She closed her eyes and downed some water, which did nothing for her parched throat and out of control, not-been-laid-in-far-too-long body. Huh. Seemed she was out of her comfort zone already, without even trying.

At the next rumble of distant thunder, she started walking again, not bothering to wait to see if he followed. She didn’t need to, she couldn’t have lost him if she’d tried. He’d been born and raised in those mountains and knew them like the back of his hand. He could probably track her coyotes better and faster than she could.

They climbed another mile before he spoke. “Going to rain soon,” he said.

She looked up at the still churning and ominous sky. “That problem will have to get in line.”

He slid her an amused glance. “You have other problems?”

Yes. Not the least of which was that they’d come to a fork in the trail, with three possible directions. Two veered right, and she wasn’t sure which she was supposed to take. She looked down at her map and at the little GPS unit Stone had given her, and she still didn’t have a clue.

“Want help?”

Hell, no, she didn’t want help. It was one thing to sit at her laptop and interpret data, but-as she was beginning to realize-it was another entirely to be in the field. “Give me a minute.” She grimaced. “I’m talking myself into not being stupid, into accepting help from one of the smartest, sharpest, best guides in the country.” She eyed her map again. Yeah. She was going to need his help.

Dammit.

“All you have to do is ask,” TJ said quietly, all mocking and signs of humor gone.

She kept her eyes on her maps rather than him because looking at him was doing funny things to her insides. “How much will it cost me to keep you from saying I told you so?”

“We’ll work on a payment plan.”

Lightning lit the sky, followed by another sharp crack of thunder that made her jump again.

“You have raingear?” he asked. “We’re going to need it.”

“Yeah, but I don’t want it right now.” She was still overheated from their kiss. Not him, apparently, because he removed a waterproof shell from his backpack and pulled it on. And damn if he didn’t look good in it, like he could be on the cover of Outside.

Or the centerfold of a different magazine altogether.

“Let me hold your stuff while you gear up,” he said.

“I’m fine for a minute. Here’s where I want to get to tonight”-she said, pointing to the map-“which is where the first malfunctioning camera is set up. I think the best route is this far right trail. You?”

He leaned over her shoulder to take a look. She could feel the heat and strength of him seeping into her, and she had the oddest urge to press into him, sink against him.

“This one drops you in right above Mystic Flats.” His arm came around her as he pointed with a long finger. “And this one ends at Big Oak Flats. They’ll both get you there, but yeah, Mystic Flats is the easier way in.”

She searched that statement for an insult but decided there was none. Even more interesting, he was leaving the decision to her, not taking charge. It defused her, and honestly, also completely charmed her.

So they took the far right trail and she did her best to keep the pace up, wanting to get there before nightfall.

At the next burst of thunder and lightning, the drizzle began, the light mist feeling cool and delicious against her heated skin.

“You want to stop and wait out the storm?” he asked from behind her.

She knew it was stupid to let herself get wet, but it felt so wonderful. Intoxicating. She turned to shake her head and he pulled off his sunglasses to eyeball her.

“What?”

“Nothing,” he said. “I like the look, is all.”

The look? That’s when she realized she was smiling from ear to ear. It was just that lately she’d been so damn stressed all the time, awake or asleep, and it’d gotten to her. It’d been slowly sucking the energy and life from her.

But it’d all faded away to nothing when he looked at her like that. “You’re getting wet,” she pointed out.

“No shit, Harley. It’s raining.”

She laughed. “I like it out here.”

His gaze touched over her features, a small smile on his lips. “I know the feeling.”

Common ground.

It was unexpected, and like everything else in regard to him, arousing. They just looked at each other, the moment more intense than the kiss they’d shared. She let out a breath, and they started walking again.

A quarter of a mile later, the skies opened up and dumped on them. Walking became tricky, their feet slipping on the thick carpet of pine needles shedding from the trees all around them. “Here,” TJ said, pulling her under the protection of a tree as the sound of the rain hitting the ground in large, golf ball-size drops deafened them both. They dropped their packs, which felt like a nice relief.

“It’s a little too late for this,” Harley said wryly.

“Yeah.” He stood next to her, hands on his hips, watching her from behind those reflective glasses. Shell zipped, hood up, he was completely dry.

Unlike her, who thanks to her own stupidity, had gotten drenched while being pelted by the big drops.

She shivered.

“Harley,” he said on a barely expelled breath. He sounded almost pained.

Yeah. She knew. In a matter of three seconds, her clothes had plastered themselves to her body. She pressed her spine to the tree, dropping her head to study her muddy shoes. “I might have made a tactical error not putting on a jacket when you did.”

“Wait here. I want to check out the distance from the cliff.”

While he was gone, another burst of lightning hit, and then the shuddering boom of thunder so close it rattled the ground beneath her feet. The rain hadn’t let up, and she took a moment to be impressed in a sort of distracted way. Like most things out there in the Sierras, thunderstorms were oversized and amazing to behold.

A set of boots came into her vision, attached to a pair of long denim-covered legs. A single finger, warm and callused, lifted her chin, and two sharp green eyes held hers. He had a five o’clock shadow going, which only upped his sexy factor, giving him a dangerously alluring appeal that he didn’t need. “You look like you could use an umbrella,” he said.

“Umbrellas are for sissies.”

“How about jackets?” he asked. “Are they for sissies, too?”

“No.” The truth was, she knew her shell was shoved in the very bottom of her backpack. Somewhere. She was a lot of things, but organized wasn’t one of them, and she really wasn’t anxious for him to see the state of her pack.

Especially since his was perfect-obnoxiously so. “I like the feel of the rain on my skin.” Or she had, up until she’d gotten chilled to the bone, a fact she involuntarily gave away when she let out a full-body shiver.

“Harley.” He waited until she looked at him, which she didn’t want to do because she didn’t want to see him laughing at her. His eyes were dark, and full of lots of things, but he wasn’t laughing. “On my first solo trip, it snowed. In July. I walked in it for three hours in a T-shirt. I thought I was in heaven.”

Again their gazes held for a long beat, and as always when he gave her his undivided attention, heat slashed through her stomach. “What happened?” she whispered.

“When I got home, I had pneumonia.” He turned them so that he was the one backed up against the tree. He unzipped his shell, then pulled her into his arms. She leaned into him as he tucked her inside his jacket, allowing her to absorb his body heat.

Heaven, and hell. Heaven, because he smelled…yum, and felt even yummier, and hell because being up against him like that after avoiding contact for so long brought up memories she tried to only visit in the deep, dark of her dreams where secret fantasies reigned.

“You okay?” he murmured, his mouth to her ear, his breath a warm caress on her skin as he rubbed small circles on her back.

Was she? She could feel the steady beat of his heart beneath her cheek, could feel the lean hardness of his muscles, the way his hand was infusing her with his warmth as he stroked her. Startlingly, she realized she was so much more than okay. Forcing herself to shake off the haze of desire, she stepped free. “Yes. Thanks.”

His gaze dropped from her face to her T-shirt, then swept back up again, blazing with heat.

She looked down. Her nipples were two tight little dark points pressing against the white material as if begging for attention.

Perfect.

“Is this the part where you tell me that they’re just breasts?” he asked a little thickly. “Because I’ve got to tell you, Harley, they’re pretty fantastic breasts.”

“It’s not like you haven’t seen them before.”

He stared at her while the shock reverberated through her. Why had she said that? God. She whipped around to grab her pack but he snagged her by the back of the shirt and reeled her in like a snared fish.

“Look,” she said. “I have to-”

“Talk to me.”

“Yeah, that’s not what I was going to say.” She struggled against him uselessly. “Let go.”

“Goddammit, Harley.” Shrugging out of his shell, he wrapped her up in it.

The warmth from his body infused her and she sighed. Okay, she’d needed that. “Thank you.”

Not responding, he pulled out another shell from his pack and put it on himself, proving how much smarter than her he was. He wouldn’t let himself get wet and cold. He was too good for that. Then before she could grab her backpack and put it back on, he once again effortlessly pinned her to the tree, his face in hers. “For years you’ve avoided me or been pissed off at me. But now you keep saying things that give me the impression I’m either stupid, or missing something.”

She closed her eyes. “The latter.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere. And I’m not moving, you’re not moving, no one’s moving until you talk,” he said.

He wasn’t kidding. He’d completely immobilized her, which meant that once again he was plastered up against her and that meant her brain was functioning at less than ten percent. Far too low for rational decision-making processes.

The rain was still falling all around them, splattering on the ground with an oddly musical sound. The tree provided a good amount of relief. It was their own little cocoon, enclosing them, providing protection, creating an intoxicating sense of intimacy.

An intimacy that was increased tenfold by TJ’s gentle but firm hold. “This is ridiculous,” she said. “We can talk later. At home.”

“What’s ridiculous,” he said, enunciating her word, “is the fact that we’ve been tiptoeing around each other for forever now, and I want to know why. Whenever I get too close, you either snap at me or get all flustered, and if I touch you, we’re so combustible, we just about burst into flames.” He bent his knees a little to better see into her face. “I’m completely willing to go up in flames, by the way.” His smile was tight, his eyes dark. “But this first.”

Her breath caught. “This?”

“Yes. Let’s start with why you treat Cam and Stone like they’re blood, and me like the redheaded bastard stepbrother.”

“Well, I wouldn’t exactly use the word brother…” she muttered, drawing a breath. Not easy when she was plastered to him, chest to chest, belly to belly, thighs to thighs, and everything in between. “Please, TJ…just let it go.”

He dropped his head close, so close that his jaw brushed hers. The stubble there scraped gently across her skin and gave her a shiver. The good kind, dammit.

“Tell me,” he said in that quiet voice that tended to make people do exactly as he asked.

She curled into him. He smelled so good. So good that she maybe, sort of, kind of by accident, pressed her nose to his neck.

“Harley.”

His low voice rumbled from his chest, a soft warning she didn’t heed, and when she moved against him again, his grip went from gentle to something far more dangerous as he breathed her name again.

Unable to help herself, she pressed her mouth to his neck and felt him stir against her.

“You’re trying to distract me,” he whispered roughly.

Distract him, herself…

And before she gave too much thought to it, she opened her mouth on his throat, scraping him with her teeth, absorbing his rough groan.

And then…

And then he abruptly yanked himself free of her with a soft oath, pushing her behind him. “TJ? What-”

He strode from beneath the protection of the tree to the center of the clearing, his head cocked as if listening for something.

“What?” she said.

“Someone was standing right here, watching us.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know.” He turned and pointed at her. “Stay.”

And then he vanished down the path.