Читать книгу The Rebellious Rancher - Kate Pearce - Страница 12

Chapter Five

“Did you say coffee?” Silver croaked as she crawled out of her tent on her hands and knees and headed for the fire, not caring what she looked like or what Ben might think of her.

“Way ahead of you.” Ben, who was looking remarkably bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, pointed at the metal pot sitting over the fire. It was already sunny and the birds were singing so loudly they hurt her head. “It’s cowboy coffee, nothing fancy.”

She used the thick cloth to lift the pot and poured the dark brew into the cup Ben had left for her, almost salivating at the aroma. She clutched her mug hard and looked over at him.

“This morning I think I might love you.”

“For my coffee?” He chuckled. “You’d better taste it first.”

She took her first sip and felt the caffeine shudder through her veins. “Perfect.”

“I’m impressed.” He threw the coffee grounds from the bottom of his cup onto the ground and checked the fire. “I’ve got high-protein pancakes and maple syrup coming up for breakfast.”

“Gluten-free?” Silver said hopefully.

He gave her a pitying glance and slid a plate over to her before turning to eat his own.

“Did you sleep okay?”

“Yes.” Silver couldn’t actually believe it herself. “I’m not used to all this fresh air.”

“Your dad said you hadn’t been well.” Ben cut into his second pancake.

“Did he?” Her goodwill toward him over the coffee dissipated slightly and her stomach tightened. “I wonder why he told you that?”

“Was he not being truthful?” Ben met her gaze. “If you do get sick, or need medical assistance, tell me as soon as possible.”

“I’m perfectly fine.” She faced him. “My dad is a terrible worrier.”

“Why’s that?”

“Ever heard that story about the goose who lays the golden eggs?”

His brow creased. “I’m not following.”

“I basically support my whole family. I have since the age of seven when I was cast in my first major film role,” Silver said flatly. “They all work for me. If I go down, they go down.”

“That’s pretty harsh.”

“Of me?”

“No, on you. That’s a hell of a responsibility.” His smile wasn’t happy. “I have the opposite problem. No one in my family depends on me at all.”

Happy to get off the subject of her complicated relationship with her father, Silver pounced on his admission.

“That’s not what I heard. My dad had to pay through the nose to get you to be my guide for this trip. You’re obviously in demand.”

“Maybe BB Morgan’s just a shrewd negotiator.” Ben set his plate aside, licked the syrup from his lips, and rubbed a hand over his mouth. “It was expensive because it’s calving season and most ranches need all hands on deck.”

“Oh.” Silver took a bite of one of the pancakes and it wasn’t bad at all. “So was your family mad that you took this job?”

“You could say that.” He stood up, dusted down his jeans, and put his mug and plate in the center of the circle near the fire.

“So your family does depend on you,” Silver said triumphantly.

He looked over at her, one eyebrow raised. “I’m here, aren’t I?” He nodded at her plate. “Help yourself to more coffee if you need it. I’m going down to the creek to check on the livestock.”

She finished her pancakes, had another cup of coffee, and felt better than she had for a long while. Her body was aching in weird places, but the rigorous fitness regime her occupation demanded was definitely paying dividends. Ben obviously had a few issues with his family, and she couldn’t say she blamed him. She knew all about being beholden to people yet feeling like they no longer saw you as a person but as a means to an end.

Going back to her tent, she changed out of her jammies and back into her jeans, fleece top, and boots before heading down to the corral.

The horses and mules were eating hay Ben must have put out for them, but there was no sign of him. She turned a slow circle and then walked down toward the edge of the creek where she abruptly stopped.

Her trail guide was just stepping out of his boxers and wading naked into the creek. She took three steps backward until she was in the shadow of the trees, and couldn’t take her eyes off his rather nice ass. She doubted he’d ever been near a gym, but he didn’t have any surplus fat on his well-muscled physique.

He crouched down and splashed water over his face and body all the while cursing up a storm. She guessed it had to be cold in there.

“I’m going to come out in a second, Silver, so if you don’t want to see the rest of me, you might want to get back to camp.”

Silver jumped as he spoke directly to her.

“We’re really going to have to work on your tracking skills.” He started to rise and turned toward the bank. “Last chance to run.”

Silver clapped her hands over her eyes like a scandalized maiden aunt, but still got an eyeful of his lightly haired chest, six pack abs and ...

“I suppose you’re going to say that the water was cold.” The words slipped out before she could stop them.

He glanced down past his flat stomach to his groin. “I think everything is perfectly in proportion, thanks.” He advanced slowly toward her without a hint of shame. But why would he be ashamed, Silver thought feverishly, when his body was everything most men aspired to? “Sure you don’t want a dip? I could throw you in, if you like?”

She ran, then, all the way up to the camp, and started packing up her tent. By the time he joined her, she’d managed to stop blushing.

“I’m sorry.” She made herself look at his face, which now that she’d seen the rest of him was harder than she’d thought. “It was incredibly rude and insensitive of me to invade your privacy like that.”

He waved off her apology. “You didn’t know I was bathing when you came down there. I should’ve told you to keep away.”

“But I should’ve known better,” she kept on arguing. “I hate it when people take unauthorized pictures of me when I’m not expecting it.”

“I bet.” He eyed her curiously. “Maybe I should be glad that you didn’t have your phone on you or else I’d be Internet famous right now.”

She met his gaze. “I would never do that to you. I swear it.”

He nodded and turned toward his own tent. “Let’s get packed up.”

* * *

Ben led the way up the slope that looked over the interior of Morgan Valley. There were several ranches out here with land boundaries that met and separated and rejoined like the random outlets of a creek. BB had secured access to most of the valley for the trail rides. In return, Ben, or whoever was leading the ride, would report back on boundary fences, the presence of predators, water issues, or any of the hundreds of problems running a large ranch brought up without having the necessary hands.

Budgets were tight these days even at his own family ranch. If Ben saw a fence that needed mending, he’d get it done with the assistance of his guests who got to support with real-time ranch conservation. He’d even moved a few cows out of a flooded field into a safer one on the Garcia ranch once, which currently needed all the help it could get. If he saw any predators, he also had permission to hunt them. It was an arrangement that had worked well so far.

Somehow, despite not having bathed in the creek or had a proper shower, Silver still looked good. He guessed carting around that Korean skin cream was worth it. He should’ve told her that he was going to wash in the creek, but he hadn’t thought she’d come looking for him for a while. When he’d heard her footsteps, he should’ve kept his boxers on and called out a warning. Had he wanted her to see him naked? If that was true, what was wrong with him?

The last time he’d felt so off-kilter was as a stupid teenager who’d done some stuff so out of character that he still didn’t understand it himself. Mind you, she could’ve walked away, and she hadn’t. He’d noticed the second she’d stopped retreating and stayed to watch.

At least he’d told her that he was turning around and coming out. That had done the trick, but he’d noticed that she’d still gotten an eyeful. He half smiled to himself. And she hadn’t exactly run away screaming; she’d had enough time to make a joke about a certain part of his anatomy. . . .

“Why have we stopped?” Silver asked as she came up alongside him.

“I wanted to show you the valley from up here.” He stood in his stirrups and pointed downward. “We’re going to make our way to the floor and head out to the right of the canyon where the trees are.”

“It doesn’t look that far,” Silver commented as she shaded her eyes against the glare. There were patches of green, but big stretches of dry barren grassland that in the summer months were a real fire hazard. Morgan Creek ran through the top right corner of the valley and meandered its way down to Morgansville, past Morgan Ranch, and disappeared underground just after the town.

“We’re higher than you think, and going down can take twice as long as going up.” He turned to look at her. “You know how to shift your body weight to balance out the horse, right?”

“Yes.” Silver nodded. “Lean back and let the horse do the work.”

“Ladybug’s a champ at this so you’ll be fine. I’ll deal with the mules.” He handed her his water flask and waited as she took a sip before handing it back. “Any questions?”

She looked him up and down. “You should use sunscreen.”

“I do.” He blinked at her.

“Your nose is red.” She leaned over and lightly touched it. “Stay right there.”

A second later she was slathering his nose and face in something that smelled like a bunch of roses.

“There, that’s better.” She recapped the lotion and put it back in her pocket.

“Thanks, Mom,” Ben quipped, surprising a laugh out of her as she picked up her reins.

“Trust me, Ben Miller, I have no motherly feelings toward you whatsoever.”

“Was it something I said?” Ben asked innocently.

“You have the body of a god, and you darn well know it,” she said severely. “I’d have to be dead not to appreciate it.”

“A god?” Ben echoed and patted his chest. “And it’s all natural and homegrown.”

“Like your beef?”

“You could say that.” Ben studied her. “You had a nose job, didn’t you?”

“Where did that come from?” she squeaked.

“Because we’re talking about appearances.” He paused. “You might as well admit it. I’m not going to tell anyone.”

“I broke my nose and had to have it reset.” Silver sniffed. “While they were fixing it they might have altered it ‘slightly.’”

“Slightly?”

“Oh, come on, it’s such a minor thing to do!” Silver protested. “Lots of girls have it done. At least I didn’t do the boob thing.”

His attention dropped to her chest and he raised one eyebrow. “You sure about that?”

She grabbed his wrist, pulled off his glove, and pressed his hand to her chest. “Feel it! It’s one hundred percent natural!”

He went still, his gaze on his trapped hand, which was now full of warm, squeezable, female boob. His thumb rested right over her nipple, which was rapidly hardening.

“Uh . . . I . . .”

She hurriedly released his hand and threw his glove back at him. “Do you want to untie Bill from the back of my saddle if you’re going to take him down the slope?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll do that now.” He dismounted and untied the rope, glad that he was out of her view as the fit of his jeans grew way more uncomfortable. “You can start on down. I’ll be right behind you.”

* * *

Silver kept her gaze on the downward slope, which was way less regular than the previous route, with several switchback turns to avoid large boulders or landslides. Why had she put Ben’s hand on her boob? What on earth had she been thinking?

Again, it all came down to her inability to have a normal conversation with anyone. She just didn’t know how to do it. He must think she was insane. She should never have agreed to come on the trail ride. She’d been so shocked when her dad had agreed she could go by herself that she hadn’t thought things through. Being out here without her usual support team was making her look like an ass.

But if she wanted to break out of her light comedy, blond girl roles and appear in the gritty Western, she needed this kind of experience on her resume. She wanted to act, to show the world that she wasn’t just a pretty face, and was more than willing to take a huge pay cut to do the independent film if they’d have her.

Silver stared off over the valley. Had her father just been humoring her all along? Did he think that ten days stuck out here would be enough to make her give up her dreams and return to the kind of roles that had made her famous and her family rich? The more she thought about it, the more likely it seemed. Maybe he’d told Ben Miller to make things as difficult as possible for her....

A shadow loomed over her and both she and Ladybug jumped a little to the side as a turkey vulture flew low over their heads. Silver banged her elbow on the protruding rock wall and muttered a curse as her mare righted herself.

“You okay?” Ben called out to her from behind.

“Yup.” She wasn’t in the mood to turn around and talk to him right now—what with the boob incident, and her gathering suspicions that Ben and her father were somehow in cahoots.

She focused her attention on the path ahead. It had taken way longer than she had anticipated getting down. She hadn’t reached the valley floor yet, and the sun was already overhead. She was so hot that rivulets of sweat were running down her back. When she was on solid ground, she would take off her fleece and leave just her T-shirt on. The thought of jumping into the creek with or without a naked Ben in it was really appealing.

She took the last angled corner and walked Ladybug out onto the sparse grass, turning in a circle to watch Ben complete the descent. Despite the fact that he was managing his horse and Bill and Ted, he still looked more competent than she ever would. He barely moved in the saddle yet was so in tune with Calder that it was like watching poetry in motion. He clicked to the mules, took the last turn with a dexterity that impressed her, and came down in a cloud of dust that briefly obscured him.

He pulled up beside her and silently offered her his water bottle. She showed him her own, and drank from that, still unwilling to share more than she had to with him.

He took off his Stetson and knocked the dust off it. “Jeez, it’s hot. Let’s find some shade, check the time, and have something to eat.”

She was more than willing to get out of the sun. When Ben suggested they pick up the pace and kicked his horse into a smooth sitting trot, she ended up bobbing along behind him like a demented whack-a-mole. She didn’t care. Gaining the shelter of the trees was such a welcome relief after the unforgiving glare of the sun. Ben had already stopped and was busy tying up the mules and his horse, his movements efficient with long practice. She dismounted and led Ladybug over to stand beside Calder.

“Give me five,” Ben said as he loosened Ladybug’s girth. “And I’ll get the fire started.”

“Fire?” Silver shuddered. “Like we need more heat?”

“We have to eat something.” He glanced over at her as he checked her horse, all business again. “And, until we reach the creek, we can’t catch any fish, so we’ll need to boil some water.”

The wall to the right of the wooded area was a mixture of crumbling red clay and rock through which a trickle of water made its way down to the valley floor.

Silver’s stomach gurgled as if to agree with him. “What can I do?” She was determined not to sit around and watch him work. If he and her dad thought she was a quitter, she would prove them wrong. This was part one of her independence campaign and nothing was going to stop her achieving her goals.

“Gather some wood for the fire while I set a bucket under the water to give to the horses and mules.”

“Okay.” Silver took off her fleece, wiped her brow, and went off into the wooded area gathering the plentiful dry, fallen wood as she went. It was peaceful within the shadowed shelter of the trees and, when a slight breeze picked up that ruffled her hair, almost pleasant.

She came back to find that Ben had unpacked the food and the pot and was lining a small indentation away from the trees and within the shelter of the wall with stones.

“Thanks.” He inspected her offerings, picked the ones he wanted, and arranged them in a neat interconnected pile over the stones. He added some grass and hunkered down beside the fire beckoning for her to join him. “When you light a fire, pay attention to where the wind is coming from so you don’t accidentally set the dry grass alight.”

“Good thinking.”

“If it’s high summer, always have a bucket of water or a fire blanket close by to douse the flames if they get whipped up by the wind.” He set the tripod over the flames and waited until the wood caught before setting the pan of water to boil. “Shouldn’t take long. The water in my flask is already warm.”

“Shall I check the horses?” Silver asked, getting to her feet.

“Yeah, sure, thanks.” He looked up at her, his brown eyes narrowed against the sun. “If the bucket is empty, fill it up again, and make sure the mules get their fair share. Calder’s a pig and too much water is bad for him.”

“Will do.”

By the time she’d completed her tasks, the water was boiling, and Ben was digging into the container of freeze-dried food. “Beef, chicken, or sweet and sour rice?” he called out.

“Chicken.” Silver sat down next to him, her back against the canyon wall. “You are going to put that fire out as soon as you can, right?”

“Absolutely.” He poured water into the two packs and handed her one. “Stir it and then leave it for a couple of minutes before you eat.”

Silver instinctively got out her phone while she waited for the meal and made a sad face at the screen. “The battery’s almost gone.”

“Good.” Ben met her gaze. “You know what really bugs me? When people come out here and spend their whole time looking at the view through their phones instead of experiencing it in real time.”

Silver hastily put her phone away. “That’s great, but now you’re going to have to talk to me for the next eight days, and that’s been going so well.”

“I’d rather talk than touch your boob again.”

“What was wrong with my boob?” Silver demanded. “Most men would give a million dollars to get to do what you did.”

“But I didn’t do it.” He raised his eyebrows. “You made me.”

“What are you, nine? I was trying to prove a point!”

He shrugged. “Seeing as I wouldn’t know what a fake boob felt like anyway, I’m not sure what you proved.”

“None of your girlfriends have had breast implants?” Silver asked.

“Nope, or nose jobs, or any other kind of stuff you celebrities get up to.”

“So trying to look your best is a bad thing?”

“Of course not, but morphing into a totally different person is just weird.” Ben mimicked a frozen face.

“I’m not planning on doing that,” Silver assured him. “But when your face is your business, you do have to take care of it. Even the male stars get work done these days.”

“Work.” Ben chuckled. “Like it’s hard to do or something.”

Silver opened her food pouch and vigorously stirred the contents. She didn’t know a single person who hadn’t had some kind of plastic surgery. Even her mom who tended to stay out of the limelight had had a tummy tuck and endured the occasional injection of Botox.

“Must be nice to be so perfect that you don’t have to worry about the lines on your face,” Silver muttered between mouthfuls.

“Lines build character,” Ben said. “Look at Mrs. Morgan. She’s going on seventy, and she’s still beautiful.”

“That’s a different kind of beauty altogether,” Silver argued. “And she doesn’t have to see her face magnified five hundred times bigger on a screen where everyone can tell if you have a pimple or a booger up your nose.”

He snorted a mouthful of food and started to wheeze. She couldn’t help but grin even as she passed him his water bottle and helpfully thumped him on the back.

“See? You’ve never thought about these things, have you?” Silver finished off her meal. “We live in very different worlds.”

“But yours is totally fake,” Ben protested.

“That’s very judgmental of you.” Silver wasn’t buying it. “Are you saying that my family aren’t real people with real problems just like anyone else?”

He studied her for a long moment. “No, I’m not saying that. I have no right to judge you whatsoever.” He sighed. “Jeez... I’m beginning to sound as bad as my father, so just kill me now.”

“Your dad runs the ranch with you and your brothers, correct?”

“Technically, it’s just my dad, Adam, and me who work full-time at the place.”

“So what exactly do you do?” Silver asked as he handed her an apple.

“It’s a cattle ranch.” His smile dimmed. “I do all the stuff that no one else has the time or energy for. I’m basically the clean-up guy.”

“Or the guy everyone depends on?”

“Yeah.” He slowly raised his head to meet her gaze. “You could say that.”

“So they’ll probably miss you more than they thought,” Silver added encouragingly. “And when you go back, they’ll be nice and grateful to you.”

“I’m not sure I’m going back.” His smile was wry. “My dad wasn’t happy at me taking off to do this trail ride during calving season. He said he might not have a job for me when I return.”

“Did he mean it?” Silver felt instant guilt.

“Maybe.” Ben set his food pouch down and started on his apple. “He’s got something of a temper. When my mom left him, he threw all her stuff out in the yard and had a big bonfire.”

Silver pressed her hand to her mouth, aware that even though Ben was acting like they were discussing the weather, there were storm clouds gathering in his eyes.

“My parents never fight.”

“Lucky you.” Ben crunched down on his apple. “Mine were awful.”

“Did they divorce?”

“Yeah, when I was around ten or eleven.” He finished his apple and set the core on the ground.

“How long did you have to go to therapy to get over that?” Silver asked.

“Therapy?” He raised his eyebrows. “What I had was my auntie Rae coming to save the day, and a miserable bastard of a father who decided that hard labor was the best way to stop us having time to miss our mother. It kind of worked, too. Do you want coffee?”

Silver just stared at him.

“What?”

“You poor little boy,” she blurted out.

“Nothing poor or little about me.” He stood up and held out his hand. “Do you want to give the apple cores to the horses while I clean up?”

* * *

The fact that Silver felt sorry for him was still bugging Ben as they cut through the copse of trees and followed the line of the canyon wall around to the right. Sure, he’d cried himself to sleep a few times after his mother had left, but only because he was exhausted after completing the long list of chores his father laid on him every day after school. Ben was fairly certain there were laws about child labor, but Jeff hadn’t cared about such niceties.

Silver was supposed to be the one with the issues, not him, but he’d let himself be railroaded into a discussion about his father, which would never end well because as much as he loved his old man, Jeff definitely had a few issues of his own....

Ben was supposed to be keeping an eye on Silver, not the other way around. He’d gone through her saddlebags the first night when she was sleeping, feeling bad about it, but aware that he’d promised her father that she wouldn’t be smoking anything on his watch except jerky. He’d found nothing but makeup, skin care products, and silky underwear that had given him some great dreams.

She didn’t seem jittery or anxious, and he was beginning to wonder exactly why Mr. Meadows had been so insistent that his daughter was using drugs. He’d promised the man that he wouldn’t mention the subject directly to Silver, which should probably have been his first warning. There was obviously a lot going on that he didn’t understand. Ben didn’t appreciate being stuck in the middle of another family’s drama. He’d had enough trouble dealing with his own.

“Ben!”

He turned his head sharply as Silver yelled from behind him. She was pointing at the sky. “What’s up?”

“Look at that bird!”

He grinned as a raptor flew by with a still-wriggling snake hanging from its beak.

“Let’s hope he doesn’t drop it.” He squinted into the sun. “That’s a red-tailed hawk.”

“How do you know?”

“Because it’s my job to know,” Ben replied, glad to be back talking about something he could handle. “I’ve got a set of binoculars in my saddlebag if you want them.”

“Maybe later.” Silver smiled at him. “I suspect I’d get nauseous if I tried to ride and stare upward at the same time. Are there a lot of raptors around here?”

“Yeah, there’s even a pair of nesting condors on the canyon wall we’re heading toward.”

“They’re rare, right?”

“Very.” He shortened his reins. “You ready to move on? We’re going to camp by Morgan Creek for the night, and I want to get there before it’s too late.”

He heard the sound of the water well before they reached the edge of the creek. They’d had a lot of rain recently and the creek level was rising, which would be good for the drier months ahead. There was still snow on the peaks of the Sierras, and one of the mountain passes wouldn’t be open until at least June, if not July. If the snowpack was good, the melted ice flow would eventually work its way down to their level and keep the valley blooming.

He dismounted, tied up the mules and Calder, and beckoned for Silver to follow him. He led her through the trees to the rocky wall of the canyon and stood back. The ground was trembling beneath their feet and there was a peculiar muted booming sound.

Ben pointed upward. “It’s cool, isn’t it?”

Silver gasped as she looked up at the water pouring over the rocky, top ridge of the canyon and crashing down to the base with an almighty roar.

“It’s incredible.” She had to raise her voice to be heard.

“This is where we start calling it Morgan Creek,” Ben said. “It feeds the whole valley.”

There was a deep pool of water under the fall and then a wide rock-filled riverbed along which the water meandered at varying speeds, swirling and crashing and reforming in an endless dance.

“Is it safe to walk into?” Silver asked.

Ben grinned down at her. “It’s safe enough to walk behind the waterfall. Wanna try it?”

“Really?”

“That’s why I wanted us to get here before it got dark.” He pointed at the bank. “Take off your boots, socks, and anything else you don’t want getting wet, and we’ll get going.”

While Ben stripped down to his black T-shirt and jeans, Silver hurried to do as he suggested and then rolled up her jeans to her knees.

“It’s going to be slippery,” Ben warned. “If you think you’re going to lose your balance, feel free to grab on to me.”

She glanced at his muscled biceps and figured he’d probably be able to hold her up if he had to. He led the way along the path toward the waterfall and Silver was quickly enveloped in a damp mist that felt like she was in the middle of a cloud.

He stopped on the edge of the creek and leaned down to talk directly in her ear.

“We’re going to walk out along the flat piece of rock and then head toward the canyon wall, okay?”

Silver nodded, and as he smiled down at her she noticed the absence of his cowboy hat, which now looked wrong.

“Come on.” He reached for her hand. “It’s worth it.”

He didn’t tow her along, but allowed her to pick her way through the boulders and slippery flat rocks at her own pace. The noise got louder and louder and the power of the water more immense the closer she got. She risked one more look up before she took a deep breath, gripped Ben’s fingers hard, and followed him into darkness.

The water this close up sounded like the roar of a jet engine. She closed her eyes and trusted that Ben would lead her safely through. Her feet hit drier, pebbled ground and she went still.

“Move in a bit more,” Ben said, “and open your eyes.”

She did as he suggested, and just stared in stunned silence at the curtain of water rushing downward in front of her while she remained relatively dry and safe. Ben maneuvered her backward, pressed on her shoulder, and she sank down onto the bench someone had thoughtfully provided for visitors. The diffused light that managed to filter into the cave flickered and danced like a lace curtain billowing in the breeze.

Ben sat beside her, his hard thigh aligned with hers, and she reached for his hand and just held it tight. He made no effort to speak or rush her out the other side. She again got that sense of how much a part of him this valley was, and how comfortable he was with its wonders.

If it weren’t for Ben she would be completely by herself. How often was she ever alone like this? Silver wondered. Just sitting and observing rather than being observed? Her breathing slowed, and her shoulders dropped in a way that all her yoga and meditation classes had never achieved. If it weren’t for Ben she would never have known that such an amazing space existed. Part of her wanted to stay there forever to experience the power of nature and suck that energy into her own spine.

She shivered and Ben put his arm around her. “You ready to go?”

“Not really,” she confessed. “It’s blowing my mind.”

He chuckled; the warm sound reverberated around the rock cave and settled somewhere in her stomach.

“I’m glad you like it. Some people get freaked out by the lack of space.”

She finally tore her gaze away from the waterfall and looked around the small cave. “It’s okay. I don’t feel trapped in here at all.”

“I did have second thoughts about your claustrophobia just before I stepped through,” he confessed. “But I thought you’d let me know real quick if you wanted to get out.”

She shivered again and made herself stand up. “It’s definitely damp, but I’m really glad you brought me here.” She looked up at him, noticing the droplets of water caught on his eyelashes and his beard and couldn’t look away. “Thank you. I really mean it.” She went on tiptoe and kissed his cheek.

He stared at her for a long moment and then slid his hand under her chin. “I know I’m going to regret this, but what the hell.”

He kissed her with such urgency that she kissed him back, letting him inside her mouth, curling her tongue around his and giving as good as she got. He wrapped one arm around her hips, bringing her entire body in contact with his. With a convulsive shudder, she pressed closer, just as he wrenched his mouth away from hers and stepped back, breathing hard.

“Jeez, I’m sorry. That was way out of bounds.”

Reaching forward, she grabbed hold of his damp T-shirt and hauled him back in. “That was going really well until you had to spoil it.”

He stared down at her. “How about we get out of this cave and go and set up camp?”

“Coward.” She let go of his shirt and pushed him back on his heels. “Fine. Why don’t we do that?”