by Vella Munn
She chuckled and slid her fork under her stir-fry. “Why do you think I did what I did? Your delightful grandmother would probably come up with something designed to see how much she could embarrass me.”
“No probably to it.”
The dish was good, a little spicy and a lot homemade. They watched the shadows expand as they ate, but he acknowledged he was far from relaxed. Being near her was all it took for him to want her. Naked and under him. Maybe on top if that’s how the wrestling wound up.
She was wild in bed, deliciously uninhibited. Although she hadn’t said much about her previous sexual experiences—hell, he didn’t want to know—he would be surprised if she’d been like this with what’s his name. On the outside, Amber Baum was a conservative and circumspect woman, a good girl.
Then the wraps came off.
“That was delicious.” He placed his empty plate on the table and gave her his full attention. The sunset had painted the treetops in oranges and reds. Another time, a time when he wasn’t in a hurry to get rid of her clothes, he’d guide her through the trees until they reached the lake. Sitting side by side, they’d watch the lake ease from blue to black. The stars would come out, the air would chill, and the moon would cast a silvered stream over the water.
And they’d have sex. Fuck in the open. Entertain the ducks. Keep it physical and uncomplicated.
“I’m glad you liked it.” She stood and reached for the plates. “Let me clean up then we can—”
He stopped her hand. “Clean up later.”
“Oh? Is there’s something you don’t want to put off?”
“Damned right I don’t. Call it dessert.”
“What did you have in mind?”
“Whatever you’re serving.”
“Oh, no, you don’t.” She winked. “I slaved over the main meal. You’re responsible for the next course.”
He liked how she swung from serious to playful. Her job called for what he saw as way too much serious, not that he’d risk ruining this moment by pointing it out.
“What I have in mind will put responsibility for making the experience last on you.” He stood and matter-of-factly unbuttoned her slacks and pulled down the zipper. “I need to head for the mountains in a couple of days. Spend the night alone.” His expression still neutral, he dispensed with the buttons on her blouse. “Just me in a deserted fire lookout tower.”
She looked down at what he’d done then at him again while drawing her blouse off her shoulders and tossing it onto her chair. “What’s the trip about?”
“Some inventory taking. Hopefully not exciting.” He ran a nail over the top of her bra. “Certainly only about half as interesting as what I’m doing right now.”
Judging by her frown, she was trying to think of something to say but coming up short.
“This is your fault.” He feathered the space between her breasts that the bra didn’t cover. “If you hadn’t fed me, I’d be too weak to be able to do this. Fortunately, my strength is returning.”
“I haven’t noticed weakness being a problem for you. However, the digestive process funnels considerable energy into the stomach.” She reached behind her and unhooked the lacy pale yellow bra. “I’m thinking we’d be wise to get sex over with before you fall asleep.”
His mouth lifted, he took over the task of removing her bra. “I agree. Immediately dealing with something that takes considerable energy is a wise suggestion. In fact”—he snagged her waistband and started the downward journey—“we’re already late getting started.”
“What do you mean we? I’m darn near ready for the exercise, unlike you.” She reached for his jeans’ snap. “Your procrastination is troublesome.”
“Are you complaining?” He jerked down so her slacks were around her ankles. “Do I have to point out that assuming responsibility for you makes accomplishing anything else difficult?”
“I’m perfectly capable—”
“Not capable enough.” He grabbed her around the waist and hoisted her onto his shoulders. He kept her in place by wrapping an arm around her legs and headed for the couch. She’d managed to unhook his jeans, but he had a long way to go before reaching nudity.
“Put me down.” She tried to lift her head. “I’m getting dizzy.”
“That isn’t all you’re getting.” He slapped her, not because he had punishment in mind but because her ass was so inviting. Judging by her gasp, he surmised her thin panties hadn’t blunted the impact.
“Stop it. Dang it, stop...”
“Is that a protest?” He swatted her repeatedly, loving how she jerked, wiggled, and giggled. “Hard to tell since it isn’t very convincing.”
“This is crazy. Put me down.”
He dropped her onto the couch. Something about her barely visible ankles, bouncing breasts, and the heat simmering in her expression fully woke the male animal in him. He positioned her arms by her sides then leaned over her, trapping her.
“What’s this?” she asked. “Caveman with his captive?”
Uninhibited. Lost. “At least I didn’t hit you over the head with a club.”
“Gee. I’m relieved.”
“You should be.” Aware that everything could fall apart between them, he raked his teeth over her chin. Now was everything. It had to be. “That’s how I get most of my women.”
“What then?” She wiggled ineffectively. “Do you have a witch doctor on hand to treat their concussions?”
Keep it light. “Nah. If they don’t recover, I figure they wouldn’t have been strong enough to haul the wooly mammoths I kill back to the cave.”
“Mighty hunter, are you?” She tried to free her right arm, which prompted him to snag her wrist and press it against the couch. “Rumor is you steal your wooly mammoths from other cavemen.”
“Lies. All lies. You aren’t defending my honor?”
“I can’t defend anything.” She wiggled some more. “Neither can I participate.”
She was participating all right by remaining beneath him with her breasts begging for his mouth. There was a little matter of getting rid of the rest of her clothes and doing the same himself, but he wasn’t in a hurry.
Affecting what he hoped was a fierce expression, he lowered himself to his knees, leaned over her, and caught a nipple between his teeth. Squeaking, she went still. She remained like that as he lightly nibbled and when he ran a hand under her panties and pressed against her belly. She trembled when he worked a forefinger between the panties’ leg band and her skin, squeaked again as he slid his finger into her.
She was a mountain breeze, a scent of pine. Neither might endure but he’d hold on as long as he could.
“You’re making me crazy,” she whispered.
“I know.”
He wasn’t sure what happened after that, not all the details. There was some more playing with sexual bondage on his part, playing being the operate word because he didn’t try to keep her on the couch. After a bit she realized she was free to move, scrambled to her knees and started in on his clothes. By turn he resisted and helped. He helped her dispose of her slacks and panties then dumped her back onto the couch.
Somehow they wound up on the carpet, naked limbs intertwined, breathing loud, and hands in motion. He was on his knees with his hands on the couch about to get to his feet when she rammed into his side and sent him sprawling.
“Now you’re going to get it,” he threatened.
“Yeah? Prove it.”
Of course he did. What turned-on male—him at least—could ignore such a challenge? Although she tried to keep him from getting up, he put his muscles, to say nothing of his goal, to use by grabbing her leg and dragging her to him. He flipped her onto her stomach, straddled her, and repeatedly slid his fingers down her back. She was his tonight. He wouldn’t let tomorrow intrude. When she laughed, cursed, and bucked, he turned around, which gave him full access to her butt.
“Don’t you dare.” She bucked some more or rather she tried to.
“
Don’t I dare do what?” Determined to stay in the now, rested his splayed hands on her ass cheeks.
“Spank me.”
“Thanks for the suggestion.” He swatted.
The sound of flesh lightly striking flesh sounded so good he did it again. He kept the pace slow and even, barely stinging his palms, but she continued to wiggle and try to get her arms under her. Every move she made transferred to his body, especially his cock, which made keeping this kind of foreplay up harder and harder.
Finally, prompted by her gasps and more giggles, he rolled off her. On his back with his arms outstretched and fingers curling, he watched as she got to her hands and knees.
“Don’t move.” She rubbed her backside. “You better not or I’ll punish you again.”
“Again? That’s not how I remember it happening.”
“Well, you’re wrong. I distinctly recall winning the round.” After rubbing her buttocks a little longer, she crawled over to the couch and got up. Not looking back at him, she walked into the bathroom then returned.
“Put it on.” She tossed the condom at him. “You owe me.”
“For what?”
“For letting you win. What do you think?”
He could care less who had won what. Neither was he interested in continuing the discussion, especially since she’d dropped to her knees and rested her arms on the couch. She looked over her shoulder at him.
“Can you figure it out?” She wiggled her reddened ass at him.
He answered by sheathing himself, complied with her unspoken command by knee-walking over to her and sliding the hand he’d punished her with between her legs where she was wet. Feeling a little dizzy and a hell of a lot ready, he teased her there while holding onto himself with his other hand. He was right. Tonight was everything. He refused to think about tomorrow.
“Do it, please,” she begged with her back arched. “Take me.”
“No fight left in my cavewoman prisoner?”
“Depends on what you mean by fight. Garret, please. I’m going to go crazy.”
So am I.
Sanity didn’t matter, only becoming one with Amber did. Entering her, pushing deep, feeling her slick heat all around his cock, grasping her around the waist and holding her in place as he thrust. She whined and whimpered, lifted and lowered her head, pushed back. Sweat covered her back, prompting him to lick at it.
“Oh, god. Oh my—damn.”
Wonderful words. Words born of the powerful need for sexual release. Even as he heeded his own body’s demands, he treated her to long, strong thrusts interspersed with fast, hard action. He’d lost himself and didn’t care.
She climaxed with her head lifted and body shaking, her whine lengthening then becoming a scream. As her inner muscles massaged him, he surrendered his last bit of sanity.
Chapter Ten
“You bring out the crazy in me, the crazy uninhibited.” Amber stared at the leftover stir-fry.
“Is that good or bad?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted to the naked man who was putting plates in the dishwasher. “Right now I don’t care.”
“It’s going pretty fast.”
“What’s between us? Yes, it is.” Her ass still burned a little, but that was nothing compared to the glorious sense of wellbeing between her legs.
“Too fast?”
She took plastic wrap out of a drawer and pulled out a length in preparation for covering the dinner bowl.
“I don’t know. Do you really have to be gone? I wish—we need time to talk about what’s happening between us.”
He froze. “Can’t we just let it happen?”
She wanted to do exactly that. In fact, if she could have her uninhibited way, she’d be here when he got home wearing nothing except one of his flannel shirts rolled up at the sleeves. That way getting naked wouldn’t be so much work. However—
“Maybe it’s a woman thing,” she offered as she placed the leftovers in the refrigerator. “The whole emotional component.” Trying to understand why I wanted him to take me like he did, like some animal.
“I’m not sure I know what you want.”
Now that she’d completed her complex domestic task and had time to think, she realized she wasn’t sure what she wanted from him, from either of them. It was dark out, the house was cooling off, and she was still sans clothes. Post sex lethargy was starting to give way to modesty, but she didn’t want to be the first one to put on something.
“Where is it you’re going?” she asked by way of changing the subject. No man should look sexy while doing domestic chores but Garret did.
“Back into the Missions.”
“And what are you inventorying? See, I remembered.”
He didn’t immediately answer, which caused her to study him.
“Grizzlies. Specifically sows and cubs.”
“Oh.” The word eased from her, not nearly strong enough considering the knot that had seized her. “Alone? That has to be dangerous.”
He kept his attention locked on her eyes. “It isn’t dangerous if a person knows what he’s doing and what to look for, which I do. Besides, I won’t be sleeping in the open.”
If his comment was designed to ease her mind, he hadn’t gone far enough. Grizzlies were monsters of teeth and fangs backed by aggression. They feared nothing and no one. Why should they? Short of a high-powered rifle, nothing could stop them, and as far as she knew, Garret wouldn’t shoot one unless his life was in danger.
“Where I’ll be spending the night used to be a fire lookout tower. It calls for climbing thirty-nine vertical steps to get into it and grizzlies see no reason to go to that much effort.”
“What about before you’re inside the tower?”
She bristled a bit when he chuckled. Darn it, she needed him to understand how important his safety was to her. He might take monster bears for granted, but she didn’t. Heck, she couldn’t even stand up to a man who wore his baseball cap backward. Garret was her man, or at least he was the man she wanted to become hers. Right or wrong, he’d walked into the middle of her life and turned it all around.
“What do you want me to do, not tell you what my job entails so you won’t worry?”
Like I did. “Of course not. It’s just that—”
“I’ve been there countless times. In fact, that’s where I was when you arrived.” He walked into the living room and returned with their clothes. “Put on something. I don’t want you getting cold.”
She slipped on her blouse and slacks while he covered his nudity with jeans and shirt.
“I was thinking,” he said, “about the tower. I don’t know when it was built, but William told me it was there when he was young. Considering the elements, you’d think it would have collapsed, but it’s in pretty good shape. Because it’s still in occasional use, and those who rely on it have done some maintenance. What if I take pictures? Maybe it’ll turn out to be something you can use?”
That was right. She had a job, a career. She should have already told him about having gone to the cabin tract and what had happened both there and afterward. She’d do that, soon. Just not right now.
“Garret? I want to go with you.”
Two days later Amber exited Garret’s work vehicle and stared at the narrow trail leading into the forest. She hadn’t been able to keep her attention off the imposing white-topped mountains during the drive. They’d seemed to be challenging her, demanding to know if a woman who ran from a semi-confrontation thought she had what it took to enter the wilderness.
It was early morning, the air chilly. She hoped the all-weather coat she’d bought in Sweetheart would be warm enough. At Garret’s suggestion, she’d worn her new hiking boots yesterday to break them in. Thanks to the wool socks, her feet were well-cushioned with no sign of blisters developing. Because Garret was responsible for putting her gear together, she was certain her backpack held everything she’d need. He obviously believed in buying the best in outdoor gear, including a lightweight sle
eping bag with a built-in air mattress.
Her pack was heavier than she’d thought it would be and she had to lean forward to balance things. At least they wouldn’t need a tent. As Garret helped her into her pack and adjusted the straps, she reminded herself of why she’d asked him to take her along. It had taken a while for the reality of an ancient fire lookout station to sink in, but once it had, she’d gotten excited. This could turn out to be a true find, proof that she was doing her job. Also, she wouldn’t have to deal with hostile cabin owners.
“One last thing before we get started,” Garret said. “Hopefully we won’t see any other hikers, at least we better not. This part of the Missions is off-limits this time of the year so grizzlies can feed on cut worms and ladybugs without being interrupted.”
She struggled to straighten. Darn Garret for looking as if his pack weighed no more than a pillow.
“You made your point. I’m to follow your lead, and if we spot a grizzly, I will not run.”
“Use your senses.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “Your nose and ears will be your best defense.”
“And watching your reaction.”
“Yes, that. You’re sure you’re ready for this?”
“I want to be.”
His expression became serious. “This isn’t just about identifying an old building is it? What is it? You’d determined to prove you’re tough?”
“This country speaks to you. I want to try to understand why.”
“All right.” He again touched his lips to her nose. “It isn’t something I can explain. You’ll have to experience it, or try to anyway.”
As he set out ahead of her, she mulled over what he’d said. He was leaving a great deal up to her. Seeing if she could stay on her feet on a steep, narrow trail while carrying a weight was only part of the experience, the unimportant part.
The impact of the woods on her heart and soul was what mattered. If nothing happened, would what was developing between them survive? The Flathead National Forest was a living force for Garret, something to love and protect.
A world apart from what she felt about how she earned her living.