by Naima Simone
He couldn’t possibly know how much she hated being in this position, feeling like she’d screwed up. Like she’d overlooked something important.
“Okay. Thank you.” Swallowing back her fear, she focused on his hazel eyes, needing to believe he was as confident as he sounded. “I’ll get my gear on.”
* * *
He moved her out of harm’s way quickly enough.
The knot of worry in Weston’s chest eased a fraction with each step they took away from the gully where she’d pitched her tent for the night. Avalanches were a real danger in that ravine. He hadn’t been a part of any rescue missions there, but there’d been another one ten years back that some of his team had experienced. Plus, he’d seen two avalanches with his own eyes on these peaks. Both had scared the hell out of him.
And conditions tonight were prime. He was so damned grateful he’d found her, and that she’d been safe. Whole.
The demons from his past had teeth, and they would still be gnawing on him when he closed his eyes tonight.
“Where are we going?” she called to him through the wind, her voice doubly muffled by her scarf.
They trudged side by side down the mountain, their pace slow in case of loose rocks under the snow. He’d offered her a second headlamp that he’d brought with him, but she had her own and wore it now. She’d been more prepared than he had anticipated, from her gear to her ease with packing quickly and efficiently.
She’d been scared, though. He’d read the fear easily in her body language from her blinking eyes and darting gaze to her jerky movements, signs that would have been clear even if he hadn’t been trained to deal with frightened survivors. He’d done his best to calm her once they were out of the most dangerous area, but he could tell she was spooked. And he’d damn well been reassured this wasn’t a setup on her part. She hadn’t baited him out onto the mountain just for a chance to interrogate him about his dealings with Alonzo Salazar, the subject of her financial investigation.
She would have had to be a good actress to fake the fear he’d witnessed earlier. The flash of panic in her blue eyes. The tremor in her voice. Although with her goggles on now, he had fewer cues to how she was doing.
“There are safe campsites this way.” They hadn’t gone far from her original spot, since he wouldn’t risk a fall in the dark in these harsh weather conditions, but they were out of the ravine and following a ridge he knew well.
“Shouldn’t we get off the mountain?” she pressed, leaning closer to him as she spoke.
If he’d been alone—yes. He would have returned to the all-terrain vehicle he’d left at a trailhead. But he wouldn’t risk it with April in tow. Sure, she seemed like she must be a strong climber on a regular day. But it was late; she had to be tired and most definitely stressed. Bottom line, he didn’t trust her sure-footedness or her judgment and couldn’t risk going any farther than necessary.
“Safer to make camp someplace I know will be protected until the storm passes.” He pointed to a spot tucked out of the wind ahead of them. Between a secure rock ledge and sheltering trees, there was far less snow here. “I brought a big tent with the highest weather rating.”
Stepping under the shelter of the ledge, he shed his backpack and unzipped it to dig out the gear. Only when he pulled off his gloves did he realize she’d stopped moving. A few steps behind him, she looked lost in the spotlight of his headlamp, snow almost reaching her knees.
She might have said something, but the words were lost in the wind.
Gesturing for her to come closer, he called, “I can’t hear you.”
He set his flashlight on the rock ledge so it shone down onto his backpack while April hopped down to join him. She wrenched off her goggles, taking her headlamp with them. He could see her blue eyes clearly now.
“You’re staying?” she asked, the question huffing into the cold air between them. “With me?”
Maybe it was because she didn’t seem frightened anymore. Or maybe it was because he knew they were out of danger here. But something in the way she asked reminded him how very appealing he found this woman. And how grateful he was that she was safe.
April Stephens had been a red-hot distraction from the first time he’d seen her. Then he’d discovered how good she was at her job as she started to uncover the long-kept secrets of his mentor. And tonight, he’d seen a grit in her that he never would have expected from a woman who looked like she’d be more at home on a glossy magazine cover than a Montana ranch—let alone on a mountaintop.
From the high cheekbones and delicate bone structure to her pillow-soft lips, she had an exquisite beauty that turned male heads. But better than that, she had a fiery determination that he admired, even if he’d been on the wrong side of it when they met.
“I didn’t hike all this way in the dark only to leave you alone now, April.” He couldn’t have held back the flare of anticipation now if he tried. Not that he was going to seduce a woman he felt responsible for tonight. But he couldn’t deny the sensual draw every time he was around her. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“That’s—kind of you.” She didn’t sound convinced of that, but at least her voice sounded stronger. Feistier. “But I have a tent of my own.”
She was already wriggling out of the straps of her backpack, plunking it down in the snow while he found his ice ax, which doubled as a mallet to pound in the stakes.
“You’ve got a tear in yours,” he reminded her. He’d heard the fabric shredding in the high gusts along the ravine before he’d helped her disassemble it. “Besides, this is meant for two people.”
His shelter was state-of-the-art. Everest winds wouldn’t take the thing down. Setup took less than two minutes since he was familiar with the equipment and accustomed to putting together a shelter in a hurry. He tossed his sleeping bag and insulated pad inside and then held the canvas flap door open for her.
She still clutched her own backpack uncertainly, wind whipping the ends of her hair that she hadn’t taken time to tuck into her hat. Lips pursed, she studied him and seemed to weigh her options.
That’s when the adrenaline letdown from the rescue mission kicked in, rushing through him in the form of sweet, sharp desire.
April must have been blinded by the snow-globe effect of white swirling between them, because she didn’t seem to notice. She took a deep breath and crawled inside the tent, giving him a view of lush feminine curves that didn’t do anything to put out the flames.
Swallowing back the sudden hunger for her, he ground his teeth while he watched her carefully remove her boots and leave them in the vestibule area. He tilted his face up to the snow, needing the cooling touch on his heated skin before he got anywhere near her.
No doubt about it, he was in for a long night ahead.
Copyright © 2020 by Joanne Rock
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ISBN: 9781488062698
Blame It on the Billionaire
Copyright © 2020 by Naima Simone
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Name
s, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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