by Unknown
Jericho put a hand to the nape of his neck, eyed the artifacts she’d already uncovered. “We’ve already got a dig under way.”
“And we’ve unearthed absolutely nothing.”
“So far. It’s only been four days.”
“But what if we don’t find anything at all on Triangle Mount?”
“The point of the field school is to teach students the proper way to conduct a dig, and all the August McCleary Foundation wants is for us to debunk the pyramid myth. It’s good enough for those purposes.”
“Aren’t you the least bit curious about who these people were and what happened to them?” she wheedled.
“Of course I am. Archaeologists live for surprises like this.”
“Well then?”
He was shaking his head, but when his eyes met hers, she knew she’d gotten her foot in the crack of the door. “I guess there wouldn’t be any harm in doing some legwork. If we can find something that indicates a settlement, we can go into a meeting with Winz-Smith armed with research.
“Woo-hoo!” Zoey hollered, swept off her cowgirl hat, tossed it in the air, and jumped into his arms.
JERICHO CAUGHT HER. What else could he do when she’d hurled herself at him like a cannonball? Let her fall?
Her legs enfolded around his waist, his arms wrapped around her. She stared into his eyes. He stared right back. Her scent tangled up in his nose, lit a fire deep inside him. She was impossible to ignore and already he was getting hard.
Get out while you still can!
Their timing had always been off. For the longest time, she’d simply been too young for him, then when she’d come of age, he was moving to Utah. It seemed that whenever one of them was unattached, the other was in a relationship.
Hey, you’re both finally unattached at the same time and the age difference is moot at this point.
But if the risk of mucking up their friendship wasn’t enough to stop him, something else hung over his head. He was now officially her instructor and this was his dream job, the position he’d spent his life working toward.
More bad timing.
Plus he’d already made the mistake of getting mixed up with one of his students, and look how that had turned out. His affair with Mallory had come close to imploding both of their careers. He wasn’t about to make that mistake again.
He untangled her arms from around his neck, set her on the ground, and clenched his jaw to fight off the raging attraction.
“One thing for sure, we can’t keep doing this,” he said.
“Doing what?” she asked so innocently that he realized she had absolutely no idea how much she affected him.
“Being alone together. Spontaneous jumping into each other’s arms.”
Zoey hooted. “You’ve never once jumped into my arms.”
“For obvious reasons. I’d crush you.”
A mischievous smile lit her lips. “I used to jump into your arms all the time, remember? It was never a problem.”
Jericho ducked his head. “Yeah, um … that was before.”
“Before what?”
Before one look from you sent me into testosterone overload. “Things changed.”
“Oh,” she said, her expression half jovial, half sad. “Maybe if we just give it some time they’ll change back the way they were.”
But I don’t want things to change back the way they were.
He liked feeling this way about his best friend, except it scared him too, on so many levels. Zoey’s mind was mercurial and it changed as quickly as wind direction. Did he really want to risk getting caught in an updraft? Sometimes being cautious was annoying. While it served him well as a scientist, it also held him back, keeping him from enjoying the moment because he was too busy worrying about tomorrow. But in this case, extreme caution was a virtue.
“C’mon,” he said. “Let’s get out of here.”
She bent to pick up the artifacts she’d unearthed. Her total lack of protocol set his teeth on edge. She’s new at this. Cut her some slack. “What are you doing?”
“Taking them with us.”
“We can’t take them with us.”
“So we’re just going to leave them here?”
Since they weren’t allowed to excavate here, they should just leave the artifacts, but neither could Jericho bear the thought of leaving them lying exposed on the ground, out in the elements. He supposed they could bury them where she’d found them, but that didn’t sit well with his sense of order either.
“Why can’t we take them with us?”
“That’s looting.”
“Not if we bring them back. We could take them, clean them up, and examine them—”
“No. We have to put them back where you found them.”
“Aw, man.”
“You caused it.”
“And you’re not cutting me one inch of slack.” She stuffed her hands into her pockets.
“Sometimes, Zoey, you simply have to follow the rules.”
“You’re right,” she said. “I’ll put it back.”
He helped her return the artifacts into the ground, but he didn’t admit to her how much it killed him to do so. “We’ll do some research,” he reassured her. “I promise you that, and then we can approach Winz-Smith about extending the dig to include these mounds.”
“When can we do that?”
“We’ve got our official site to work on right now, this will have to wait.”
“But we haven’t found anything over there and right here is this juicy mound of artifacts.”
He had to give her that. “Okay, tomorrow morning you and I will drive into Cupid and do a little research. If we find nothing, it’s over. Got it?”
“Got it.”
“You’ll let it lie?”
“I will.”
“Not a peep to our crew.”
“Lips zipped.”
“I hope I don’t live to regret this,” he mumbled as he followed her bouncy butt back to Triangle Mount.
Chapter 8
Evolution: The gradual process by which living organisms develop over time.
“GET out.”
That night, Zoey blinked awake in the darkened tent she shared with Catrina. “Huh?”
“Get out.” Catrina prodded her in the ribs with her bare foot.
She propped herself up on her elbows on the thin narrow cot, mussed hair falling into her eyes, and peered past Catrina to the man standing behind her. Avery Slocum.
Avery held up a hand. “Hey, Zoey.”
“What is this?”
“Avery and I need some privacy.”
“And I need a good night’s sleep. We have to get up at first light.”
“This is urgent,” Catrina insisted.
“Use Avery’s tent.”
“You know he’s rooming with Dr. Chance.”
“Seriously? Can’t you two wait until the dig is over?”
“No. Dig sex is the appeal. We don’t want to have a relationship, just a hot hookup. Now get out.”
Zoey rolled over onto her side, punched her pillow. “Go find somewhere else to have your bonkathon.”
“We’re doing you the courtesy of throwing you out,” Catrina said, “but if you’d really rather stay for the show, okay by—”
Zoey threw back the covers and hopped to her feet, shuffled around for her slippers. “I’m going. I’m gone. I’m out of here.”
Avery chortled.
The next thing she knew she was standing outside the tent with her pillow in one hand, a light blanket in the other, looking up at a rash of stars. Great. Now what? She supposed she could go climb in Jericho’s pickup parked at the bottom of Triangle Mount, but that meant walking through the brambles and rocks in the dark. Not to mention running into snakes and night creatures while dressed in her pajamas and house shoes.
Of course, since Avery was in her tent, that meant Jericho had a vacancy in his. Could she just tiptoe in there and see if she could slide onto Avery’s cot without
waking Jericho?
The night air was nippy and smelled of charcoal from the barbecue where the group had grilled meats and vegetables for dinner. She wrapped the blanket around her, and cast a sidelong glance at Jericho’s tent. What if she tried it and he woke up while she was in the process and assumed she’d come to see him? She blew out her breath. Couldn’t have that. Maybe she could just wait the couple out. How long could it take?
From inside the tent behind her came noises of heavy-duty lovemaking. From the sound of things, apparently it could take a long time. Whatever. She didn’t want to stay here and listen to this. She scurried over to Jericho’s tent, paused outside the closed flap.
“Jericho,” she whispered.
Somewhere in the distance a coyote howled.
She lifted the flap, whispered louder, “Jericho.”
“Zoey?” His deep voice wrapped around her in the chilly night air, warming her instantly.
She slipped into his tent. He sat up on his cot, his head brushing the top of the tent. He was a tall man, forcefully lean, and in the green glow from the digital clock on the small camp table, she could see that his chest was bare. Did he sleep in the nude? Or did he have on BVDs beneath the blanket covering his waist? The scandalous question teased her.
Shadows honed his high cheekbones to sharp ridges as prominent and compelling as Triangle Mount. Darkness hooded his eyes, giving him the appearance of a stranger. How was it she could know him so well, and yet in this moment, still feel as if they’d just met? She had an overwhelming urge to move toward him, put her finger to his lips, and trace them. She battled every womanly urge inside her not to do just that.
Acting glibber than she felt, Zoey plunked down on the edge of the empty cot across from him.
His eyes darkened with an emotion she couldn’t read. “What is it?”
“Catrina and Avery are hooking up in my tent and since I have no desire to either be part of a threesome or a voyeur, here I am.” She held her arms out wide and then realized belatededly she was not wearing a bra and her nipples were beaded up tight. She grabbed her pillow, clutched it to her chest.
“Zoey,” he said hoarsely. “You have to go.”
“I won’t be any trouble. I don’t snore. At least I don’t think I do. No one ever told me I snore. Catrina, on the other hand, could wake the dead with her snoring,” she rattled. When she got nervous she had a tendency to babble. “We’re talking coffins flying open emptying out vampires, zombies walking the earth, whole ball of wax.”
“You can’t stay in here.” His tone gentled. “People will talk.”
“I know. So, um … then could you just go tell Avery to return to his tent so I can have mine back?”
“They are adults. I can’t tell them how to run their sex lives.”
“And yet, you can’t have sex with whomever you want.”
“That’s different. I’m the instructor and I’m on probation.”
They stared at each other.
She’d forgotten how handsome he was. Or maybe she’d never fully appreciated his good looks before. He was her buddy, after all, you didn’t think about your buddy in those terms, right? But she was noticing and thinking and appreciating right now.
He curled his hands into fists and swallowed so hard that his Adam’s apple bobbed. “You’ve got to go.”
“But where?”
“You’re right.” He shook his head. “That’s thoughtless of me. I have to go. You can stay here and I’ll clear out.” He swung his legs over the side of his cot and stood up to reach for his pants. He wasn’t going commando, wore traditional tidy whites, but even in the darkness there was no missing his arousal.
Jericho had a serious boner.
Over her?
She did some gulping of her own and dropped her gaze as Jericho pulled up his jeans. Now, she was staring at his long bare toes. Damn! Even the man’s toes were sexy. She fell back on the cot, covered her head with the pillow. She heard the slither of a zipper, the cling of a belt buckle, felt her face heat. No one would ever accuse her of being shy, but she couldn’t help wondering if this was how a virgin felt on her wedding night—scared, excited, nervous, anticipatory, sick to her stomach.
“Zoey?”
“Uh-huh?” It came out muffled against the goose-down pillow.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine,” she lied. She could feel him standing over her and her pulse skipped like a jump rope. An old playground rhyme went through her head. Cinderella, dressed in yellow, went upstairs to kiss her fellow. Did kids even jump rope these days?
“Try to get some rest.”
She flung off the pillow, looked up at him. “Where will you go?”
“To sleep in the back of my pickup.”
“I feel guilty throwing you out of your own tent.”
“It’s not your fault. I’ll have a talk with Avery in the morning and tell him that he and Catrina need to find another spot for their midnight rendezvous.”
“Thanks,” she said. Why was it so hard to catch her breath?
He stood looking at her, and not moving.
“I really don’t see why you have to go,” she said. “Everyone already knows we’re best friends. That’s no secret. And it’s also no secret that Avery has been bird-dogging Catrina. We’ll just explain what happened.”
He shook his head. “Considering my situation, that’s playing with fire.”
“Really, I’m sure I could convince everyone—”
“That’s not the real problem,” he interrupted.
“What is?” The words slipped thinly across her lips.
He lowered his eyes, swept his gaze over her. “You know.”
“I do?”
“You. Me. Alone. Midnight. Not a safe combination.”
“How …” She was finally able to haul in a deep breath. “Why …”
“Did this happen?” he finished for her.
She stared up at him, nodded mutely.
“I have no idea. It came out of nowhere.”
She was at a distinct disadvantage, on her back, on the cot, Jericho looming above her.
“I’m gonna go,” he said.
“Good idea,” she croaked.
It wasn’t fair of her to throw him out of his own tent, but she didn’t know what else to do. A minnow of sadness swam in her stomach, small but troublesome. Once upon a time, she’d felt so comfortable around him. Now, since that kiss, everything was awkward and fraught with hidden meaning. Was she losing her best friend all because of a little sexual attraction?
A little?
His eyes gleamed wolfishly. She’d never seen Jericho like this. It both turned her on and scared her.
“I feel like—” He chuffed out air, stabbed his hand through his hair.
“What?” she prompted softly, remembering a time when he held nothing back, told her everything, and she did the same with him. But now? Things were different.
He shook his head, stepped back. “Never mind.”
She sat up, and regained a bit of equilibrium. “Go ahead. You can say it.”
He pulled a palm down his face. “It’s just that …”
“What?”
“Now don’t get your feelings hurt.”
“Who me? The water-off-a-duck’s-back girl? C’mon, you know I can handle it.”
He sighed, sank down on his cot directly across from her. “Zoey, whenever I’m around you, I feel like I’m losing my mind.”
She made him crazy. Was that good or bad?
“I was looking so forward to coming home and seeing you again and now this—thing has ruined what we had.” He scowled.
Okay, bad news. The way he said “thing” made it sound like being attracted to her was the worst thing on earth. The minnow mushroomed into a shark and she put a palm to her queasy stomach.
Jericho reached for his shirt, slipped it on and started buttoning it over his Herculean chest. Her heart hammered headily.
“Every time I look at
you I remember that damn kiss. I can’t stop thinking about what it would be like to—” He shook his head more forcefully this time. “Never mind.”
The belly shark spawned babies, multiplied, a whole school of predators eating her up from the inside. “What?” she whispered.
His eyes met hers, dark and dangerous. What had happened to the slightly nerdy boy-next-door she’d known for twenty years? “Do I really have to spell it out for you, Zoey?”
She raised a shaky hand to her throat. “Can we … er … can you make this feeling go away?”
“What do you think I’ve been trying to do for the past few weeks? I’ve been keeping my distance as much as I can. I knew being together at the dig was going to be tough, I just didn’t understand exactly how difficult it was going to be.”
“If that’s the case then why did you kiss me?”
“I kissed you before I got the job, remember.”
“Even so, if you’re feeling this tortured about it …”
“I don’t know.” He fished his work boots from underneath the cot and shoved his feet into them. “That’s the crazy part. You’ve got this pull on me that I can’t seem to break no matter how much I want to.”
He didn’t want to be attracted to her? Her nose felt stuffy. She wrinkled it. “Sounds like an addiction.”
“I’ve never been addicted to anything so I can’t speak about that, but if this is how addicts feel, heaven help the poor bastards.”
Wow. Exactly how many woman-eating sharks could a girl hold in her stomach until they killed her? He could have kicked her in the head and it would have hurt less, but she wasn’t about to let him know exactly how much his words stung. Don that alligator skin, pronto.
“I don’t mean to be blunt, just laying it on the table.” He looked as mournful as she felt.
“Do you want me to quit the dig?” she murmured, crossing her fingers and gritting her teeth, aching for him to say yes, even if it meant losing her trust fund. Quitter. All right, truth? She honestly wanted him to say no, but could a girl’s arms actually hurt from keeping someone at arm’s length, because her biceps were already trembling.