by Gemma Snow
“How about Penny?” she asked Micah, who was now standing over her. God, the man was large. His dark skin caught the afternoon sun and seemed to glow golden, like the leaves still clinging to the trees, and Lily had to focus on the puppy to keep from letting her mind wander to just how close she was to the zipper of his worn jeans and…
“I could deal with Penny,” he said. “What do you think, girl?” The puppy proceeded to roll over onto her back and expose her belly, which made the great large man laugh and bend to give her a belly rub. Micah was such a series of contrasts, big and quiet and mysterious. Laughing, amused, full of love.
And wasn’t there an idea…
“Penny, it is,” Lily said, because she had to say something, anything to keep herself from looking into his dark brown eyes and leaning forward and… “Good name for a dog.” At that, Penny turned around and looked up at her, a playful expression on her face, so Lily grabbed a stick sitting near the foot of the tree and tossed it off a short distance. Penny was hot on its heels, grabbed it the second it hit the ground and she trotted back to them in triumph, her whole butt wagging with her tail.
“You are now her favorite person,” Micah said, setting on the ground and wrapping his hands around his bent knees. Every part of the man was large—his legs, his shoulders, down to his big workman boots.
“She has good taste,” Lily said with a teasing smile. She couldn’t help herself. She just felt comfortable around him, like sinking into a favorite chair around the fireplace at the end of a long day. She felt comfortable around Dec, too, but it was different, soft breezes on a warm summer afternoon, a hammock in the sun. She needed to stop comparing the two men or she’d lose her damn mind.
“I’ll say.” Micah laughed. “You’re my favorite person on the mountain, too.” Something passed across his eyes and he shook his head, that long, beautiful mane of hair, now free in the afternoon breeze, falling over his eyes at the movement. “Which, of course, is a wildly inappropriate thing to say.” His laugh was a little self-effacing, contrasting the powerful, confident man she had seen these past days, and she didn’t like it, didn’t like that he might think he was stepping out of line for something as simple as a passing thought. And one that had been rioting around in her mind for days.
“I wouldn’t say wildly inappropriate,” she said, tossing the stick for Penny again and watching the dog run down the hill to get it back. “Wildly inappropriate would be saying that you want to press me up against this tree and kiss me.”
Christ on a…something. That had been more than wildly inappropriate. And also, what the fuck? She’d kissed Dec last night and Lily had never been the kind of person to go around kissing as many strangers as she could. But, of course, neither of these men was a stranger and just because she couldn’t explain the odd and still somehow comforting connection she felt for both of them as individuals and the two of them together didn’t suddenly mean that she didn’t feel it.
“Wild Flower, indeed,” Micah said, shaking his head. “You may look cute and innocent, but damn, that is way not the full picture.”
She sat up and eyed him. “You think I’m cute?” she asked, because, damn it, she couldn’t seem to keep her mouth from running a mile a fucking minute, not with him sitting there looking so sexy in those faded jeans and his flannel and fleece jacket. Part of her wanted to skip all the conversation and just pull on the open jacket flaps until he was kissing her against a tree. But she couldn’t do that. The conversation was important. Maybe the conversation was more important than all the rest, because she needed some explanation for why she was so damn attracted to both of these men, despite not having taken a lover in years.
“Lily, you know damn well I think you’re cute.” He eyed her, a haze of desire in those deep brown eyes. “Not only cute, but tempting and enticing and dangerous. I think you’re a whole lot of woman that I wouldn’t mind getting to know better, if I’m being honest.”
Whoa. That was a lot to take in.
“Really?” Because it somehow seemed a little insane that not only had she suddenly found her carnal desire after many, many years of squashing it down, but that she had found it for two men and that both of those men returned the feelings.
“Really,” he said. He seemed to be taking extra care not to move any closer to her and she wasn’t sure exactly why. Well, there was the whole these feelings are complicated and oh yeah, I have a crush on your best friend, too. Crush, like she was seventeen again and making moon eyes at the TA with the gorgeous smile. Which, of course, was exactly what she had done.
“I’m not…good at this part,” he said after a moment. He picked up the stick she had been throwing to Penny and tossed it a short distance. The puppy chased after it, tripping over her own oversized paws and rolling over, floppy ears falling into her face. She found another stick and set about chewing it to shreds in the afternoon sunlight. Clouds were forming in the distance and the stark contrast between golden sunlight and ominous shadow caught her eye.
“Which part is that?” she asked, looking at him. His jaw slanted hard and ran straight and thick and, in a moment of insanity, Lily reached out and ran her finger down the line of it, feeling the stubble of a growing beard against her hand. Her skin, so pale and light, cut a contrast to the dark shade of his that wasn’t ominous, not like the sky, but was fascinating. Enticing. Tempting.
He caught her hand in his and threaded their fingers together, his much larger one wrapping around her equally work-roughened fingers.
“The part where I tell you that I like you,” he said. “That I want you. I do, Lily. Jesus Christ, do I want you.”
She couldn’t help it, her gaze darted to the front of his jeans, where, sure enough, they strained against his prominent arousal below. But he caught her staring and raised an eyebrow, some of the humor and amusement returning to his eyes.
“Yup, nothing but trouble,” he murmured under his breath.
“I want you, too,” she said, before he could stand up, before he could walk away and pretend he hadn’t just dropped this giant bomb on her. But it was true, as she thought about the press of his muscled body against her back, as she thought about the feeling of his fingers on her cheek and the way that his smile lit something powerful and potent within her.
He still had his head turned away from her, so she whispered his name softly, “Micah.” He turned, just a little, and she continued, “Why don’t you think you’re good at this part?” Because he was doing it all right, slowly seducing her whether he meant to or not, keeping her right at the edge of her seat on this crazy ride she’d been on for almost a week but had only just realized it.
“You don’t really want me to go there,” he said. God, this man was intense and wild and full of information below the surface.
“I really do,” she said. “I want to know more about you, too, and you have to know I’m not just saying that.”
His sigh was deep and rumbling, like the sound of thunder far off in the distance. A storm was definitely on the way.
“Abridged version, all right?” She nodded and he continued, “My family comes from the Blackfeet Nation. We’re Siksika, Blackfoot, one of the oldest nations in the country.” He sighed. “I loved my life there. I have two sisters, ya know, both older. Growing up, I couldn’t imagine how anyone would ever leave. It was paradise to me as a child, lush and wild and full of the people I loved.
“When I was six years old, I got caught up in the river’s current and dragged ten miles out of the reservation. I was terrified, Lily, convinced I was going to die, ashamed that I wasn’t able to protect myself against the will of nature, even though I knew so much from my family. Anyway, an S&R team rescued me three days after I’d first left home. I had climbed to a cave and gotten stuck there after a storm. I almost starved to death and was too dehydrated to speak.” He paused, eyebrows raised to the sky. “I knew that very night that I wanted to join their ranks, to use the skills my family had given me—skills I clearl
y had to hone—to help people and rescue lost kids.
“I didn’t leave for the reason a lot of people leave,” he continued, “poverty, the unemployment, lack of secondary education options. I left because I wanted to join an S&R team and I couldn’t do that if I didn’t.”
“What about your family?”
He didn’t respond, not in words, anyway. Instead, his face contorted into a fine line of grimace and sadness and he looked down the length of his legs at his boots. It was answer enough, to her question now and the one from before—why don’t you think you’re good at this part? Because he’d left his family to follow his dreams, left his heritage behind, left his whole life to do what he’d thought was right, and now, a decade later, he was still punishing himself for the choice.
“Anyway, I met Dec running S&R on a job in Helena, a little after he got stateside again,” he said. “And he knew a thing or two about leaving and we became fast friends. When he first came up with the idea of forming the survival camp in the town where he’d grown up, well, I was along for the ride.”
“But you never went back?”
His voice was filled with a sadness that Lily felt deep down to her bones. “I’ve been back, but that’s not what you’re asking,” he said, his voice tinged with guilt. “I never intended to stay away this long. I always meant to go home. But then I realized that search and rescue, saving people and finding lost hikers and kids, maybe, just maybe, rescuing someone, that mattered to me. Teaching people how to protect themselves and others, it mattered to me. I couldn’t live without helping people, and the deeper I got into it, with the dogs and the tracking and the business, all of it, the more it became part of me. So, no, I didn’t go back, not permanently.”
“Did they forgive you?” she asked him, even though she definitely knew, even though that pain in his voice resonated and gave her all the answers she didn’t want.
“They didn’t understand, not really. People talked about leaving the reservation a lot, but not many ever did. It’s like stepping into a portal to another world and, when I left, I realized just how much harder going back would be. I got to see both my sisters get married, not long after I left, but I knew my mother kept wondering why I’d never be back for good, because at that point it was pretty clear that I had picked a direction and stuck to it, a direction they saw as rejecting everything about their culture and heritage.”
He shook his head. “It wasn’t, but I knew that I’d grown too far away from them to ever go back to life there, and they knew it, too. It was too late.”
“You don’t think you deserve love, do you, Micah? You don’t think you deserve a family or people who care about you?”
He laughed, the sound hollow and sad. “I should have just kissed you when I had the chance.” Despite the low sound of his voice, the words did something funny to her stomach and she placed her arm on his shoulder, leaning forward to do so.
“We don’t have to talk about this,” she said. “Not now, not if you don’t want to.” God, he was strong, corded muscles making his shoulders broad and powerful, and she had to resist the urge to squeeze them, like she really wanted to do.
“I think it’s enough sharing for today,” he said, a spark of humor lighting his eyes. “At least, enough sharing with words.” Then, in a flash, he had scooped her into his arms and brought her back down into his lap. She seemed to end up in his lap a lot, not that she had any complaints about that.
“Micah,” she squeaked and looked up to meet his eyes. “I don’t think I’m the dangerous one here at all.” She said that, because, God, he was strong and big and built and so incredibly handsome that her heart almost hurt, or it would have, if she’d been able to concentrate on anything other than the lust pulsing behind those dark, enticing eyes.
“Tell me not to,” he said, “and I’ll walk away and pretend that I don’t want you, that I don’t get hard the minute you walk into a room, that I don’t find the dirt on your cheek sexy as hell. Tell me no, Lily.”
But, God, she didn’t want to tell him no. She wanted to tell him yes, yes, yes… So, she leaned her head up, tilted back ever so slightly, and parted her lips in invitation.
He took it, descending on her mouth with all the power and ferocity that had been sparking between them for days and it lit her from the inside out, making her moan deep into his mouth, making her want and ache, for more, for something, anything to help temper the insane desire burning within her. She moaned again and his cock pulsed hard against her leg. God, he felt big, almost too big, though, of course, Micah was a large man, and Lily’s mind darted to the feeling of him inside her, of the depths of her ache for him.
He palmed her breast and she was just about to push him back onto the ground and set about getting rid of the rest of their clothing when his phone buzzed from deep inside his pocket.
“Fuck.” He managed to pull back from her and dug into his pocket, one arm still wrapped around her waist and holding her close to his erection. “Ellison.” His face contorted as he took the call and resignation and regret passed across his handsome features. “We’ll be there. I just have to grab Dec from the house, so fifteen minutes at the high end. Yeah, I’ll bring Rosie and Axel. Okay.” He hung up and sighed heavily.
“You have to go?”
Micah nodded. “God, you have no idea how much I wish I didn’t.” He smiled and helped them both to their feet, whistling for Penny who had been chewing her prized stick a little way away. She came bounding up the hill. “Don’t forget that thought, okay?” he said. “We’ll probably be back late, so just be safe. Cade called us in on a missing hiker, but he’s worried about the storms and I think he might be right. If you lose power, start a fire and pull the candles out of the left drawer in the kitchen.”
He was babbling. The powerful, confident, kiss-like-hell Micah Ellison was babbling. So she reached up and pulled the back of his head close until she was just an inch away from his delicious lips.
“Be safe,” she whispered. “Both of you, come back safe.” She brushed his lips ever so softly then turned, away from him, away from the temptation of kissing him again. When she glanced back over her shoulder, he was headed for the cabin, Penny at his heels.
Chapter Seven
Lily’s phone rang and she pulled it out of her pocket and glanced down at the screen.
“Mads?”
“Which research site are you at right now?” her sister asked, in lieu of a greeting. Lily laughed and looked around.
“I’m at Site C,” she said. “I’m assuming you’re going to ask me to come down and visit you.”
“Considering you’re supposed to be visiting me in the first place,” Maddy replied, her voice filled with amusement, “and not doing God knows what in that cabin with two of the hottest guys in Wolf Creek, then yes, I would like you to come visit me. Ryder says he just saw the guys out in their ATVs headed out to meet up with Cade for a potential search, but I can come up to you, if you’re around?”
“So many things in that loaded statement,” Lily said. “But fine, I’ll be back at the cabin in a few.” She packed up her research kit and headed to the house, taking her time. The Black Reef Mountain range was gorgeous in October—she had to assume it was gorgeous all year around—but the mountains were almost undulating in their autumn colors, with golds and reds reflecting the sparkling afternoon sun, sun that was fading in and out behind the clouds, as if the sky couldn’t quite figure out whether or not it was going to storm.
Even if it did, it would be beautiful. This place, all this nature and fresh air and shimmering, clear water, it put her at ease, even more than Mia’s reassuring words that the shop was doing just fine, almost more than just being back in her dear sister’s presence, even if she hadn’t seen Maddy in days. Not that she was doing God knew what with two of Wolf Creek’s hottest men.
Except… Christ on a cream puff, she totally freaking was. How had she not even thought about this, the fact that, in the span of less than eight
hours, she’d kissed both Dec and Micah, and liked it both times? The men kissed differently, which wasn’t any surprise. The more she got to know them, the more she realized just how different they were, how neither of them was quite the man she saw on the surface, how they called to her, attracted her for different reasons.
Red fucking alert, Lils—you have to pick one.
She did. Have to pick one, that was. And yet, how could she, when both these tempting, striking heroes who ran off to save people who needed saving felt so right, their hands on her body, their lips on hers?
So this was what trouble felt like, then? Well, she’d certainly jumped back into the deep end of desiring a man with both feet. And with that thought, a healthy dose of guilt swamped her, making her suddenly cold in a way that had nothing to do with the gusts of wind blowing against the mountains. Every time she was able to go without thinking about Daniel, every time she found herself wanting Dec or Micah, the only two men she had actually wanted in years, wanted for real, instead of some perfunctory understanding of a famous actor’s hotness level, she remembered why she was here, why it had taken so long to get here. And she still couldn’t figure out which way was up when it came to feeling desire again. If it was so good for her to move away from Daniel’s loss, then why on earth did she feel so damned guilty about it?
And, of course, none of that answered the pressing question of how she was going to pick one of the two, since her body ached for and demanded both of their touches and images of what she had seen Madison doing when she’d first arrived here, images of them all tangled up together, kept flitting across her mind.
“Okay, why do you look like you swallowed a lemon?” Maddy was already in the kitchen when Lily dropped her caked boots off on the mud mat and put her research kit on the counter. “I brought beer, if that helps any, some new apple-cinnamon blend from that family brewery that just opened up.”