Burn on the Western Slope (Crimson Romance)

by Smith, Angela

  Steeling her mind against the onslaught of delusion, she snapped one more photo as he posed with the sled. “You enjoy photography?” she asked.

  “Yes, it’s a hobby of mine.”

  He tore his cockeyed beanie from his head, mussing his hair. Combing it with his fingers, he only tousled it more. She clicked another picture, wondering if she ran her fingers through his hair if it’d be as soft as it appeared.

  “Did you take those pictures on my mantel?” she asked.

  “Some of them.”

  “Some?”

  “Your uncle took a lot, too.”

  Reagan paused, wondering how to respond. She wanted to learn about her uncle, but she didn’t want to spoil their mood. She didn’t know how well Garret knew Ray, if he was still grieving over his neighbor’s death, or how to speak of his loss when she knew nothing about his life.

  “So you know my uncle?” she asked softly.

  “Yeah, I knew him.” He stood and dusted snow from his pants. Holding out his hand, he grabbed hers and pulled her up, then dropped her hand.

  But he didn’t move away. They were close — so close — close enough for her to see the rise and fall of his chest behind his heavy layers. His jaw twitched as he glanced at her lips, his eyes darkening when his gaze latched to hers. His back was practically against the tree, but she didn’t step away. He could have moved to the side away from her, but he remained where he was.

  Neither moved to break the space between them.

  • • •

  She wasn’t at all what he expected. Okay, he’d thought it before, but he couldn’t get her out of his mind, even when she wasn’t standing right in front of him.

  She was cute, flirty, not afraid to speak her mind but surprisingly shy and vulnerable, like she wasn’t as self-confident as she should be, as she had every right to be. She wasn’t manipulative, or at least that personality hadn’t materialized yet. He had a lot to learn and it was too early to judge, but he liked her.

  Problem was, his job didn’t include appraising her character. His job was to investigate her knowledge of a very dangerous man. And Garret knew that even the most innocent and infallible women could know a lot about danger.

  And dangerous men.

  “It’s time to eat.” Garret stepped away, tamping down on his lust before it got out of hand. “You hungry?”

  Her eyes narrowed and she stepped away. “Starving.”

  He took her hand and escorted her to Tanyon Creek, hoping she appreciated the beauty of the outdoors. The sun glistened across diamond-tipped water. Ribbons of ice punctuated the creek, making their steps crunch as they walked along the bed. Once they reached his favorite spot where a stream gushed through clusters of ice and rock, he dropped his backpack and spread a blanket on the ground. Reagan laughed as a bird nosed down and skated across icy patches of land only to swoop up, spin around, and do it again.

  Garret removed a thermos of hot chocolate from his backpack and poured some into a thermal cup. She smiled her thanks when he handed her one.

  “You’re a planner, aren’t you?”

  “You always have to plan here.” He unwrapped two sandwiches and handed her one. He tore open a bag of chips and set the bag between them to share. “In the summer, you have to plan for bears.”

  “Bears?”

  “You have to be cautious on outings like this, just in case. They’re usually not dangerous, but you don’t want to sneak up on one.”

  “You mentioned you were here visiting. So you don’t live here?”

  “I grew up here.”

  “This is beautiful,” Reagan said as she munched on a chip. “I recognize the site in one of the pictures back at the condo.”

  “Yes, four eight-by-tens hang in the hallway of your condo, depicting each season of this exact area.”

  “Did you take those?”

  “Your uncle and I both did. We hiked every chance we could and never left without our cameras.”

  “So you knew Ray well?”

  He stared into her eyes, unsure what to say. Better to just say nothing. Nothing about how he knew Ray enough to know that he loved her as a daughter. She’d been five the last time he saw her, but she probably wouldn’t remember.

  After listening to Ray cry in his beer many nights over the family he lost, he knew a lot but then again not much. For no reason, or at least reasons Ray never admitted, Reagan’s mother didn’t want to have anything to do with him. Her father wouldn’t allow him within ten feet of his daughter, but he didn’t want to tell her that.

  “I knew him a long time.” Garret reached for a chip.

  “What was he like?”

  “A lot like Chayton.” Garret paused. She knew Chayton as well as she knew Ray. “Rugged, like these mountains. They both harbored restless energy. He and Chayton were kindred spirits. I swear they were more like brothers than Chayton and me. They were practically attached at the hip, but there was a part of Ray he kept private.”

  Ray and Chayton reminded him of the panorama he viewed now. With ice in their veins but beauty in their hearts within a moving river that wasn’t quite frozen. Afraid to open up and share the deepest part of themselves, but willing to die for those in need.

  Hiding, always hiding from their wounds.

  He wasn’t any different.

  Chapter Five

  The next evening, Reagan and Naomi went to Air Dog for a Super Bowl party. They’d spent the day exploring the town and meeting more people. So far, everyone she met had known and loved Ray. She still had no idea why her mother didn’t.

  After sledding yesterday, Garret took her to Air Dog for another hot buttered rum drink, where she’d hooked up with Naomi. Chayton had invited them to this party, and she and Garret parted ways. He hadn’t walked her home, hadn’t given her a kiss on the cheek. Hadn’t asked to see her again. Nothing. It was like their outing was just that, an outing. Not a date.

  He’d never said it was a date.

  He acted cavalier about the whole thing. Treating her as he would any female friend he knew forever. It shouldn’t have bothered her. She didn’t need to get involved with anyone. Being friends was the best idea. She barely knew him.

  But it did bother her. Every time she stepped into Ray’s condo, she grew restless. Lonely. This quiet little town made her wish for things. Things like curling up on the rug beside the fire with a mug of hot cocoa and a man.

  A man like Garret.

  Air Dog was decorated to the hilt for the Super Bowl. Lighted footballs hung from the ceiling. Streamers ran across the tops of the wall on all sides. The flat screen TVs behind the bar aired the game. Bowls of popcorn and nuts enticed snackers from every table and a table full of appetizers perched against a back wall. Several people entered, carrying more trays and bowls of food.

  “Ladies.” Chayton sidled up to them on the other side of the bar and winked at Naomi as they plopped themselves on bar stools. He reached above him for two glasses. “Our special today is Super Bowl Sundown. Something I made up myself. You want to give it a try?”

  “I’m game,” Reagan said as she shrugged out of her jacket and gloves. “Were we supposed to bring something?”

  “Just yourself.”

  “What about those people?” she asked, pointing to a couple who carried several plates of food.

  “Some of the regulars pitched in to help feed the crowd. It’s an annual party and usually gets pretty crazy.”

  She looked around but didn’t voice the question if Garret would be here.

  “I’ll take your jackets.” Chayton deposited their drinks on the counter and stretched out his hands. “I don’t let just anyone keep their jackets back here, but I did it for Ray and I’ll do it for his niece and her friend.”

  “Thanks,” Reagan said. “Actually, Naomi is my cousin. On my dad’s side,” she added after noticing the quizzical arch of his brow.

  “Oh.” Chayton stowed their coats, gloves, and hats behind the bar and tended to the ne
xt customer. It was getting busy and impossible for him to hold a conversation at the moment, so Reagan and Naomi picked up their drinks and roamed.

  The appetizer table held all kinds of treats. Cookies, cakes, and breads shaped into footballs. Sauces and dips. Reagan fixed a plate, returned to the bar, and asked for another cocktail. Chayton was busy with other customers so a woman bartender helped her. She sat at the crowded bar eating the snacks, mulling, thinking, and pouting. Naomi, the social butterfly, continued to schmooze.

  Her heart flipped when she saw Garret threading his way through the crowd. God, he was sexy. An unbuttoned white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up hung open over a tight gray tee, revealing ropy forearms and an athletic chest. As he walked, men thumped him on the back or high-fived him. Women hugged him. He stopped to say hello to several people, shaking hands. Smiling, nodding. Heat curled through her belly, to her toes.

  “Good to have you back, man,” someone said.

  “Garret, good to see you,” a woman said, who gave him a hug. Reagan wondered where he’d been and how long he’d been gone. None of her business.

  He was already smiling before he caught Reagan’s gaze, but once he saw her, that magnificent smile became more magnificent, radiating pleasure. Like maybe he was happy to see her. At least that’s what she’d like to believe. As he strolled across the floor, he continued to watch her and her heart continued to pound, making her thighs shake, her throat ache, and her head spin.

  She returned his smile, gritting her teeth, fearing if she let her lips relax, she’d blurt out everything she felt. As he stopped at the bar beside her, she glanced at the TV for something to watch besides him.

  His thick golden hair wore the messy bedhead look, and stubble drew faint lines on his face. That alone was an aphrodisiac without the earth-shaking cologne.

  “Glad you came.” He nodded at Chayton for a drink. “Heineken tonight,” he said before landing his gaze on Reagan. “I worried you wouldn’t.”

  “Oh?” she asked. He was glad she came? Worried she wouldn’t? Did that mean he wanted to see her?

  Propping his hand on the bar, he leaned into her. “It gets pretty rowdy here.”

  She simpered as she turned to him, bringing the straw to her lips. “You don’t think I can handle it?”

  “Oh, I know you can handle it.”

  Chills sprouted on her arms as his baritone voice burned through her. She shifted on the stool, but the heat only intensified, spreading to her toes. His eyes — were they blue or green? She noticed they changed from deep green to turquoise, to the coastline after a storm or akin to the sandblasted jeans he wore.

  “You bet on the game?” he asked. Reagan couldn’t even name the teams playing, much less who had the better chance of winning.

  “No,” she replied, finding it hard to focus with his head so close to hers.

  “Good. Because it’s already a given that I’ll win.”

  “You’re that sure of yourself?”

  “No. I’m that sure of the team I’m betting on. You want to play a game of pool?”

  “Pool?” That wasn’t a game she played well. Actually, she wasn’t good at many games, except maybe Monopoly, but only because most people got bored before she did. “That won’t prove how good you are. Even my grandma can beat me.”

  His shoulders shook when he laughed. He closed his eyes as he tilted his beer to his mouth. Her eyes trailed the length of his Adam’s apple, to his jawbone, and to his hand that held the beer. His hands were rough in the way a man’s hands should be rough but smooth in a delectably masculine way. She vaguely noticed him bring the bottle down and quickly averted her gaze to his.

  “We better grab a table before they’re gone,” he said.

  “No, really. I’m not very good.”

  Garret grasped her elbow. “That’s okay. Neither am I.”

  “Don’t you want to watch the game?” She didn’t want to watch the game, but she preferred to keep her butt planted right here on this stool.

  “Nah. I’m recording it at home and it’s usually too loud to hear anything. I’ll watch it later. Besides, there’s a TV near the tables.”

  Reagan drained her drink and asked for another before following Garret. The cocktail helped her to relax. “Why do people come here to watch the game if they don’t watch it?”

  “For the party.”

  They pushed through the crowd to the tables. Garret parked his bottle of Heineken beside him and racked the balls on the table.

  She gulped her drink as she admired his shoulders contract and expand under the shirt he wore. Downing the cocktail like that was a stupid thing to do and put stupid thoughts in her head, but it helped to quell the loneliness she knew would greet her as soon as she opened her condo door.

  Her breath caught in her throat when he looked at her. This time his eyes were bottle green, matching the Heineken that rested next to him on the edge of the table. His golden hair, messy but relaxed in a sexy jaunt across his forehead, coasted the length of his neck, curling at the top of his shirt collar. Desire coiled in her stomach.

  She turned and fiddled with the cue sticks, pulling out a few as if sizing them up to choose the perfect one. He stopped beside her and took one as if he knew exactly the one he wanted.

  She knew exactly what she wanted. Him.

  “You need help?”

  “No,” she said, grabbing a cue stick and almost dropping it.

  He patted his hands with talc. She followed suit.

  “You wanna break?”

  “No way,” she said, turning to him.

  He had a beautiful smile. His eyes crinkled, the smoothness across his cheeks dimpled. He was tall enough that the top of her head barely came to his chin. He carried grace and poise without being arrogant and seemed streetwise but was all country. That lent to his appeal.

  “I’ll make it easier on you,” he said. “We won’t call the shots.” He blasted in a solid ball on the break and two more before her turn.

  Taking a deep breath, she leveled the cue stick on the table and eyed a ball that looked like an easy enough target. Her hands shook. Her body jittered. She prayed Garret didn’t notice. She’d never felt so juvenile but loved the screaming adrenaline.

  She managed to pocket the nine. “Whoop!” Straightening, she threw her fist up.

  “You’re fooling me,” Garret said. “You said you couldn’t play.”

  “Lucky shot.” She skated across the floor, eyeing the table for her next move. Her dad taught her to play years ago, but skill had nothing to do with her game.

  She missed the next and Garret took his turn. He pocketed another and grinned at her, taking another swig of Heineken before taking his next shot.

  Reagan fought the urge to touch him, to see if his biceps felt as tight as they looked. Instead, she leaned in a wee bit closer and used flirting to her full advantage. “You’re really good at this,” she whispered against his ear, the flirty bite of sexual chemistry erupting in her loins. Her face felt splotchy, her body shaking with a fervor that left her vulnerable to insecurities she wouldn’t reveal.

  He straightened. The look he gave her sent a burning trail of fire through her limbs. She moved away, stopping on the other side of the table, across from him. Leaning her elbows against the table, she rested her chin in her hands.

  He struck the ball, and it skipped across the table to the floor.

  A man fetched the ball and handed it to Garret. “Where are your panties, boy?” he asked as he glanced at Reagan.

  Garret slapped the man on his back. “Yeah, yeah,” he said as he accepted the cue ball and planted it on the table. “Your turn,” he told her.

  Completely out of sorts after his friend’s comment, she stared at the cue ball and willed it to go anywhere but on the ground. Uptight and edgy, she hoped she wouldn’t make a pocket. That only meant she’d have to do it again and with Garret watching her, she wasn’t sure her nerves could handle it.

  If she was
like Naomi, she would have wriggled her hips as she leaned over the table, but self-consciousness triumphed in a room filled with testosterone.

  “You don’t have her beat yet?” Naomi asked as she stopped beside Reagan and handed her a drink. Reagan gratefully took it and gulped the drink, praying it would help relax her.

  “She lied and said she couldn’t play.”

  Naomi’s voice fluttered around a soft, flirty laugh. Reagan wanted to slug her, but had no right to be jealous. She must be stressed. It was perfectly logical that stress could make her muscles tense and her palms sweat. Stress was the only reason she wanted to rake her claws down Naomi’s face when she smiled at Garret. She hadn’t had enough rest since her arrival. She’d met a hot guy on her second night here, went sledding with said hot guy, and hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep from thinking and wondering about the hot guy.

  Leaning over the pool table, she wiggled her hips. The room spun in a pleasant, orderly way and her inhibitions slipped. She felt possessive over a man she barely knew and wasn’t going to let Naomi have the floor tonight.

  Or Garret’s bed.

  • • •

  He was a dead man.

  No, dead men didn’t have hard-ons burning a hole through their jeans as he did. His heart raced so fast it could win Olympic gold.

  For a girl he’d known barely a day. A girl he wanted to dislike in order for his job to be easier. A girl who blushed when he looked at her but could pose nude for Playboy and make millions. Only, she didn’t know it.

  He’d faced deadly opponents in his job, yet this woman was killing him.

  If she’d been what he expected her to be — a flirt and a tease, like Naomi — he would have found it easier to dislike her. But the smile that lit her face when she “accidentally” struck a ball into the pocket was natural.

  He wished she’d strike his ball in.

  A woman with her body, with her curves, had every right to sidle up to any man, whisper sweet nothings in his ear, and gain exactly what she craved.

  Reagan didn’t even try.

  Okay, so she flirted a little, leaning low so her gorgeous red sweater would hint of what hid underneath. Whispering words full of heat in his ear, her cool breath raking coals down his spine.