by Jill Shalvis
on the balls of his feet, and looked over the wall.
She realized she was holding her breath, waiting for his reaction.
It was an endless minute as he absorbed it all, slowly, taking his time to see everything before he turned back to her.
“Okay,” he said. “So you know how to paint.”
She let out the breath in a whoosh and made him smile.
“Like you care what I think,” he said.
If he only knew. She blithely ignored this and offered him her coffee.
He took it with a heartfelt gratitude that had her taking a second look at him. “How long have you been up?”
“Since two thirty this morning,” he said. “Got called in. The conditions were ripe for an avalanche.”
She must have paled because he smiled. “We got it handled.”
“How do you handle it?” she asked.
“Explosives.”
She blinked.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “We’re good at it.”
She let out a breath. That easy confidence was incredibly attractive. Or maybe it was the element of danger she found exciting, though she wasn’t sure she liked what that said about her.
Still, the fact remained that she couldn’t even begin to imagine all the responsibilities he faced on a daily basis. “The most dangerous thing I face on my job is a paper cut,” she said.
He shrugged. “You could fall off this platform. You ever think of that?”
She eyed the drop and felt her stomach quiver. “Not until now, thanks.”
He flashed a grin and she stared at his mouth.
His eyes heated. “You’re going to need to change the subject now,” he said, voice sexy and low, “or we’re going to risk the both of us falling off when I haul you over here and—”
“Your list,” she said quickly. “You make it yet?”
He pulled her small notebook from one of his cargo pockets, giving her a small smile. He’d kept it on him. That gave her more than a small thrill.
But the notebook was empty of new writing.
“Didn’t have time,” he said.
“How about now?”
He looked around. “Here?”
“Sure. Unless you’re the sort to get stage fright…” Which she knew damn well he was not… “How about I go up a level and give you some privacy.”
She’d been up there for five minutes before he spoke again, saying just her name. She was sitting facing the wall working on the tree, and had to twist and bend low to look beneath her.
He was sprawled out on his back, knees up, using a thigh as a surface for steadying the notepad. He looked extremely comfortable. Kind of like a big, lethal wildcat taking a rest before pouncing… He smiled up at her and her pulse kicked. “I’m ready,” he said.
Good God. So was she. She cleared her throat. “Let’s hear it.”
“Number one,” he read. “Have sex on scaffolding.”
She choked and nearly fell off.
He flashed that devastatingly sexy grin. “I was watching you work above me. I didn’t know that painting was so sensual. You move as you paint, your whole body moves, did you know that?”
And he’d had quite the view from below her… She suddenly felt like amending her own list to also include having sex on scaffolding…
“Number two,” he read. “Encourage our new muralist to wear a dress when she paints.”
Her legs actually quivered. “You’re awful.”
“Awful sexy, right?”
He was teasing her, and she rolled her eyes and went back to her work. “Since you’re not taking this seriously…” she trailed off, and vowed to forget he was there.
“Oh, I’m taking this very seriously.”
“Get a room,” someone yelled up to them.
They both peered over the edge and found Kenna below, hands on hips and looking irritated. “You’re making me remember how long it’s been since I got laid,” she snapped, and strode off.
“Number three,” Hud went on as if Kenna hadn’t just called them out on their sexual tension. “Experiment with paints.”
“I can teach you how to paint,” she said. “But not on my wall.”
“Your wall?”
She blushed. “Yes. For the duration.”
“No worries.” His bad-boy smile, naughty to the core, reappeared. “I wasn’t talking about painting on your wall.”
“On paper?”
“Nope,” he said.
She blinked. “You can’t mean… body painting?”
“I can’t?”
Her entire being trembled at the thought of him, paintbrush in hand, working it across her body.
Maybe they did need a room.
“Oh boy,” she whispered, and had to sit again, which she did with a thunk that made him laugh.
“Okay,” she said. “I get it. The list is silly.”
There was a beat of silence and then he climbed up to her level on the scaffolding. Crouching at her side, he put a hand on her belly to steady her but didn’t speak until she opened her eyes.
“The list isn’t silly,” he said. “Far from it. I didn’t mean to trivialize it. But any list I’d make would have to be fluid. It’d change all the time as I change. Some things would become not as important as they were and other things would take precedence as I went through life. And that’s the point of the list, right? To make sure you’re living your life?”
She stared up at him, shocked to the core that he’d taken her from sheer lust to deep thought in a single heartbeat. “Yes,” she said. “You’re right.”
And he was. She wasn’t the list and she was cheating herself out of exactly what she’d been trying to do—live her life—by limiting herself to the things she’d written. “I need the notebook back.”
He pulled it from his pocket and handed it to her. She flipped to the back page, where she had her own list, and added:
Be flexible.
He read it upside down and smiled his approval.
Their gazes met and Bailey realized that once this mural was done she wouldn’t have this with him. She’d be gone. Back to Denver. But one thing facing death up close and personal had done for her was teach her to live in the here and now.
And her here and now still had at least a month on the clock, and she was determined to enjoy every single moment of it, even knowing that eventually she would be walking away.
When she shivered, Hudson zipped her jacket up to her neck and pulled her hood up over her ski cap, making sure she was covered. “You wearing sunscreen?” he asked. “We’re at altitude and your skin is fair.”
“Pale.”
“Fair,” he repeated. “And beautiful.”
He didn’t see her as pale and sickly and she could’ve thrown herself at him for that alone. But there was the whole on-a-scaffolding thing, so throwing herself anywhere would be dangerous.
Still not nearly as dangerous as melting under his touch…
At the look on her face, he grinned, and she couldn’t stop the question that fell from her lips. “Are you reading my mind?”
“Don’t have to. Everything you think crosses your face for the whole world to see.”
“Dammit.” She put her hands on her cheeks and sighed. “So now we both know what I want to do.”
“Do we?”
He asked this with such faux innocence that she laughed and shook her head. “You need me to paint you a picture?” she asked.
He grinned. “Would you? I’m confused, very confused, so make sure it’s real clear. Best add instructions.”
She laughed.
“Oh, I’m not kidding,” he said. “And I want those instructions, Bailey. In great detail.”
“Uh-huh,” she said dryly. “Because you have no idea what you’re doing, right?”
He was still smiling but his eyes were suddenly very serious. “When it comes to you? Hell no,” he said. “With you, I’m so far out of my league I can’t even see the le
ague.”
She stared at him, her body suddenly very still, like it couldn’t quite take this in. Her brain also struggled to keep up. “Are we still playing?” she whispered. “Cuz I’m not very good at games.”
“I’m not playing with you at all.”
She blinked, trying to process what this meant. “Then what are we doing?”
His gaze touched over her features and then came back to her eyes. “You need to put a label on it?”
“You don’t?”
He gave a slow negative shake of his head.
She was still taking that in when he reached out and ran a finger along her temple and then her jaw. “It’s no secret that I want you, and I want you bad,” he said with a small wry smile. “But the truth is that probably isn’t smart, for either of us. I work twenty-four-seven and am emotionally unavailable, and you…”
She’d sucked in a breath at the emotionally unavailable part. That was indeed a huge doorstop. “I what?”
“You live two hours away.”
She blinked. “That’s it?” she asked. “That’s the worst thing you can think of about me?”
He smiled. “Nope, but here’s the problem. The fact that you’re a smartass and even more stubborn than I am? It totally works in your favor.”
“Oh,” she breathed, having no idea why that was so… well, arousing. He was attracted to her biggest flaws. How do you not fall for a guy who likes your flaws? “And I’m supposed to resist?”
“It’s your call,” he said.
“Great.” She blew out a breath. “You should know that I’m not real good at resisting.”
He flashed another smile, but she never got to hear what he might have said to that because his radio went off. She was torn between thinking, Dammit, and Oh, thank God, because he had to go. There was going to be no time to do anything stupid, like keep talking and forcing them to put a name on this… thing between them. Her heart was ever so much safer just as things were. No complications. Just a few admittedly hot stolen moments. No real intimacy.
But he didn’t rush off. He stood there and looked at her very seriously. “What’s it going to be, Bailey? We going for this?”
Oh boy. So he wasn’t the sort to put off a decision. She should have known that about him.
I’m not emotionally available…
Those words haunted her. She wanted him, but she wanted more than just his body—didn’t she? Or at least she wanted the chance at more. Holding his gaze, she gave a slow shake of her head. She wasn’t exactly looking for The One right this minute, but if she was going to get intimate with someone, she wanted him to at least have potential to be that person. She would need to protect herself against Hud since he’d taken himself out of the race. “You aren’t The One,” she whispered.
Hud held himself still for a heartbeat before letting out a low breath and nodding. “Smart choice.” That said, he hauled her up to her toes and kissed her with a whole lot of tongue and frustration, and by the time he pulled back she had his shirt in two tight fists.
Good Lord. Forcing herself to let go of him, she smoothed the wrinkles she’d left. “What was that?” she whispered.
His mouth curved slightly. “That was one part damn-I’m-an-idiot-for-letting-you-go and one part good-bye.”
And then he turned, leaving her standing there dazed as he lithely climbed down and vanished.
Chapter 12
That night Hud was actually alone in the old lodge, something that almost never happened because Kenna rarely went anywhere off the premises. But Lily and Penny had dragged her out for girls’ night, something about dinner and an indie theater viewing of Fifty Shades—which they’d already all seen a dozen times.
Hud didn’t understand going to that particular flick without someone to get laid with, but Penny had told him that since he was a penis-carrying human he couldn’t possibly understand. He was going to trust her on that one.
Aidan and Gray were both still at work. Hud would’ve been, too, except he’d been on the graveyard shift the past two nights in town and could hardly keep his eyes open.
He’d ordered a pizza, which would arrive any second. He intended to inhale that, snag a few of Aidan’s beers from the fridge, and crawl into bed for no less than eight straight hours of sleep.
When the knock came, he’d just gotten out of the shower. Wrapping a towel around his hips, he grabbed the money he’d left on the foyer entry table and pulled open the front door.
But it wasn’t the pizza guy.
Instead, Bailey stood there. She’d been looking at her clasped hands in front of her, but she lifted her head, slowly, her gaze taking in his body as she did.
Her mouth fell open.
Gratifying, he had to admit. “Not that I’m not enjoying the way you’re looking at me like I intend to look at my pizza when it arrives,” he said, “but what are you doing here?”
Her eyes were still locked on his torso, her teeth sinking into her lower lip.
“Bay,” he said.
Her eyes heated at the shortening of her name, and he let out a rough laugh and gripped the doorjamb at either side of him rather than reach for her. “You can’t look at me like that and tell me nothing’s happening.”
“Yeah, and while we’re on the subject…” She lifted her gaze to his and blushed. “I might have been… hasty in some of the things I said last time I saw you. That’s why I’m here. I came to retract part of it.”
He stilled. Or most of him did. One particular appendage did the opposite of being still. “Which part?”
She swallowed hard and stepped into him, setting her hands on his stomach. Head bent, she stared at her fingers on his bare skin, her brow furrowed in concentration.
Up or down, babe. Either way works, but I pick down…
She drew in a shaky breath. “The whole point of me even being here in Cedar Ridge was to gain experiences I couldn’t have before.” Her fingers shifted slightly, driving him crazy. “Things I thought I’d never get to do because my only focus was surviving.”
Aw, hell. “Bailey—”
“No, please, let me finish,” she rushed on. “I’m twenty-four and I’ve lived so damn sheltered that I didn’t even know some of what I was missing. But when I’m with you…” She smiled and bit her lip again. “I feel things. You make me feel things.”
“Like irritated? Annoyed?”
“Yes,” she agreed, and laughed. “But also warm. And…” Her fingers flexed and so did his libido. “Fuzzy.”
“Warm and fuzzy?” he repeated, running the unexpected adjectives through his brain. “I’m not a pair of slippers, Bailey.”
“No—I know that,” she said, and seemed to get flustered, lifting her hands from him and waving them around like that might help her find the words she was looking for.
Feeling his chest constrict, he caught her hands in his. “You’re trying to tell me something.”
“Yes!” She sucked in a breath. “I’ve never had a… fling.” She grimaced. “I bet people don’t even use that word anymore. But whatever they call it, hot, up-against-the-wall sex, or gorilla sex, or—” She broke off and stared up at him when he choked on his own breath of air. “What?”
