by Camryn Rhys
“You didn’t make the sausage this morning, did you?”
He nodded. “It’s not as good as I usually make it, but I was missing a few spices. I’ll have to put in an order when I get back to the ranch. Or maybe go into Denver myself. I don’t need much. Your mom gave me some blends, but…I don’t know. I have a hard time using blends when I don’t know what’s in them.”
“Oh, right. I forgot to tell you. We’re supposed to use those blends when we cook on the trail. Mom sells them at the ranch to people so they can take them home as a memory of the trail.” She picked up one of the sausages and bit down. The smoky, earthy scent exploded over her tongue.
“Yeah, your mom stopped by last night to tell me that.” Kyle pressed his big hands into the wood of the tabletop. “I know she wants me to use them, but…”
“You should use them.” Jamie drained the last of her orange juice. “It’s part of the job to use the products.”
His lips were tight and he cocked his head to one side. “Okay, Bobby Flay.”
Jamie swallowed just as she was about to laugh, and it came out somewhere between a choke and a cough. Kyle’s face wrinkled in concern, and he slid into the chair next to her, pounded on her back, and laid his other hand on hers.
Heat sliced through her body where their skin touched, and she tried to right her breathing. She shrugged his hands away. “I’m okay. Just needed to get some food in my stomach is all.”
She picked up her plate and walked between the tables and back toward the wagon. Memories of his hands on her would plague her all day if she didn’t put a stop to the emotions that kept welling up inside.
I can’t let him get to me.
She had to keep reminding herself that he was just another sweet-talking guy. Just another man who wanted something from her. She had to be more guarded.
Her behavior at the campfire had been out of character—she’d given in to her lust and forgotten her better judgment. She wouldn’t make that mistake again. That mistake had been what landed her back home, working for her brother, in the first place.
After disposing of her plate, she headed back down toward the river and tried to shake the feeling that Kyle was following her. And the feeling that she wanted him to.
When the group left for the first trail ride, Kyle threw himself into the preparations for their return meal. Since they’d eaten a late breakfast and taken sandwiches on the ride, a late-in-the-day return would do him well.
Jamie had left him a list of chores, which he quickly finished, and he set into his prep cook mentality. He made more sausage for the following morning, peeled and sliced potatoes for that night, made custard to chill for the crème brûlée, built a makeshift smoker, and at about noon, started smoking the ribs for dinner.
Being alone in the outdoor kitchen gave him a sense of normalcy again, as though he were back in his restaurant in Denver. He’d rather not think about someone else in his restaurant, using his equipment, re-training his staff, erasing Kyle from the collective foodie unconscious.
But routine in the kitchen calmed him. Made him almost believe nothing had changed. He was still the executive chef. Still in charge of menu and concept. Still relevant. Except, even if he had been back in normal, he’d never have come to the Banfield ranch. And met Jamie.
Jamie. Who practically dominated his every thought. She had been incomparable in her beauty, the haze of desire all around her. There had been real lust there. Not just curiosity. There was something under her surface, and he wanted to peel it all away and just look at her.
While he was finishing the risotto, she came loping down the pathway from the camp. He allowed himself the luxury of a good stare and let a slow smile take his lips. Damn, she looked good.
Those tight-fitting jeans, accentuating her long legs, topped off by a fitted gray shirt that left little to his imagination when it came to those perky tits of hers. The girl could pull off the cowgirl look better than any woman he’d ever seen.
Kyle didn’t get a smile in return, and something sank hard in his stomach when she avoided his gaze.
“How long till dinner?” she asked.
“That depends.”
Jamie came all the way into the tent and leaned against the portable butcher block, as far away from him as she could be, but still be under the kitchen canvas. She didn’t meet his eyes, still didn’t smile. Dammit, where’s the Jamie from last night?
“What does it depend on?”
On the crest of the trail, a few more people appeared, and she turned back to look at them. Her jaw tightened.
“When you’d like to eat.” Kyle set his knife on the wood cutting board. “The earliest I can be ready is about fifteen minutes. But I can keep it hot for another thirty without too much trouble. And an hour with some trouble, but the risotto will be clumpy.”
“I left the guys brushing down the horses for the night.” She thumbed back toward the corral, and her face soured again.
Kyle looked up finally and saw Lana’s silhouette stopped in the middle of the trail. Something was up there, and he was tempted to ask about it. But he couldn’t afford to seem too interested in his ex. “So fifteen will be okay?”
“Sure.” Her gaze stayed glued to his ex-wife as she and another girl walked past the kitchen tent to the water well.
Lana did a good job of avoiding Kyle as well, but Jamie could have been a laser, her attention was so precise.
He reached for her. “What’s going on?”
She shook her head, backing away from his touch, and a long strand of hair fell in front of her face.
Kyle instinctively reached and Jamie grabbed the loose hair, backing up a couple of steps and tucking it behind one ear. His arm dropped away and he turned back to the cutting board.
She cleared her throat. “We had a long day with that one.”
“Lana?”
“Yup. I tried to get them to pair off for the trail ride, and she didn’t like the guy she was with, so she complained about it all day. How she was the customer.” Jamie sighed. “I told her part of the service was that they were paired by the staff. And she made some comment about—”
A loud ringing sounded that reminded him of one of those old rotary phones his grandma owned. He looked around, forgetting for a moment they were in the middle of nowhere.
Jamie reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone. Whatever she saw on the readout made her whole face into a wrinkle. “I’ve gotta take this.” She backed out of the kitchen tent and headed up the trail to the camp. The phone continued ringing until he couldn’t see her anymore, then it stopped.
Kyle began chopping scallions, wondering who was on the other end of that call and why Jamie’s hot and cold routine still managed to draw him in.
“You’ve got it bad for that girl, don’t you, Kyle?” Lana’s voice woke him from his thoughts of Jamie like a sluice of cold water. She leaned through the door, her long blonde hair wafting around her face.
“Mind your business.”
“You look at her like she’s the only girl on the planet.” She stepped toward him, rocking her hips while she walked, like some runway model. Where she’d learned that trick was beyond him, but it made her appear to try too hard.
Cuz she did.
“I told you. Mind your business.” He sprinkled scallions over the steaming rice and tried not to look at her, encourage her, or even acknowledge her.
“You used to look at me like that, y’know.” Lana was close now, almost touching him. “Do you remember that?”
Kyle stopped his rhythmic stirring and regretted his curiosity before he even opened his mouth. “So, you’re nostalgic, now. Huh.”
She sighed and leaned against him. The pressure of her body was at once familiar and strange. They hadn’t really touched in more than a year, and her scent was a thing of the past. Instead, he sniffed in the rich, earthy smell of his mushroom risotto.
“I miss you, Kyle.” Her hand stole up to his shoulder and stroke
d his bicep.
He rolled his eyes and ignored her. “Oh. Now, you miss me?”
She smacked his arm. “Ass.”
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re wrong.” Lana’s lithe fingers grasped him above the elbow and yanked him back, but he held his ground.
“I doubt that very much.” Kyle set the spoon down, taking a step back to break the contact. “Let me guess.” He crossed his arms and stared her down. “You got paired up with some guy today you didn’t like, and now Paul’s gone, and you’re looking for a distraction from your boredom.”
She mimicked his posture and narrowed her eyes. “That’s not true.”
“I know it is. I just talked to Jamie.”
“She’s setting you against me.”
He laughed and turned back to his risotto, pulling another ladle of stock into the pot. “She didn’t have to turn me against you, La-La. You did that all by yourself.”
Lana stamped her foot. She hated when he used her childhood nickname, and it was the only thing that would instantly raise her hackles. “I can’t just miss you?”
“You don’t miss me. You had no idea I’d even be here.” Kyle took a breath and tried to push down the slow bubble-up of anger. He’d wasted enough time getting angry at her actions. Or inaction. “You never really cared who was on your arm, as long as he was a somebody. It took me way too long to figure that out. But you can’t fool me anymore. I’m done being your stooge.”
A hurried set of approaching footsteps stopped him, his heart in his throat. But no one materialized and he kept stirring his risotto.
Kyle released the air he’d inadvertently trapped in his lungs. He needed to talk to Jamie. In private. Tell her the truth about Lana and hope she would take his side. He couldn’t afford to lose this job, but he couldn’t lie anymore.
To Jamie. Or himself. Or anyone.
Chapter Eleven
Kyle stored the last of the leftovers in the refrigerator and stretched out the anxiety residing in his back and shoulders. It’d been a long night. Lana had avoided him a little too openly, and he was glad Jamie hadn’t been around much, even though he’d been looking for her all night. She hadn’t eaten dinner, and one of the leftover ramekins of apple crumble had disappeared from the cooler, so he stopped looking.
He wanted to have it all out. It might not assuage the ache he felt, but it would make it easier for him to kiss her boots right off, like he wanted to. Instead, he hitched the makeshift doors of the kitchen cage and walked toward his tent.
It was late enough that most of the guests were sleeping, and the campfire had been doused, which was good, because he’d spent entirely too much time relaxing against the tree he’d pinned Jamie to the night before.
Closing his eyes, remembering the feel of her lips, the heat that built inside and threatened to explode. She was so cold today. Almost like she was a different person. But it only made him want her more.
Kyle went to his tent to get his backpack, and walked over to the other side of the banks, near the edge of the dark water, where he could get a full-body wash, even if it froze his balls off. Might do them some good.
Once he was far enough off the trail that the light disappeared, he flipped on his flashlight to keep his footing. A quick glance behind him said no one followed, so he slid down the bank to the edge of the river and splashed over the bank.
Effin’ cold, but not as cold as it would’ve been in April or May with runoff. No swimming pool, no Jacuzzi tub, but it would do for a good cleaning.
The river, which was really more like a creek, was slow moving and shallow around the camp. Likely, that was why they’d chosen this particular spot, because in other places, it was much more of a river. But it was safe enough a person could stand in it and not worry about getting washed away.
Kyle set his backpack on a big rock and shed his shirt. He kept his shoes on just in case of slick rocks, and waded out into the dark to find a little deeper water. Not five minutes passed before he’d soaped up every inch of his body, removed and washed his shorts and boxers, rinsed them and himself, then returned to the rock, naked and clean. This is pretty heavenly.
He sat on the rock with his towel, drying his hair, when he heard a shuffle to his left and froze. He had no idea if there were bears out here, but even a mountain lion or cougar or, hell, a badger…bad news.
Kyle pulled the towel around his neck using as little movement as possible, his heart pounding in his ears. There was no flashlight, so it had to be an animal. Maybe if he held completely still, it would pass him by. After all, he smelled like Irish Spring, and not sweaty man. Maybe that would work in his favor.
A flash of white came sliding down the bank and straight into the water near him. He waited for his eyes to adjust to whatever had narrowly missed his very vulnerable man parts. But it wasn’t an animal at all.
A white shirt smacked him in the face, and he grunted. The first noise he made drew a tiny scream, and he hushed whoever it was, peeling the shirt from his head.
Jamie’s alarmed face crystallized in his night vision, and his heartbeat ratcheted up again. She was naked, standing in the middle of the river with water up to her waist, holding her hands over a pair of beautifully pert breasts, staring at him like he was the wild animal. His groin stirred as he quickly imagined the million things he’d like to do to her in this river.
“Holy hot damn, Jamie.” Kyle laid the t-shirt on the rock over his still-wet shorts and boxers, and slipped the towel over his uncomfortably growing erection. “You scared the living shit out of me.”
“I scared you? Jeez.” She moved one of her hands as though she might gesture, but quickly replaced it.
Not a glimpse of those breasts he’d been thinking about since he first drove up to the Silver Spring Ranch.
“You flew down that bank and didn’t even use a flashlight. I thought you were a cougar or something.”
Jamie shook her head. “We don’t have cougars out here.”
“Like I would know that.”
She shifted her weight in frustration. “Just throw me my shirt.”
He lifted the tee from the rock and prepared to toss it to her. Kyle could torture her with this. But she’d never let him live it down. He tossed it across the distance and she reached for it, dropping the cover of her breasts.
And they were just as gorgeous as he’d imagined they would be, even if he only saw them for a moment. She had large, dark nipples that stood so erect, they’d cut his skin like diamonds if he pressed her against him. It’d be worth the pain.
Jamie slipped material over her head, and he lost sight of those gorgeous breasts, but his dick didn’t back down.
He’d gotten his appetite whet, and even a dip in the river wouldn’t calm down his blood flow anytime soon.
Jamie held her arms out as though to balance, and the T-shirt clung to every line of her body as she stepped through the water toward the rock.
“Need some help?”
Her face crooked into a frustrated scowl. “Not all women need help from big, strapping men.”
“Does that make me the big, strapping man in this scenario?” Kyle pressed his heels into the spongy earth, prepared to leap if she mis-stepped. But she finally reached the bank and came around the rock, as far from him as she could get and still be touching the same surface.
Jamie leaned up the bank and grabbed her discarded towel. “I didn’t get clean, really. I was just… I was so hot, after I finished eating that apple thing you made. I couldn’t…”
As she wiped her arms, those big, erect nipples became visible through her shirt, and warmth sloshed through him.
“I can leave if you want. I’ve gotten as clean as I can.” He shifted to stand and lost his footing, tumbling toward the river.
Jamie was at his side in a split second, kneeling in the water and putting her warm hands on his shoulders. She smiled into his eyes. “Need some help?”
“That depends.” He cocked
a grin at her. “Does this make you the big, strapping man in this scenario?”
They both laughed, and he shifted his hands to get better leverage so he could push himself up, even to be kneeling. When he did, Jamie’s gaze dipped below his waist, and Kyle froze. He had the sudden awareness of two things. His dick could have cut granite, and the towel was gone.
Jamie had seen plenty of naked men in her life. But none of them would be as memorable as Kyle Harris. The man sat in eight inches of slow-moving water, bare as buckskin, with a tantalizing erection sticking up out of the black river. Something hot and urgent breezed through her body and, as cold as the river was, she could’ve been next to a roaring fire.
She had an unmistakable urge to reach for his hard dick, but instead, grasped his arm and stood, pulling him up.
His fully naked body towered over her, and his eyes locked with hers. It seemed like they were engaged in some kind of elaborate dance. Some prehistoric ritual that predated language, where with the slightest nod of her head or forward lean of her torso, there would be no return to this limbo. Before she could contemplate too much, something flashed in his eyes, and he started to step back.
That was the moment.
This would never happen again. He was naked, hard, wet, and clean. Ready. They were secluded.
This was her chance. All she needed to do was give him permission. Make the first move. And he would do the rest, she could feel it.
Never wanted anything so much. Jamie’s throat clenched and memories of Sam covered her in gooseflesh. There had been this moment with him, too. Where her strength had given out, and she’d fallen into his gravity.
There had been no stop to that fall, and in a lot of ways, she might still have been falling, only through the center of the earth and with so much force, she was going to keep gathering speed until there was no choice.
She didn’t want to go supernova again.
Tears choked her, but did not fall. Why can’t I leave Sam in the past? Why does he always make my choices for me, even from years ago.
“Kyle,” she whispered.
