by Jill Shalvis
hadn’t, but it’d happened so gradually she hadn’t noticed until it’d been too late. She’d gotten lazy and had let things drift. And then she’d compounded the error by getting stupid on top of lazy, and she’d quit him.
And now he was quitting her.
All her fault, and she’d deal with that. Was trying to deal with that. “Well, soon enough I won’t be your problem at all. As soon as you sign the damn papers.”
He swore roughly beneath his breath. “Not what I meant, Annie.”
“Then what did you mean?”
“About what you said, about this me not seeing you shit.” He hesitated and looked at her the way he used to, with bewildered affection in the mix now. “I was thinking.”
“Yeah?”
“Is it something I could fix?”
Her heart actually skipped a beat and she dropped eye contact, busying herself with washing her hands. She’d been waiting and waiting for him to ask that question, and he never had—until now. “You’re a pilot and a mechanic. You fix stuff for a living. Theoretically, you’d be a cinch at fixing anything.”
“Goddammit, Annie. I need a direct answer.”
She went to work making coffee. “Yes,” she said after a minute, “I think you can fix it.”
“Okay.” He nodded. “Does that statement come with directions?”
She met his gaze. “I want you to know how to fix it.”
He let out a long breath. “I really hate that answer.”
“You know what I hate, Nick?” She set down the coffeepot rather than throw it at his head. “I hate the way you talk to me as if you don’t already know every single thing about me, the way I know everything about you, down to the fact that you’re probably wearing stupid boxers right this minute just because I can’t stand them.”
“I’m not—” He broke off, pulled out the waistband of his jeans to look, then sighed. “Okay, I am, but only cuz it’s laundry day.”
She shook her head and pointed to his. “I also hate the way you forget to comb your hair after you wash it and it falls over your eyes.” She rolled her eyes when he tried to pat it down. “I hate the way you can read my mind when I don’t want you to and not when I do want you to.” At that, the fight went out of her and she leaned back against the counter. “And I really hate that even with all that, I still don’t hate you. That I want you to fight for me.” Her throat burned, and defeated, she tossed up her hands. “I just want you to see me, Nick.”
“Ah, Annie.” His voice was soft and slightly gruff as his frustrated demeanor drained. “I see you every single day.”
“Then show it.” She so desperately needed that. “I need you to show it, Nick.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face while she stood there staring at him, yearning, aching. “I’ll try,” he said.
“That’d be really great.” She cleared her tight throat. “In return, I think it’s only fair that you give me something to work on. For you. To please you.”
She had the pleasure of surprising him; then an unmistakable wicked gleam came into his eyes and she had to laugh. “You’d actually want me that way?” she asked. “In bed? When we’re scarcely talking?”
“Hell yeah.”
Men. “How about outside the bedroom, Nick?”
“Anywhere,” he said fervently.
And she had to laugh. “I meant how about me pleasing you while not having sex?”
“Oh. Well…” He gave the question some thought, which was one thing she’d always loved about him. There was no subterfuge with Nick, no guessing at hidden meaning. If he was mad, she knew it. If he was happy, she knew it. No games.
“Maybe I want you to see me too,” he finally said.
She was still staring at him when Cam came into the kitchen. Annie had done her best to leave him out of this thing with her marriage as much as possible because dissension between her and Nick had always bothered him, and after all these years and in spite of the fact that he was a foot taller than her, he was still hers, a little, hurting kid who’d been given up by both his parents and needed protecting. Still protecting him, she managed a smile in his direction. “How was the brownie?”
“Amazing.” Not fooled, Cam eyed them both. “Do you two need to go to your separate corners?”
“No.” Nick had always loved Cam as Annie had, and that had never changed. He clasped a hand on Cam’s shoulder. “We’re good.” Then with one last look at Annie, one that held frustration with a glimmer of an old heat—which sparked a matching one burning inside her—he left.
Cam turned to Annie. “You’re good?” he repeated. “Since when?”
Annie handed him a mug of coffee. “We’re going to try to see each other.”
“Okay.” He took a sip of the coffee. “And what the hell does that mean?”
Annie sighed. “I really haven’t a clue.”
“Whose idea was this?”
“Some idiot’s.”
“Some idiot by the name of Annie?”
Annie slid him a glance. “Dammit. Yes.”
Cam burst out laughing, and the sound was so beautiful, so unexpected yet longed for, she just stared at him. “I thought you’d be mad at me.”
“I was. You are a nosy, bossy, mean, mean woman.”
“I try.”
He laughed again, and she could not stop staring at him. “What’s coming over you?”
“Nothing. I don’t know.”
“Huh. Well, whatever it is, I like it.”
He just sipped his coffee, and so did she, somehow feeling a little easier at heart for the both of them.
Cam left later for a two-day trip with Stone, taking a group snow climbing up to the frozen Jackson Lakes, a trip he’d planned and organized. And as Annie went on with her day, something different happened. Instead of the usual resentment and anger eating her up during the hours, she had something new stirring in her belly.
Hope.
For all of them.
Cam and Stone climbed mountain peaks all day with a group from the Bay Area, and it was good. It would have been great except Cam couldn’t think of anything other than getting back to Katie’s cabin to continue their whole getting naked thing.
Actually, he thought of a lot of other things too. Things like maybe she’d been right to call him on his shit. He hadn’t moved on.
He needed to move on…
Two days later when they returned to the lodge, Katie was at her desk, and as he passed by, she smiled at him. He returned it, and her glasses fogged, which was fun.
She’d missed him too.
While she dealt with the ringing phone, he went to his office to change. He’d just stripped out of his shirt when she knocked on his open door.
“Hey,” he said, turning to face her.
She was staring at his chest. Admittedly gratifying. So was the blush working its way up her throat to her cheeks as her eyes caught on the narrow tribal band tattooed around his bicep. “You have a tattoo,” she murmured. “It looks…” She bit her lower lip. “Tribal.”
“I got it in Africa.” He pulled on a black long-sleeved thermal. “How’s it been going?”
“Great.” She swallowed. “Except I can’t seem to find my tongue.”
Oh man. He wanted to strip down again, and then strip her. But first things first. He reluctantly pulled on an outer shell with WILDER blazoned across the front.
“You have a good trip?” she asked.
“Yeah.”
“I saw the schedule. You’re giving boarding lessons tomorrow.”
“Not really. Just meeting a few local kids to go over technique and style, and how to get sponsored. They’re on the team at school and their coach doesn’t have a lot of experience at that end.”
“That’s sweet of you.”
He looked at her, feeling decidedly unsweet. “Come here.”
She swallowed again. “Really? Here?”
He wished. But he gestured her closer and she nearly killed herself to g
et across the room. He took her hand and opened his closet. It was filled to the brim with outdoor equipment for any kind of adventure one could want.
She looked around. “There’s no place to—”
“Pick one.”
“Um…what?”
“Pick your next adventure.”
She blushed, then pushed up her glasses. “OH! Oh, you want me to pick out equipment. I thought—”
“Yeah, I know what you thought,” he said, nearly groaning at the look of disappointment on her face. She’d wanted him in the closet. Just the thought made him hard. “That’s next. This first.”
She stared at him, then tore her gaze from his and touched a pair of skis. Downhill skis. His gut clenched.
He’d figure she’d pick snowshoes, or cross-country skis. Despite his numerous attempts, he still hadn’t been on downhill skis or a board since his crash, managing to avoid both like the plague, and everyone had let him.
“These are nice,” she said, running her fingers over the edges.
Skiing and sex.
He’d once been great at both. Okay, well it seemed as if Katie wasn’t the only one taking a risk today. He pulled out the skis instead of facing the truth.
He was actually procrastinating sex.
God, that was a tough one to swallow.
He had no doubt he could turn on the charm and get her in his bed right this very minute—hell, she would have taken the closet—and it would be great.
But then…
Yeah, it was the but then tripping him up. It could be any of a hundred things, he had no idea exactly, but he could guarantee it would end badly.
It always did.
And he didn’t want this to end.
How ironic was that? He’d always slept with the women he liked. He’d slept with them and then it’d been over. Now this thing was going to be over soon regardless, and he hadn’t slept with her.
By choice.
He’d lost more than his nerve after his crash—he’d lost his mind.
Katie was still running her hand along the skis. “They look fast.”
“You’ve skied?”
“Not since high school.”
“That’s okay. It’s like getting on a bike.”
“I thought having sex was going to be like getting on a bike.”
Okay, still hard. “If there is any justice, it’ll be even easier. Try these.” He tossed her a set of ski pants from the new samples—sleek and black and formfitting.
“These would maybe fit if I hadn’t been eating Annie’s food for two-and-a-half weeks.”
He took in her maroon turtleneck sweater, which hugged mouthwatering breasts. Her gray wool pants did the same for her legs and ass, an ass he’d stared at enough times to know exactly what would work on it. “They’ll fit.”
“Okay, but if I burst out of them, it’s all your fault.”
And he’d be happy to take that blame. “Don’t worry.”
“Me worry? I left that behind in Los Angeles.” She smiled wryly. “Mostly.”
“It’s going to be okay, Goldilocks. We’ll stay on the easy runs. Now hurry and change, we’re burning daylight. I’ll wait for you out front.”
And then, because she just stood there a little dazed, a little overwhelmed, and a whole lot adorably sexy, he leaned and kissed her.
No idea why.
Okay, maybe he knew exactly why. Because he couldn’t get enough. Pulling back, he watched her glasses start to fog. He really loved knowing he did that to her. And after skiing, he was going to do a hell of a lot more to her.
For her.
And then…and then if history was any indication, he’d screw it all up somehow.
But that for later. For now, with her still staring up at him in sexy wonder, he left her alone in his office to change.
Chapter 11
Katie looked down at the ski pants in her hand, her heart pounding. They weren’t going to have sex in his closet. They were going skiing.
Dazed, she tugged down her pants, then proceeded to get them stuck on her boots. Crouching to fix the problem, she had to laugh at herself—not exactly how she’d imagined getting naked in Cam’s office. Giving up on the pants, she unlaced her damn boots, then nearly jumped out of her skin at the low scraping sound beneath the desk.
It was the same sound she heard outside the bushes every time she walked by them. Somehow her animal stalker was in this very office with her, possibly planning on eating her alive. Oh, no. Not going out like this, and she leaped back.
And tripped over the pants around her ankles. Her flailing arms knocked over a huge stack of skis and poles on the way down, all of which fell in a spectacularly noisy cascade to the floor as she landed in a graceless heap on her butt.
Someone came pounding down the hall. “Katie?”
Oh, God. She yelled, “Don’t come in—”
But the door whipped open, and Cam stood there staring at her.
She couldn’t blame him. She lay on her back, draped over a pile of skis and poles, her pants still around her ankles. She decided to take some comfort in the fact that she wasn’t wearing either granny panties or a thong, but a nice pair of cotton bikinis in a demure pale pink.
With a picture of Hello Kitty on the front.
She’d have been far happier in a suit of armor, but what could she do?
Cam crouched by her side. “Are you hurt?”
“No!” She tried to sit up. Not easy with no stomach muscles and her feet weighted down. She straightened her glasses. “And I said don’t come in.”
He was looking at her panties and smiling. “Hello Kitty.”
“As in Don’t. Come. In.”
“You screamed.”
“I did not.” Scooting backward, she rolled over and staggered to her feet, pointing to his desk while scrambling to pull up her pants. “And you have a wild animal under there. You—” She stopped when he bent to look and let out a huff of laughter. “What? What’s so damn funny?”
“It’s just Chuck.”
“Chuck.” She pictured a rabid coyote. A psycho wild turkey. “Who’s Chuck?”
“Take a look for yourself.”
She glared at him, then bent a little and peered beneath the desk.
Sitting down there among a few electrical cords and a forgotten pair of athletic shoes was a scrawny, patchy gray cat, nearly all skin and bones.
“He adopted this place a while back apparently, when I was gone. He’s feral, and comes and goes as he pleases, though he hasn’t been around too much lately. Doesn’t like new people.”
