Tequila

by Rebecca Sharp

  But photos were no match for the man walking toward us and the story behind him.

  “Jesus Christ…” I swore under my breath.

  I would’ve rolled my eyes at her, but if I thought his uniform fit him well, the worn jeans and Broncos tee he now sported stunned me like the first time I’d been trained to experience G-force in flight simulation: frozen for a second, wide-eyed and heart pumping, wondering if I was going to pass out.

  Wouldn’t that be embarrassing; can stay conscious while flying jets but can’t remain upright in the presence of a devastatingly handsome park ranger.

  “Careful, or your panties will drop faster than a freefall parachute,” I drawled, crossing my legs before mine could top the one-hundred-and-twenty miles per hour plummet.

  “Oh, Bae,” she teased, completely distracted by our approaching guest. “I’d say they came and went… but the truth is, they went and I came.”

  “You have problems,” I told her as she sucked down the last of her Bay Breeze. I turned back to Duke, ordering myself another drink. “Tequila, please.”

  “I do have problems,” she bemoaned, leaning into me. “My problem is that our friendly ranger is dangerously sexy, but I’m not the one he’s lookin’ at.”

  She patted me on the back and before I could reply, Zoe hopped off the barstool to greet Logan and then, with a loud holler, called out to some of her girlfriends from Boulder who she’d told to meet us here.

  “Close it out or put it on a tab?” the bartender asked, capturing my attention when he set my drink on the bar.

  “Put it on my tab, Duke.” A familiar large hand slid a card onto the counter.

  I bit back a groan; Fuck, even his voice sounded like it was made from mountains, all rocky and strong.

  “You want something, Logan?” Duke raised a brow. “Didn’t expect you tonight.”

  Logan shot him a half-smile and replied only to the first question, “Whatever she’s having.”

  Flying fuck, my body liked his voice.

  “Thank you,” I said, spinning my seat to face him only to realize just how close he was.

  With the other patrons at the bar, there wasn’t much room for a mountain man like him to fit and not be crossing the bounds of personal space. I stopped my knees just short of running into his stomach. Any further movement would force him right between my legs—and I hadn’t had enough tequila for that yet.

  “I take it you weren’t planning on coming here tonight before I invited you?”

  His gaze widened, giving me a view of the rich array of browns and golds in his eyes as they acknowledged my perceptiveness.

  “I don’t usually come in on a work night—or more than once a week.” He shrugged.

  “Ranger rules?” I asked lightly.

  He smirked and the effect it had on me while sitting was just as devastating as when I’d been standing. And falling off a chair would be ever more embarrassing.

  “More like Logan’s rules,” Duke chimed in as he set the second shot glass down.

  My eyebrow arched. It sounded like there was a story there. “Do you have a lot of rules, Ranger Daniels?”

  “Logan,” he insisted with a strong stare. “And I have some… enough to make sure my life goes in the right direction and doesn’t drift into the gray area between right and wrong.”

  I nodded in agreement. “I do, too, actually.” I picked up my glass. “It’s not a bad thing to have rules.”

  The Air Force certainly had its own version of that philosophy. Some days, it felt like my DNA had been rewritten with the code of the UCMJ.

  The Universal Code of Military Justice. The foundation of all military law for the United States Armed Forces.

  “No, it’s not,” he agreed, though it still sounded like there was a story behind his rules rather than a codebook.

  Before I could respond and probe deeper, he raised his shot glass.

  “Congratulations.” And there came the smile again that scrambled so many rational thoughts in my mind.

  “Thanks,” I smiled, handing him a lime as I raised my glass, too.

  Instead of focusing on the small glasses of alcohol, his eyes locked on me with an intensity that tried to mask the desire behind them. But it was an attraction that my body recognized as similar to its own and every cell became alert.

  “Here’s to flying high,” I toasted with a huskier voice than anticipated.

  His eyes darkened. “And to landing safely.”

  I let out a small laugh.

  “Here’s to rules.” I threw back the tequila, letting the clear blanco burn down the back of my throat.

  I was born to fly.

  Fuck landing.

  My glass clunked onto the wood bar as I sucked the acidic juice from the lime, letting out a soft mewl at the way it both heightened and calmed the traces of alcohol.

  I might look like Pilot Barbie, but I’d lived in a world that was eighty percent G.I. Joe; I was an expert in aviation, alcohol, and expletives.

  “Damn, that was good.”

  I looked up at Logan. While the bitter shot made my expression tighten with both pleasure and pain, the only effect it seemed to have on him was to stoke the fire in his eyes to burn brighter.

  He reached forward, brushing stone-solid abs against my bare knee as he placed his glass on the table.

  “So, now that we’ve done a shot together, think I could get your name?” he drawled.

  The heat from his stare spiraled straight down through my body and made a home between my legs. I clamped my thighs together, but it was no help.

  For the first time in four years, I didn’t want to be seen as a wingman. I needed to be seen as a woman.

  By him. Logan Daniels.

  I wanted him to want me.

  And I’d jumped from planes with less fear than I had at that thought.

  Maybe that explained why the next word out of my mouth was ‘Bae’ instead of Shay.

  “Bae?” His eyebrows rose.

  “It’s what my friends call me.” I shrugged. “And we just did a shot together, so I think that makes us friends.” I finished off with a wink and my heart gave a violent start.

  Was I flirting?

  Did I even know what that was anymore?

  “We’ll take another round, Duke.” I gave the bartender my heart-stopping, Miss-America smile and he laughed as he took our glasses, shooting Mr. Ranger Danger a ‘good-luck’ grin as he poured.

  “You know what they say about tequila?” Logan asked as he nodded to Duke and picked up his glass.

  I raised my own. “Tequila won’t fix your problems, but it’s worth a shot.”

  He laughed and the sight of his free smile sitting on that dimple was about to melt me right onto the floor.

  This man lived by the rules and lived in uniform like I did—maybe that was why the sight of his smile felt like it unlocked all the barricades I’d put up around every part of me that didn’t scream pilot.

  Tapping my glass to his, I tossed back the alcohol, grateful to feel something else burning aside from the obnoxious ache between my thighs.

  This was what happened when you swore off all men for the last two years in order to be the best.

  Before. Anyone. Else.

  “So, Logan…” I sucked on my lime and tossed it in the empty shot glass. “How long have you been a ranger?”

  “Going on five years. Two at Grand Teton. One at Joshua Tree. Then one at Santa Monica Mountains. And now here for about a year.”

  “That’s a lot of parks,” I drawled. Not that I knew anything about the National Park Service. Maybe it was common to move around so frequently. “Didn’t like any of them?”

  The flash of his strained smile was brief as he replied, “Just working on a… bigger project… that took me through all of them.”

  “And it brought you to Colorado?” My head tipped to the side, the alcohol creating a buzz in my blood. But the warmth in my body? That was all because of his steady stare. />
  It didn’t shy away. It didn’t falter against mine.

  Logan Daniels was a man who knew what he wanted when he saw it, and right now, he was looking at me.

  I couldn’t be sure if a shadow crossed his face or if it was just the vintage lighting at TRT.

  “Yep. Not sure how long it’ll keep me here, but this park, I definitely like,” he teased lightly, his eyes dropping for a second to my chest and my nipples hardened.

  “It’s a good spot,” I agreed. “I like it because it makes me feel small. It reminds me that we can only do so much, you know?”

  His eyes roamed over my face, absorbing my words and I wondered if I’d just gotten too philosophical for tequila shots.

  “I think I could use that reminder, too,” he agreed, and we clinked our empty shot glasses in agreement. “How about you? You from here then?”

  I quirked my lips and adjusted my seat, enjoying the way his body tightened as the movement made my breasts bounce.

  “No,” I admitted. “Military brat. My parents have been gone for a few years now, stomach cancer and then heart attack. I’ve got an uncle and some cousins in NorCal, but I came here for school.”

  Someone bumped into me walking by and made my knee brush against the muscle ridges (that could’ve passed for mountain ranges) of his chest, sending warning flares off in every direction.

  The combustible silence between us lengthened. I glanced around and wondered if anyone else thought the temperature was rising or that the desire-laden air seemed to lack even less oxygen than it normally did at seventy-five-hundred feet above sea level.

  “You like hiking?”

  I licked my lips. “I like anything that takes me higher.”

  It wasn’t fair; his half-grin at my reply was just as devastating as his wide smile.

  “Last I checked, Bae, tequila will take you to the floor,” he teased, the lighthearted sentiment almost as foreign on his lips as the taste of tequila.

  I had to force myself to laugh when my brain was really stuck on how my call sign slipped from his lips.

  I don’t know why I gave it to him.

  Maybe it was safer than my real name. Or maybe just force of habit. Or a shield that kept everyone at wing’s distance from the woman and her heart underneath the uniform.

  But he didn’t know it was a call sign. So, when he said it, it came out like it was originally intended. As an endearment.

  Before anyone else. As though I were his before anyone else’s.

  “You have something against tequila?” I shifted in my seat.

  His gaze bored into mine. “Not anymore.”

  I felt the heat rising to my cheeks as my tongue darted out over my lips.

  Minutes ticked as easily as questions slipped from my lips. As though we were taking shots of information about each other. Necessary absorption of facts until we felt comfortable forgoing the inhibitions we were eager to get rid of.

  We both had no siblings.

  I was twenty-two, and he was thirty.

  I was a Marvel girl, and he preferred DC comics. But we both agreed that country music was the only one worth listening to.

  My parents were gone. He didn’t talk to his.

  I didn’t have a boyfriend. He didn’t have a girlfriend.

  And we both liked tequila.

  “Oh my God, Bae!” Zoe squealed from the other side of the bar as the song ‘Cotton-Eyed Joe’ came over the speakers.

  There was a love-hate relationship with this song, but no matter how the rest of the crowd felt about it, it seemed like a perfect choice to blast in a small tavern in the Rockies.

  “Come dance!” she yelled again.

  A second later, she and her three friends were in lines in the middle of the bar, dancing the steps with the coordination of a well-trained platoon.

  I hadn’t danced in a while. Just like I hadn’t touched tequila like this in far too long.

  And I hadn’t felt this… high… around a guy… ever.

  I looked to Logan, and we both started laughing.

  And then the dimple did me in.

  “C’mon, Ranger Daniels, let’s dance.” I bit the side of my lip, watching fire flare in his eyes as I led him out toward my friends, the energy of the bar—and the tequila—taking hold of my senses.

  Fucking hell, Cotton-Eyed Joe.

  For long-laugh filled minutes, we danced our hearts out. My mountain ranger came over with me but stood by one of the bar tables, watching as I swayed and spun, nothing able to wipe the smile off my face.

  The alcohol was kicking in and I was finally relaxing.

  Relaxing back into Shay Covington. Relaxing out of the armor I’d built so I was neither looked at as less or more because I was a woman.

  But I was a woman.

  And that woman danced because I knew he was watching me.

  Desire.

  Protection.

  Possession.

  I felt it all burning in his stare each time I caught it. It was as though looking to him was part of the routine. Two taps in the front. Two in the back. Lift and look. Step and look. Spin back and stare.

  Somewhere in the course of the next few songs, a whole bottle of tequila made it into our dance party. Zoe pulled me to her as she took a sip, and then, grinning handed me the bottle. I followed suit and passed to the random guy standing next to me—a little too close for my liking.

  As the thought crossed my mind, the creeper wrapped his arm around my shoulder and took a swig of the alcohol—like handing him the bottle meant I’d handed over use of my body along with it.

  My fist tightened. I had no qualm about flattening this fucker, though assaulting someone my very first day as a Second Lieutenant in the Air Force probably wouldn’t look too good for me.

  Before my happiness was completely doused, a mountain drifted between us and the creeper’s arm disappeared like trees above eleven-thousand feet. Logan didn’t have to do anything else for the other man to vanish from the floor.

  My mouth dried out as my eyes trekked up the imposing expanse of his chest, up to where the expression on his face made me forget about anything except him.

  Anejo.

  That was what the color of his eyes were. Tequila aged in oak barrels. The deep caramel brown darkening with protectiveness.

  It made sense. Protecting was his job.

  Just like flying was mine.

  But right now, neither his actions nor the way my heart soared had anything to do with obligation and everything to do with desire.

  “You know how to dance, Ranger Daniels?” I asked with a low, breathless voice as his large hand ever so gently touching the small of my back.

  It was a subtle stake of his claim.

  I wished it were less subtle.

  “The tequila told me I do.” His head dipped down and he murmured next to my ear.

  I chuckled and as if on cue, a slower country song took over the speakers. I wrapped my arms up around his neck before he could think about dispersing with the crowd.

  “Tell me something about you no one else knows,” I demanded as his other hand found my waist.

  Holding me at a polite distance, we began to sway together and with each step, I inched closer to him.

  His jaw tightened as the tips of my tits brushed his chest. He grunted, “I always follow certain rules.”

  I sucked in a breath, my chest flattening against his. “And what are those?”

  “Don’t steal. Don’t lie. Don’t cheat.” He cleared his throat as his head drifted closer to mine. “The basics.”

  “Boy scout and a park ranger,” I murmured as my eyes scanned up over the dimple on his chin, my tongue running along the backs of my teeth eager to taste it. “I think you broke some of them, though.”

  I felt his body tense, corded muscles rippling underneath my fingertips, urging me closer against him.

  “What do you mean?” An expression of horror crossed his face so sincerely that it was almost comical.
r />   Maybe if he hadn’t been holding me so closely…

  “Well,” I began and stepped between his legs, pressing every last inch of my front against the rock-solid wall of his. The hands on my waist cinched down and pulled me tighter, confirming he wanted this closeness, too. “I’m sorry to tell you, Logan, but when you stopped us earlier, you stole my breath.”

  His eyes turned molten.

  “Which means you lied when you said you never steal.” I swallowed over the huge lump in my throat.

  I’d never been this forward with a guy before.

  Then again, the Academy had changed me. It made me decisive when it came to what I wanted—and what needed to happen.

  And there were only inches standing between what needed to happen right now—inches between his lips and mine.

  “Well, at least I didn’t cheat,” he rasped. My eyelids drifted down, weighed with desire.

  “You’re in the process of it.” My heart raced.

  “And how’s that?” he growled, this accusation affecting him the most.

  I slid my tongue over my lips and replied, “Every second your lips aren’t kissing mine, you’re cheating me—”

  His mouth sealed over mine, cutting off the rest of my claim and staking his own on me.

  His lips might have been the first to touch mine, but my tongue was the pioneer, sliding out along the seam of his lips, tasting the rich earthiness of evergreen and tequila. I was frantic to taste him, meanwhile, his tongue responded with firm and measured strokes as he charted every inch of my mouth.

  Whatever rules there were about kissing—he was either breaking them all, or he was following ones I never knew of. His lips slanted possessively over mine. Something I thought would’ve bothered me. To be possessed by a kiss. By a man. Instead, I only felt powerful as his possession carved new planes of hot, hard need over his body.

  I sagged against him, my arms wrapping tight around his thick neck as my fingers speared through the hair on the back of his scalp.

  My body was running on desire, a substance I would swear that burned hotter than jet fuel as it coursed slickly through my veins. And Logan was the ignition. I need to be closer… to be kissed deeper… to be felt more… so that I could soar.

  I moaned into his mouth.

  Was I really doing this?

  I’d had plenty—plenty—of opportunities to date, or hell, to make-out with guys. So many, it felt like flying was the only way to escape them all. But until I’d earned those wings, I hadn’t been interested.