Instant Gratification

“Yes. I don’t trust me, but oddly enough, I trust you.”

With a smile, he took her hand and pulled her outside. “You should know, I’m grumpy,” she said.

“Shock,” he said.

“And irritated.”

“More shock.”

That tugged a laugh out of her. “And I don’t think anything about us being alone together is a good idea, much less being naked.”

He slid her a speculative look. “No one said anything about being naked except you. And you keep saying it.” He flashed one of his slow, killer smiles. “You’re going to miss me.”

“You think so?”

“Oh, yeah.”

Oh yeah was right. She was going to miss him. So damn much it hurt to think about, so she’d managed not to think at all for the most part. “Did you bring me the instructions you promised?”

“Worked all afternoon on it,” he said, and gestured for her to get into the Jeep.

“Isn’t this TJ’s vehicle?”

“Yep. He has my truck.” The top was off, but the evening was warm enough. She got in and let the light wind roll over her as he took off. “Where’s my instructions on relaxing?”

“Coming.”

But he just kept driving.

Just outside of town, on the narrow two-lane highway cutting up through two majestic mountain peaks, he finally handed her a folded up piece of paper.

She unfolded it. He’d written only one line:

Close your eyes.

“Sort of self explanatory,” he said when she just stared at him.

Fine. She closed her eyes.

“How do you feel?” he asked.

“Silly.”

“That’s because you don’t like to follow directions, you like to make them.”

True enough.

“What else do you feel?”

“Dizzy. The road is curvy.”

“You can get car sick if you need to, it’s TJ’s Jeep.”

She laughed, and heard the smile in his voice when he said, “What else, Emma?”

“Well…” Sometimes after a day off from her ER, she’d come back and stand in the middle of the place and close her eyes, just breathing it all in. The rush of rubber soled shoes, the sounds of the equipment beeping, the scent of antiseptic and rubbing alcohol…It’d always been nirvana to her.

It couldn’t be more different here. She could feel the warmth from the remnants of the setting sun on her face. She could hear the whistle of the wind, the screech of a bird, the hum of the Jeep’s engine. She could smell the fresh dirt, the pine trees. “The air up here always makes me think of Christmas.”

“Yeah, that’s the thing I miss the most when I leave here, and the first thing I notice when I come back,” he said, and turned down a dirt road, shifting into four-wheel drive, taking her up a trail she wasn’t sure she’d even be able to hike.

She opened her eyes again. The Jeep rocked from side to side, and on the next turn, she’d have sworn two of the wheels left the ground. It wasn’t what she’d expected, the whole four-wheeling thing, but in truth, she’d never been, never even thought about it, had only seen pictures in a magazine, or the occasional story on TV, but the reality was…

Bigger.

The Jeep was versatile and tough, taking the roads with ease. Or maybe that was Stone himself. He handled the wheel as if he’d been born with it. She watched his big hands, one on the wheel, one on the stick shift, not white knuckled like she was, but handling the job while remaining cool, calm and collected.

In easy control, as she would be in the ER.

Yet unlike how she’d be at work, he was also relaxed. Laid-back.

All the things she wanted to learn to be. “What’s next?”

He handed her another little piece of paper, which she unfolded.

Be patient.

Ha. “If I knew how to be patient,” she said, “we wouldn’t be doing this.”

“Wouldn’t we?”

She met his gaze, his clear and green, and so direct it was hard to take. He allowed her to see his affection, his need for her, the heat, and she found herself swallowing hard. “I meant, I wouldn’t be here in Wishful. I’d have hired someone for my dad instead of coming to help him out.”

“Would you have? Really?”

She blew out a breath. “No.”

He smiled and reached for her hand. “Hi.”

“Hi?”

“Hi to the real Emma. Now stop thinking so hard and look around.”

She didn’t want to, because she instinctively knew that she was vulnerable to him, but she did as he asked and looked around. They were surrounded by woods, deep, dense, overgrown woods, and she could see nothing but pine and Manzanita bush and-

And suddenly, with one last turn, it all fell away and they were on the edge of a cliff.

Looking down. And down. And down…

It was staggering. Heart-stopping. She’d never in her life seen anything like it.

“The Tahoe Rim Trail,” he said quietly, turning off the engine so that the air was filled with nothing but a bird’s cry, the hum of unseen insects, the light brush of a breeze.

He hopped out of the Jeep and she followed him, walking to the edge of the drop-off, where hundreds of feet below, she could see the huge expanse of Lake Tahoe, spread out like some magnificent feast for her eyes.

“This way.” He led her along a very narrow trail that had her huffing and puffing in two minutes flat while his breathing remained perfectly steady.

“I could have relaxed easier at a spa,” she said, huffing like a freight train.

“Consider this the Wilder spa, and you’ve booked the Stone Special.”

She gasped for breath for another few hundred feet. “I think I’m dying.”

“It’s the altitude.” He opened his backpack and pulled out a water.

“You came prepared.”

“Don’t look surprised. It’s my job.”

It was, she realized, not just to have a good time, but to be ready for anything. Like her job, his required him to have whatever they’d need. She might have just gotten in the Jeep without thinking much about their plans, but he’d put thought into it, as he did into every trip he made because it was up to him to be in charge.

It was odd to think of his work that way, to compare it to hers, even in broad scope. But it reminded her that when she’d first come here, she’d seen him as a mountain bum. How perceptions change. She couldn’t help but wonder, had his perception of her changed too?

He pulled a third piece of paper from his pack and handed it to her:

Stop over-thinking.

“You think you know me pretty well, don’t you?”

Smiling, he handed her another.

Go with your gut instincts.

He’d kept walking while she read that last one. She eyed him just ahead of her, moving along with an easy confidence that was so sexy he made her mouth dry. His shirt was stretching the limits at the shoulders, playing over the muscles of his back, half tucked into his Levi’s, which were all in themselves a gift to her eyes. The jeans were loose and low on his hips, nicely taut across his extremely fit butt, and emphasized his long, powerful legs. “Go with my gut instincts on what?”