“Every time you touch me, I…” She grimaced.
He smiled. “Come?”
“Yes!” She took a drag of air. “You have to stop that.”
“I don’t think I can.”
“You have to! It’s your turn!”
His eyes darkened. “Ever since you told me about that night at Long Lake, I’ve racked my brain trying to remember it, trying to make sure I didn’t hurt you, that your first time was memorable, and I can’t.” He shoved his fingers into his hair, standing there, arms up, taut and strained. “It’s been killing me.”
She gaped at him. “So is that what this has been? You trying to make it up to me?”
He didn’t answer but she saw the truth in his gaze, the soft regret, the heat and desire, and even more devastating, the affection, and it did the unexpected.
It softened her.
For once he seemed unable to read her. He was quietly watching her, and when she didn’t speak, he rubbed his bristly jaw to hers. “Are you okay?”
Funny, but she was. Maybe even better than okay. Sure, this probably was going to end in heartbreak, but that was for the future. She’d always lived for the damn future and she was tired of that. For once she was going to live in the moment.
And enjoy every single second of it.
At least for the next week anyway. Putting her hands to his biceps, she turned them, pressed him to the door, cupping his face to brush her mouth over his jaw. She was trying to find the words to tell him how okay she was, that he had nothing to make up for, but found herself distracted by how his body felt held between the door and hers, how deliciously hard he was.
Everywhere.
Her hands slid down his chest and he groaned. She kept moving, over his belly, heading for gold.
“Goddammit, TJ!” came Nick’s voice through the door. “I’ve been out there alone for fifteen minutes. Those girls have grabbed me at least twice, and I think Annie went looking for her gun.”
“Fuck.” TJ let out a long, shuddery breath and straightened, jaw tight. “Ready?” he asked Harley.
“I am.” She glanced down at the huge bulge in front of his cargoes. “But I don’t know about you.”
“Baby, if I was any more ready, I’d bust out of my skin.” He closed his eyes. “Now don’t talk to me for a minute. I’ve got to picture somebody’s grandma naked.”
She heard the laugh burst out of her as his words bathed over her, infusing her with a power she’d never felt before. She’d never been sexually aggressive, so when she found herself reaching out and running a finger over his zipper, and the hot length beneath it, she shocked herself.
A sound of raw desire tore from deep in his throat. “Harley.”
She did it again.
With another one of those sexy growls, he grabbed her wrist and gulped some air in. “Not helping.” He opened the door and gently shoved her out in front of him. “Go.”
She looked at him over her shoulder, and he groaned again, squeezing his eyes shut.
She felt another surge of that power and confidence, and unable to hold it back, she smiled.
He took it in and helplessly matched it. “Killing me here, Harley. Killing me.”
CHAPTER 22
Outside, TJ and Harley helped Nick load up the coeds and all the gear.
“About fuckin’ time,” Nick whispered over the top of the truck as they tied on the kayaks. “Jesus, what the hell were you two doing in there?”
“Do we need to have the birds and bees talk again?”
Nick rolled his eyes. “But the closet? With Harley? Seriously, what is it with you guys?”
“Hey, I seem to remember you and Annie just last week in the snowcat.”
“That’s different.”
“Really? How?”
“Well…” Nick scratched his head. “We’re old married farts.”
“You just turned forty. Not exactly ready for the senior home.”
“Just trying to keep it interesting. Besides, Annie attacked me. It’s the pregnancy hormones or something. I can’t keep up with her. She’s like a cat in heat. She wakes me up in the middle of the night to-”
“Stop!” TJ covered his ears. “Christ. I do not want to hear this.”
Nick grinned, apparently over his mad. “What happened to the no nookie-on-the-job rule?”
TJ and his brothers had come up with that rule a long time ago, when they’d first started the business. No fucking around on the job.
Literally.
There’d been slip-ups, most notably Cam’s thing with Katie last year, but for the most part, the rule had kept them from being stupid. “Harley isn’t a client.”
At that moment, she came up beside them to help tie the kayaks down. Her cheeks were flushed, her hair a little tousled. Her shirt was still untucked.
Nick pulled her in for an easy, affectionate hug and sent TJ a long, level look of warning over her head.
Yeah, yeah. She was like Nick’s baby sister, and if TJ hurt her, he was dead. Got it. As for Harley, she was looking adorably flustered, and to TJ, sexy as hell. Just watching her fingers work the ropes reminded him of how they’d felt outlining his-
“I don’t understand why you need my help with this trip,” she said softly, gesturing to the coeds. “Looks like any guy’s idea of a wet dream to me, having those four Mountain Barbies all to yourself.” She met TJ’s gaze. “Explain it to me again?”
“I need you to protect me.”
Nick smirked, then smoothed it into a smile when Harley glanced over at him. As far as “protecting” went, Nick would go to great lengths to do exactly that for Harley. Hell, they all would, which reminded TJ that if he screwed this up and hurt her, there’d be a lot of people looking to strangle him. Specifically Cam, Stone, and Nick. And while he could take any one of them, he was pretty sure that against all three he’d get his ass kicked.
Nick drove them out to the trailhead at the start of the Snake River. The plan was for him to make a food drop at the halfway mark the next day, then pick them all up at the ending point in two days.
Katie had given Harley the trip details to read on the ride, though it was hard to absorb details when she was still quivering from what TJ had done to her up against the door in the closet-which she was absolutely not going to think about.
She forced herself to concentrate on the file. The trip was relatively simple. Kayaking. Two nights of camping. She was to record the trip with her camera, and maybe give out some wildlife facts while she was at it.
No problem. She was experienced enough for that. She could kayak to Mexico if she had to. Cooking might be a little bit of a problem, but hey, TJ knew going into it what her skills were. He could cook. She’d happily serve and clean up.
Simple.
TJ rode shotgun in the front seat next to Nick. He was slouched back, looking deceptively lazy and at ease as the girls chattered incessantly amongst themselves. He looked like he was breathing once every other minute or so, and maybe that’s what he had to do in order to survive the silliness coming from the back, lower his heart rate to hibernation level.
Lani and Tandy asked about the landscape and the river, and TJ opened a map and showed them the proposed route, passively pleasant and professional. But when Shelly and Kitty asked about him personally, like was he single, did he date college-age sorority girls, and what was his favorite drink, he didn’t respond.
Nick shot Harley a glance in the rearview mirror, and Harley bit her lower lip to hold back her smile.
At the staging area, the girls pulled off their shorts and T-shirts, once again revealing their teeny tiny bikinis as they put on the protective gear that TJ and Nick handed out and insisted on everyone wearing. TJ spoke to the girls
