“You were with Chrissie,” she reminded him.
Chrissie had been his on-and-off girlfriend through high school.
Mostly off.
Actually, to be more accurate, girlfriend was a loose term for fuck buddies.
Good times.
“I went up there with Lance O’Brien,” she said.
TJ remembered Lance. They’d played basketball together. Lance had gone on to become some big hotshot sports announcer in San Francisco, but back then, he’d been into a different girl each week, slowly making his way through the entire student body.
Harley had been very shy and quiet in high school, and it had been an odd match.
“Yeah,” Harley told him, reading his mind. “It was what you might call a pity date on his part.” She didn’t look happy to be recounting the story.
In fact, she looked uncomfortable and extremely embarrassed.
“Lance was an ass,” he said.
She looked slightly mollified. “You and Chrissie were parked next to us, having a great time. I wasn’t having a great time.” She paused, then pushed away from him and walked a few feet off, staring into the wilderness, her shoulders straight but quivering slightly, as if they held the weight of the world.
And though he knew he wasn’t going to like the story, he moved close. “Tell me,” he said softly.
Harley had thought a lot about what had happened between her and TJ over the years, about her resentment, about him not remembering, but surprisingly enough, she’d never given any thought as to what it’d be like to tell him. She turned away from him and crossed her arms over her chest, staring into the woods, which were still echoing with the rain dropping from the trees.
TJ said her name, a quiet demand. “Harley.”
She acknowledged the low timbre and roughness of his voice with a little nod. She wasn’t being coy or annoying on purpose. She was just so nervous that her legs were shaking, but she’d started this, she’d finish it. It helped that she had her back to him, that he couldn’t see her face. “Chrissie had stolen some of her dad’s booze, and the two of you were sitting in the back of your truck sharing it.” Closing her eyes, it was as if she was back there. Late, hot, dark night. No moon. No breeze. Just the sounds of the crickets, the water lapping at the rocks, and TJ and Chrissy laughing and enjoying themselves.
Oh, and her own misery.
“I was mortified,” she went on quietly. “Because I’d been determined to lose my virginity that night, and you were parked right next to me. The whole time Lance was kissing me and copping a feel, I”—she shook her head—“I was wishing it was you,” she whispered.
She could feel him staring at her, could practically feel his frustration.
“Christ,” he said. “I don’t remember.”
“Chrissie asked you if her dress made her butt look fat and you didn’t answer. She got pissed, threw the bottle of liquor over the side of the truck, and got out.”
“Sounds like Chrissy.”
“She came over to us and asked for a ride home. Lance was drooling over her halter top. She was…far more well-endowed than I was, and I was already over the evening, so I got out of the car and said he could take Chrissie, that I was going to party with the others.” She paused. “I didn’t.”
“What did you do?”
“I climbed into the bed of your truck to sit with you.” She closed her eyes again. “They drove off and I found you lying alone, watching the stars.” He’d looked so damn hot all sprawled out. “You smiled and held out your hand, and I lay back with you to watch, too. You closed your eyes and drifted off. I did the same.” She’d been glowing, a little toasted from the alcohol. Mostly she’d been glowing because she was lying next to the big, bad, wildly sexy TJ and he’d been holding her hand. “You turned to me and pulled me into you and told me I smelled pretty.” He’d been so sweet, unexpectedly so, and warm. God, so warm. “You kissed me and…”
And here was the tough part to handle. “You…started touching me,” she said. “I’d had this stupid, silly crush on you for so damn long, but you’d never treated me as anything other than a pesky little sister, and…” And he’d kissed so amazingly, like heaven on earth. Some things never changed. “You started touching me, and all our clothes sort of fell away, and then…” And then he’d pulled her beneath him and she’d completely lost herself.
It’d been heaven, all of it, until he’d fallen asleep afterwards. She’d tried to rouse him and he’d pushed her away, muttering “Chrissie, shh. Tired.”
She’d never forget that, staring down at him in confusion and utter devastation. Remembering it now brought a flush of embarrassment to her face, and she put her hands up to cover it.
TJ let out a long, slow exhale, his breath ruffling the wet hair at her nape, and then turned her to face him. His voice was different when he spoke, calm but the concern clear even with his tight control. “Did I hurt you, Harley?”
“No. God, no. You…you were…” Sweet. Loving. Hot.
Perfect.
He pulled her hands away from her face and held them, waiting until she looked at him to speak. “Are you sure?”
“Very,” she said weakly, and closed her eyes, swallowing hard. “And I’d really like it if we could go back to not talking about it now.”
“We didn’t talk about it because I didn’t remember it,” he said quietly. “If I had, believe me, we most definitely would have talked.”
“It was a long time ago. It’s done.”
He let out a long breath.
“So…is this going to be uncomfortable now?”
“Does it feel uncomfortable?”
“No more than usual.” With her eyes closed, she registered the sounds around them. The wind rustling the trees, the rainwater still in the branches falling to the ground. The chirping of birds…
Incessant chirping, actually, which wasn’t a normal, happy sound. “Do you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
Shaking her head, she turned and followed the bird sounds, off the trail and through the thick brush.
“Harley—”
“Hang on, there’s something wrong.”
She found it at a full, majestic Jeffrey pine, towering at least a hundred feet in the air. At the base of the thick trunk sat a very young bird, squeaking, pathetically flapping its wings for all it was worth and getting nowhere. Above it was the nest from which it’d fallen, its frantic mom, and two more babies.
“Oh, no, you poor thing.” Harley carefully scooped up the baby and eyed the tree, trying to figure out how to climb it with the baby in her hands when TJ gently nudged her aside.
He reached for a branch above his head, using it to pull himself up with what appeared to be no effort at all. His T-shirt clung to all those flexing and bunching muscles as he straightened to a stand on the branch. He tested the branch above him, his jeans going tight and snug over his very fine ass.
“Here,” he said, crouching low again to hold out his hand for the baby bird, and caught her red-handed staring at his hind end.
He said nothing but did raise a brow at her.
She shrugged, but figured apologizing was a waste of breath. Besides, he’d ogled her in her wet shirt plenty. Fair was fair. She set the birdie in his palm and watched in awe and not a little bit of envy as he gently settled the little bird back into the nest. In thanks, the mom viciously pecked at him.
He pulled his hand back quickly, chuckling as he lithely leapt to the ground. “I don’t think she liked me much.”
Harley took his hand and looked at the blood welling from the new hole between two of his knuckles. “Ouch.”
“It’s okay.” He gestured to her to precede him back through the bush to the trail, where they’d left their packs. She started to open hers to look for her first-aid kit but he already had his out. “It’s really nothing,” he said. “Just want to make sure it’s clean.”
She took the kit from him. Since they didn’t have running wa
ter, she took his hand in hers and used an antiseptic spray. They both had their heads bent over their joined hands, so close she could feel the warmth of his breath on her jaw. Looking up into his eyes, she winced for him. “Hurt?”
“Nah.”
She smiled softly. “Now who’s the liar.”
Then she lifted his hand to her mouth and still holding his gaze, softly blew on the wound.
His eyes smoldered.
Later Harley would think she had no idea what the hell came over her, but she blew again, and he appeared to stop breathing. “If you’re doing that on purpose,” he said softly, his voice pure silk, “you should know, paybacks are a bitch.”
Next, she dabbed antibiotic ointment on the wound, then covered it with a Band-Aid, struggling with her conflicting emotions over him. The need to run far and fast—versus the need to crawl up his body.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she finally said, innocently.
He let her get away with that. Or so she thought, but when she turned to walk off, he snagged her, pulling her back against him. “Are we playing, Harley?” he asked, his mouth against her ear.
She could feel him, hard and warm at her back. Were they playing? Tilting her head up, she looked into his eyes, dark and heated.
“Is that question going to take you awhile?” he asked, mouth slightly curved.
“The question’s going to have to wait, since we’re losing valuable daylight.”
His slight smirk said he recognized a diversion tactic when he saw one, but he let her have it.
They had two hours left, she figured. She set the pace, and they walked in silence—which didn’t mean she couldn’t feel the weight of his thoughts, because she could. But he kept them to himself. It shouldn’t have made her like him even more, but it did.
An hour later, they cleared a ridge and came to a stop while Harley consulted her maps and GPS. “There,” she said, pointing to the next ridge over. “That’s where the first camera is.”
“Where did you plan on staying tonight?”
“There, or as close as we can get to it before dark.”
From where they stood at the cliff, they were overlooking a wide meadow, which was abundant with plant and small animal life that her coyotes depended on for food. Some large elk were grazing, their impressive antlers glinting in the waning light. It would take an entire family of coyotes to bring down one of those beauties. “I’m hoping to get a visual on some of the tagged coyotes,” she said, “if they show themselves. According to their trackers, most of the red group is in this area. There’s six in their pack and—” She paused. “Listen,” she said as the telltale buzzing of flies sank in, along with a sudden dread.
Stomach dropping, she followed the sound to a cluster of trees. At the base of one was a large burrowed hole in the ground, reinforced with a fallen log. A coyote den. Lying just inside was a far too still ball of fur. With an involuntary gasp, Harley crawled closer. “Oh, no.”
TJ dropped to his knees beside her and leaned in to look at the coyote. His expression was grim when he sat back on his heels.
“Dead,” she murmured.
“Not just dead.” He looked at her, jaw tight. “Shot.”
Her stomach dropped, but she brushed past TJ to look for herself, and felt her heart squeeze when she caught sight of the tag. Red. The coyote had been one of theirs. Throat burning, Harley consulted her GPS and her maps, and shook her head. “She was right where she should have been. She just got in some asshole’s way.”
TJ covered the mouth of the den with large rocks, making it a grave so that other animals couldn’t get to it, but also marking the spot so that Harley could lead the authorities up there if she had to.
TJ called it in to the forest service, and then Harley worked on pulling herself together with sheer will as they hiked to the next ridge.
It was a challenging hike, and got more challenging as they climbed. The air was thin, and they were surrounded by peaks that had been formed more than 30,000 years ago beneath ice sheets and snowfields. Back then, the ice had piled more than 5,000 feet deep in places, and as it’d retreated, the meltwater had forced glacial troughs, forming the harsh peaks and outcroppings, creating a rugged, isolated, unfriendly land.
For humans.
But wildlife tended to thrive there. Especially coyotes—at least when no one was shooting at them. Proving it, Harley watched as a group of them moved as one through the meadow far below, bounding through the tall grass calling and yipping to each other.
She pulled out her camera and lost herself for long moments, taking pictures with her wide lens. The moist air rode out on southeasterly winds. Clouds were still sifting trough the trees like wood smoke. The weak sun hung as low as possible in the sky, seeming to perch precariously at the horizon line for a beat, then sank down in a blaze of glory. After that…utter darkness.
In that darkness, the air was heavy with humidity from the storm and fragrant with late autumn wildflowers and pine. It was gorgeous, and Harley felt a rush of excitement and adrenaline from all of it, the moon-streaked landscape, the wildlife’s natural music.
The company.
“What now?” TJ asked when she’d put her camera away.
“Make camp.” Which was really his expertise, not hers. She felt a little nervous pulling it off in front of his watchful eyes, but he’d let her lead all day long, and didn’t seem in any hurry to take over.
She knew that was out of deference to her, that he wanted this to be her gig as much as she wanted it for herself. She appreciated it, more than he could know. Being out there, being in control and in charge, had fueled her soul in a way she hadn’t expected.
Even with the unexpected emotional trip down Memory Lane, and finding the dead coyote.
Standing in the clearing where she’d planned on staying the night, TJ shook his head, pointing to signs of a recent campfire. She stared at it, wondering if whoever had shot that coyote had camped there.
Beneath the ambient moonlight, he took her hand. “Not here.”
“A little higher?”
“Definitely.” He squeezed her hand. “I’d like our backs up against the mountain and a good view in front of us.”
She nodded, and for the first time all day, let him lead, which he did with expected efficiency, using his Maglite. He moved them along as fast as they could go in the dark, and in less than ten minutes, he’d found a better spot. It was higher and, as he’d wanted, had the added advantage of them being able to keep their backs to the wall.
As they stood at the new spot, Harley realized for the first time that they were going to spend the night.
Together.
Her body gave one traitorous little quiver of excitement, which her brain worked hard to shut down, though it wasn’t entirely successful.
It’s not like the last time you spent the night with him, she told herself. For one thing, this time, you’ll be fully dressed.
No getting naked, she repeated to herself several times.
No getting naked.
CHAPTER 8
“Here, where the ground is dry.” TJ used his flashlight to better reveal the spot in the clearing. He dropped his pack on the ground and looked at Harley, who nodded but didn’t speak. She was hugging his jacket to her and seemed pale. He figured it was due to the combination of the shock of finding the dead coyote and being cold and wet. “I’m going to get wood for a fire,” he told her. “You need to change into dry clothes.”
“No,” she said, and pointed to a fallen log. “Sit.”
He arched a brow. “Excuse me?”
“Yeah,” she said toughly, ruining it by shivering. “You’re going to sit. And stay. Just like you told me to stay before.”
“But you didn’t stay.”
“Okay, true,” she said. “But you’ve already walked through a rainstorm, climbed a tree, got a hole pecked into your hand, and dragged rocks for a grave for that coyote, all for me. Hell, you even gave u
p your warm jacket. So now you’re going to sit and let me do the rest, as I would have done for myself anyway.”
He wanted to argue, wanted to say he could get a fire going in three minutes flat, and that she needed to get warmed up quick. But those things were counterproductive to his plan, which was getting her back to relaxed and enjoying herself. He really wanted that for her, so he obediently sat. “You going to cook for me, too?”
They both knew damn well she could burn water with little to no