The Care and Feeding of an Alpha Male

  “What’s that?”

  “Magnesium. It’s a fire starter.” He took the other side of the knife and shaved the bar on one side, then began to flick the knife against the magnesium, letting it spark repeatedly until the tinder caught, and began to smoke. The entire process had taken minutes.

  “Handy,” she commented, impressed. “I should get me one of those.”

  He glanced over at her, the hint of a smile tugging at his mouth. “Probably not much use in a beauty salon.”

  “You’re right. I’d be much better off arming myself with a curling iron.”

  Again that flash of an almost smile. It was encouraging. He nodded at the fire, barely more than a little spark in the middle of all that tepee wood. “Get me a little more tinder from the bucket, if you please.”

  She did so, quickly, and commented, “You guys sure have a lot of supplies in there. I thought it wouldn’t be much of anything.”

  He grunted. “Grant feels that if we have clients on the land, in case of emergency, we need to have the supplies readily available for them to survive with. Last I checked, there’s even a tackle box. Don’t see why we don’t just put a few cans in there with a can opener and a sign that says ‘Here, eat this.’”

  “You don’t approve?”

  He shrugged, feeding small twigs to the fire. “Not for me to approve or disapprove. It all boils down to the students. If they’re willing to learn, we can teach them. If not, well…” He shrugged. “We have MREs and a pile of firewood at the ready.”

  She sat on her haunches near the fire, watching the smaller bits he fed into the fire take flame and grow. “Yes, but we’re using the supplies, too.”

  He flicked a glance over at her. “We’re different.”

  Not in a bad way, she hoped. As he leaned forward and fed twigs on the fire, she watched his bare chest flex. His chest was rock hard. A hint of a six pack rippled on his abdomen, and his shoulders were big and lean. Allan had stopped exercising in college and had put on a belly. She hadn’t minded, of course, but all this lean, brawny muscle in front of her made her pulse flutter and she remembered how nice it was to dig her nails into a man’s skin and feel the taut muscle underneath.

  All thoughts she kept to herself, of course.

  Soon enough, the fire was crackling. Colt dragged two of the larger pieces of wood out and laid them flat, and they served as seats. They curled up near the fire on their logs, and pulled out two of the MREs and a bottle of water to split between the two of them. Colt showed her how to pull the tab on her MRE to heat it. The meal itself was kind of hideous if she stopped and thought about it, but she didn’t, and wolfed it down without complaint, noticing Colt did the same.

  “Not the tastiest meal,” he said casually.

  “Better than apples,” she said, and leaned over to nudge him with her shoulder teasingly. “Don’t knock it.”

  At her casual brushing against him, he stiffened, and she internally winced. Okay, maybe she was striking out. He just wasn’t into her. That was fine, really. They could be friends. Being enemies made hanging out with Miranda and Dane awkward, anyhow.

  “So what’s the plan?” she said, putting her hands on her knees and looking over at him.

  He squinted at the skies. “It’s probably going to rain again tonight. We’ll stay here, warm up by the fire, and head into the cabin for the evening…once I get rid of your possum.”

  She rubbed her arms. “Sounds just fine to me.”

  He stood up and headed into the cabin. Well, while he was occupied, she could at least get rid of the shoes that had been paining her so much. For a few hours, anyway. She bent to wiggle one off her foot. The straps were caked with mud and when she pulled it off, she winced with pain, hissing as it felt like part of her skin came with it. Blisters, then. Or she’d rubbed her foot raw. With all that mud on her feet, it was impossible to tell. All she knew was that it hurt.

  “Something wrong?” he said, startling her. She turned and looked over her shoulder and he hovered there, frowning down at her.

  “Oh…” She turned back to her foot and began to pry the other strappy sandal off. “Just questioning my choice in footwear. They seemed fine when I didn’t have to slog through a foot of mud cross country. I’m going to be feeling this for weeks.”

  “Hurts?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  He moved in front of her and sat on his knees. To her surprise, he reached for her foot and pulled it onto his lap.

  She sucked in a breath of surprise at the feel of his strong, callused fingers against her foot, but winced when he grazed one of the raw spots on her foot.

  “You tore them up pretty good,” he said with a drawl.

  “I didn’t have another pair of feet to walk on,” she said with a laugh, then winced when his fingers swept over her foot and grazed another tender spot.

  He didn’t seem to like her answer. His mouth compressed as he studied her muddy, dirty feet. “You should have said something.”

  “There was nothing to be done with it,” she said calmly, and pulled her foot out of his grasp. “Complaining about it wouldn’t have fixed it.”

  “Wait here,” he said, and got up, heading back into the cabin. He returned a minute later with a water jug.

  “Oh, now, you don’t have to do that,” she protested as he sat in front of her again and grabbed her foot once more, then began to pour water over it to rinse it. His fingers scrubbed away the mud carefully, and Beth Ann’s job was to basically sit there, with her foot extended, as this big, muscular soldier cleaned her foot. It was silly. It was awkward.

  It was…nice. He seemed determined to take care of her. When he placed her foot down and reached for the other, she didn’t even protest. It was too enjoyable to get her feet cleaned. “You sure we should be spending the drinking water on that?”

  “We’ll leave the jug out overnight. It’ll refill.”

  Good enough for her. She gave a sigh of pleasure as he swiped the mud off her ankle and calf, his fingers sliding up to stroke the mud off her smooth leg.

  Once that was done, he took her other foot in his hands again and began to carefully knead the muscles.

  A small moan of pleasure escaped her throat before she could bite it back.

  His head jerked up at that, and he gave her a look of surprise.

  “Sorry,” she said, blushing. “My feet are, um, sensitive.”

  That, and she was finely attuned to his touch right about now.

  His mouth quirked and she saw a flash of that dimple again. “I’ll be careful, then.” His fingers rubbed the ache in her foot even as he examined the places where her poor foot had been scraped raw and abused. She bit her lip as he continued to rub and brush his fingers over the skin. It was half massage, half medical examination. It shouldn’t have made her pulse beat low in her pussy, sending shockwaves of heat through her body.

  He leaned over her foot, then gave a snort of amusement and set it down, reaching for the other one. “You have a heart on your toe.”

  “Fourth one down,” she agreed with a small smile. “It’s my signature.”

  He looked up at her as he continued to stroke and rub her other foot. “Signature?”

  Beth Ann shrugged her shoulders. “It sounds kind of stupid, but when I first started doing nails, I put a heart on mine because I liked it. I thought it was cute. Then when girls would come in, they’d ask for the same heart on their nails as mine. I didn’t realize it, but apparently that’s how people know that women in town get their nails done at my salon.” She wiggled her fingers at him, showing the tiny heart on the tip of her short nails. “I like it. I always get a kick out of seeing people out and about and finding that small mark I made on them.” God, now she was babbling on about manicures and nails. He was going to think she was the world’s ditziest woman. “Kind of stupid, right?”

  His thumb pressed into the arch of her foot and sent another pulse of pleasure thrumming through her body. “Nah. Smart br
anding. It was a clever idea.”

  Well what do you know. He thought she was clever. Between the foot rubbing and the compliments, she could have expired on the spot.

  “All right, peas or carrots?”

  She thought for a minute before responding. “I think I’d have to go with carrots.”

  He nodded, hands behind his head as he stretched out on his back. “I’d have picked that, too. Your turn.”

  “Hmm.” She shifted on the slicker. The ground was still damp, so they had spread it out and used it as a makeshift picnic blanket in front of their fire. They lay there now, staring up at the starry sky overhead. Sometime in the afternoon, the clouds had begun to disappear, and tonight it was clear and brisk and lovely. The fire was warm, and even though the ground wasn’t the softest, she was content. She also couldn’t think of a thing to ask him. “Boxers or briefs?”

  “Briefs. You already saw that.”

  So she had. They’d been playing versions of this sort of question game for hours. With nothing to do but hang around camp and feed their fire, they’d started on safe topics…such as spring or fall. It had gone on for hours.

  She should be bored. Miserable. Annoyed as hell that her hair was tangled and she had dirt under her fingernails and her butt was mostly on grass that hadn’t quite dried yet. But, looking up at the blanket of stars overhead, feeling the warm fire toasting their legs, and the warm press of Colt’s shoulder against her own and she felt…curiously anything but miserable. She was enjoying herself. And that was odd.

  “You kinda fixated on clothing?” He nudged her with his shoulder.

  Only the ones covering his ass. Beth Ann shrugged. “I’m not good at this game.”

  “Nonsense,” he drawled. “My turn. Supergirl or Wonder Woman?”

  “Wonder Woman.”

  “How come?”

  Beth Ann thought for a moment. “Because Wonder Woman doesn’t live in anyone’s shadow. Wonder Woman is her own woman. Supergirl is just Superman’s kid sister or something.”

  “I don’t know that she’s Superman’s sister,” Colt said, twirling a blade of grass as he stared up at the sky. “Maybe his hot underage cousin or something.”

  “You’re so into superheroes, then here’s your question. Batman or Superman?”

  “Batman.”

  “And why’s that?”

  Colt grinned up at the stars. “Because Superman’s a reporter. Batman’s a millionaire playboy. He gets all the pussy.”

  She rolled her eyes and laughed. “Typical man answer.”

  He grinned back over at her. “Cake or pie?”

  “Cake,” she answered promptly. “Definitely cake.”

  “Why definitely?”

  “Because no one ever lets me eat it,” she said with a smile up at the stars.

  She felt him shift, sit up. His shadow blotted out the stars and he leaned over her, and his dog tags swayed close to her face. “What do you mean, no one lets you eat it?”

  Beth Ann glanced over at him, her gaze straying to that bare expanse of chest. He didn’t have a single hair on his chest. She liked that—neat, and clean, and allowed every muscle on his chest to show in blatant definition. She liked his tattoo, too. And the dog tags. Okay, she liked everything about him, which surprised her. “Oh, my parents were always very appearance conscious when I was growing up. Instead of a birthday cake, I got a fruit basket.” At his snort, she laughed. “It’s true. It wouldn’t look good for the mayor to have a butterball for a daughter.”

  “Don’t see why it mattered,” he said in a low, angry rasp.

  “It mattered very much to my parents. You’ve seen them about town. Have you ever seen a speck of dirt on my father’s car? Never.” Beth Ann supposed she should be annoyed with them, but their overbearing tendencies had been recently overshadowed by her newfound dislike for Allan. “They’re nothing compared to my ex.”

  “Oh?” He lay back again, but still propped his head up on his bent arm, as if he wanted to watch her in the firelight.

  The thought made her cheeks flush a little with excitement. “Allan always wanted me to look my best, of course. Anything other than a salad was greeted with ‘You’re going to eat all that?’ or ‘Will you be able to fit into your dress for the mixer on Friday?’ Allan very much wanted me to remain as thin and beautiful as I was in high school, in his eyes. Too many women let themselves go, he said, and he was determined to keep me looking just as perfect as I was then.” She gave a bitter laugh. “I told myself that when I broke up with him for the last time, I was going to eat an entire birthday cake in revenge.”

  “And did you?”

  She shook her head. “Nah. I think I was too upset to eat much of anything at the time, and by the time I remembered, it felt like I’d missed the point.”

  “He was a controlling bastard, wasn’t he?”

  This was getting uncomfortable. The last thing she wanted was a delicious, beautiful man leaning over her and talking about her ex. “Allan is Allan. He means well, but he has really high standards for everyone’s behavior but his own. It took me a while to realize that, and then when I did figure it out, I kept hoping he’d change. He didn’t, and I realized that I didn’t trust him anymore.” She looked over at him. “I’ve decided that I’m not having another relationship without trust.”

  He grunted.

  She couldn’t tell if that was agreement or disapproval, and felt the need to explain a bit more. “But no, I was oblivious to Allan’s true nature for a long time. Sometimes we just have blinders to how certain people are, because we want them to be how they are in our minds. Don’t you have anyone in your life like that? Your family?”

  “Nope,” he said abruptly. “We’re not talking.”

  She remembered his big clan of brothers on the edge of town, all living in a doublewide. She saw one of the Waggoners every now and then, but she didn’t run in the same circles as them. Most people didn’t. She remembered the father as a Nascar-shirt-wearing, tobacco-spitting junkyard owner. “Ah,” she said delicately.

  His finger brushed her forehead, nudging aside a stray lock of her bangs. It sent a skitter of pleasure through her body. “If it makes you feel any better, I always thought Allan was a dick, even back in high school.”

  She laughed at that, smiling up at him. The moment felt so intimate—she didn’t want to keep talking about Allan. “Let’s just say that I don’t regret our years together, but I also don’t regret breaking up with him.”

  “Kinda thought I’d come back and see you still with him, and driving a minivan full of kids.”

  She’d always viewed herself with that, too. Funny how life worked out. Beth Ann’s breath stopped for a moment as his finger brushed the lock of hair back to her hairline and lightly skimmed her brow. This was…incredibly sexy and intense all at once. And she felt like she had to make a little confession to him. “When I was with Allan, I was so focused on being the perfect girl—the perfect girlfriend, the perfect daughter, the perfect friend—that I didn’t realize that I wasn’t doing anything for myself. Allan didn’t want me to work, so I stayed home and made him lunches and kept the house clean. And I volunteered for book clubs and charities and ran fund-raisers because he liked that. And at some point, I realized, I stopped being me.” Her hand went to her heart, and her throat rasped just a little in remembrance. “I wasn’t Beth Ann anymore. Not to anyone. People didn’t see me as Beth Ann—they just saw me as that nice girl that Allan was going to someday make an honest woman out of. Not me. An extension of him. And it was partially my fault, because I’d been so focused on building him up in everyone’s eyes. All my hobbies were designed to make him look good.”

  Colt said nothing, simply watched her, his fingertip still smoothing stray hairs back on her hairline.

  “Do you know,” she said with a wry twist of her mouth, “that when I broke up with Allan for the last time, people in town kept coming up to me to give me advice. At first I thought it was sweet that they we
re so concerned with my happiness. And then I realized that they were giving me advice because they’d felt I’d done something wrong. That I’d been the one that somehow screwed up. And that with their guidance, they were sure they could make him love me again.” The laugh that escaped her throat was bitter.

  “Does it help much if I say I always hated everyone in town, too?”

  A tiny laugh escaped her, and she smothered it with a hand. “No. Well, a little. I’m sorry to unload on you about Allan.”

  “Don’t be,” he said, his voice a low, soft drawl. “I always thought he was a jackass, but I didn’t realize how much of one.”

  She smiled and shook her head. “It’s not his fault. Or I should say, it’s only half his fault. He made me half a person because I let him. After we broke up, I decided I was going to be Beth Ann from now on. I was going to do things that people didn’t expect Allan’s fiancée to do. I was going to say what I thought, and do what I wanted.”

  A tiny flash of dimple appeared in his cheek. “And have you?”

  “I opened my salon,” she admitted. “Everyone thought I should go to college, but I didn’t want to spend four years waiting for my life to start again. I wanted to start it right away, and I’d been taking beautician classes on the side. Hair and makeup has always been something I was good at, and I loved making other people feel special. It just seemed like the right move for me—to open a salon and run my own business, doing my own thing. Not dependent on anyone for anything. My father didn’t approve of his oldest daughter being something as common as a hair-dresser. He thinks ‘trophy wife’ is an acceptable occupation. And I thought Allan was going to have a fit over that. He didn’t think I could do it. But I am, and I’m doing just fine,” she said proudly. “And I dress how I want, not how I thought Allan’s fiancée should dress.”