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Clumsy Girl Disintegrates into a Million Pieces—and Loves Every Second of It.
Myla wanted to laugh. And cry with joy. And leap tall buildings with a single bound. Anything was possible.
The world was full of roses and sunshine.
And love.
She'd made love with Sawyer. They'd made love together. He hadn't been disgusted. Hadn't turned away.
Instead, he'd turned her inside out with pleasure.
As her breathing leveled out, Sawyer raised his head. She ran her fingers over his scruffy jaw. Who could have imagined that stubble could cause such delicious sensations? She reached up and kissed him, enjoying the textures until he pulled back.
His serious eyes studied her. “You okay?”
That made her laugh. "Any more okay and I might explode. Again."
A soft smile appeared. “Any regrets?”
“Not a one.”
Sawyer moved off her. “Let me deal with the condom. I’ll be back.”
Myla watched him cross to the attached bathroom. The man was a piece of art. Strong muscles, smooth movements. Someone who knew his body well and kept it finely tuned.
Myla tugged the sheet more tightly about her. He certainly hadn’t acted like Joel. Not that she’d expected it. Sawyer had more decency in his baby toe than Joel had in his whole heart.
He also had made her feel things she hadn’t expected. And that wasn’t limited to the orgasms that had nearly melted her bones.
She was afraid Sawyer’s fears had been right.
Her heart was way past wobbling, it had gone and plopped itself right into a puddle of love.
Unless that was an aftereffect of orgasms.
She had to be sensible about this. Logical. Practical.
The plan was to leave Bloo Moose in a few days. Which meant she’d only been in town for a week. No one fell in love in a week. No one.
Certainly not someone who had never experienced love.
That was it. The only explanation.
She was latching on to poor Sawyer because he was her first. And the only one who had ever really paid any attention to her. Sexual attention.
Which she wanted to enjoy as long as she could.
Love schmove. Sex was where it was at.
All she had to do was convince her heart.
Sawyer opened the bathroom door and his self-satisfied and hungry grin had Myla forgetting everything except that sexual attention.
As he prowled toward the bed, shivers traveled over Myla and her imagination started figuring out ways to spend the rest of the coming week.
***
SAWYER hadn’t seen much of Darby over the past few days, so he popped into the B&B early. He was taking Myla to Fortini’s that evening. The first time he’d taken her out.
They’d spent most of the past day and a half in bed. Or the shower. And hot tub.
Before his mind could conjure up more of places they’d spent some quality time, he shut down the images. He was going to chat with his sister. Not the time to be thinking about Myla gripping the kitchen counter with her legs over his shoulders.
Sawyer drew in a breath and brought up the reintegration statistics for the wolf program and ran through them a few times before climbing the steps into the B&B.
As she was most days, Darby was in the kitchen and the place smelled like heaven.
She was scraping plates and loading the dishwasher so he moved to the sink to start on her pots and pans.
“What smells so good?”
“Chicken marsala.”
“Never heard of it but I’m invited the next time you make it.”
Darby laughed and gave him a hip bump as she moved past him to grab the cutlery she rinsed in the sink. When she was done, she grabbed a towel and started drying the pots.
“You picking up Myla?”
Sawyer nodded. “In a bit. Thought I’d pop in and see you first. Things okay?”
Darby smiled and nodded. “Of course.”
Sawyer wasn’t fooled. He knew his sister had been spending more and more time in the B&B and less time out and about with people. She was the friendly one, the one everyone liked. But something had changed and he wondered if he should be worried or if she was happy with the way things were.
Women were tough to figure out.
“You seem to have gotten over your distrust of Myla.”
And then some.
The morning after their first night together, he’d gone online again while she was still warm in his bed and checked out her claims.
She hadn’t lied. A quick search of her name pulled up a ton of results. Links to articles she written for a wide variety of magazines. He’d even found the one about the sailor with hypothermia.
None of her writing leaned toward sketchy news journalism. None of it was written for shock-value.
Myla wrote about people sometimes but always based on interviews with the people.
For the most part, especially in the last couple of years, she solely focused on tamer level adventures that could be enjoyed by Joe Average. No right-on-the-edge extreme sports. No death wish stuff.
The articles he skimmed matched his Myla perfectly. Informative and fun. The woman could write.
She’d found him at the computer, brought him coffee he hadn’t noticed her making and unlocked her phone and dropped it beside the computer. “Have a look at whatever you’d like.”
So he’d looked at what he’d liked. And it wasn’t the phone or the computer. Instead, he’d tugged open his robe that she’d thrown on and looked his fill.
Darby poked him with her finger, shaking him out of more memories he had no business reliving in front of his sister. Where had his control gone?
Myla had shredded it.
Shredded him.
“Earth to Sawyer. Where’d you go?”
Sawyer drained the sink and rinsed it out to give him a moment. “You doing okay, Darb? The B&B getting enough guests over the winter?”
Of course, the change in direction didn’t fool her. Not much had since he’d been able to get her to help with his chores by convincing her she was too young to do them.
The memory made him smile and he reached out and pulled Darby in for a hug. “Are you really okay, Darby? Things are good?”
She returned his hug tenfold and held on tight. “I’m really okay.” She just held on for a bit. “You? How are you doing? Really?”
He squeezed her again. “I’m good.”
“Flashbacks?”
He thought of the one in the woods. “Not often.”
Darby wriggled away and moved the coffee machine to pour them both a cup. He’d never been in the kitchen when there wasn’t a fresh pot ready for him.
She motioned him to a stool and started preparing a tray of desserts and baking she’d leave out in the front room for her guests.
He snagged a chocolate chip cookie.
“Did you want something else to eat? There are some leftovers.”
He shook his head. “I’m taking Myla to Fortini’s.”
Darby stilled for a moment. “Fortini’s? Nice.” But her tone said otherwise.
“What’s wrong with Fortini’s. It’s the best restaurant in town.”
She nodded her agreement. Best Italian food he’d ever found anywhere.
“Are you sure you know what you’re doing with Myla?”
He forced his thoughts to strictly PG because he sure knew what he was doing with her when they were alone. “What do you mean?”
She shrugged and her pinks tinged. Tough talks had never been Darby’s thing which meant she was worried.
“I don’t want either of you getting hurt.”
“We’re having fun, Darby, that’s all. She’s great.”
“She is. But she’s leaving soon.”
Sawyer ignored the way his stomach dropped and his heart raced. “I know.”
“Are you going to be okay with that? Both of you?”
“Of course. We knew going in there was a time limit. It’s not like we’re planning to get married, Darby. Nothing but a bit of fun. It’s no big deal.”
But he was starting to think it was a big deal.
At least it was to him.