Luke shook his head quickly. “What? You can’t—what?”
She pulled back, but didn’t lift her hands from his chair. He struggled to keep his eyes north of her neck, but dammit, he was pretty sure she was torturing him on purpose.
“I said I reject your challenge. You said I had a choice, right?”
“But—why—Gabi, seriously. You come walking over like you’re about to drag me to bed … and then you say you reject the challenge? Not nice.”
She smiled. “Not trying to be nice. Maybe I have my own challenge in mind.”
“Oh?” God, he was dying to reach out and pull her onto his lap. Dying to let his hands slide off her clothes and touch all of that silky smooth skin. Dying to lift her up and take her inside, the future implications be damned. “What’s your challenge?”
She tipped her head. “I’m an old-fashioned girl, Luke. Maybe I want you to kiss me first.”
He smiled, relieved, sliding his hands into her hair. “But I don’t have to?”
“Nope. You can reject mine just as easily as I rejected yours.”
He laughed, sliding one hand around the back of her neck as he brushed wisps of hair from her forehead. He pulled her gently forward, watched her eyelids flutter closed.
“Ah, hell, sweetheart. I definitely accept your challenge.”
And then his lips were on hers, and holy hell, it was like he’d never kissed a woman before. The zinging energy that flew directly from their lips downward had him shifting in the chair after only a few seconds, like he was in frigging junior high. She was tentative, sweet, and oh, so soft, and she tasted like strawberries and Sam Adams. Her hair fell around his face, and it was all he could do not to imagine it fanning over him in bed.
He gave her a gentle tug, and then she was nestled against him, one hand on his chest while the other slid slowly up his jawline and into his hair. And all the while, their tongues danced a slow, sweet rhythm as he tightened his arm around her, pressing her close.
It had been a long, long time since he’d been able to completely shut down all of his sensors and just live in a moment, but Gabriela gave him no choice. There was no way to think about anything but her as she whimpered softly when he pulled her closer. No way to imagine anything but slipping those clothes over her head and cupping her ass as he lifted her to his mouth.
Would she stop him?
They kissed for what felt like hours, until he could feel his pulse ratcheting up to meet the birdlike one he felt just under the skin on her delicate, sweet-smelling neck. He slid his hand under the hem of her tank top, meeting impossibly soft, silky skin. As his thumb grazed her curves—good Lord, no bra—she made a low, contented sound that went straight to his nether regions, and he knew if they didn’t stop soon, he wasn’t going to want to stop at all.
Oh, who was he kidding? He already didn’t want to stop. He had no idea where the woman had learned to kiss, but Jesus, she was going to do him in here, and he was going to be loath to prevent her from doing so.
Her fingers played in his thick hair, a heaven-sent erotic massage as she broke the kiss and pulled his head to her neck. He planted soft kisses along her collarbone and up to her ear, tracing it with his tongue, making her gasp and tighten her hands on his head.
With one hand, he slid the strap of her tank top aside, kissing a trail over her shoulder as his fingers slipped down her arm and onto her thigh. He could hear her breaths coming faster, could feel her pulse racing under his lips … knew there was no way making love to her would be anything but frigging spectacular.
And then one of the dogs yipped and moved to the edge of the porch, quickly joined by the other one. Gabi jumped, pushing her shirt back to rights as she pulled away from him. Luke swore internally as he grabbed for the flashlight. The dogs, even though they were small, weren’t barkers. If they were yipping, they’d seen or heard something in the woods. And there were four teenagers in a tent in those woods.
“Gabi?” A tentative voice came from just outside the light of the porch, making Luke swing his flashlight her way.
Make that three teenagers.
Gabi stood up quickly, almost losing her balance. Her cheeks were dead pink, as was her neck, and her hair was mussed from his hands, but she did her best to be all business as she turned to Sam.
“What’s up, Sam? Everything okay?”
“Um, yeah. Just woke up and saw you were gone, and you didn’t come back. Figured I’d better make sure you hadn’t been eaten by a bear.” She shrugged, crossing her arms. “But I guess … well, that wasn’t exactly the issue. Never mind. Carry on. Forget I was here.”
Gabi looked back at Luke, her eyes wide, but he didn’t know what she wanted him to do. Clearly they’d been caught. Even if Sam hadn’t seen them kissing, she’d only have to take one look at Gabi right now to know they’d been this close to taking things inside.
“Hey, Sam?” Gabi cleared her throat. “I wouldn’t mind if maybe we could keep this—you know—between us.”
Sam smirked, but Luke noticed it didn’t have quite the venom of a week ago. “You want to offer me something for my silence?”
“No. I’m just asking, one woman to another.”
Sam was silent for a long moment, but finally nodded. “Fine. I saw nothing, but if you do get mauled by a bear on the way back to the tent tonight, I want it on record that at least one of us gave enough of a shit to check on you.”
* * *
“Y’know, you can put that thing on backwards six times, and it’s still not gonna fit.” Oliver shook his head as he put his hands on his hips early the next morning. “Where’s your head today?”
Luke looked up from the outboard motor he’d been trying to repair, then sighed as he set it down and wiped his hands on a rag.
“My head’s fine,” he growled, then put up an apologetic hand. “Sorry. Not a lot of sleep last night.”
“Ah.” Oliver turned to the workbench, but not before Luke saw him smile. “Wouldn’t have anything to do with a woman, would it?”
Ha. It had every-damn-thing to do with a woman, and that woman was currently in the water, doing dock-to-raft laps, even though the air temp was still hovering below seventy degrees. She’d forgone her morning coffee in favor of a penguin plunge, which left him wondering exactly how much sleep she’d gotten after she’d followed Sam back to their tent last night.
“Why does everyone always assume a bad mood or sleepless night is about a woman?”
“Because usually it is.” Oliver shrugged. “And I might have seen one wandering your way last night, long after she should have been asleep.”
“Oh.”
“In my defense, I wasn’t looking … well, any more than I’ve had one eye out that window for thirty years now. Old habits and all.”
“Well, then, you must have seen her come back down that pathway an hour later, right?”
“Nope. Went to sleep. Figured you could handle her.”
Luke sighed, watching her touch the raft and head back toward the dock. She picked up speed, her strokes long and fluid, and he wondered if she was half as conflicted this morning as he was.
“I don’t know, Oliver. ‘Handle’ might be a strong word.”
“Well, I imagine she didn’t head your way looking to borrow a cup of sugar.” His eyebrows were up as he turned toward Luke. “Freak you out, did she? Not exactly the type you’d expect to show up at your door at midnight?”
“She’s not the type I’d expect to show up at my door anytime, if she wasn’t trapped here with us.”
“And that’s what’s got you all discombobulated this morning?”
“Maybe.”
Hell, yes.
Oliver shrugged again. “Might not be my place to notice, but all things being equal, I gotta say, she seems genuine. She could have come in here with a lot more bluster and a lot less class, and she didn’t. Somebody pulled a big-ass snow job on her with this assignment, and she hasn’t taken off yet.”
“Well, that’s because we’re holding her van hostage.”
“Bullshit. She knows she can have that battery anytime she asks. It’s not her we’re trying to keep from leaving.”
“I know.”
“She hasn’t been too proud to ask for help, either. I think that says a lot.”
Luke rolled his eyes. “Pretty sure that says she’s completely, utterly desperate.”
“Not that you have a pool-boy complex or anything.”
“A pool-boy—what?”
“Complex.”
Luke sighed. “I heard you. I just don’t know what you mean.”
Oliver reached for a metal stool and sat down. “Luke, we’ve known each other a long time, right?”
Oh, boy. In the scheme of conversational openings, this one never ended well. “Yeah. A really long time.”
“So you’ll excuse me for knowing a lot more about you than you’re probably comfortable with, right?”
“Nope.”
Oliver nodded, smiling. “Good. Then you’ll also excuse me for being more than a little pissed that you don’t think you could possibly measure up to a woman like Gabi.”
“It’s not about measuring up.”
“No?” Oliver sent his eyebrows upward. “Then what is it?”
“It’s about—hell, I don’t know. It’s about the fact that this isn’t reality, you know? She’s here for four weeks, I’m here for—well, I don’t even know, given Briarwood’s plans. We’re from completely different worlds, Oliver, and I’m pretty sure neither of us has any plans to change that anytime soon.”
“That’s a weak argument. Just saying.”
“No it’s not, and you know it. It’s reality. She’s here because she’s stuck here, not because she would have ever chosen a summer like this.”
“So it’s Stockholm syndrome? You’re going with the theory that the captive is falling for the captor, because he’s the best thing on the menu?”
“She’s not fall—she’s not a captive. Jesus, Oliver.” He rolled his eyes, trying to refocus his attention on the motor.
“Hey.” Oliver’s voice commanded attention, and Luke’s head snapped up, just like it had the night Oliver had bailed him out of that stupid drunk-tank cell. “You’re not the going-nowhere kid you tried so hard to be fifteen years ago. You’re not some sort of carbon copy of the loser father who never showed up to raise his son. You’ve made a life for yourself, and it’s a damn good one. You’re making a difference, and the right woman is going to see that. I have a feeling a good woman is already seeing it.”
“She knows nothing about me, Oliver.”
“And you think her feelings would change if she knew you spent your early days bouncing around from foster home to foster home? Think she’d find you less attractive if she knew you’d spent years fighting anybody who pissed you off, just because you didn’t know what else to do?”
“Yeah, I do.” Luke nodded, his jaw set hard. “Because that kid’s still boiling inside, and that kid will never get over getting left behind when his mother’s rich new boyfriend thought she’d be more attractive with fewer little truants in tow. So yeah, I’m all reformed adult and all, but there’s still a lot of anger there, and it’s firmly directed at a lot of people who deserve it … people who reside in the same circles as Gabi does.”
Oliver was silent for so long that Luke thought maybe he was finished speaking. But then he sighed carefully.
“What happened to your sister isn’t Gabi’s fault, Luke.”