Tansy placed the last jar of spices back on the shelf. Phail Phoods had a surprising amount of bulk items and that helped reduce the amount of prepackaged foods Tansy bought. The glass jars she used for storage were heavy to cart to town and back again, but it was worth the effort. And it took far fewer trips with Sam to help.
Sam shoved the large bag of flour onto a pantry shelf. “You’ve been hefting all of this by yourself?”
“Are we on that again? Simple answer for future questions. Yes, I did it by myself. No, it wasn’t a big deal. Yes, I’ve been perfectly safe. No, I haven’t had any problems I couldn’t solve. Does that about cover it?”
Sam’s laugh rumbled across the room. “Getting a little annoyed by the questions, Tans?”
“The repetitive ones, yes.”
When she turned, he was in front of her, caging her against the counter like he had at the trunk of the car.
The man’s muscles had muscles, but she could break free with nothing more than a look. She stayed where she was, enjoying the warmth that always radiated from his body and his presence.
Like she had at the car, she ran her hands up his chest and down his arms. They’d rid themselves of their jackets, so she could feel those muscles beneath his Henley.
“Maybe I should find something else to do with my mouth.” His growl sent tingles to all the very best places.
Tansy reached up to kiss him lightly. “Maybe you should.”
The moment Sam’s lips touched hers, Tansy felt as if gravity had forgotten to work. Her body lightened and lifted.
And then Sam followed through on her thoughts and boosted her up onto the counter without breaking the kiss. Tansy spread her legs for him and he stepped into her. She wrapped her legs around him, tugging him closer and earning a growl of approval.
Tansy eased her hands under his Henley and finally touched that marvelous skin.
She traced her fingers over his abs and smiled into the kiss when he flinched in reaction to her touch. She did it again and moved up to roam over his pecs.
When they broke their lips apart, Tansy shoved the shirt higher and pressed a kiss above his heart. Sam reached behind him and yanked his shirt off in one smooth move.
“Perfect.” She wasn’t sure if she meant the sexy move or the fact that now she had all this skin to explore and to taste. His muscles reacted to her touch, and she knew she could become addicted to him in no time. If she wasn’t already.
While she explored, Sam’s hands reached under her shirt and his thumbs brushed over her nipples through her bra, making her arch into his touch.
“Let’s even things out.” And then he ran his hands up, so she automatically raised her arms and then her shirt flew. Leaving her in a plain bra. She’d never bothered with fancy lingerie, but suddenly she wanted to be frivolous and buy all things lace and silk.
Sam’s smile was predatory as he took her in, and then those big hands were back on her body, cupping her breasts and rubbing his thumbs over her bra.
Then the bra was gone, and his mouth replaced his thumbs. And Tansy nearly rocketed off the counter.
“You’re gorgeous, Tansy.” His words were muffled because his mouth was locked on her skin.
One of Sam’s hands reached for her yoga pants and slid inside. His other slid her forward a bit, so she was barely sitting on the counter.
Still, his mouth played with one breast and then the other, sending her heart racing and need spinning through her.
Part of her mind wanted desperately to catalogue the sensations. She’d never felt anything this strongly and wanted to know the how and the why.
But most of her brain simply collapsed in on itself and all she could do was feel.
When Sam’s fingers reached beneath her panties, and slipped lower to tease her, she liquified and only his other hand kept her upright.
Sam lifted his head to smile at her. “Time for my experiment. Let’s find out what happens when I do this.”
His finger teased along her entrance, lightly. Back and forth, back and forth.
With each pass, her bones melted a little further.
“Nice. Very nice. How about this?”
His fingertip eased in, barely parting her and Tansy couldn’t hold in the gasp.
“And this?”
His finger dipped in and Tansy’s head fell back. He licked her breast and moved his finger with the same rhythm. Slow. Lazy.
Perfect.
“Deeper?”
Deeper was good. Very good.
“Maybe this?”
A second finger entered her and Tansy hissed out her breath, unable to form coherent thought.
Sam swore and then hauled her upright to slam his mouth on hers.
His tongue matched his finger in rhythm and in pressure, never letting her settle, never letting her fly.
And then he found her clit, and it was only moments before Tansy was soaring.
Sensation filled her, spun her, and sent her chasing every last drop of pleasure as Sam continued to ply her body like a fine instrument.
She was shuddering and gasping for breath, unable to do anything but hang on to Sam.
“Holy shit, Tansy. That was the sexiest thing I’ve ever seen. You are freaking glorious.”
His words were low and rumbly, and she wrapped her arms around him and kissed him with everything she had.
When she had enough strength back, she kept her mouth on his but reached for the button on his jeans.
Sam laughed and stepped back, breaking contact and leaving her wobbly. He scooped up her bra and shirt and handed them to her.
Confusion fogged her brain. Her gaze went to his jeans and she was right. He was turned on. Feeling exposed, she held the shirt in front of her. “Sam? What are you doing?”
“Getting dressed, honey.”
“Why?” She knew her voice wavered, but she couldn’t do anything about it. She must have done something wrong. His words and his actions contradicted each other.
She wanted to believe the words, but actions always told the truth.
And Sam stood across the room from her, fully dressed and pulling out his phone.
“We can’t go any further. Not yet. I have to talk to Joe. Like I said before, I can’t do this until I speak with him.”
He wanted to talk to her brother. He’d been thinking about her brother while she’d been losing her mind with pleasure.
Tansy yanked on her t-shirt and grabbed her bra. She wasn’t fumbling with that while he watched.
“I am not a child. Joe is not my keeper.” Her voice wasn’t strong enough, so she took another breath. “You go ahead and call him, but you might as well talk about something else, because you just killed the mood. Permanently.”
Tansy grabbed her keys and moved back to put on her shoes. She was jerking the laces when Sam knelt beside her and touched her arm. She flinched away.
She’d been completely carried away, and he’d been in a clinical mood, thinking about her damn brother.
“Tansy, listen. I just need to talk to him.”
“Do whatever you please. I need to work.”
She pushed up, and he tried again, but she shook him off.
“Where are you going?”
That nearly snapped her control. “None of your damn business. I don’t answer to you and this is my property. Take your stupid big brother attitude and leave me alone.”
Then she stomped out the door and started to run.
Sam watched Tansy run off into the woods, not in the same direction they’d taken that morning.
He wasn’t sure what the hell had just happened.
Why would him calling Joe send her into such a tizzy? Tansy wasn’t any sort of drama queen and he rarely remembered her raising her voice in all the years he’d known her.
She was more pissed than he’d ever seen her.
And hurt.
Those eyes had radiated hurt more than anger.
He knew he couldn’t keep up with Tansy’s brain when it came to science, logic, and creativity. But he’d thought he was more her match when it came to real life stuff.
Apparently not.
He was trying to do the right thing here. He didn’t want to sneak around behind Joe’s back with his sister. Didn’t want to hide their relationship.
He was trying to be direct and above board.
Trying not to rush her.
His mind was swirling with images of Tansy reacting to his touch, going over the edge in a burst of fire and light.
Maybe he’d be able to think once his head was cleared. And once his body had calmed down. Which might be awhile.
He hadn’t expected to take it that far with her, but her reactions had pulled him in and dragged him along. God, if his brain hadn’t finally kicked in, he might have taken her right there on the counter.
She deserved more for their first time.
He’d make it better.
If she hadn’t been serious.
Permanently.
He’d miscalculated by a mile because he’d never expected that reaction from her.
He considered tracking her down, but decided against it. It was obvious she wanted some time to herself at the moment. She knew her land far better than he did and she wouldn’t have any trouble evading him.
But if she wasn’t back soon, he’d head out to her fort. He’d even give her a couple of hours.
That was reasonable. Then they’d figure this out and he could make it up to her in a creative way. Or two.
Satisfied with his plan, Sam shoved his phone into his pocket. He needed to be calmer before talking to Joe. He turned his attention back to the lodge. What was he going to do for the next couple of hours?
He wandered the main floor looking for the room Tansy had decided on for the workout space. When he spotted the yoga mat in the corner, he figured he’d found it.
The large room was at the far end of the lodge from the kitchen. Windows looked out to the lake, and the ceilings were high enough to accommodate some weight machines.
Marking the location in his head, he wound his way back to the basement stairs and wandered through the space to find the beams beneath the room.
No wonder Tansy was fascinated by the basement. It was full of boxes and barrels and bins holding endless amounts of leftovers from over a century of life just beyond the edge of civilization.
There’d never been a need to make a road from the sawmill to the lodge, even though the same family owned both.
The structure of the lodge appeared sturdy enough for him, but he wasn’t an expert. There was nothing obvious he could do here to help out, so he headed back to the stairs, pausing at the aisle that held the camouflage vests that had triggered Tansy enough to drop her phone.
He knew enough now to realize the camo had caused her to think of James the Asshole who was trying to claim credit for her solar panel hologram device.
And that gave Sam a focus while he let Tansy cool off.
He headed back upstairs and sat on one of the chairs beside the pellet stove, then started a search on Tansy’s lab back in California.
Unsurprisingly, it wasn’t easy to find information. Tansy wasn’t interested in notoriety and she didn’t have a single social media profile. But Sam hadn’t worked at the FBI for nothing. Even without the specialized programs he had access to at the office, he had some serious research skills.
It took another twenty minutes, but in the end, he had a name and a picture.
James Stephens.
Dweeb.
Sam studied the picture. The man looked normal enough. Nothing about him screamed thief or user. He supposed women would think he was good-looking.
Obviously Tansy had.
Which pissed him off.
Sam doubled down on his search and came up with a lot fairly quickly. Stephens was on multiple social media sites. The man took a lot of selfies. Obviously, notoriety was important to him.
Never much information about his personal life, but always with captions aimed to make him look impressive.
#scientistatwork
#physicistinaction
#anotherexcitingdiscovery
#investigationinprogress
Asshole.
Stephens didn’t list his relationship status or mention Tansy in any of the posts.
There were no obvious ties to organized crime or terrorist groups, but no one advertised that.
Joe might be able to dig up more from the office programs. As if his thoughts had brought him up, Sam’s phone rang and Joe’s name flashed on his screen.
“Hey Chevy. Just about to call you.”
“You found the asshole?”
Sam grinned. They were on the same page. “Pretty sure. James Stephens, with a ph. Physicist extraordinaire according to his social media shit.”
“Good work. Tansy know that you’ve found him yet?”
Sam couldn’t ignore the segue, even though he wanted to. “Not yet. She’s a little pissed at the moment.”
“What did you do?”
Sam laughed. “You assume I did something?”
He could almost hear Joe’s eye-roll over the phone. “Obviously. Tansy doesn’t get pissed all that often and certainly not at you.”
Huh. “Well, I kissed the hell out of her and she kissed me back. And then I said I needed to talk to you before we took it further. Don’t want you thinking I’m going behind your back.”
There was dead silence on the other end of the line, and Sam clamped his teeth together to stop himself from any more rambling.
“Okay.” Joe stretched the word out to about four syllables.
“Okay?”
“Well, you two have been watching each other for years, so it’s not like it’s a big surprise.”
“What?”
Joe sighed. “This is weird. She’s my sister. You’re like a brother. It hurts my head. And if you screw it up between you and make a mess of our family, I’m going to kick your ass.”
He could try.
Joe swore and then spoke again. “Look, you guys have been wanting to do this for a bit. Just don’t mess it up and make it awkward for anyone. Meaning me. Don’t make it weird because that would suck.”
Sam laughed ruefully. “I may have already managed that.”
“Tell me you weren’t being literal when you said you stopped kissing her to talk about me.”
His pause said all it needed to.
Joe swore again. “Man, don’t you know anything about women? They don’t want you thinking about anything else but them when you’re kissing them. Hell, if you’re doing it right, you shouldn’t have room to be thinking about anything else yourself.”
Shit. That’s exactly why she was pissed.
“This is weird because it’s Tansy, but you gotta do better than that, Sam. Especially since that asshole used her.”
Oh, hell. That hadn’t crossed his mind. And it should have. Maybe he should kick his own ass. He’d barely been able to keep a thought in his head, but his need not to blindside Joe had blinded him.
“I’ll fix it. I’ll figure it out.”
“You’d better.”
He would. “We also had a potential fly-by. Small white plane, couldn’t see tags. Flew over three times and Tansy hasn’t noticed planes before. I’ve ordered a pile of security stuff through Phail General. Guy’s former military and he read between the lines and will keep an eye out for strangers.”
They chatted for a bit, and then Joe sighed. “Gotta go. Still up to our asses in it here. This is my sleep break. Got an hour left. Leave me a message if you need to. And fix it with Tansy.”
Sam looked at his watch. Way more than a couple of hours had passed and there was no sign of Tansy. Even knowing she was likely in her fort and working, he worried.
He’d throw together some food to bring out to her and then he’d find her.
And fix things.