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“You are insufferable.”
“Insufferable?” Croft laughed, this time genuinely amused. “I’m a royal pain in the ass. Look, Ms. Reid, why don’t I take you to Phantom Ranch? You can stay there, and we can either send a chopper for you, or you can take a raft downriver to one of the exit zones, where someone can pick you up in a nice, air-conditioned vehicle.”
“Listen, you arrogant jerk, I’ve hiked some of the remotest places on Earth. I’m sorry if riding down this suicide trail got tome. I’ve been a bit stressed about my brother. I’m sure I’ll be fine.”
“And I’m just as sure you won’t be. So, either you ride with me, or I ride alone, and you go Back East to wait for me to send you word about what happened to your brother. Personally, I’d prefer the latter.”
“I’m sure you would,” Finn snarked. “But your personal preferences are irrelevant.”
All Croft could think was that one trip over his knee for a well-deserved spanking would negate her belief.
Chapter
Two
They arrived at the foot of the trail, and Croft brought the mules to a halt. He dismounted, untied Jasper’s lead, and went back to assist his charge. Finn was already unbuckling the safety strap, throwing her leg over her mule’s back, and getting down. She didn’t see Croft as he came up and almost put the juncture of her legs right in his face. Certainly, he got an up-close-and-private view of her backside as she went to step off. It was every bit as nice inches from his face as it had been from several feet away.
He reached up to help her down, which seemed to put her off-balance and sent her crashing into Croft’s chest and down the front of his torso. The only thing that kept her from ending up on her butt were his strong hands catching her and setting her on her feet.
“Don’t,” she said as she pushed away from him.
“No problem,” he drawled. “Next time, I’ll let you land on your butt.”
“If you hadn’t been standing there, I wouldn’t have lost my stability and would have been fine.”
“And I wouldn’t have had such a lovely view of your ass.”
Croft couldn’t believe he’d said that out loud. It wasn’t that he didn’t think she had a very fetching behind, he’d just been taught better than to say something like that. At least, he’d caught himself before he told her what he really thought—he’d like to do a lot more than just look. If she kept pushing, he might tell her about all the things he could imagine doing to her sweet ass… some of which might shock the very properly raised Ms. Reid.
Finn ignored his comment saying, “I just wanted to get off for a minute and stretch my legs.”
“And a very nice set of legs they are.”
He shook his head and again commended himself for not saying the rest of what he was thinking, which was how very much he’d like to have them wrapped around his back as he plowed the slit between them. He shook his head to clear the picture in his head. It had really been far too long since he’d enjoyed that particular form of exercise. Maybe when he got back, he’d see if Noah wanted to out and do a little tomcatting.
Finn shrieked in outrage as she stomped off. Her exit would have been more effective if she hadn’t come back to fish a bottle of water out of her saddlebags. Croft enjoyed watching her stride away. There was no way you’d mistake the way her hips swayed when she was walking away, she was all woman. She wandered about fifty yards from him before she plopped down on an overturned log. Apparently, she disturbed the log’s current resident, a rattlesnake that had been sunning itself just out of sight.
Croft watched it detect her presence and coil itself. He heard the distinctive rattle, and as it gathered itself to strike, he unsheathed his knife from its scabbard, sending it flying to kill and pin the snake to the log. The knife landed expertly in the middle of the pit viper’s head, rendering it harmless.
Finn screamed and ran back to his side, crashing into his chest and wrapping her arms around him. Damn, she felt good with bumps and curves in all the right places. He only sort of hoped she didn’t feel the bulge growing inside the front of his jeans.
“Oh my God, that thing could have killed me,” she said, clearly frightened.
“It’s rare for a snake bite to kill you, but they’re damn painful. Do me a favor, and don’t wander off. If you’re done going for a stroll, how about you get back on Jasper while I go retrieve my knife?” He walked over to the snake and removed his knife, wiping it off on some nearby foliage before returning it to its casing.
“Shouldn’t you do a better job of cleaning your weapon before putting it in its sheath?” she asked.
Had she really just said that? Had the woman who could have gotten them both killed coming down into the canyon because she’d lied to his boss, then almost got herself snakebit, be dissing him over the way he handled a knife? Did she know he’d been a SEAL and knew more ways to kill something with a knife than she could possibly imagine?
“I’ll clean it properly later. I might point out if you hadn’t decided to take a little stroll, I wouldn’t have had to use it. Get on Jasper, or did you want to add dying of sunstroke to the ways you’ve tried to kill yourself today?”
The only sheath he was thinking of was the one she kept between her legs, the one he’d really like to make use of, but it wasn’t his knife he wanted to ram home… at least not the weapon she was referring to. He grinned—his cock had lovingly been referred to as a weapon by one of his ex-girlfriends, an admiral’s daughter who had decided a man who wasn’t going to follow his or her father’s path up the chain of command wasn’t for her.
“You’re a real prick, you know that? I haven’t exactly had the best day, and you’re certainly not doing anything to help.”
“You don’t think so? I got you off the side of the fucking canyon wall… at considerable risk to myself. I just saved you from a nasty snake bite, and now I’m trying to get you out of the sun before you give yourself sunstroke. Lady, I’m the very fucking definition of help. Now, get on the damn mule,” he growled.
Croft was trying to remind himself the woman was a paying client, probably worried about her brother, and clearly out of her league. He was just turning away from the log to apologize when he realized she had closed the distance between them—realized it as her open palm struck him across the face. Damn, the girl had some serious strength in her arm.
