Page 83 of Mountain Man’s Mystic Touch

“It appears that way.”

“Is he still at the festival?”

“We don’t know.”

Her eyes remain on mine. No panic enters them, but the certainty I saw at the lodge returns.

“This isn’t over,” she says.

“No.”

“Then you shouldn’t be alone tonight either.”

The invitation is not subtle. Neither is the effect it has on me.

I look past her into the warm cabin. Her crystals rest on the table. A candle burns inside a glass vessel near the window. Everything in the room belongs to her, including the choice she is offering.

My radio remains quiet.

“Loralee.”

“I know what I’m asking.”

“I’m not sure you do.”

She reaches for the front of my jacket and draws me across the threshold.

“Then come inside and explain it to me.”

Chapter 14

Loralee

Rocco crosses the threshold because I pull him across it, but once he is inside, neither of us pretends I have invited him in to discuss security footage. The door closes behind him with a soft click. His broad body fills the small entryway, bringing cold night air, the scent of cedar, and an intensity that reaches me before he does.

For three days, I have felt the control he keeps wrapped around every instinct. It is there now in the rigid line of his shoulders and the hand hanging motionless at his side, as if touching me without another clear invitation would violate something he refuses to name. The restraint should make this easier. Instead, knowing how much he is holding back sends heat curling low through my body.

I slide my hands beneath his open jacket and push it from his shoulders. Rocco allows it to fall onto the chair beside us, but his eyes never leave mine. He is giving me every opportunity to slow this down, change my mind, or turn the invitation into something safer.

I don’t want safe.

I reach for his hair, drawing him close enough that my mouth brushes his when I speak. “You told me I might not understand what I’m asking.”

His hands finally settle at my waist. The contact is firm, warm, and unmistakably possessive, but he still waits.

“Show me,” I whisper.

His mouth claims mine with a force that almost knocks me off balance. For a moment, I am simply held by his hands and the weight of his body. There’s a certainty in the way he kisses me, with nothing gentle about it. I want none of his gentleness. The days of waiting, of watching him look at me with those dark, unsolvable eyes, have built a pressure I only now understand.

We move backward until the wall catches me, though I couldn’t say who led whom there. My fingers slide into his hair and grip the back of his neck. Rocco kisses like a man who believes in consequences, and tonight he has decided to accept all of them.

Rocco’s hands map the shape of my sides, slipping under my sweater to pull me closer, until there is no air between us. His tongue tangles with mine and my fingers caress his neck where the skin is hot and pulsating.

I want him inside me so badly it is almost painful. I guide his hands beneath my sweater, and his palm spreads hot across my waist. He pushes the fabric higher, exposing my ribs to the chill of the cabin, then traces upward until his thumbs brush the underside of my breasts. I have never worn a bra to bed and tonight there is nothing between his skin and mine except the thinnest layer of air. His breath breaks against my mouth when he feels this, and the sound of it makes me arch into his hands.

His mouth leaves mine and moves down my neck, biting gently where my shoulder meets the sweep of my throat. I dig my fingers into his hair, guiding him lower. He laughs, low and rough, against my collarbone, as if he cannot help it. The vibration sends a tremor through my chest and down between my legs.

I press my hips forward and feel the hardness already straining behind the zipper of his jeans. I want to lose the last threads of caution inside both of us, to see if Rocco can be unmade the way he sometimes unravels me with a single look.