Page 125 of Mountain Men Heroes

“So,” he pushed, looking into her eyes. He immediately wanted to shove his foot into his mouth so deep he’d need a crane to pull it free.

She drew away slightly from where they both bent over the counter, him on one side and her on the other. Perched on the edge of her stool, she didn’t have much room for retreat so he pulled back, sensing a change in her.

“Not a fully certified doc yet, but it’s a work in progress.”

Not a full answer. People who dodged had a tendency to hide things. Not that it was his business, but he couldn’t help the curiosity that dug into his brain.

“Must be hard dealing with so many other people’s problems. Separating them from your own when you go home at the end of the day. You and your sister are a lot alike. You both have hearts of gold. You more so. Especially if things don’t turn out like you expect for some patients.” He watched her over the rim of his cup.

“You read into people a lot, don’t you, Damon.” She swallowed another bite of his cake.

“Occupational hazard.” He shrugged.

“You mean as a bar and bakery owner. I had no idea. I guess you need to know people’s preferences. Makes for good business.”

“Cop. Former anyway, remember.” She didn’t need to know the grittier details so he kept that off the table.

She leaned forward with a pretty smile. “Oh, yeah, you got me with that. I did not see that coming. So, you retired from the badge and gun to what? Don an apron? Must be a story there. How long have you had this place?”

“I took it over when Morgan died a few years ago.” When he’d heard the news of his sister’s death in an avalanche he’d put in for his papers and never looked back. His job with the force had already run its course anyway. He’d done what he’d set out to accomplish and his family needed him here.

She sat back on the stool. “Your wife?” Her warm smile slipped a notch.

“No, my younger sister. The baby of the family.”

“I’m so sorry.” She reached out to clasp his hand. He drew closer and wrapped his fingers through hers and inhaled.

Big mistake. The power of her scent overpowered every other smell in the small bakery and wrenched up the heat. He was in so much trouble and he couldn’t see a way out of the dark alley he’d walked down that didn’t involve claiming Ivy and her virginity for himself.

His eyes slid shut. “You’re killing me, angel,” he grunted. The scent of happiness and torment mixed together to create a whirlwind of emotions bombarding one another in his head. His heart.

“Sorry.” Her hand slipped from his, and he wanted to tear down the world around him. “And I’m not an angel. Just a simple girl. A nobody.”

“You shouldn’t think like that. And there’s nothing that is ‘just simple about you.”

He drew closer until she could see nothing but his face, his eyes and drew her gaze to his so she could see the truth as he spoke.

“You have no idea how others perceive you, do you? What you do to the male population of this town? I can only imagine the string of doctor wannabes and full-fledged doctors you’ve left in your wake in Houston. Maybe you didn’t recognize the way Reaper was looking at you, his posture, but I did. That fucking bear of a man was ready to swoop you over his shoulder and run back to his own mountain. That was only a few minutes after meeting you. I know him. He would have done it had I not stepped in. Hell, I can’t really blame him.”

She lifted an eyebrow and her expression grew more solemn the longer he spoke.

“And you, Damon?” she asked in a soft, husky voice that made his cock turn to steel in his pants and come leak from the engorged head.

She tightened her fingers around his.

“It takes every ounce of control not to do what my gut says so I’m not much better,” he admitted gruffly, “and the longer I’m around you the less I’m in control.

She nodded; eyes cast downward as if considering his what he said.

Boundaries be damned, he couldn’t take the sad look in her eye. He slipped a palm around her cheek and eased her head up until he captured her attention once again. “He even touches you and I’ll have his balls. Friend or not.”

She studied his face for a long moment before her small smirk became a full-fledged smile.

“You should also know every old man to every twenty-something in this town wanted to get close to you last night. The only thing keeping them back was me.”

Unable to stop, he caressed the pad of his thumb along the soft seam of her lips.

“And I didn’t want to stop at kissing you yesterday. I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me but I want you spread wide for me, taking every throbbing inch of me.”

---