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I sink into her further, pumping my fingers in and out of her soaking pussy. “And you’re super fucking tight—”

I’ve barely gotten the words out when I hear a rustling in the bushes behind us.

The bear?

I turn back to check, hoping the noise is just a very large squirrel or a hungry raccoon. Instead, I’m met with three grown men snapping photos with expensive looking cameras.

What the fuck!

“Come on, sweetheart.” I wrap Opal in the blanket, leaving the basket behind. It’s one thing to follow me out to the ranch, or to the grocery store. It’s another to come all the way out here. How the hell did they even find me? I was watching for stragglers.

Fuck!

Opal glances up at me with raised brows as she stacks the proverbial bricks back up around her. “Should we run?”

Before I can answer, there’s a balding man wearing jeans and a hoodie coming toward us. I’ve seen this guy before. He’s part of the group that follows me around Nashville. This isn’t our first altercation either. A few months ago, he followed me into the men’s room attempting to get a picture of my cock. I’m guessing he’d sell that on the dark web somewhere. These people know no boundaries.

“Come on, man.” I turn toward him and give him a warning. “Not now.”

He doesn’t seem to care. He gets closer and closer until he’s nearly touching me with the heat of the flash. I was perplexed by this tactic when I first started being photographed, but my agent told me their goal is to get me riled up. Apparently, they make more money when they catch a shot of me going crazy. Casual and relaxed photos won’t sell.

You’d think me fingering a much younger woman on the side of a mountain would be enough for them to work with. Apparently, they’re craving more.

Holding my arm up to shade the flash, I try and keep my cool. It’s a flashing light, Opal is covered, we’re ten feet from the truck, and all this will be over in a few minutes.

Except… this guy takes his job a bit too far. He steps in front of Opal just slightly and she trips to the side. I reach for her, but she’s already tripped into the stream. Her hair is covered in leaves, her clothes are soaking wet, and I’m fucking pissed.

I’m going to murder these people.

Stepping into the stream, I pull Opal from the water. “You okay, sweetheart?”

“Yeah,” she says with a nod, but I see the sadness on her face. I see her going back into her shell, and I fear these assholes ruined everything.

The man with the camera flashes again and again… so I do the thing I’ve been told not to do.I lose my shit.

I rip the camera out of his hand, smash it against a rock on the riverbank, punch the man in the jaw, and stand over him as I shout, “Come near either of us again and I’ll do worse than that! Understand?”

He nods, and while I’d like to say no one is going to know about this little outburst, the other two are still filming, though they’re smart enough to back away, making it impossible for me to go after their cameras.

Something tells me this was their plan all along. They’re probably working together.

“Fuck!” I lift Opal into my arms, carrying her up toward the truck. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. This isn’t how I saw the afternoon going. I thought we’d have a nice picnic, and I… I didn’t expect this.”

“It’s okay. Really.” She shivers as I set her into the truck, then make my way around to start up the engine and blast the heat.

“Come on over here.” I slide her toward me, holding her soaking frame beneath my arm. “If you want to strip down, I have blankets in the back, or we can stop and—”

“No, really, I’m okay. Let’s just go home.”

She doesn’t sound upset or sad. Instead, it sounds worse. The crème de la crème of pain. The worst of emotional turmoil.

Disappointment…and I have no idea how to fix it.

Chapter Five

Opal

The ride back to my place is quiet except for the low country music playing on the radio and the few comments Buck keeps trying to make to put me at ease. He’s covered me in a blanket, offered to pull over and buy me new clothes at the boot shop, and he’s told about half a dozen dad jokes about the paparazzi and cameras, but the vibe has definitely changed.

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