Page 72 of Recurve Ridge

I trembled in Robe’s grip, remembering the way Will’s tongue laved the corner of my lips, tasting me. Teasing us both.

The hint of a sinful smile, so similar in its way to Robe’s, tainted the tilt around his generous mouth. What would it be like for him to touch me at the same time as Robe or Jon did? Their rough-edged passion offset by the younger man, his touch seductive and caressing.

A raw sound ripped from my unwilling throat as I detached myself from Robe’s too-close embrace. The moment I freed myself, the air cooled, leaving me exposed in a sea of men, raw hunger written on every one of their faces.

Wrapping my arms around myself, I sought out Jon again, knowing he held the linchpin to getting them on my side in this. “I don’t think I can help in… whatever it is you do, and I don’t want to be a threat to anyone here. But maybe I can be another set of eyes on something. Anything.” I squeezed my own arms, indenting the soft material of the shirt I’d borrowed from Miller the first day I arrived and never returned, blaming its comfort when in reality I craved some of his strength. And he never asked for it back. “Accounts I can work on or… I don’t know. Supplies, an inventory list. I’m good with numbers. Patterns. I can see what’s missing.”

I added that last bit in a pitch of desperation but spoke true; Gideon shunted me around departments to see where he could improve the flow of his businesses while never letting me view the whole of anything. More than once, I’d wondered what he was hiding.

I guessed after my experience in his home that I had been right, though I would never have chosen to find out that way. My brain itched to see his accounts in full, to work out what he concealed—and somehow, in some small attempt at revenge, call him out on it.

But I needed my mind to behereright now. I hadn’t articulated my CV well. Jon’s lips pursed; even I recognized that the point I’d tried to make was a piss-poor argument. He opened his mouth, but Robe beat him to whatever comment he’d lined up.

“All right.”

I pivoted on my heel, eyeing Robe. He looked me over in that calm, studious way of his, one eyebrow cocked. A full smile enhanced the lines around his mouth that were hidden beneath his beard, showing white teeth. Even his eyes lit up at some humor he alone possessed.

This man is a sex bomb when he smiles.

It didn’t happen very often, and that made each smile that much more precious. I was so used to reading serious, grumpy Robe that cheeky, cocky Robe offered a fresh shock to the system.

“All right?” I echoed, trying to enunciate my thoughts. My brain stalled, and nothing else came forward. Was I the brunt of a joke he kept locked away?

Still grinning, Robe’s face lit with mischief. “You’re right. A pair of fresh eyes won’t hurt. Maybe she knows more about this than we give her credit for.”

Silence filled the cabin as I stared at Robe. Jon pushed his way past Will, pausing to block the air flowing through the open doorway. He gave me a hard look that didn’t quite veil his frustration, concern dipping his brow. Deep thumps radiated as he walked off the veranda, silence falling when he hit the forest floor and disappeared.

Despite the difference between Miller’s and Jon’s physical presences, in the absence of their two towering personalities, Alan’s glee was almost palpable.

“Miller’s going to fucking love this.”

18

MARI

“Robe won’t playwith you, huh?” Alan stared at me beneath the soft glow of the bar. A twinkle lit his aquamarine gaze—his standard response to life, it seemed. His low-level sarcasm nicely underlined the pity party aimed my way.

Light failed outside beneath heavily pregnant cloud cover, leaving the woods in a dim, not-quite-dark haze.

“I have no idea what you mean.” I pressed smooth, manicured hands to the clean beermat.

French nails were as fussy as I let Alan go, despite the array of colors he insisted I try. It didn’t seem right, somehow, and the nude gloss suited my mood. Maybe tomorrow I’d try midnight blue.

“Uh-huh.” Alan uncapped a top-shelf whiskey and emptied an eighth of it into my coffee mug.

Notes of peat and honey filled my head, giving imagery of an eighteenth-century Highland clan roused for battle. Or maybe the after-party.

“That’s enough.” I held out a hand to ward off any more alcohol. “Alan, it’s nine o’clock in the morning.”

A cheeky smile curved his sassy lips, showcasing his popularity in his on-again, off-again job—both at the strip club and the one he did for Robe. “It’s five o’clock somewhere, sweetcheeks.” Alan tipped the bottle back, swallowing a healthy double slug, and managed to give me a sexy ass wiggle at the same time without spilling a drop.

“Talent.” I giggled, then clapped my hands over my mouth. “Inappropriate much?” I said to the coffee that burned my tongue, the back of my throat, and my stomach but left me in a happy insta-glow that threatened premeditated trouble later. I wondered what he put in that whiskey and how long he’d been tippling my coffee without my knowledge.

“Gets you right there.” Alan smiled knowingly.

I tossed back a healthy dose of my intoxicated coffee under his watchful gaze and then threw my hands in the air. “Fine! Robe is impossible. The silent, still sentinel one minute, all black mood and dark thoughts. You canseehis thoughts swirling around. His head is like a fishbowl,” I informed my bartender.

Alan leaned over his forearms where they were braced on the stainless steel bar. “If he only knew…. Oh, Mari, Mari. It’s so obvious.”

---