Page 106 of Shadow Sabotage
For half a second, I thought about asking him not to. The thought of being so close to him all night felt almost painful—the kind of pain my heart felt when I watched the wild mustangs running free and knew no matter how fast I ran I could never keep up.
The kind of pain that came from wanting something desperately and knowing you could never have it.
But I couldn’t ask him to sleep out here. This was the wilderness, and the night was already freezing.
“Don’t be silly,” I said, forcing myself to act casual. “We don’t need you to be our next rescue. It’s cold out and it’s practical to share.”
“Yeah,” he said, nodding. “Practical. No big deal, right?” There was a trace of bitterness in his voice.
“Right.”
“After you.”
He finally looked up. My heart skipped a beat when our gazes caught. His eyes held the same depths I felt swirling in my own heart. But the look of steel on his face told me he was doing the same thing I was and putting it all aside.
We had no other choice, really.
I crawled into the tiny space and slipped my shoes off, tucking them into place beside the tent flap. Then I unzipped the sleeping bag all the way so that we could both cover ourselves with it and rolled to my side on the sleeping pad to make as much room for him as possible
My heart throbbed against my chest as Vance climbed in after me, putting his boots beside mine.
“Tight in here,” he commented, his voice strained.
“Yeah, but the great thing about a search is that you’re so tired from hiking that you pass out quickly and don’t mind the lack of comfort,” I said, trying to keep things light.
“Exactly,” he agreed.
He was careful not to touch me as he crawled forward and lay beside me, but even so, he filled the space in a way that made it hard to breathe. I could feel the length of his body stretched out a mere inch from mine, the heat from his chest radiating into my back. I closed my eyes, breathing in the faintest trace of cologne that still lingered on him, mixed with the woodsmoke in our hair and the pine needles that clung to our clothes.
It was like heaven. A painful, heartbreaking heaven.
I didn’t want to close my eyes and miss a moment of it.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Claire
Despite my intentions,exhaustion took over. I fell asleep quickly and slept hard. When I woke, Vance’s body was curled around mine, his chest pressed up to my back and his arm slung around my waist.
It shouldn’t have been sexy. We were crammed into a one-person tent, still wearing our thick winter coats and dirty clothes from the night before. I’d seen myself after a search enough times to know there would be nothing cute about the way I looked this morning, with tangled curls and dirt smudged on my face and wrinkled clothes underneath my coat.
I also knew we were only snuggled up together because it was cold—cold enough to see my breath, even inside our little cocoon.
Even so, I let out a contented little sigh. Because, to me, thiswassexy. Damn sexy. There was nothing I liked more than the Wyoming wilderness. Nothing that felt better than the kind of sore you got after a long hike. Adding Vance into that mix,with his arms around me and his warm breath on my neck as he snored lightly? In another world, one where we had met for different reasons and had gone camping as a couple… Man. This was the stuff of fantasies.
He was much taller than me, but his body fit perfectly around mine, curled up like this. I wanted to linger in this moment as long as I could, no matter how bad of an idea it was to get even more attached to him. But Robin was still out there—without the benefit of a tent and a man’s body to warm her. I checked my watch. The sky was already getting light and the sun would be up soon. We had to get moving.
I gently pushed his arm, trying not to wake him so I could wiggle away while he slept. But he grabbed me and pulled me even closer, nuzzling his face into my neck with a little moan. His hard body pressed against mine, tempting me even more.
I groaned. He was killing me.
His body tensed. “Claire?” He sounded disoriented.
“That’s me.” I bit my lip.
His fingers tightened on my arm. Then he rolled away, letting me go. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize I’d—”
“It’s fine,” I said, sitting up quickly. My hair pressed into the top of the tent as I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes. I grabbed my boots and shoved my feet into them, forcing myself to focus on our mission. “I’m going to refill our water bottles. We’ll get a quick bite to eat, check in with the other teams, pack up, then hit the trail again. Can you be ready to go in fifteen?”
