Dear God, it was true. Her fingers wrapped in his shirt and she clung to him. Dane was taller than her by a few inches, but he’d bent near and their faces were so close together that she could smell the musk of his skin and see the shadow of a beard on his chin. He licked his lips as if he were still thinking about putting his mouth on her pussy, and her entire body tingled in response, a throb starting low in her sex. His other hand slid to her ass, pulling her body against him. Her nipples grazed his chest and she gasped.
His mouth brushed against her own, giving her the most fleeting of kisses. “How about,” he said softly, “I drop to my knees right now and give you a taste?”
“Do it,” she breathed, her heart pounding in her breast.
He grinned at her and slid his hands to her waist. As she watched him, he dropped to his knees, his face going to the cradle of her thighs and—
“Hey,” called a voice back at the camp. “Anyone seen Dane?”
Dane jerked upright, nearly knocking her over in his haste to get to his feet. The look in his eyes had gone from sexy to wildly paranoid in a flash.
With a sigh, she realized that she wasn’t going to get what he’d promised after all. “Guess we’ll never find out if you’re full of hot air, will we? Shame.”
The look he gave her was hot, and he pulled her in for a quick, fierce kiss. “Tonight. You don’t say a thing, I don’t say a thing, and we meet again tonight.” Then he disappeared into the bushes, trudging his way back to camp.
Tonight? She curled her toes in anticipation at the thought, then sighed. The blood still throbbed in her veins and tonight was a very, very long day away. She waited a few minutes, then sauntered back to camp herself, tying the strings on her shorts as if to make it look like she’d been in the woods for a different reason.
Dane looked up as she reentered the camp and gave her a light wave, as if just now seeing her. What a faker. “Morning, Miranda. Sleep well?”
“Like a baby.” She said the lie with a grin, and moved to the far side of the camp to get her pack. As she walked, she let her hips roll, and swung her long, tangled hair over her shoulder, knowing that he was watching. Dane wanted to see her tonight. That thrilled her just a little too much to fit in with her plans, and she frowned to herself. If this revenge idea was going to work, she needed to keep control of the situation. And Dane had just taken control a few minutes ago. Worse, she’d been ready and willing to give it to him.
She was going to need to be tougher if she wanted to get revenge on Casanova Croft, rather than just be one of his conquests.
SEVEN
O
nce the entire team was awake, they ate a small breakfast of the last of their carefully saved PowerBars, boiled water to refill their canteens, and then broke camp. The shelter was disassembled, the fire put out, and their bags repacked. Then they shouldered their packs to move on to the next location. Dane showed them how to make a fire bundle that would keep an ember smoldering while they walked, and he handed it to Miranda to carry. “It’s very important that you keep this going at all times,” he said to her, his face utterly serious. “If you keep it smoldering, you can rekindle a fire with just a touch.”
She stared at him, then at the fire bundle, her thoughts on things other than fire. Was his meaning what she thought it was…? She decided to test that theory. “I think I can manage to keep a spark burning,” she said in a low, husky voice, and licked her lips. “Even if it requires working it a little to fan the flame. It’ll be worth it, don’t you think?”
The look in his eyes grew hot, and she knew they were thinking the same thing. “See that you do. I’d hate to have to start all over, though…I’d be happy to show you how to tend it again, if need be.”
Her pulse fluttered and she tried not to blush. Show her how to tend her fires, indeed.
As the team hiked, Dane pointed out flora and fauna to them. He showed them a poisonous spider, demonstrated which nuts were edible, and gave them a nature lesson as they walked. Occasionally he’d pick up a bit of tinder or a particular leaf, his eyes constantly scanning the environment.
It was actually really interesting information, and Miranda would have appreciated it if she hadn’t been quite so distracted all the time. The vision of Dane’s tight ass muddied her thoughts of revenge, as did the incredible sex they’d had last night. And the conversation this morning. She couldn’t stop thinking about three orgasms. Three. It seemed like a sinful concept to her, when she struggled so hard to have just one in bed. Here he was offering her three. Her pussy clenched at the thought of him between her legs, languidly licking her to orgasm, and she felt the slick wetness of arousal.
Her spark was definitely going to keep going all day. By the time they were able to sneak away tonight, she’d probably come as soon as he said hello to her. And then he’d give her a smug smile, showing her that he was the shit and she was just another dumb girl who had fallen for his prowess in the sack…
But even as she said it to herself, the puzzle pieces didn’t fit. Last night, when she’d come on to him, he hadn’t acted like it was his due, or that he’d expected it. He’d seem shocked—and then flattered. And then, he was just as turned on as she was. That didn’t match the womanizing flirt she remembered and the tabloids had loved to harass. The man in her mind was far more self-centered and smug than this one seemed. Had Dane learned humility at some point? Had Casanova Croft had all the womanizing arrogance beaten out of him?
She doubted it.
They hiked over a ridge and Dane suddenly staked the flag in the ground. “This will be our next campsite.”
Miranda glanced around, but there didn’t seem to be anything particularly special about this spot. They’d passed the stream again about five minutes ago, so maybe that was why—nearby water in easy access.
The team dumped their packs on the ground and began to stretch, Pete wiping his brow. The gamer CEO was in worse shape than the rest of them; he began sweating as soon as they started hiking and didn’t stop until he went to sleep.
“What do we do now?” George said, looking expectantly at Dane.
Dane grinned and clapped the man on the back. “Now you’re going to get a chance to show me the survival skills that you’ve picked up. I showed you some things last night and this morning, and I want to see what you’ve learned.”
With that simple command, the team set to work. George left to go into the woods and begin setting up traps, and Pete headed off with the fishing line to do his task. He looked uncomfortable at the thought, but no one offered to help him with it. After the disastrous incident involving her boobs, Pete had been reassigned from water and firewood to fishing (to get him away from her, she suspected). She couldn’t say she was sorry for it.
So now it was Will who was assigned to help her with the firewood, and while she waited for him to bring back the first bundle, she examined their new campsite. There was a small, scorched area that told her someone had built a fire here in the past, and she ran her shoe over it, looking for small rocks that would pop when heated. Nothing. Holding her fire bundle in her hands, she glanced around.
Dane stood nearby, arms crossed, leaning against a tree. He’d been muttering something into his satellite phone. Even though he was concentrating on something else, his gaze was on her, watching her as she worked around the campsite. For some reason that made her blush. Dane Croft, she thought. So very, very arrogant and self-assured. So certain that she’d take him up on the three orgasms he’d offered her that evening, now that he was assured she wouldn’t run and tell his partners that he was sleeping with the clientele.
She wanted to put him in his place…or kiss him. Right now she couldn’t decide which, and loathed herself for it. She was supposed to hate the man, not think about his mouth on her body all day. Not blush when he looked in her direction. Where was her righteous indignation? Or was she starting to lose her edge?
Scowling at the thought, she turned back to the fire. She needed to foc
us on work, not on sex. Starting a fire would distract her.
There was a scatter of larger rocks nearby and she spent some time gathering them and forming a circle to ring the fire and keep it from spreading. Once that was done, she dug out the small area inside the rocks and then began to place the wood on it, stacking it the way she had been shown as Will came back with armful after armful. Poor Will had a thankless task—yesterday they’d realized just how much wood was needed to keep a fire going all night, and she suspected he’d gotten the raw end of the deal…and she’d gotten the easy job that kept her at camp and close at hand.
Miranda’s mouth soured at that. Protecting the girl? Or keeping her close for other reasons? Frowning to herself, she stacked the wood and then sat back to examine her fire pit. Not bad. She’d gathered some fallen leaves and dried grasses to use as tinder as they’d hiked. Her pockets had bulged with the material and now she pulled it out and began to set it at the base of the fire. Her fire bundle had been carefully tended all day, and every time she’d coaxed a bit of smoke out of the coals, she’d grown aroused all over again, thinking of Dane and his promises to her.
I’ve had plenty of oral sex.
And no orgasms? I’m heartbroken at the thought. Those must have been some shitty boyfriends.
She pictured Dane between her legs, her hands rubbing on his too-short hair as he kissed the lips of her sex. Her nipples went erect just thinking about it and she squirmed, clenching the fire bundle tightly.
“Miranda, before you begin,” Dane said, interrupting her thoughts.
She looked up and jerked backward when she realized that Dane was standing over her, his crotch at eye level.
Damn. Was he thinking what she was thinking? She looked up at him and licked her lips, confused.
A bolt of desire crossed his face and he glanced around to make sure the others weren’t watching, and then he crouched next to her. “Stop that, Miranda,” he whispered.
“Stop what?”
“Stop looking at me like you want me to throw you on the ground and fuck that dazed expression off of your face.” His voice was husky, as if he’d been thinking about the same thing. “Hours to go before sunset and it’s not a good idea to let the others know what we’re planning.”
“Oh,” she said, and frowned at him, resisting the urge to give him a shove. “If you don’t want me thinking about later, then don’t shove your junk in my face, all right?”
Sure, she’d gotten a glimpse of the package last night, but when he practically pushed it into her face? She couldn’t help but think of other things. And to make it worse, he was definitely…well equipped. Of course he was, she thought sourly to herself. Dane Croft had been built like an Adonis and she was being swayed by his good looks and godlike smiles. She hated herself for being so very shallow.
He chuckled and patted her on the shoulder, standing up again. “That’s better. Now, can I see your fire bundle?”
She slapped the bundle into his hand, then winced at his surprised expression. It wasn’t like it could hurt him anyhow. The fire bundle was nothing more than a long piece of rubber pulled from the inside of a shoe that had been wrapped tightly around an ember buried in packed tinder. The bundle had been tied tightly with a shoelace. He’d shown them how to make it—to carry fire from campsite to campsite without having to make it all over again.
It was extremely important to survival, Dane had said, and Miranda had treated it so. She’d kept a careful eye on it, blowing on it from time to time to stoke the embers again. It had smoked and smoldered all day long.
Just like the desire that still burned through her body. And it irritated Miranda that Dane had decided to just waltz over and put his hands all over her bundle. “It’s still lit,” she pointed out. “Give it back.”
“Can’t do that,” he said with a smile. As she watched, he carefully unwrapped the fire bundle and exposed the ember, then poured water over it.
She sputtered in shock and tried to snatch it back from Dane. “What are you doing? That’s our fire!”
“It is,” he agreed with a grin. “Or I should say, it was.”
“I worked hard on that,” she blurted. “I kept it going all day long.” Was this some sort of message he was trying to send to her? If so, she was not amused. “Or does this mean you’re no longer interested in nurturing my spark, Dane Croft?”
Her voice had risen to a rather loud level, and he winced and gestured for her to lower her voice. When he’d glanced around and had determined that no one was listening to them, Dane looked back at her. “Doesn’t mean that at all, Miranda, and you know it.”
Actually, she didn’t know it.
“This course is about survival,” he said a little louder, and handed her the wet fire bundle. “And I need to know that you can make a fire on your own. So no bundle today.”
“You are a horrible man.”
Dane only laughed and smiled down at her with a satisfied expression. “You won’t be saying that tonight, I promise.”
Flustered, she knelt next to the fire pit. Her hands searched through the wood, trying to recall what he’d taught her. Focus on work, she told herself. Not Dane. Think about fire, not about his mouth on her body. So she sat back and concentrated, gathering her thoughts. She needed to make a bow. After a few moments of searching, she found a long piece for a bow and a second piece of soft pine that would be suitable for a baseboard. She examined the wood for a moment more, and then glanced over at Dane.
He crouched near the fire pit, looking like he had nothing better to do than to sit and harass her.
“You can quit hovering,” she pointed out. “Don’t you have someone else on this team to bug?”
He grinned, seemingly unbothered by her prickly attitude. “Fire’s important. Once I’ve established that you can get a spark going all on your own, I’ll check on the others.”
She wasn’t going to touch that double entendre with a ten-foot pole. “You’re going to be waiting a while if you think I’m going to spark anything with you sitting there staring at me.”
He didn’t move.
Miranda rolled her eyes in exasperation. “If you’re going to stay here, hand me your knife, then.”
He did. “I should make you get your own knife.”
She rolled her eyes again and used his knife to make a notch in the baseboard, like he’d showed her. Once that was done, Miranda handed his knife back and began to pull the laces off of her shoe to use to string the bow. He was watching her, and it made her nervous. Made her think about sex again, and that wouldn’t do. She needed a distraction. “So, Dane,” she began as she tied one end of the laces to her chosen stick. “What made you decide to run a survival school? I have to admit it’s not what I pictured for you.”
His easy grin began to fade a little, and he hesitated for a moment, as if choosing his words carefully. When he answered, it was simple and direct. “I enjoy it. I spent the last year living off the grid.”
“Living off the grid?” she asked, finishing her bow and testing the cord. It was tight, with just enough slack to wrap around a stick. Hopefully that would do. “What does that mean?”
“No electricity, no running water, no power,” Dane explained, his gaze on her hands as she began to set up the fire-making implements. “Just you and the wild. Colt and I had a cabin in Alaska that we built. It was…” He paused, thinking. “It was nice.”
“Not a lot of girls up in the wilds of Alaska,” she teased. “Were you pinch-hitting for the other team or just doing a lot of masturbating?”
He laughed at that. “You have a filthy mind.”
“What? Admit it—that’s the first thing you thought about, too.”
Dane grinned. “I was there to camp. As for masturbating, nah. It wasn’t on my mind at all. By the time I got to Alaska, I was pretty much done with dating. It was nice to have a vacation from everything in my life.”
“You, done with women?” She laughed. She looped a stick through the
bow and aimed it over the notch she’d carved in the baseboard. “That doesn’t sound like Casanova Croft at all.”
His look became shuttered immediately. “Yeah, well, sometimes what you get isn’t always what you want.”
Before she could comment on that, he reached over and corrected her hands. “Hold it like this. And don’t forget to put your tinder under the notch so your ember has something to fall on.”
She looked at him in wary surprise. His voice had been cold, efficient. Gone was the warm, teasing note. What had she said that was so wrong? Miranda put a bit of tinder under the baseboard and swallowed down the defensive feeling. She was here to fuck—and fuck with—Dane Croft this week, and if she pissed him off, she could kiss her revenge good-bye. Irritated at herself, she began to saw the bow, turning the spindle and creating friction against the baseboard. It was harder than Dane had made it look, and she gave it another rough tug, causing the spindle to twist again.
An uncomfortable silence fell, the only sound the sawing of her spindle against the wood. After a few minutes of watching her work, Dane glanced over at her again. “So, what about you?”
She glanced up, still sawing at the bow and turning the spindle. It was hard to concentrate on the conversation, especially when she was trying so hard to get enough friction to create a spark in the small notch she’d carved in the baseboard. Crap—why did she get the fire-making task? This was hard. Concentrating on her task, she didn’t look up. “What about me?”
“You wanted to be an editor or something, right? How come you never left town? Bluebonnet’s not exactly a hotbed of activity.” His voice was wry. “I couldn’t wait to get away from here.”
She didn’t like where this was heading. So she remained silent, hoping he’d continue talking until he moved long past what she had or hadn’t done with her life.