Chapter 3
PIPER
I'm going to die.
Not from the blizzard, or the lack of food and water, but from this absolutely ridiculous attempt to sleep next to Harlon Giles without touching him.
The problem is physics.
Mostly.
Specifically, gravity and this sad mattress that dips toward the center like a black hole, constantly trying to pull me toward six-foot-five inches of brawny, beefy man.
I shift away for the hundredth time, muscles burning from the effort of holding myself on the very edge of the bed. My teeth chatter so hard I'm surprised they haven't cracked.
The quilts aren't enough. The fire is dying down—Harlon banked it to last through the night—and I’m cold. I can see my breath in the candlelight, little puffs of white that mock my attempts to bury into the covers.
Another shiver wracks through me, violent enough that my whole body jerks.
Harlon's breathing changes.
He must be so grossed out, stuck here with his brother's ex-girlfriend that he can’t stand, forced to share a bed. He’s probably counting the seconds until this hellish night ends.
He's lying there like a statue, and hasn't moved once since we got under the covers. That's how much he doesn't want to accidentally touch me.
The mattress creaks and dips again. It’s probably a spring giving up trying to hold this much weight. I slide an inch closer. My body instinctively arches toward his heat before my brain catches up and I jerk back.
Another violent shiver hits me, this one so intense my jaw locks up.
Harlon sucks in a sharp breath. "Damn it, Piper. You're still freezing?”
"I'm f-fine," I manage through chattering teeth.
"You're shaking so hard the whole bed is moving."
"S-sorry. I'll t-try to be more s-still."
A frustrated growl rumbles from his chest. "We need to share body heat."
Oh god, he sounds so angry…about having to touch me because staying alive demands it. "I kn-know you don't want to—"
"This is about survival." His voice cracks slightly on the last word, and his burly arm snakes around my waist. He hauls me backward against his chest.
Holy hell, he's so wonderfully warm. It's like being wrapped in a heated blanket made of thick muscle and musky man, and every cell in my body demands I melt into it.
His other arm comes around, banding across my breasts, holding me close. Purely clinical…like I'm a hypothermia victim and he's administering first aid.
Which I guess I am. And he is.
Except there's nothing clinical about the way his hot breath ghosts across the back of my neck. Or about the way his bulky chest rises and falls against my back, each breath slightly uneven.
I try to stay still, but my body has other ideas. It seeks his heat without my permission, an involuntary movement that presses my ass back against—
Oh.
Harlon freezes. His breathing harsh against my neck, his whole body locked up like stone.
That’s definitely...he's—
"Don't move." The words are barely a whisper, more plea than command, rough and desperate in a way I've never heard before.
My brain blows every fuse.
Harlon Giles, the man who's treated me like a leper for the entire time I’ve known him…is hard. Diamond hard and pressed right up against me, impossible to miss, impossible to misinterpret.
And he's trying like mad to hide it.
My body is warming up now, the shivers easing, and in their place is something else emerges entirely—a primal awareness that's been lurking under the surface for years, buried under his coldness and my hurt feelings and the whole forbidden mess of it all.
I move, just trying to get comfortable (I swear), attempting to find a position where the mattress spring isn’t digging into my hip.
His fingers flex on my arm. "Piper."
I make another small movement. This one maybe less innocent.
His whole body shudders, and the sound that comes out of him is somewhere between a groan and a growl.
I could live off that sound.
"Don't play games with me," he says, voice husky.
"I'm not—" I pause, gathering courage. "Harlon, you don't even like me."
The silence that follows is so heavy I can feel it pressing down on us.
"That's not—" he grumbles. "Christ, that's never been the problem."
My heart slams against my ribs. "Then what is?"
Instead of answering, he sighs in frustration, or maybe surrender—and suddenly I need to see his face.
I turn in his arms, forcing us even closer together on the narrow mattress. His arms loosen just enough to let me flip over, then immediately tighten again, like he can't help himself.
And then we're face to face in the flickering candlelight.
His gray eyes are storm-dark, pupils blown wide, and the hunger in them shocks me to the core. This is nothing like the cold dismissal I'm used to. This is raw and needy and riding a dangerous edge.
"Harlon—"
"You should go to sleep." But even as he says it, his hand slides up my spine, fingers splaying across my back, holding me to him.
His gaze drops to my mouth, and I watch his jaw clench with restraint.
I lean in slowly, watching his eyes darken as I bypass his mouth entirely and press my lips to the sharp line of his jaw. His stubble rasps against my lips, rough and masculine, and I hear his breath catch.
I trail soft kisses along his jawbone, exploring the strong angle of it, feeling the muscle jump under my mouth. When I reach the spot where it meets his ear, I pause, letting my breath linger over the sensitive skin there.
"Piper." My name comes out strangled.
I smile against his skin and move higher, catching his earlobe between my teeth.
Another shudder runs through him, head to toe, and his hands grip me hard, like he needs to anchor himself to something.
His breathing has gone ragged, harsh pants against my hair.
I trace the shell of his ear with my tongue, slowly, then dip just inside, exhaling softly.
"Fuck!" The word is punched out of him.
His control is unraveling. I can feel it in the tremor running through his massive body, in the way his grip on me has gone from restraining to desperate…like he's trying to hold himself back.
I bite down on his earlobe again, a little harder this time, and his hips jerk forward.
"You're evil," he groans, and there's something raw and wrecked in his voice that sends heat swirling low in my belly.
I align my body with his…and rock my hips against the steely length of him.
His control shatters like ice.
His mouth is on mine in a millisecond, and the kiss is nothing like I imagined—and you better believe, I've imagined.
It's not gentle or sweet or testing. It's claiming, desperate, denial combusting into heat and hunger. His hand fists in my hair, angling my head exactly where he wants it, and his tongue plunders my mouth like he's been starved only for me.
I moan—needy and feral—pressing closer to him, trying to crawl inside his skin.
"This is insane," he mutters, as we finally break apart, gasping. But his hands are shoving their way under my shirt, calloused palms deliciously rough against my bare skin. "You're my brother's—"
"Jayce dumped me six months ago. And I—" The confession tumbles out before I can stop it. "I was relieved. Harlon, Jayce wasn’t the one for me."
I watch as something fierce and possessive flash across his face.
"Piper." My name is a warning. "If we do this—"
"Just tonight," I interrupt, even though the words somehow hurt coming out. "Let’s just have tonight."
He studies my face for a long moment, and in those eyes I see the final wall crumbling.
"Tonight," he agrees roughly, and then his mouth is on mine again.
His hands touch and explore my body with clear intent. He palms my breasts and when his thumbs brush over my nipples, I arch into him with a gasp.
"You have no idea," he mutters against my mouth, "how many times I've thought about this. How often I imagined getting my hands on you."
The words don't compute. "You acted like you despised me."
"I had to." His hands are everywhere now—my breasts, my waist, sliding around to grip my ass and thighs to cinch me tighter against him.
"Do you know what would have happened if I let myself look at you the way I wanted to?
If Jayce had seen me staring at his girlfriend like I wanted to devour her? "
Holy mother of—
“That sea green sundress broke me,” he continues. “I had to leave the campsite for an hour because all I could think about was hiking it up and fucking you against a tree.”
"Harlon." My hands are shaking as I reach for the hem of his shirt.
His eyes go molten as he strips off his shirt, then mine, in one quick motion.
He growls in the back of his throat, as his gaze roves over my bare breasts like I’m presenting a feast.
"You're so fucking beautiful," he says on an exhale. Then his mouth is on my neck, teeth scraping, tongue soothing, and I'm pretty sure I stop breathing entirely. He works his way down, kissing and biting, until he reaches a breast and sucks the peak into his mouth.
My whole body detonates.
"Oh god," I gasp, nails digging into his shoulders.
He does it again, teeth grazing the sensitive flesh, and I'm writhing against him, desperate for friction between my legs, for more of all of it.
Then he bites down on my shoulder—hard enough to mark—and I actually whimper.
"Mine," he growls against my skin. "Tonight, you're mine."
“Yes, yours.” The words are barely coherent.
His mouth closes over my nipple again and I arch so hard I nearly throw us both off the bed. His arm holds me steady while he tortures me with his tongue and teeth, switching between breasts until I'm a gasping, shaking mess.
"I need—" I can't finish the sentence. I don't even know what I'm asking for.
But Harlon seems to know. His hand slides down my stomach, under the waistband of the sweats.
“Fuck, Piper.” He moans. “I make your pussy this wet?”
I nod. "You do."
His laugh is dark and satisfied. "Good girl."
Then his fingers slip into my aching folds, exactly where I need them, teasing and stroking, and it's too much and not enough and—
"Look at me," he commands.
I force my eyes open to meet his gaze. He's watching me with an intensity that should be frightening, but it only makes everything hotter.
"I've thought about this," he says, voice rough as gravel. "Late at night, alone, hating myself for it. Wondering what you'd sound like…what you'd look like when you came for me."
His fingers circle my clit, then rub against it in the most decadent way, and my hips buck.
"Wondering if you'd beg."
"Harlon—" It's already a plea.
"That's it, sweetheart. Let me hear you."
The pleasure builds and tightens in seconds under his talented fingers, and the orgasm hits me like a freight train—sudden and overwhelming.
I cry out his name, hips grinding against his hand, riding wave after wave as he works me through it.
When I finally come down, trembling and gasping, he's staring at me with raw possession.
"Stunning," he murmurs, withdrawing his hand slowly. "Even better than I imagined."
“I’ve never come that hard before,” I breathe. I should be embarrassed, feeling this vulnerable or exposed. But instead I feel powerful, desired…like I've just discovered a wonderful secret.
And I want more.
I reach for his sweatpants, and he catches my wrist. "Piper—"
"I need you inside me, Harlon." My voice is steady despite everything.
He swallows.
"Please," I whisper again, and there's no shame in my begging, only truth. Only desperate, aching need.
Any remaining restraint falls away as he removes the rest of our clothes. Then he's back, covering my body with his, skin to skin, his weight pressing me into the mattress just like I crave.
"God help me, Piper," he breathes against my mouth. "I can't stop."
"Good," I pull him down into a kiss. "I don’t want you to stop."
The last thing I see before his mouth claims mine again is the hunger in his eyes—fierce and possessive and finally unleashed.