2. Connor
CHAPTER 2
CONNOR
G lancing ahead on the trail, I watch Teagan’s auburn braid snaking through the brambles of a dense fir thicket. Her hips sway in a hypnotizing dance, her tight ass flexing as she goes.
She must feel me staring for she turns, cheeks flushed and eyes blazing like emeralds in the late morning light.
Fuck, she caught me.
I’ve been trying to wear her down, make her give up and run back to her campsite. But the woman is stubborn. Relentless. Two hours into this hike, and she’s still snapping photos of every goddamn mushroom like it’s holding state secrets.
I have to pick up my pace to keep up with her, those slender legs navigating fallen logs and gnarled roots with surprising agility. I marvel at how her determination transforms her toned body into something wholly alluring.
Her pack sags sideways on her back, straps digging into her narrow shoulders. I don’t like knowing it’s making angry red marks on the soft skin beneath her T-shirt.
“How about a break, Smokey? Or you planning to collapse dramatically over the endangered pebbles?”
She glares back at me, sweat dampening the hair at her temples.
I reach out a hand. “Let me carry your pack.”
“Not necessary,” she says, squatting down to look at something on the forest floor.
“Please,” I say, tugging on one of the straps.
She seems confused, but still shrugs out of it and hands it to me.
“Thanks,” she mumbles, as she snaps more photos.
I throw the pack over my shoulder. “What are you doing now?”
“I’m documenting the Russula brevipes you’d mow down for your axe-throwing carnival.”
I snort, kicking aside a rotted branch blocking the trail. “You like animals, right? You’ll love the chainsaw-carved bears.”
“How quaint,” she says through her teeth, storming ahead again.
Jesus, even her rage is pretty—lips pink as bitterroot flowers, freckles standing out like cinnamon sprinkled on cream. It’s been years since a woman got under my skin like this. Decades since one made me want to bite that bare spot at her collar.
My phone buzzes in my pocket. Rourke’s latest text lights up the screen:
Booked my flight for two weeks from now. See ya then. Can’t wait to meet this forest ecologist that has you huffing and puffing as you follow her around like a puppy dog
I squash a laugh.
“Friend of yours?” Teagan asks, peering at a lichen-crusted boulder like it’s the Rosetta Stone.
“Don’t be jealous. It’s just one of the buddies I’ve convinced to come work at my camp.”
She stiffens. “I don’t fraternize with extinction enthusiasts.”
“Good thing I’m retired.” I duck under a low-hanging cedar limb, holding it back so she doesn’t clothesline herself. She hesitates—too proud to accept the help, too smart to faceplant.
There’s a standoff.
Her nostrils flare and my arm starts to burn.
Finally, she ducks under, lavender shampoo punching me in the face as she brushes past. “Your permits must’ve cost a fortune,” she mutters.
“Not as much as you might think.” There are lots of incentives for new businesses in these stagnant areas of the county.
She shakes her head and hangs back for a moment.
At the peak of the ridge, I shrug off my flannel. The sun’s a bastard today, cooking the sweat on my back. Her sharp inhale cracks through the forest noise like a snapped branch. I turn, catching her stare raking over my chest.
I grin. “Like what you see?”
Color floods her cheeks. “Just tallying the carbon footprint of your vanity.”
I step closer, watching her throat bob. “Vanity, huh? Thought you academics called it field research. ”
She retreats until a pine trunk stops her, fingers digging into bark. “Your research involves bulldozers and?—“
“Backhoes?” I cage her in, bracing a hand above her head. Her lips part like she’s suddenly forgotten how to exhale. “Or were you picturing something… messier?”
God, I’d love to just press her against that tree, bury my face in her neck, and inhale her dizzying scent.
To my surprise, she lays a hand on my chest, and I nearly hiss, the heat of her fingers searing into my skin. My heart feels like it’s going to jump across to her. She licks her lips and I fight a groan. But just as I’m about to cover her hand with mine, she pushes me back and darts away with a playful smile.
She’s halfway down the slope, braid swinging like a battle flag, by the time I get my bearings. I laugh, the ghost of her touch lingering on my skin as I follow her like the puppy Rourke says I am.
The old logging road’s overgrown, choked with blackberry vines. Teagan’s trying to hack through with a collapsible hiking pole, sweat plastering her tee to the dip of her spine. I lean against a spruce, arms crossed. “Need a hand?”
“Need you to combust spontaneously,” she grunts, wrestling with a thorny tendril.
“See, this is why we need the camp.” I unsheathe my hunting knife, slicing through the thicket with three clean strokes. “Teach city kids real survival skills. Not just how to cry over dandelions.”
She stares at the cleared path, then back at my big knife. “Compensating for something?”
I twirl the blade and glance down at my crotch. “You’re welcome to call my bluff, right here, right now.”
She rolls her eyes, but her lips twitch. Maybe I’ll get that playful smile back again sometime soon.
The forest opens up to a sunlit clearing where birch trees stand sentinel around a collapsed cabin. Teagan freezes, camera halfway to her face. “This… this was your ‘no old-growth touched’ site?”
“1920s logging outpost.” I kick a rusted gearshift poking through ferns. “Foundations are still solid. Thought we’d rebuild here.”
She crouches, brushing moss off a carved beam. “You’d replicate the original structure?”
“Preserve it.” The reverence in her voice throws me. “Use traditional tools. Teach ’em how these woods built us.”
Her gaze flicks to mine. “Tradition nearly killed these woods once.”
“And ignorance will finish the job.” I yank a beetle-eaten plank from the rubble. “You think Starbucks cups are the real threat? Kids these days can’t tell pine from poison ivy. Don’t know how to listen to the land.”
The wind shifts, carrying her stunned silence, a strand of hair catching on her lip. I resist the urge to smooth it away. Barely.
“There’s a right way to log,” I murmur. “A rhythm. You don’t take more than the forest gives.”
Her fingers trace the growth rings on a splintered post. “And your camp?”
“Shows that balance.” The words taste foreign—defensive. Since when do I explain myself?
Thunder growls in the distance. Teagan stiffens, scanning the darkening sky.
“Storm’s coming,” I say.
“No.” She whirls, shoving her phone into her pocket. “I checked the radar this morning?—“
Lightning splits the clouds, the first fat raindrop splattering her nose.
“Come on,” I bark, grabbing her elbow.
She shakes free. “My tent’s near the cedar grove?—”
“Half a mile? You’ll drown first!”
“I’ll be fine?—”
A deafening crack splits the air. I lunge for her, pulling her against me and covering her head as a dead branch crashes where she stood just seconds ago.
Her chest heaves against mine, heart galloping as she clings to me.
Then the skies open like a big, gray curtain.
“Let’s go!” I pull her toward the trail, rain pelting us. “And if you die, I’m turning your notes into kindling!”
“Shut up!” Her laugh rings out, wild and bright beneath the downpour.