8. Jade
JADE
I tiptoe through the front door of the guest cabin, relieved that it’s finally quiet.
But also well aware that it’s nearly dawn and Josh might be preparing for a morning run.
I close the door, praying he doesn’t find me sneaking back from the main house.
There are not enough tacos in the world to bribe him from not telling Natasha.
But as it turns out, Natasha already knows.
“Where were you?” she asks, arms folded across her chest. She looks eerie standing in the dusky living room in her pajamas. Her high ponytail is loose and off to one side, but I’m not about to point it out. We both know how that happened.
“I forgot something. At the house,” I say, turning away and pretending to make sure the door is fully closed.
“Right. Is that why you’re still wearing last night’s clothes?”
“How would you know what I was wearing? You were a little preoccupied after I showered.”
Natasha smiles, not an ounce of her ashamed. “Sorry. Book research called. And I know what you were wearing because I was in reverse cowgirl with a perfect view out the window. I saw you sneak back to the house. The dark house.”
“It’s not what you think, Tash. Really.”
I’m not prepared for the look of disappointment on her face. “Why not?”
“Because I’m not trying to earn a reputation as a woman who sleeps with her boss.”
“This isn’t the same thing as Skeezy Seymour, and you know it.”
She’s right. River didn’t come on to me then tell everyone it was the other way around when I rejected him.
River didn’t even know I was in his bed.
“If I do a good job—which, thanks to Grandma Charlotte eagerly waiting by her phone this week, I think I am doing—River might give me a good recommendation for whatever job comes next. Considering teaching is now out of the realm of possibility without literally moving away, I need all the help I can get.”
“I bet if you give that man a good enough blow job, he’ll write you any recommendation you want.”
I’m thankful the lights are still off, because my bestie would not let me live down the blush I can feel burning up my chest and neck. She’s accused me of being full-on flustered. Which, I am.
If only she knew that less than ten minutes ago, River’s very impressive erection was pressed into my lower back, she would chew me out for abandoning a perfectly good cock in need—a direct quote from one of her books.
Sneaking out of River’s bed was not only hard logistically, but also emotionally.
It broke my heart to see him in pain last night.
To know that I have the ability to soothe him is not something I know how to process.
But the guilt I feel for leaving him is overshadowed by the fear that he actually has no idea he pulled me into his bed in the first place.
I’ve had enough awkward encounters with that unfairly sexy mountain man to last a lifetime, thank you very much.
“You know it’s okay if you want to, right?”
“Okay if I want to give him a blow job?”
“Well, that too.” Natasha’s mischievous smile is illuminated by the sliver of sunlight that slices through the front window. “It’s obvious there’s attraction between you two.”
“It’s not obvious,” I fire back.
“Oh, come on. If you two were the main characters in one of my books, my readers would be pitching a fucking fit that you two haven’t figured it out yet.”
“Figured what out?”
“That you want to bang each other’s brains out.”
“That’s…graphic.”
“We’re two thousand miles from all the judgmental assholes who have some sick loyalty to a creepy man who wouldn’t know where to find a clitoris if it hit him in the face. I’d bet you the royalties of my next book release that his wife is already getting some on the side.”
“Where are you going with this?” I ask.
“No one’s going to judge you here, Jade. If you want to have some consensual adult fun with the flannelled-up mountain man, then you should go wild.”
I want to argue, but the only argument happening in my head is the one asking what might’ve happened if I stayed in River’s bed until he woke up.
What the hell?
Maybe I should go a little wild.