Slow Heat

She supposed that was all the apology she was going to get. She stared at him, telling herself she was not moved in the slightest by the sight of him. Even if the sight of him was incredibly sexy, all clad in a skintight black Under Armour shirt and black cargo ski pants loaded with gear coming out of every pocket.

And then there was his smile as he waggled the bag, wafting the scent of bacon and donuts, damn him, like he knew very well she couldn’t possibly resist. She blew out a breath and sat next to him.

He opened the bag. “Donuts or bacon?”

She gave him a look like he was an amateur, making him laugh.

“Both it is,” he said. He handed the whole bag over and she wasn’t mad enough at him not to dive in.

“Crispy,” she said on a moan around a bite of bacon. Just the way she loved it. And there were two donuts. She grabbed the old-fashioned chocolate glaze and offered him the other. “It must be Christmas.” The first bite of the donut yanked another moan right out of her. She had to close her eyes to savor it.

“Need a moment alone?” he asked, sounding amused again.

“Yes.” But when she opened her eyes, he was still there.

In fact, he hadn’t taken his gaze off her. “I’m glad you’re here. Glad you didn’t give up,” he said.

She was glad too. “I’m not equipped to have a deep conversation until all the sugar and fat and caffeine sinks into my system.” She licked the sugar off her thumb and dove back into the bag.

He patiently waited until she’d finished every last bite.

She looked at him, his fathomless eyes holding everything close to the vest, his square jaw suggesting equal parts strength and stubbornness. Emphasis on the stubbornness, she was beginning to learn. His broad-as-the-mountains shoulders that held the weight of his world.

He both drew her in and terrified her. “I regrouped,” she said.

He smiled. “Glad to hear it.”

“But I still don’t have all the information I need to do the full Kincaid family tree,” she reminded him.

Jacob. His name hovered between them a moment.

“Fair enough,” he said. “One question, whatever you want.”

“Where is he?”

“Missing.”

She waited for more but true to form, nothing came. “I want to ask what that means,” she said. “But the truth is, I can leave Jacob out or I can fake it. I’m a damn good faker,” she said. “I’m also insanely nosy. I’m trying to curb it out of respect for you, but I’ve never been very good at curbing myself.”

“No kidding.” He paused. “We were eighteen when he left.”

“Left? But you said he was missing.”

“Missing from my life.” He took her empty coffee cup and shoved it into the now-empty bag and wadded it all up. Then he executed a perfect three-pointer into the trash in the kitchenette on the other side of the room.

It hadn’t occurred to her that Jacob had walked away from his family and never returned. Bailey had been upset with her mom plenty over the years, but she’d never once considered going away and breaking off all contact, every last tie.

“I meant it about quitting, Bailey,” Hud said, stretching out an arm along the back of the couch where his fingers settled just behind her neck. “Don’t quit. Not because of me. Don’t let me win. I don’t deserve it.”

“It’s not because of you.”

“Then what?” he asked. “You’re not the quitting type.”

“You don’t know that,” she said.

“I think I do.”

She met his gaze. His mouth was still curved slightly but his eyes were serious. Serious and she found herself wanting to fall into them and drown. “I let my doubts take over,” she admitted.

“You can do this.”

The words fueled her and filled a hole she hadn’t realized was inside her, much less that it needed filling. Before she even realized what she was doing, she leaned toward him.

He cupped her jaw, his thumb rasping over her lower lip. Then he sucked the pad of that thumb into his mouth. “Mmm,” he said, voice low and gravelly. “Chocolate.”

That’s when she remembered she was in her pajamas—a pair of sweat bottoms cut off to indecent heights and a thin, tight tank top that wasn’t going to hide the fact that certain parts of her were happier to see him than other parts. She was embarrassed but she could tell by the heat in Hud’s eyes that embarrassment wasn’t what he felt… Far from it.

“Oh boy,” she whispered as he cupped the back of her head and drew her mouth to his—

His radio went off.

He stilled for a beat, their mouths a fraction of an inch apart, the anticipation so high she nearly cried before slowly pulling back. “Duty calls?” she asked.

“Yeah.” Blowing out a sigh, he rose to his feet.

Bailey did the same, a hand to her chest, trying to calm her heart rate.

Impossible.

Especially when he looked at her for a long moment and then pulled her in again for one quick kiss. Just the appetizer on his menu, but no less potent for it. It left her dumbstruck—kiss -struck, she corrected.

He flashed her a crooked smile. “Kick ass today, Bailey,” he said.

And then he was gone.

Chapter 10

Hud left Bailey’s knowing he’d be deeply distracted by the memories of her, soft and warm from sleep, in those teeny-tiny PJs that spurned even more fantasies—all of them down and dirty—for the entire day.

Not two minutes after leaving her, his body still thrumming with want, ski patrol was called to the top of lift eight.

Two young twentysomethings, brothers, had been seen fighting on the lift as it neared the top. Apparently one brother had started out with angry words that degenerated into fists. Somewhere along the way, one of the brothers slipped off the lift and fell about twenty feet. Wearing a helmet had definitely saved his noggin, but he’d broken his arm and possibly his clavicle as well.

Which hadn’t slowed down the fight much. Reportedly, the other brother had climbed down the lift to join his brother.

When Hudson and Mitch and a bunch of other ski patrollers arrived on scene, the pair were still rolling around on the snow, fists flying, directly beneath the lift, which the lift operator had stopped.

This meant that there was a long line of people hanging over the mountain, skis and boards dangling as they waited for the lift to get moving again, watching in rapt fascination as the idiot brothers wrestled and yelled at each other.

“I didn’t say you could sleep with her!” one yelled.

“She dumped you!” the other yelled back. “You said she was a crazy bitch!”

“Yeah, so why did you screw her?”

“Because she’s a hot crazy bitch!”

“I’m going to kill you!”

Hud dragged one free while his team grabbed the other.

They looked so much alike that they were clearly brothers. And they continued to fight, though now they were united in that fight as they tussled with the ski patrollers instead of each other. But Hud and his team quickly got them under control and restrained.

One of the brothers, the one who’d slept with the “crazy bitch,” was cradling his clearly broken arm.