“Come back, Elias.”
Come on. Come back. Come back come back come back.
I’m here. Here.
A hand on his shoulder, down his arm, back up. Chaffing. Firm, solid. Real.
Darkness. Warmth. Cocooned.
He shivered again, shaking the body above his. Encased in something soft and warm. Warm.
Forever passed. Years.
“Come on, Elias. Just take this and I’ll leave you alone.” He listened, tried to move. “We’ve got to get you warm. Get warm and go. We can’t stay here.”
He couldn’t open his eyes, but let her pry his lips apart, then swallowed the hard little pills, followed by a mouthful of icy water. After sputtering, he tried to settle back and let out an annoyed grunt when she forced more on him. Another swallow. Another.
“Warn me if you need to pee.” Her voice vibrated from her chest into his.
An unexpected laugh shook him—a dying donkey sound—and their bodies moved in tandem, hers half covering him, like a blanket.
“Wait…” He raised one arm just enough to slip it up and over her soft back. “Naked,” he sighed before sinking into dreams of cold, chilly fog and warm, wet female.
***
Leo cracked her eyes open and immediately shut them again, not ready to face the pounding in her skull or the danger surrounding them or, more than anything, the fact that she was lying on a man she barely knew without a stitch of fabric between them.
A tug of the sleeping bag revealed what appeared to be daylight. Crap. Had they spent the entire night here, out in the open, on the lake’s shore?
Somewhere close by, a dog whined.
She swallowed over a thick, swollen throat and the movement pressed parts of her closer to the person she was currently snuggled up to. Naked.
There was no dignified way to get out of this, but maybe if she put out a foot and an arm and inched to one side, taking some of her weight off his…
He groaned, shifted beneath her, and lifted his hips, proving that at least one part of him was awake.
Whoa.
“You conscious? If so, I need you to tell me, ’cause this is kinda…”Hotwasn’t the right word for the situation, but it was what her brain supplied her with. It took a second before she came up with “Inappropriate.”
Another long, low sound emerged from him, this one more of a rough hum. Good. At least he was still alive.
Yeah, well, the hard-on had sort of told her that.
Now time to get off it before this developed into something completely different. Warmth curled in her belly. She ignored it.
“Okay, Elias. Can you open your eyes? You awake?” She craned her head from the sleeping bag, strained to lift up and get a good look at his face, then glanced out at their overbright surroundings before letting the bag fall shut again, careful not to jar his side.
Yep. They’d slept here all night, their naked bodies sandwiched together. It was a terrible spot to have spent the night in, out in the open like this, the sun just coming up in the east, its rays heating the insulated nest she’d created for them.
At least he looked better, though. The parts of his skin she could see were pink instead of gray. That had to be a good sign.
“Can’t stay here.” Her heavy head dropped back to his chest, in direct opposition to her urging. “Have to move.” She didn’t want to. She wanted to stay here and sink back into the blissful heat, the musky smell, the languid pleasure of skin against skin.
One arm slid up and over her, not tight, but warm and comfortable. This shouldn’t feel as good as it did. Not only was this not the time or the place, it really wasn’t the person.
Her libido apparently didn’t agree. If it had its way, she’d make her slow way down—
