“It’s a leaf, man. I can see it.”
As the young men bicker, the adrenaline seeps out of me as fast as it arrived, replaced with a surge of annoyance.
For God’s sake.
Just kids messing around. Being dumb. To my relief, their voices are moving around the lake now, like they’re heading to the next part of the trail. They’re all still laughing at Kyle, who keeps whining, “Stop fucking laughing, assholes! I thought it was a bug.”
Everly isn’t looking at me anymore. She’s craning her head around the branches, making sure the group has left, eyeing the place where our clothes are piled up. Then she turns to me, her cheeks pink.
“Uh, I better go get dressed. They might come back.”
I try to hide my disappointment as she moves past me, away from the cover of the tree branches. I follow her, flinching as the cold water laps my shoulder, my eyes fixed on Everly as she swims toward the shore ahead.
As she pushes herself out of the water, I don’t look away. I glimpse her thick, rounded ass, the green fabric of her panties almost transparent, and a deep groan tears from my throat.
God help me.
I shouldn’t be looking. But it’s like I’m hypnotized, the world moving in slow motion as Everly towels herself dry with her t-shirt, pulling on her leggings. Then she ties the t-shirt around her waist and turns to look at me, her hair dripping lake water down her face.
There’s a heavy silence—nothing but the sound of birdsong and the gentle lapping of lake water. With a jolt of panic, I realize she’s probably about to head home. Disappear through the trees again, just like yesterday. I can’t let that happen.
“My cabin’s not far,” I tell her, trying to keep my voice calm. “Want some lunch?”
She looks down at me, bathed in sunlight, and I swear she looks like a fucking goddess. Too damn perfect to be real. Too perfect for a man like me.
I hold my breath as she glances toward the trail, biting her lip. Then she turns back to me and smiles hesitantly.
“That would be great.”
My chest soars, heart thudding like it’s trying to escape my rib cage. Everly has had plenty of opportunities to walk away from me. But she came back to the lake today. She joined me in the water. Now she’s willing to follow me home. I don’t know what I did to deserve that, but I’m sure as hell not complaining.
All that matters is that she said yes.
And that means I’m one step closer to making her mine.
7
EVERLY
I followGunnar away from the lake and into the trees, trying to keep up with his giant strides. I know I’m being reckless by agreeing to go back to his cabin. Heck, I’ve been making reckless decisions ever since I set eyes on this man.
I’ve always been the kind of girl who plays it safe. Sticks to the trail. But something about Gunnar makes me want to leave the trail behind, run straight into the wilderness, and never look back.
We walk in silence—the air charged as our footsteps echo through the trees. There was a moment back at the lake…a moment when his gaze flitted to my lips. For one crazy second, I was sure he was going to kiss me. I can’t help wishing he had.
God, this is getting messy.
I’ve only been home from college for a week. I have no job, no clue what I’m doing or what’s going to happen next. And now I’ve thrown a gorgeous older mountain man into the mix—swimming in lakes with him, following him back to his remote cabin in the forest instead of acting like a responsible adult.
But I can’t resist.
Gunnar does something to me. Something I’ve never felt before. Something wild and giddy, like a runner’s high but amillion times more intense. I feel like he’s shocked my body to life, stirred up my most primal instincts and desires. It took every ounce of restraint not to sneak a peek when he got out of the lake, when all I wanted to do was see him. All of him.
He must have toweled himself dry with his shirt like I did, because he’s carrying the sopping plaid under his arm, his bare torso exposed. I snatch glances at him as we walk—his broad back, the swell of his biceps.
It should be illegal to be that hot.
I spot his cabin a few minutes later, nestled in a thicket of pine trees—a log cabin made of dark wood with a roof covered in vivid green moss. It’s bigger than my sister’s, with large windows and a view of Sugar Creek, which snakes behind the cabin like a silver ribbon.
