Page 5 of Tempted By the Mountain man

“You okay with that?” River asks.

Heat instantly creeps up my neck and settles on my cheeks at the realization I hadn’t heard a damn thing he just said. Hell, had he caught me staring at his beard?

“Um, yep. Totally good.”

For all I know, I agreed to re-shingle the roof. But I’m too embarrassed to ask him to repeat the question.

“I’ll let you get started then,” he says, something akin to a smirk lifting one corner of his mouth. As though he knows I hadn’t heard him earlier.

“Right now?”

Though the sun hasn’t disappeared completely behind the horizon, it’s on the verge. I’m also a bit jetlagged and in desperate need of a shower. But considering I forgot to pack my noise-canceling headphones, getting a head start on the job I’m completely unqualified to complete but somehow managed to Sangria-talk myself and said employer into is probably not the worst idea.

“We don’t have a lot of time,” River says, eyebrows drawn in confusion. Fuck, this is probably what I agreed to.

“Right. I’ll, uh, just…start in this corner over here.”

“Or I can show you the rest of the cabin so you make a plan of attack like I offered,” River says, moving toward the staircase at the back of the room.

Dammit. He absolutely knows I was distracted.

“A tour sounds like a great idea.” I follow him up the creaky stairs, making a silent vow to listen. Even if I have to close my eyes to concentrate. Which I do as I climb the staircase because I can’t seem to stop staring at his firm ass.

It would be such a terrible idea to sleep with my new boss for normal, generic reasons. But add on the false accusations that got me suspended from my teaching position, and it would be catastrophic. My too-small-for-its-own-good Indiana town would decide I’m a harlot who sleeps her way to the top. As though there were some top to rise to.

I’m better than that.

And, if by some miracle I can pull off this appraisal job, River might be a valuable reference on my resume. The man might very well hold my future in the palm of his hand. I can’t let something like simple lust derail that only hope I’ve had in weeks.

Marty zips by us, charging down the hall and darting into a room on the left. He hops onto a king-sized bed and stares at us expectantly.

“Don’t mind him,” River says over his shoulder, stopping just outside the bedroom. “He’s retired.”

“Retired?”

“He’s a Marine.”

“But you said he’s retired.”

“Once a Marine, always a Marine.”

“Except now, while he’s bouncing on your bed?” My nipples tighten at the thought of me bouncing on that bed. Preferably with two hundred pounds of mountain man on top, bouncing with me.

Get a fucking grip, Jade.

“He’s earned the right.”

I’m about to ask how River ended up with a retired military dog when the shrill ring of a phone cuts me off.

He pulls a phone from his shirt pocket. “I need to take this,” he says, moving past me toward the stairs. His bicep brushes my shoulder, and dammit if heat doesn’t coil low in my belly at the briefest physical contact. “Head down the hall. Last door to your right.”

“Right,” I say, though the reply is to myself since the man has already flown down the stairs as if the cabin were on fire.

I glance at Marty on the bed. The pup looks both annoyed and disappointed that I haven’t joined him. I grip the doorframe with both hands, fighting the temptation to step into River’s bedroom.

What the fuck is wrong with me?

I’ve known this stranger for all of an hour.