Born to Be Wild (13 page)

Her hand dove into his hair, and she hungrily returned his kiss. He felt her other hand slide down his chest to the button of his jeans. His better judgment warred with primal desire. Judgment won out. A split
second before her hand could brush against him, he backed away from her.

Dara stumbled backward a step, her expression a bit wild and unfocused. She wobbled a bit as she bent down to retrieve her shirt, but she was moving away from him before he could reach out to help.

“Dara.” His voice was little more than a rough growl. “Look at me.”

She slid her arms into her shirt, keeping her back to him.

He curled his fingers into his palm to keep from reaching for her. “Please.” Her actions stilled for a split second, then continued. “Don’t hide from me, Dart.”

With a sigh of disgust, she gave up trying to button her shirt and turned to him. “I’m not—”

“God, you’re beautiful.” The words just tumbled out, heartfelt, soul-deep. Something deep inside twisted painfully when she automatically reached up and held her shirt closed. “I was looking at you when I said that. Not your open shirt.”

He couldn’t tell if her cheeks were red from his beard, or from a blush. Stepping forward, he slowly reached for her hair, softly untangling the wild snarls he’d created.

“I have a pretty good idea what you’re thinking right now,” he said quietly.

“No, you—”

“Shhh. I stopped you because I was about a nanosecond from disgracing myself. If your hand had moved even a quarter of an inch …” Now the blush was apparent. He smiled, feeling tender and protective and a whole bunch of things he didn’t want to analyze. “And I
don’t know about you, but I had a different idea in mind for our first time.”

He watched her throat work as she swallowed. She started to speak, but stopped, looked away for a moment, then finally back at him. “I guess it’s sort of ridiculous to deny there will be a first time at this point?”

She smiled, and Zach laughed softly before growing serious. “Can you honestly say you don’t want to?” Zach wasn’t sure he was ready for her answer, so he didn’t allow her time to give him one. “I know you’re keeping some mental list in your head about the pros and cons of our having a relationship.”

She stiffened, and Zach stifled the urge to curse.

“One of us has to be sensible.”

“And it goes without saying it can’t be me, right?” Zach clamped his mouth shut before he said something stupid he’d regret forever. A moment later, he said, “I hate to break it to you, Dara, but we’re already having a relationship. Whether you want to or not. As long as we keep spending time together, this will keep happening. And it won’t be long before it’s a whole lot more than this. You know it and I know it.”

“Does it make any difference to you that I wish it wouldn’t?”

Bang. Dead center. The intensity of the pain took him totally by surprise. “Why?” The question was nothing more than a hoarse whisper. “Would it really be so awful? Am I such a poor bargain, Dart?”

She lifted shaky fingers and traced them over his mouth. Damn if his eyes didn’t burn. Why was this so hard? Why the hell did it matter so much?

“Honestly, Zach? I think the reason I can’t seem to
stop this from happening is because a part of me wants it too. A big part. Badly.” The last word sounded as if it had been forced from her.

“Then what’s the problem?”

“The problem is that for you, this is …” She shrugged. “I don’t know, for fun, casual. Not serious.” She turned away. “I can’t explain it.”

“And for you it’s not? Is that what you’re saying?” He pulled her gently back around, keeping his hands on her shoulders. “Dara?”

She looked up at him, and the wariness he saw in her eyes tore at him. “I’m not real good at casual.”

“I’ve never felt less casual about anything in my life.”

“Maybe I know that too,” she said, so softly, he wasn’t sure he heard her correctly. “Maybe that’s why I keep making lists. So neither of us gets hurt.” She moved a step back. “And I think I’d rather have you as a friend forever, than a, than a …”

“A lover, Dara. You can say it. Lovers. And who says we can’t have both? Which brings us back to the original question of how we’d have one without the other. You know as well as I do what would have happened if I hadn’t stopped just now.”

Her eyes darted away, then suddenly her mouth curved in a small smile, then erupted into a soft laugh.

“What’s so damn funny?”

“Nothing.” She giggled again. “Which is just what would have happened. You said yourself if I’d touched you, you would have—”

“I know what I said!” He turned around, then found himself fighting the urge to laugh too.

Careful to keep his back to her, he said, “I’m trying
to be serious here, Dara.” He heard her stifle a snort and spun around. One look and they both burst into laughter. They laughed until they each had to hold on to the nearest tree for support.

Several moments later, he walked to her and pulled her gently into a loose embrace. He released a deep sigh as she looped her arms around his waist and let her head drop forward onto his chest.

He lost track of how long he stood there with her in his arms. He tightened his hold slightly and leaned down to whisper in her ear. “Let it happen, Dara. Let’s just let it happen.”

Dara didn’t say anything, but a few seconds later she stretched up on tiptoe and kissed him gently on his neck. She moved her arms from around his waist and turned away from him.

He let her go, feeling oddly as if a part of him had just gone with her. He stopped short of helping her button her shirt. Just the knowledge that she wasn’t wearing a bra any longer would likely keep him in pain the rest of the way up the trail.

He found the bra dangling from a thin tree limb and unsnagged it, giving her plenty of time before he turned back to her.

“You still want to sit down for a while?”

“How much farther is it?”

“About a mile and a half.”

She raked her fingers through her hair, doing little to untangle the snarls, but quite a lot to increase Zach’s discomfort.

“Might as well get on with it.”

His cocky grin finally resurfaced, and he wiggled his
eyebrows suggestively. “I thought that’s what we were just doing.”

Dara rolled her eyes as she brushed by him. “Get your mind out of the boys’ locker room, Brogan.”

He started after her. “Hey, I resent that!” he called out. “It’s at least in the men’s locker room by now.”

Dara flashed a smile over her shoulder. “Last one to the top is a rotten egg!” She took off toward the trail, her laughter ringing through the trees.

“Now who’s still in grade school, Dart the Dragon Colbourne?” he yelled.

She turned around and stuck her tongue out at him, then squealed when he took off toward her at a dead run.

Leaving her pack behind, she tore up the dirt path, but after the first fifty yards, her blisters screamed in protest. She raised her hands over her head and spun toward him. “I surrender, I—oof!”

Zach barely had time to duck his shoulder and scoop her up in his arms before trotting to a stop.

She braced her hands on his shoulders and looked down at him. They were both laughing between gasping for breath. He let her feet drop lightly to the ground and pulled her to him for a quick, hard kiss.

He groaned and rested his forehead on hers. “Dara, we’re going to have to talk about this, you know.”

“I thought that was my line.” She leaned up and kissed him again before pulling away. “I’m trying, Zach. Okay? But no talk, not yet. Give me a chance to get used to this ‘go for it’ mentality, first. It’s not as easy as it used to be.” She didn’t wait for his answer, just winked at him and started back down the trail.

Zach stood there watching her walk away and wondered
just when his own “go for it” philosophy had changed to “grab hold and don’t let go.”

Dara studied the small dome-shaped structure Zach had just popped up. “You have the nerve to call that a tent?”

Zach grinned at her. “All the comforts of home.”

“If you’re Fred Flintstone, maybe.”

Zach rolled back on his heels and stood. “Aw, it’s not that bad. Besides, all you’re going to do is sleep in it.”

Dara thought his eyebrows might have lifted with a hint of a question, but she didn’t take the bait. She was working hard at not analyzing things, not thinking about her past or all the really good reasons she had for why Zach was the last man on earth for her. But it didn’t require much thought to know she wasn’t ready to share a tent, much less a sleeping bag with Zach Brogan. Or maybe she was too ready.

She shrugged and smiled with determination. “You have a point.” She bent down—way down—and peered inside the small tomblike dome. If she lay flat on her back and reached both arms out, her fingertips would brush the sides. “I guess I can always just change clothes inside my sleeping bag.”

“Hey, don’t turn yourself into a pretzel on my account.”

Dara mimicked his innocent expression, then said, “I managed to change clothes inside my sleeping bag when I was fourteen, I guess I can do it now.”

“I thought you said you’d never been camping.”

“I haven’t. But you’ve never had your survivalist skills
truly challenged until you’ve lived through a teenage slumber party.”

“Speaking for all fourteen-year-old boys everywhere, I’m sure they’d love to give it a try.”

“You could speak for a fourteen-year-old boy.”

He pressed a hand against his chest. “Oh, she still scorches the heart.” Chuckling, he grabbed for her hand and pulled her down into his lap.

Dara shifted around until she could look at him, causing a reaction she’d have to be dead not to notice.

She was far from dead. Quite the opposite.

“So, why did you change clothes in your sleeping bag?” he asked. “Weren’t all the slumberers girls?”

Dara rolled her eyes. “I hope you have many daughters, Zach Brogan. It would be the ultimate justice.” She ignored the odd expression that flickered in his eyes, though it caused a strange reaction deep in her belly. “But to answer your question,” she went on, “I was spending the night at Mary Beth Waters’s house. Mary Beth and her best friend Toni were, shall we say, early bloomers.”

Zach grinned, his gaze dropping to the front of her shirt. Only a small part of her wished she’d put her bra back on. A part that was amazingly easy to ignore.

“Well, speaking from, ah, firsthand experience—” Zach ducked and just barely missed her attempt to pull his hair. “Your blooms are quite wonderful, Ms. Colbourne.”

His smile faded from cocky to sincere, and Dara felt her cheeks warm. “Why thank you, Mr. Brogan,” she said, refusing to let things get serious. “Coming from an
expert such as yourself, I’m flattered.” Wrong answer, she realized too late.

His smile faded altogether, but she quickly scrambled out of his lap. This line of conversation had gone on long enough. Dara was halfway across the clearing before she realized he was still sitting by the tent.

She turned. “Zach?”

Zach waved. “Right here.” Then under his breath he added, “Which is where I’m staying until I think I can stand again.” The way she’d torn out of his lap had left serious doubt that he’d be able to fulfill her prophecy of having daughters. Or sons for that matter.

“Come on, you said you’d show me where the kids could go fishing.”

Zach groaned. She’d traded her hiking boots for sneakers and Band-Aids back on the trail. Since then she’d fairly hopped up the remaining part of the service road. Gone was the woman who was afraid of heights and terrified of snakes. Except for the comment about the tent he’d provided for her in lieu of the portable condo she’d packed, she’d been all enthusiasm and bounding energy.

In short, he’d created a monster. Dart the Dragon had returned with a vengeance.

Zach slowly rolled to his knees and pushed to a stand. When he was sure he could walk without looking like he’d just spent a month on horseback, he headed her way.

She stood at the edge of the clearing, hands on her hips. The stance pulled at the buttons of her blouse, not letting him ignore the fact that her sports bra was still in his backpack. But he didn’t let his gaze linger on the shadowed fullness of her breasts. Instead, as he closed the distance between them, he kept his attention focused on her. All of her. She’d mystified him as a child, provoking him to do idiotic things that had resulted in alienating her. He stopped a few feet away from her, reveling in the discovery that the enchantment was still there. Only far more potent.
Please Lord
, he found himself silently praying,
don’t let me do anything stupid to mess things up this time
.

“Which way?”

“The lake is over here.” He gestured toward a gently
sloping path that had been recently widened, although he was pleased to see the crew he’d hired had taken pains to keep it from looking that way. The other surrounding paths, as well as the service road they’d hiked up on, had also been recently graded to remove the deep ruts the winter runoff always created. From the looks of it so far, the buggies should do just fine.

“I know I said it all looked the same earlier.” Dara shifted her gaze to the sweeping vista spread out below them. The fields in the valley were sectioned off, planted with various crops, making them look like an odd game board, with the small farmhouses and other buildings resembling small playing pieces scattered about haphazardly. “But up here the view is simply outstanding.” She turned to face him. “You picked a beautiful spot, Zach.”

“I think the kids will like it.”

Dara gave him a “we’ll see” look. He loved knowing he could drive her to complete distraction in less than five seconds almost as much as he loved the reemerging wildness in her. But he realized he was equally drawn to her business-only side, and he actually liked the way she insisted on analyzing everything. Maybe even when it came to the two of them.

She kept him on his toes, made him look at things from a different perspective, challenging him on levels he’d never experienced. Like one long never-ending thrill ride.