Page 21 of Trapped with the Forest Ranger
No shit, Ranger Rude and Repressed. But sure—let’s pretend like this is about weather.
I catch the blanket, fingers trembling, and wrap it around my body like armor. As if wool can protect me from the hunger burning low and deep. As if I’m not seconds from combusting.
Then his hands go to the hem of his shirt.
Oh God.
He peels it off in one smooth pull—water sluicing down his torso, catching on the curve of his chest, the dip of his stomach, the line of a scar slicing across his side like a memory of fire.
And I break.
My mouth actually drops open. Like a damn cartoon character. Like I’ve never seen a shirtless man before in my life.
Holy hell.
He’s not just ripped—he’s ruinous. Like a Roman statue got tired of being admired and decided to learn how to throw a woman over his shoulder and wreck her worldview instead.
My hands twitch with the need to touch. To trace the cut of his hips. To map every scar with my tongue and learn the story of his body through taste and sweat and surrender. I want to fall to my knees in front of him and offer everything—breath, restraint, control—and watch his face as I do it.
Lightning flares outside, blinding for a split second. His silhouette glows sharp and wild—jaw clenched, hair damp and curling at the nape, eyes locked on mine like he hears every single thought I shouldn’t be thinking.
Thunder answers—low, rolling, obscene.
The room smells like smoke, pine, ozone, and him. The airis thick with it. With us.
I can’t look away.
Don’t want to.
Because if he touches me now—if he takes even one step forward—I’ll burn alive.
And I’ll beg for it.
His gaze lifts to mine, slow and deliberate, like he’s peeling back layers I didn’t know I had. And just like that, the air in the shelter shifts—thick with heat, with want, with something neither of us is saying.
“You’re staring.” His voice is low. Rough. The kind of sound that curls around your spine and whispers don’t stop.
“You’re not exactly easy to look away from.”
The words leave my mouth before I can catch them. Honest. Raw. Soaked-through-and-horny truth with no filter and even less shame.
He doesn’t smile. Doesn’t flirt. Just watches me.
And it does feel like watching—like I’m under a lens, like he’s studying every flicker of my breath, every tremble I try to hide. His eyes stay locked on mine, unreadable and steady, until they flick—just once—down to my mouth.
Oh.
Oh, hell.
I feel it. A jolt, pure and physical, snapping through me like lightning striking too close to home. The kind of tension that hums beneath the skin. Dangerous. Addictive.
One more look. One more breath.
And I’m going to do something reckless.
Something irrevocable.
And he’s either going to stop me.
