Page 10 of The Mountain Man's Curvy Surprisem
He looks away, his turquoise eyes searing the wall in front of him. I half expect smoke to rise from the cabin at the intensity of his gaze.
Shaking his head, Mack says, “I got carried away in the letters.”
“Got carried away? What is this? A bad joke?”
“No.” He growls. “I fell in love with your picture, your personality. I couldn’t help myself. But one look at you in person, and I know you can do so much better.”
“Mack,” I whisper, crossing the distance towards the big, rugged man. “Is there another woman here that I need to know about? A girlfriend? A wife?” The words burn my tongue, my voice caustic. My eyes plead with him as I add almost inaudibly, “Tell me now if there is.”
I don’t know what I’m thinking beyond making the least scene possible. Especially if there are children here, too.
“No, Callie, it’s not like that at all,” Mack reassures, his eyes finally snapping to mine. They simmer as he stares at me, sparking a need so dangerous that I clench my thighs together beneath the long, black-and-white floral sundress I wear with a distressed denim jacket and strappy sandals.
“Are you mad at me for showing up unexpectedly?” I ask.
He shakes his head, his expression downright gloomy.
“Then, what’s the matter?”
He inhales slowly, and I wonder if he’s buying time, trying to figure out what he’s supposed to say. His tongue darts out, wetting his bottom lip, and I’m a goner.
How can this man look like he was cut from sin’s cloth? Fashioned for danger? And capable of the letters he wrote me simultaneously? I can’t leave here until I figure this out.
“I’m a broken man, Callie. Something the letters never conveyed to you. I’m sorry for that, but it was outside of my control.”
I feel dunked into a tank of cold water, barely comprehending the conversation. “Could you maybe slow down for a second? Greet me politely. Take my coat like a gentleman and offer me something to drink? I drove nearly four hours, and I could use some manners before we dive into a breakup.”
Mack looks convicted by my words, his countenance torn as he steps closer to me, gesturing for my coat. I turn around, shrugging my shoulders to help as he removes the denim, sparks somehow igniting between us despite the thin layer of fabric separating our flesh.
I wonder what it’d be like flesh to flesh with this man, nothing in between. My clit throbs, the juncture at the top of my legs tightening despite his rude reception and grumpy mood.
He saunters towards the rack, hanging up my coat as I eye him ravenously. I kind of expected him to be fifty pounds heavier and fifty years older. I thought there had to be a catch. But I was so very wrong.
Instead, my eyes absorb a wall of muscle, his ass round and tight in his Wranglers. Never in my life have I considered dating a cowboy. Even now, I thought I was getting a forest poet, a silver-tongued lumberjack. But this brutish cowboy mountain man is sexy as hell despite his offish demeanor.
Reason flies to the wind as my eyes devour him. Suddenly, he turns, catching me in the act. His cheeks darken along with his eyes.
The subtle recognition makes the heat in the room even more brutal. I fan myself, pulling at the collar of my sundress, though the temperature in his air-conditioned cabin doesn’t warrant such a display.
“A drink?” he murmurs.
“Yes, please.”
He arches an eyebrow as I take a seat on the couch, done with standing on ceremony and waiting for his manners to kick in.
I ask, “What do you have?”
“Water, tea, juice. No booze. I’ve been sober for about a year and a half now. No soda, either, because that shit’s poison.”
“Do you have coffee?” I ask.
“You want coffee? Isn’t it a little late for that?” His gruff, unexpected concern catches me off guard.
“No, I just want to make sure for the morning.”
He grimaces, and I feel like an idiot. After this reception, how in the world could I possibly think I would spend the night here?
Simple. In one of his last emails, he offered to let me stay at his place anytime I was in town. I extended the same invitation were he ever in San Francisco. It seemed like a fair enough trade-off for grown-ass adults discussing marriage …
