Page 217 of Her Reluctant Hero
Then Gabe crawled in and sucked all the air out of the tent. Her skin tingled with awareness as he tried to fit in beside her. She scooted toward the seam and still felt the press of him against her back. She held her breath, heard him clear his throat in obvious discomfort as he settled on his side also.
“This, ah, this isn’t going to work,” he said gruffly, his breath grazing her ear.
She couldn’t turn around to look, didn’t want to see how close he was, though his shoulder bumped hers as he tried to find a spot for his arm. “Um, what?”
“Maybe you could put your head on my arm. There doesn’t seem to be any other place for it.”
She lifted her head in surprise and he took that as agreement and slipped his arm beneath. She settled back down, at first hesitant to let the whole weight of her head rest on it. He grunted her name and she tried to relax. His arm was hard and warm and smoky. Just when she thought she was used to the smell, her senses had to come back in full force.
All of them. The change in position brought his chest against her and she wished for the extra layer of his fire shirt between them. His T-shirted chest felt naked and she cursed her fertile imagination.
He flipped her hair over her shoulder away from him and she immediately tensed.
“Sorry. It was tickling my nose.” His voice was so close, his words teasing the back of her neck. She tensed all over again.
“Oh.” She smoothed the ponytail against her throat so no stray hairs would bother him. Then she shifted her hips and bumped her bottom into his groin. Both of them went perfectly still. Then, as if not to draw attention to her movement, she eased her hips away infinitesimally.
“We both have to, ah, relax,” he murmured at last.
He placed a hand on her hip and she flinched. He shushed her and slid his arm about her waist, drawing her against his body, spooning her against him, careful to keep their lower bodies apart, which of course only made her focus on it. Had her little bump aroused him and he didn’t want her to realize it?
No, she was being ridiculous. She was filthy and sweating and still wearing her boots, for crying out loud. Hardly arousing.
No one had held her since Dan died. She squeezed her eyes shut at the memory of the intimacy they’d shared every night, even the night before he died, but her eyes were too dry for tears. Good thing, since she didn’t want Gabe to think she wasn’t tough enough.
His heart beat against her back, strong and sure. One arm over her body, the other under her head, almost made her forget the tent wall inches from her nose.
And made her remember with an alien longing other things that happened in the dark.
She’d forgotten how wonderful a man’s strong arms about her felt, how safe. The thought terrified her. She took awhile to relax against him.
“That’s more like it,” he said against her ear. “Good night, Peyton. You did real good today.”
Pride rose at his words, almost blocking out the awkwardness of their sleeping arrangement. She’d hung in, she’d proven—
Proven what? That she was as tough as the people she wrote about, as Dan? Not yet.
Gabe’s breathing evened out almost immediately, but as tired as she was, she couldn’t sleep. Her mind snapped from one thought to another, from the fire to the campers, from Gabe to Dan, back to Gabe. Always back to Gabe.
He wasn’t as much like Dan as she’d first thought. Though both men were heroic, Gabe’s confidence didn’t come at the expense of caution. His mistakes were quickly rectified. He hated to be questioned about his decisions, but never failed to answer her. He was pure hero material, decisive, tough, intelligent. Just the right combination for her story.
So why was this the first time she’d thought of her story in hours?
