Page 10 of Goddess of Storms

We don’t stop until we are at the shore and Stone drops my hand. He sets down his pack and then he starts stripping.

I can’t tear my eyes away from him as he lifts up his shirt after kicking off his shoes. He is all hard muscle—a six pack and fuck that V that disappears into his pants.

“You gonna stare at me all day or join me?”

“The sun was in my eyes,” I lie and unlace my boots. “You go ahead. I’ll meet you in a minute.”

“Don’t get shy on me now,” he teases and tugs his pants and underwear down all in one swoop before he wades in the water. “Stop watching my ass and get in. I’ll stay turned around until you say so.”

“What a gentleman you are,” I respond wryly as I peel off my clothes as fast as humanly possible. My entrance into the water is less graceful than Stone’s but true to his word, he hasn’t turned around.

“This water is so refreshing. It’s nice to wash away all this ash, too,” I say as I step closer to Stone. I near him and whisper in his ear. “Why is your touch familiar?”

He turns to me, without touching me, “Do you want me to do it again?” His face is serious and solemn.

“What?” I gulp.

“Touch you.”

“I don’t know,” I answer honestly. My emotions are a mess and I’m torn. My heart is telling me to do it, while my brain is screaming no.

He lifts a hand to my cheek and with a gentle touch, he says, “When you ask me to, I will. Until then you’ll have to settle for you just staring at me.”

“Asshole.” I smirk and slap water in his face. “Come on, as nice as this is, we need to get moving to the outer edge of the park. Stay turned around, no peeking or I will kick your ass.”

“On my honor,” Stone says.

I scurry from the lake and dress in a hurry. Gazing over my shoulder, I see Stone is still turned the other direction.Maybe I am too hard on him.

As I gather my hair up into a ponytail, I holler, “Stone, your turn.”

“Don’t you dare peek,” he laughs as his voice goes closer.

While I wait for him to finish dressing, I pull my phone out and check our location on the map. We are still about a four-hour hike from where we need to be.

“Hope you are wearing your comfy boots,” I call over my back to Stone. “We have a long hike ahead of us.”

“So, more quality time, just the two of us.”

“Are you ready? If we hurry we’ll make it before nightfall. It’s a full moon tonight, maybe an eclipse, so the weirdos will be out.”

“We are the weirdos.” Stone laughs.

“As true as that is, the wrong kind of ones are out,” I state.

“Wrong kind?” Stone raises an eyebrow as he stands next to me.

“Yes, the ‘murdering, leave you in the woods’ kind.”

“Oh,” is all he says as he starts walking.

I follow with one last glance for smoke, it’s all clear, so I jog to get back on pace with Stone.

* * *

“Are we there yet?” Stone asks.

Sighing, I check the GPS on my phone once again. “No, we still have about forty-five minutes before we hit our campsite. I can’t wait to get off my feet.”

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