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“I came here to, um…” Speech left me again as I saw his fiery gaze flick down to my lips, then dip lower to my collarbone, my clea**vage—God how I wanted him to put his hands where his eyes were—before jumping back up again. He was still glowering at me like I was a Pinkerton agent come to check up on whether he was keeping an illegal moonshine still.
I tried again. “Hunter, I just—” I’m so glad to see you, it’s so good to see you, oh God, are you okay, oh, I wish I could say any of these things out loud and not risk getting shoved back out onto the porch and the door slammed in my face… “We need to talk.”
“Do we now?” he said, stony-faced.
“Yes. We do.”
I pulled away from his grip and his hypnotic eyes and pushed past him, further into the house. It was even more rustic than my cabin back at the estate had been; there was a fridge and stove, but that was about the only sign that this cabin existed in the twenty-first century. Everything else was wool rugs and antlers and animal hides, hand-hewn wooden tables and a lumpy home-made couch. A door off to the right looked like it might lead to a bedroom; I caught a glimpse of more wood.
I pulled myself back to the present; I hadn’t come out here to gawk at his living quarters. “What’s going on at the company? Have you seen the new campaign? You have to have seen the new campaign. How could that have happened? Can we stop it? We have to stop it! How do you think we can—”
“I haven’t seen them, and I have no intention of seeing them,” Hunter snapped. “And I’ll thank you not to bring them up again.”
He strode past me to rummage in the fridge for a cooler, a dented red and white number. He opened it to check the number of bottles, added a few more from a half-empty case on the floor. And of course I definitely did not examine the curve of his as**s in those jeans as he leaned over, didn’t have to force myself not to drool. Not for a second.
“How can you say that?” I demanded. “This is your legacy!”
“Not anymore,” he said, grabbing at a bait box, which he balanced on top of the cooler; he picked up a fishing pole with the other hand. “I’m just being practical. Knowing the specifics isn’t going to change one damn thing, so I’d rather not know. Here’s all I need to understand: I lost control, the board outvoted me, and now it’s all over. See how simple that was? Or did you think things would turn out differently?”
He shot a glare at me that could’ve stripped paint, and stormed through the open door back outside.
I followed. “But—”
“I’m done listening to you,” he interrupted. He was making his way to the dock, his strides long, impatient. “I listened to you once before and look where it got me.”
The words hit me like a punch to the throat.
I pushed back at the pain, spluttering, “Fine, don’t take my advice on what to do. But do something. I can’t believe you’re just sitting here doing nothing at all!”
He bared his teeth in what was technically a smile, but looked like it was causing him actual pain. “Oh, I’m not doing nothing. I’ve got plans. Me, the lake, some fishing and beer. It’s golden.”
“Oh, great plans,” I said sarcastically. “Why didn’t I think of that? That’ll definitely save your family name, for sure.”
His jaw tensed for just a second, his eyes opening wide enough that I thought I glimpsed a moment of true hurt, like a puppy who had been kicked. Then he wheeled around and stomped away down the length of the dock without saying anything.
Damn that man!
I hustled on after him, my sensible heels clicking rapidly against the wood of the dock. I followed him right on into the boat, which he was not expecting. His eyes darted over the side, skimming the surrounding lake water, and for a minute I thought he was going to try to get me off the boat by force.
“You wouldn’t dare,” I said, though we both knew full well that he would. That is, if things were better between us. And then he’d jump in after me and pull me close, his hot tongue searching the corners of my mouth as my legs wrapped around his hard torso—ah, and there my brain went again, malfunctioning with dirty thoughts.
Instead of making my dreams come true, Hunter just sighed and turned away from me, opting for the oh-so-much-more-mature option of pretending I didn’t exist. Which was quite a feat considering how small the boat was.
The muscles in his arms rippled as he rowed us out in the center of the lake. The moon was high in the sky, lighting each wavelet and cat-tail with ethereal beauty. Everything looked gilded in silver.
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