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His tickling intensified. “Then say it again.”
“Reece is a sap,” she said, finding it hard to catch her breath.
“Damn,” he muttered, “she’s on to me.” He stopped tickling her, his expression turning serious. “You know I’m not like this with anyone but you.”
Her grin vanished. She didn’t know how to respond to something like that, so she changed the subject. “Did you know you’re really sexy when you’re all covered in sweat and concentrating on a target with a bow and arrow?”
He grinned, sappy Reece going back into hiding and smart-assed Reece coming out to play. “You know, I seduce more women that way.”
“How many would you say?”
He seemed to think it over for a moment. “One that I know of.”
She grinned. “And who was that?”
“I think her name was Jennifer.”
Her mouth fell open in feigned outrage. “Did you forget about me?”
“Oh, were you seduced?”
“No,” she denied, knowing it was a lie. She wanted him, desperately, but this little game between them was too exciting to submit to her desire just yet. Maybe in ten minutes. But not yet.
“Well, there you go,” he said. “There was just the one.”
She took the sides of his open shirt in her hands, and tugged him towards her. “Less talking, more kissing,” she demanded.
“Yes, ma’am.”
He stretched out beside her and leaned closer to kiss her. Her hands explored the hard contours of his chest and stomach as if they had a mind of their own. She found a round spot of skin with a smoother texture than the rest of his belly, and fingered it, perplexed. He drew away and looked down at her, as if knowing what she was going to ask.
“Bullet wound,” he told her. “There’s a matching scar on my back.”
Her hand slid around and found a slightly larger area of puckered scar tissue on his back.
“You were shot!”
“Just a little,” he murmured.
“What happened?”
“Wrong place at the wrong time,” he said. “No big deal.”
She thought it was a big deal. “Did you almost die?”
He shook his head. “Nah, I’m too tough to die. Don’t worry about it, sweetheart. It’s all in the past.”
“That’s funny coming from someone who thinks the best way to escape the future is to hide in the past.”
He chuckled. “Point taken.”
“Are you going to tell me what happened?” she persisted. “Who shot you?”
Reece sat up and stared out across the creek to the forest on the opposite bank. “Someday I’ll tell you, but not today.”
“Don’t you trust me?”
He squeezed her hand. “That’s not it. I just don’t want to talk about it. It happened over ten years ago. I’ve put that part of my life behind me.”
She sat up and cuddled up against his back. “Okay,” she said. “I want you to confide in me, but I won’t press the issue.” She wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her chin on his shoulder. “You can tell me anything, Reece. I mean that.”
“I’ll tell you some day.”
“Did you tell future-me?”
He shook his head. “It never came up.”
“I never asked you about your past?”
“I don’t think you wanted to know,” he said. He glanced over his shoulder at her. “Besides, you were too busy trying to get in my pants.” He grinned impishly.
“I find that very hard to believe, Jericho.” She had a strange feeling settling in her chest. She wanted something special with this man. Something that a future Lara, who didn’t yet exist, never got to experience with him. It was as if she were jealous of some other woman for being with him first. And that other woman was herself. She knew it was strange to feel this way, but her tongue decided it was worth voicing. “Tell me one secret about yourself that future-me never knew.”
“Just one?”
“Anything. You chose.”
His ear was temptingly close to her nose, she couldn’t seem to stop herself from nuzzling it. Nibbling on its lobe. Sucking it into her mouth.
“My parents were gunned down when I was nine. The people you met as my family in the future took me in and raised me, but they were not my biological family.”
Lara felt as all the air had been sucked out of her lungs. She released his ear and leaned around his body so she could look him in the eye. “Your parents were gunned down?”
He nodded and lowered his gaze, but not before she saw the raw ache in his soul.
“How awful.” She rose up on her knees before him and hugged him against her chest. Wrapping both arms around his head, she pressed his ear to her heart. It thudded so hard, she feared it might burst out of her chest. She brushed her lips against his hair, her desire to take his pain away an absolute necessity. “Is that how you got shot?”
“No. An attempt at revenge got me shot, but I don’t want to talk about this. It’s in the past.” He chuckled. “Actually, it’s a few hundred years in the future, but... Can we start celebrating now?”
She had a feeling that it had taken a lot for him to trust her enough to confide what little he had. She understood his need to change the subject. “Thank you for telling me,” she said. She released her hold on his head and dropped a kiss on his brow. She could tell bringing those memories to the forefront of his mind caused him pain. She almost wished she hadn’t asked. She also wished the tender kisses she trailed along his forehead could erase those terrible memories. “When you’re ready to talk, I’m ready to listen.”
“Okay, one more secret,” he said.
She bit her lip, anticipating something profound to escape his lips.
He lifted his gaze to hers. The sincerity in his eyes stole her breath. “That dress makes your tits look fantastic.”
She slapped at him, unintentionally hitting his bruise.
“Ouch,” he cried. “Okay. I’m sorry, sadist.”
“Did I hurt you? I didn’t mean to.”
“Honestly, that ache is a lot more tolerable than the one below my belt.”
“How can you possibly be turned on at a time like this?”
“Everything about you do turns me on, sweetheart. I thought you had figured that out.”
“I’m starting to feel the same way,” she admitted. She leaned forward and kissed the horrible bruise on his shoulder. Her hands ran down his washboard abs and around his sides to his back, while her lips traveled from his shoulder, down his hard chest. She flicked her tongue over the tiny pebble of his nipple.
Reece drew a shaky breath through his teeth.
“Did I hurt you again?” she asked, immediately concerned.
“I’m hurtin’ all right,” he breathed. “Are you sure you don’t want to get into my pants? There’s quite a lot going on down there.”
“Poor baby,” she crooned. She dipped her fingertips into the waistband of his trousers and slowly drew her hands from his back around his sides to his belly.
He tensed, and pulled away. “Okay, I can’t take any more of that. Cold shower time.”
He was sitting waist deep in the stream before she could voice a protest.
“Damn, this is cold,” he shouted.
She couldn’t help but laugh. “Jericho, you keep tempting me to ge
t into your pants and when I try, you run away.”
“I know better. You’re just teasing me to the limit of my tolerance, woman. It’s Lara Kensington’s favorite game.”
She shrugged. It was unnerving how he knew her so well. “Maybe. Or maybe you took flight before I could offer you some relief.”
He stared at her. “What are you saying?”
She held up her hand. “Something to do with my hand.”
“What?”
“Use your imagination.”
“I suppose it’s too late to find out now.”
“You missed your chance.”
“Of course.”
He continued to sit in the stream for several minutes. She could hear his teeth chattering from her position on the bank.
“Are you coming out of there?” she asked. “You must be cold.”
“Oh no you don’t, woman. I can actually think when I’m in here. You’re trying to lure me back to that state of incoherent thoughts and a one track mind.”
“I’ll behave,” she promised. “I just don’t want you to freeze.”
“Whatever gave you the impression that I wanted you to behave? I’m the one who is trying to behave.”
“Well, if I’m not behaving, how can I expect you to behave?”
He grinned at her and stood up in the stream. Water poured from his lower body in torrents. “I always did like your brand of logic.” He waded back to the stream bank and rung water out of his pant legs.
When he sat next to her, she couldn’t help but notice the goose flesh covering his entire body.
She made a sound of impatience. “Look at you. You’re freezing.”
“True,” he said, “but the perpetual hard-on is gone.”
Her eyes went to his crotch automatically. There was a stirring of movement there and he swore under his breath.
“God, woman, don’t look at him,” he muttered. “Then he thinks he has something to prove.”
She laughed, gaze moving back to his handsome face. “Reece, I can honestly say I’ve never laughed more in my life than I have the last few days. Thank you for stirring up my ho-hum life.”
“You’re welcome,” he said. “Now hurry up and fall in love with me. I have an agenda here.”
