Bear’s jaw tightened. He picked up the axe again. “I know what he needs.”
“Then why aren’t you pushing harder?”
“Because you can’t push a man into wanting to live differently.” He set a log on the stump. “It doesn’t work that way.”
“So you just watch him drink himself into a ditch?”
“I watch him.” The axe came down. “I stay close. I don’t turn my back on him.” He kicked the split halves aside. “That’s all you can do for someone who isn’t ready.”
She stared at the back of his neck, the tendons there, the dark line of his hairline. “That sounds like an excuse to avoid a hard conversation.”
He turned then, axe loose in one hand, and looked at her with that flat, dark patience she found genuinely infuriating. “And that sounds like someone who’s been in a car for six hours picking a fight because she doesn’t want to think about why she went to Spokane.”
Bullseye. The words landed directly in her heart, and she hated him a little for it.
“Are you trying to psychoanalyze me now?” She scoffed. “Stick to chopping wood, Pooh Bear. You’re better at it.”
He slammed the axe into the block and faced her, his expression dark as the storm clouds gathering over the mountains. “Stop trying to piss me off.”
She had to tilt her head all the way back to meet his gaze, and her breath caught. “No.”
He stared down at her.
She stared back.
Then his big hand was at her jaw, and his mouth came down hard on hers. The kiss wasn’t sweet. It was punishment and relief and surrender. It was everything she’d been goading him toward for two years and so much more.
His free hand closed hard around her hip, and he backed her until her shoulder blades hit the wall of the woodshed. He kissed her again, rougher, like he was trying to see how much pressure she could take before she’d break.
But she didn’t fucking break. Ever.
She arched into it, greedy for all of him, and bit at his lower lip, just to see if he’d flinch.
He didn’t.
His hand was huge at her jaw, callused thumb rough against her chin. The edge of it pushed her mouth open wider, the threat of it clear: he could take, if he wanted. She let him. For a second, she just let him. She dug her nails into the sweat-beaded skin of his back.
He pulled back enough to look at her. His eyes were almost black, pupils huge and ravenous, and she could see herself reflected there—flushed, wild-haired, snapping with want.
“Tell me to stop,” he rumbled, but his body said the opposite: don’t.
She laughed, breathless. “You’d hate it if I did.”
“You’re right.” His voice was a low, dangerous scrape.
“So don’t fucking stop.” She hooked a finger in the waistband of his jeans and dragged him all the way in, so there wasn’t amolecule of daylight between them. She flipped open the button, yanked the zipper down, and slid her hand in.
He wore nothing underneath.
Of course he didn’t.
She wrapped her fist around his cock and squeezed. He was huge there, too, just like he was everywhere else. He jolted, chest stuttering once, and she grinned up at him because she liked knowing she could make a man his size twitch.
She tightened her grip, feeling the pulse in his cock shudder against her palm, and the muscles in his body went taut. Bear made a noise deep in his throat—half threat, half hunger—and buried his mouth at the hinge of her jaw, biting hard enough to leave a mark.
She shifted her hand, stroking from base to tip, and god, he didn’t just move into it—he bore down, trapping her against the shed, making her feel impossibly small and caged and safe. He bit her again, this time at the shell of her ear, and his breathing turned ragged and heavy. It made her want to ruin him for all other women.
“Is this what you want?” he rumbled and thrust into her hand. “My cock in your hand, your mouth, your pussy?”
