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This guy won’t think twice if he catches you alone.
Joel’s ominous warning from the meeting sent a tingle of uneasiness along her spine. She rose to her feet, shifting her gaze from tree to tree, studying the shadows as she imagined someone out there, watching her.
A sudden rustle from behind made her jump and spin around. Paelo stared back at her as he chewed a small branch loaded with green leaves. The pounding of her heart eased.
“Oh, this is ridiculous,” she muttered. The tracks were obviously old, and whoever it had been was long gone by now.
Still, she decided it might not be a bad idea to wait after all. She backed Paelo up so they wouldn’t disturb any more of the tracks and found a large boulder alongside the trail where she could sit.
Quite a bit later than she expected, Joel rode up, his face cast in shadow from the low-sitting brim of his Stetson. She stood as he dismounted before facing her with a scowl.
“I specifically instructed you to wait.”
Irritation flared even as she wondered how he knew she hadn’t. Then it dawned on her, Paelo had left behind his own set of single tracks. Shrugging, she retorted, “You caught up, didn’t you?”
His jaw tightened and his fists clenched at his sides. Britt stood her ground despite the fact her stomach was doing that damn little flippy thing it did whenever he was near. She moistened suddenly dry lips, and his attention flicked down.
Heat flared at the memory of his mouth on hers. She’d re-imagined both kisses way too many times over the past couple days.
“I—” Her voice broke. She cleared her throat and tried again. “I found some tracks.”
He finally took a small step back and she moved past to direct him to the spot. As he squatted for a better look, a reassuring thought occurred to her. “They’re probably from a ranger, but I figured you’d want to look at them.”
He rose back to his full height. “Stay here. I’m going to see if I can pick up the trail further on.”
She automatically took a step after him, and he whirled so fast she gasped.
Taking hold of her shoulders, he backed her up until the heels of her boots came up against the boulder she’d been sitting on. “Damn it, Brittany, I said stay here.”
“I was just going to—”
With a low growl, he pressed her shoulders until she sat. She leaned back as he planted a hand on either side of her. “This is precisely why I told you to wait. Any evidence up to this point you’ve trampled, now let me see what I can salvage of the rest of it without you getting in the way. Move off thi
s rock and I’m going to take you straight back down this mountain—trail be damned.”
She crossed her arms over her chest, meeting him stare for stare as her stomach muscles quivered from the extended backward lean. When he straightened and walked away, she fantasized about throwing something at his head, then got up and went to stand by her horse.
Guilt began to creep in and she tried to rationalize it away. If anything, he ought to be grateful she’d even noticed the tracks for him. If she and Mitch had still been riding, they might have missed them all together.
Joel returned after a few minutes. His gaze narrowed at the sight of her next to Paelo, but he didn’t say a word as he stuck a foot in the stirrup and swung astride his horse. She mounted up as well.
“Where’d they go?”
“Nowhere. This was it. “
He touched his heel to his bay’s side, and as they moved forward, she urged Paelo to follow. “Was it a ranger?”
“Can’t tell that from a set of prints.”
His sarcasm only made her feel worse about potentially destroying evidence. “I meant were there any patrols over here after the storm?”
“No.”
She gave the silence a few minutes, then asked, “You going to explain why Mitch had to go back?”
“No.”
“Why not?” When he didn’t reply, she asked, “Don’t you trust him?”
