Chance Encounter(27)

“Okay, I definitely heard that,” she said to the trees.

More unnatural silence, though she could have sworn that “hush” had sounded like…Brian? But it was a weekday, which meant he’d be getting ready for school.

Or he’d better be.

Not that she was worrying about him. No, that would mean she wasn’t following her new pattern for life—Ally first. But there was something about him, so tough yet so vulnerable, that if she had been the old Ally—and that was a big if—then she would have ached to help him.

As if he’d ever let anyone do that for him.

Hopefully he’d find his own way, and that it would be a safer, more grounded path than the person he so clearly idolized—T. J. Chance. Because while she was enjoying living the wild life during her time here, she knew it couldn’t last, just as she knew it wasn’t the lifestyle for a fourteen-year-old. Not with his fondness for adventure, his dislike for authority, and a definite penchant for danger. Even his girls weren’t picked with care. Jo had told her Brian was “hanging” with one whose father was an owner of a competing resort, a man who’d undoubtedly look at Brian’s baggy clothes and sullen expression and hate him on sight.

A twig snapped.

“Darn it!” She stopped again. “Who’s there?”

More silence greeted her. No reason to feel this frustration. So there were two people having a grand old time in the woods, when she had a deep longing to have a grand old time in the woods herself. So what? It didn’t mean she had to become irritable simply because the only man she wanted didn’t want to want her back. She began walking again, faster, frustrated. “Damn him anyway.”

“Talking to yourself again?”

She nearly fell over. That very man she’d been thinking about stood on the steps of the lodge as she came out of the woods. His big body blocked the sunlight, but she refused to let him know he intimidated her, even when she backed herself against the wooden fencing guarding the resort’s equipment.

Chance merely stepped close and penned her in. She looked up past his broad chest, his tanned throat, past his full, sensuous mouth and into his dark, hooded gaze. She didn’t know if it was the early hour or the intoxicating scent of him, but her brain sent mixed signals.

Wrap your arms around him.

Run like hell.

He’d clearly just come off the mountain, maybe from a ride. His black biking shorts and matching damp shirt clung to every inch of him, and every inch was pretty amazing. No fancy gym body for this man, no his came custom-made from his lifestyle. Still, it was his eyes that drew her now, those fathomless eyes.

Both she and Chance had pointedly ignored what had happened between them. They’d both danced around the fact that if they so much as touched each other, they would most likely implode.

And yet he was nearly touching her now. Slowly, he took his gaze on a leisurely stroll down her still wet body, taking in her messed up hair, the borrowed jacket, the shorts…her bare legs.

And despite the fact that she was dressed quite modestly, the way he looked at her left her feeling…naked. “Good morning,” Ally said, meaning to sound upbeat and confident, as if he didn’t affect her at all, but her soft, whispery voice betrayed her.

“Morning.” His voice wasn’t any more steady than hers, which was interesting.

And unnerving.

Nothing new. They’d been playing this casual game for weeks now.

“Busy day,” she noted.

He simply nodded and bit into the middle finger of his cycling glove and tugged it off. Then did the same with the other. He tossed them to the ground and planted his hands on the wood fence behind her head. “Were you on the river?”

He spoke so evenly. She would never have guessed at the bad temper behind that casual voice—except for the heat of it in his eyes. “Tim was showing me how to kayak.”

“I thought you weren’t a strong swimmer.”

“Tim was right there.”

“Stay out of the river, Ally.”

“I don’t respond well to demands.”

“Too bad. Stay out of it. And suppose you tell me why you’re wearing my jacket.”

“Your jacket?” She shook her head. “No, Jo gave it to me to borrow.”

“Yeah, from my office closet.”

“I—” His eyes were dark and unreadable as ever, and she bit her lip, thinking she would have to kill Jo personally. Slowly. “I didn’t know.”

“Now two of my jackets will smell like you.”

It embarrassed her that she had thought she’d been so independent here, and hadn’t been at all. “Nothing a little detergent won’t fix.” Frustrated, she ducked from beneath his arms and went to pull off Jo’s—his!—jacket. It was a pullover, with wide bands of rubber around the neck, waist and wrists, to keep out the water.

The bands also kept her in. Darn it, but it was hard to get off. She wriggled and writhed and pulled, but all that happened was she got caught, her arms up and over her head, the jacket holding her locked in that position.

She wriggled and writhed some more, but it was no use, she was good and truly stuck. “Um…Chance?”

He said nothing, but now that the jacket was over her face she couldn’t see him. Great. With as much dignity as she could muster, she tried to escape again.