Bad Boy Brody(22)

I feared she’d run like the last time.

It’d been two weeks since I saw her at the river, and as she stood beside me, looking out over the field with me, she was every bit the ghost she’d been that night.

She murmured softly, “Everyone left,” before turning to look at me as I took a seat in the chair to her left. “Why?”

“Your brother was worried someone would see you.”

Her forehead wrinkled, just a small line. “Someone did. You.”

I laughed, a small one. “Someone who wouldn’t keep quiet.”

“Oh.” She bit her lip, moving to the chair beside mine. She folded down, her petite body so strong but so small and graceful. “He cares for me.”

I barked out a laugh. “It’s more than that, Princess.”

I felt her surprise as she looked at me. Her eyes were wide, startled, then a slow smile spread over her face. “That name reminds me of one of the horses.”

Great. I gave her the same nickname as a real-life feral horse. Awesome.

“Anytime.”

Another peal of laughter came from her. It was genuine, and I smiled along with her. I would give her all the cheesy-ass nicknames she wanted if this was the reaction I got. When she started to fade, I asked, “Why’d you come see me?”

A person with an agenda could’ve feigned being hurt, saying that maybe I didn’t want them to come. I’d have to go on the defensive and tell her I wanted her here. Or even use it as a come-on. Kara, who most certainly had an agenda, would have somehow used the question as an excuse to crawl onto my lap.

Though, I wouldn’t mind if Morgan crawled onto my lap.

“Because I’m curious about you.” There was no game between us. No hidden manipulation. She was being real, and goddamn, my dick bulged inside my pants. I had to dig my nails into the chair. I needed to calm it down. Otherwise, I’d jump her bones.

I coughed, getting some restraint in there. “What are you curious about?”

“You.” She shifted on her seat, pulling her feet underneath her. She was facing me, leaning on the one side of her chair. Rapt curiosity was etched on her face. “What’s your full name?”

No thought. I answered immediately, “Brody Josh Asher. Not Joshua, just Josh.”

“Are you named after anyone?”

“My mom had a thing for a soap actor named Josh.”

“A soap?”

I grinned. That was goddamn cute. “Not something to clean yourself. It’s a type of show on television.”

“Ah. I had a nanny who watched one, I think.” Her eyebrows pulled together again.

I was having a hard time not reaching over and smoothing out the small wrinkles.

She added, “There was a lot of sex.”

An awkward laugh from me. “Let’s not talk about sex.”

Her eyes were on me again. They were full. They were unblinking. There was something there I didn’t want to identify. If I did, I would be in her within a minute. I wanted this time with her. It was real. It was the type of shit I didn’t want with anyone else.

“Ask me another question.”

“Do you want to have sex with me?”

A mangled cry ripped from my throat. “I’m finding the more time I spend with you, the less control I have.”

“So you do want to have sex with me?”

I saw the knowing look on her face and bit back a groan. “You goddamn know I do.” I fixed her with a hard look, letting her know that she may be able to see me, but I could see her too. “You want me as well.”

There was no hiding, only the continued spread of that smile. Yep. Tonight was going to be one of the most torturous nights I’d ever experience. I already knew I wouldn’t trade it for anything else.

“Yes.” She sat up, her feet tucked directly beneath her.

I nodded at her. “I have a feeling you could hang upside down from the post.”

“I live mostly in the woods. You develop the ability to climb trees and rocks if you want to survive.”

“Horses too.”

She nodded solemnly. “Horses too.”

“They climb trees?”

She chuckled. “No, but they can climb rocks if they have to. They can also run down cliff edges.”

“I’ve seen Snowy River.” I suppressed a shudder at the idea of her riding a horse down one of those edges. “It looked damned scary.”

“Snowy River?”

“It’s a movie.”

“I’ve not seen it.”

“Do you watch television?”

“I have in the past, when I went to school.”

I shot up in my seat. “You went to school?”

She laughed, settling into her seat again. Her feet slowly unwound from beneath her until she looked as if she was almost lounging back. “I had to. I live with horses for a choice, but I’m not a moron. I couldn’t give anyone a reason to say I couldn’t be with them. Getting a high school degree and,” she leaned forward again, a teasing glimmer in her eyes, “a college degree made it so I could do what I wanted.”

“You went to high school and college?”

She snorted, motioning in the direction where the main lodge was. “No way. I did the homeschooling thing, and I did the online thing for college. Peter made sure there was staff here to take care of me.”