My Kind of Wonderful(50)

And then they were gone, heading straight for the staff entrance, which led to the offices.

Which meant that they’d be in Gray’s office with the door locked and no one would see either of them for at least an hour.

“I’m off too,” Lily said.

“To your dentist appointment,” Hud said with narrowed eyes.

“Um, yes. Right.”

Hud shook his head at her but she just smiled, went up on tiptoe to kiss his cheek, winked at Bailey, and then was gone too.

When Bailey stood, Hud grabbed her hand and reeled her in a little bit. “Where you going?”

“Back to work.”

“You really going to run off after they worked so hard to get us alone together?”

She met his gaze, studying him a moment. He studied her right back. Her knit cap was sunshine yellow today, suiting her rosy complexion, which was a lot less pale than it had been her first week up here. She’d gotten a little color from being outside on the weekends, giving her a healthy glow that made him happy to see.

She’d shed her jacket and was in just a stark white, long-sleeved V-neck T-shirt that fit her like a second skin and pretty much took his breath away. She also wore skinny-cut ski pants today that hung low on her hips and were tucked into boots that made her legs look a mile long.

She had a streak of pale blue paint on her yellow cap, some purple over her jaw, and forest green across one breast.

She’d never looked better to him. “Tell me about the fiancé,” he heard himself say.

“You mean the ex-fiancé.”

“He was kissing you,” Hud pointed out.

“Right,” she said. “He was kissing me. I was not kissing him.”

He just looked at her.

She blew out a breath and looked around. “Listen, I’d like to tell you the whole, sordid story but I can’t go on until I get some chocolate. And I promised myself that I’d take a few ski runs during my lunch break today. I really want to be a better skier.”

He took her hand and tugged her toward the front of the cafeteria. The lines were long today. Too long. So he steered her past them, grabbing a handful of candy bars on the way.

At the front he waved at the checkout clerk. He’d known Sydney since tenth-grade algebra. He’d done her math homework and she’d written his English papers for him. And sometimes, when he’d gotten very lucky, they’d done other stuff for each other in the back of her daddy’s truck. For each other. To each other…

She winked at him and nodded that she’d put the candy bars on his account, waving him off at the same time. Fifteen minutes later he’d gotten Bailey skis and boots from rentals and had her on a lift with him.

“What are we doing?” she asked, breathless, and it was no wonder. She made getting on a lift a dangerous sport, knocking out an entire line of people. Hud had shown her the right way to get on, which didn’t involve injuring any of his paying guests. “You’re telling me a story,” he said. “And I’m going to make you a better skier.”

At least a non-dangerous one…

“Cocky much?” she asked.

“Nope. Just good.” He dumped four different candy bars into her lap. “Wasn’t sure which one you’d like.”

“You didn’t ask.”

“Didn’t need to, because I covered all the options available,” he said. “Pick your poison.”

“And if I said I wanted all of them…?”

He laughed. “I’d probably try to sweet-talk you out of the Snickers.”

She didn’t look impressed. “She winked at you.”

“She?” he asked.

“The cute blond clerk at the checkout.”

“She did,” Hud agreed. “Sydney.”

“Sydney the cute blond clerk winked at you.”

“Jealous?”

“Of course not. Why did she wink at you?”

“Because I’m cute too?” he asked.

She narrowed her eyes. “You’re something,” she agreed. “But not cute. A mountain cat isn’t cute. Smart, sleek, beautiful, and deadly, maybe. But not cute.”

He laughed again. He was doing that a lot around her. “You think I’m smart, sleek, and beautiful?”

“And deadly,” she pointed out. “And most definitely not cute.”

The lift slowed and then stopped entirely. Someone had undoubtedly fallen off of it either at the top or the bottom. But for once Hud was happy to be stuck on a lift. “Tell me more,” he said.

“About…?”

“Eric.”

“Aaron.” She narrowed her eyes. “And you knew that.”

He shrugged. Yeah, he’d known that.

“He was my first boyfriend,” she said. “For a lot of years. And he’s my only ex.”

“Only?” he asked, not sure he could have heard right. She was sweet and cute and sexy and smart and talented… Why in the world would she have had only one boyfriend?

Because, you idiot, she fought cancer for most of her life.

“I got sick when I was fifteen,” she said softly, confirming his thought as she stared out at the scenic view of the Rockies for as far as the eye could see.