Hers to Take(9)

Kira started. He could see her tense.

"I heard you drive up," he said as way of explanation. It's not as though he could tell her that he'd sensed her. That he felt her just as he felt the blood pump through his veins. She was already clearly unhappy with his presence; Nash was definitely not going to freak her out with that little piece of information. "Connor told you about the fish?"

She nodded and pointed to the bucket. "You didn't have to do that."

"It was no big thing." He shrugged. "Besides, I'm the maintenance guy. It's what I do."

"Still." She shook her head, but he could see the concern lining her face as she looked at the pile of dead trout in the bucket. "You … wow. There are a lot of them, aren't there?" Kira crouched next to the bucket and pulled a pair of gloves from her back pocket. He couldn't help being impressed as she picked up a fish with none of the squeamishness of most of the women he knew. "What do you think happened?"

Nash squatted next to her, so close he could feel the heat from her body. To keep from touching her, he picked up a fish of his own and examined it despite the fact he'd already looked at each one of them and couldn't see anything unusual. "I've been racking my brain, trying to figure it out, but it just doesn't make sense. The only thing-" 

"It was a rhetorical question," Kira snapped.

"Okay." Nash tossed the dead fish back in with the others and stood. His instincts might be going wild for this woman but that didn't mean he needed to stick around while she snapped at him. "I was just trying to help. But if you got it all figured out, boss. By all means." He held up his hands and took a few steps backward before she got to her feet.

"Nash, I … "

"You're what?" He tried not to grin but he could see the apology would be hard for her.

"I appreciate you cleaning up the mess."

It took him a second to realize she hadn't apologized for anything after all. "You appreciate it?"

She nodded. "I do. Thank you."

"That's it?"

"Was there something else?"

Damn this woman.

She wasn't going to apologize for snapping at him and being rude for no reason at all except she was clearly struggling with the way she was feeling about him. Because she was feeling something. Of that much, Nash was sure. More than that, the sexy as hell she-bear had no idea that despite the fact that she'd been nothing but rude to him from the moment they'd met, all he was trying to do was help her out. What he should have done was walk away, maybe even told her off and put her in her place before leaving her to figure out her dead fish on her own.

But he couldn't. And he wouldn't.

In fact, he should have done a lot of things that would have made a lot more sense than what he was about to do.

A deep growl threatened to escape his throat and in that moment, Nash knew he had no other choice. He'd been drawn to her in a way that went far beyond him and what he was in control of.

His actions were pure instinct as he took two long, smooth strides toward her so he stood barely an inch from her. She was tall but he still had height on her, and when she looked up at him with fire flaring in the dark depths of her eyes, what was left of his control evaporated.

"You need to be taught some manners, Kira."

"Pardon me?"

Before she could say another word, Nash bent and scooped her up as if she weighed little more than his duffel bag. Her fists flung out at him, but he dodged her blows easily and positioned her over his shoulder before he pinned her in place with one strong arm.

"Put me down!"

"No."

A sense of calm that he hadn't felt since he'd arrived a few days earlier, and her sexy ass had walked into that campground shower, washed through him. He walked toward the river.

"Nash! Put me down right now!"

"No."

"So help me … " He held her tighter with his arm, enjoying the feel of her ample breasts pressed against his back, the core of her squirming against his shoulder. It was a feeling he could get used to. Not that she would let him carry her around again. But, you never knew what could happen …

Nash strode into the river until the water, still icy from the mountain runoff, hit the top of his thighs. The cold water did nothing to dampen his desire, but he knew it would have the desired effect on Kira. Before she realized what his intentions were, Nash released his grip on Kira and dumped her into the rushing water.



He would not do it!

By the time Kira's brain caught up with her body, and she realized that not only would Nash dump her in the water, he had just done it, it was too late to form any other thought. All she could see was a haze of red anger in her vision as she splashed and sputtered in the cold river.