Page 10 of Anyone But You

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“Let me fix the tent, baby.”

Reluctantly, I let him up, moving to the dry camping mat and watching his glorious ass as he secures our shelter.

“You keep watching me like that and I’m going to think you might actually like me a little.”

I busy myself looking through the supplies so he doesn’t see how right he is. Dean collects our clothes, wringing them out and laying them flat at the back of the tent. Maybe they’ll dry out in the next decade. Dean grabs the waterproof bag, dropping it at one end of the camping mat and pulls out a bottle of whiskey.

“You keep whiskey in your emergency supplies?”

He grins at me, and my heart flutters. Because of course it does. I could try to blame the post-orgasm high for making me all doe-eyed, but I suspect that it’s justhim.

“Sure. It’s just as good at sanitizing as vodka and it tastes better.”

“Debatable.” I eye him skeptically.

He sits behind me, reclining on the bag and pulling me back. I lay my head on his shoulder. He wraps his arm around me, fingers stroking along my collarbone as he tips the bottle back. He hands it to me and I look at it for a long second before putting it to my lips and taking a gulp. I cough, hissing through my teeth as it burns my throat.

“Jesus, are you okay?” He cranes his head around to look at me.

“This may come as a shock to you, Dean. But I’m not usually one for whiskey straight from the bottle.”

He laughs, and the sound is deep and warm as it vibrates through my chest. “Me either, Sunshine.”

“Pulling booze out of an emergency supply kit might be the most pirate-y thing I’ve ever seen.”

He kisses the top of my head. “What if I make jokes about plundering that booty?” he asks. “Where would that rank?”

“Ugh, that’s terrible!”

I groan and try to sit up, but Dean pulls me back, laughing. “In the realm of pirate-related humor, that’s about as good as it gets.”

He grabs my knee, pulling my leg over his hips. His fingers trail softly along my spine, sending little tingles over my skin. Under normal circumstances, naked in the woods wouldn’t be my first choice for a Monday night, but this feels too good to fight. I run my hands through his chest hair, biting my lip so I don’t say something to ruin this moment.

* * *

The storm is still raging the next morning. We wake up to thunder booming overhead and bands of rain slapping the outside of our tent, but it’s warm and dry in here. I wouldn’t call it comfortable, but it beats the hell out of being outside or blown up.

And then there’s Dean. Former bane of my existence turned insatiable sexual obsession. Everything he does is so sexy that I can’t keep my hands to myself. It’s like now that I’ve cracked the seal on this urge, I can’t close the jar back up.

He opens two bags of granola with freeze-dried strawberries, but before he hands me mine, he pulls all his strawberries out and puts them in my bag with a heart-stopping grin. Normally, that’s not the kind of thing that lights my panties on fire, but sweet baby Jesus, is it working for me now. He barely sets the bags aside before I jump in his lap.

He goes out in the rain to switch out our water collectors and comes back all wet; I jump his bones. He stretches his arms out over his head and smirks at me; I jump his bones. He breathes; I jump his bones.

Not that he seems to mind any of this. By the end of Tuesday, he’s explored every single inch of my body with his tongue and I’m pretty sure he’s doing inane little things just to see if they’ll turn me on. Spoiler alert, they do.

It’s also extremely effective at shoving my worries into the background. Post-rescue questions are Future Sutton’s problems. Current Sutton can just ignore those pesky thoughts and enjoy this stolen moment with him.

8

Dean

Sutton is so quiet and still in my arms that I wonder if she’s fallen asleep. That or I’ve finally pushed her into a sex-induced coma. Given the way we spent our day, it could go either way. I can’t see her face, but I can feel her breathing against me, her cheek warm on my shoulder. The sky gets darker; the sun going down somewhere behind the rain clouds. The rain is slowing and I don’t know if it’s a break in the storm or the tail end, but the fat drops give way to a drizzling mist and it’s only now that I realize how deafening it was.

“Sutton, when we get back—”

“Can we talk about that later?” Her voice cracks just the tiniest bit.

“What’s wrong? Are you upset?”


Tags: Mae Harden Romance