Catamount Ridge Read Free Page A

shreds of material. Dirt and debris caked the edges of the wound. Not wanting to know how badly she was injured, Jessie twisted the shirt around her arm a few times and used her teeth to help tie the ends together. When the task was complete, she drew in a couple of deep breaths and let some of the panic exit her body. It was promptly replaced by an unwanted side effect of the day’s adventure.
    Shock.
    Cold sweat dripped from her brow and her limbs felt weak. Lightheaded and dizzy, it became increasingly difficult for her to breathe. Darkness crept in from the edges of her peripheral vision. Before she passed out, Jessie bypassed her chest and forced air deep into her lungs.
    Eighty-seven controlled breaths later, she was able to make her first intelligible sentence. “I was tracking you when I came across two mountain lions.”
    The dark haired ranger shook his head. “It must be slim pickings out there. You don’t usually have over ten cats within a hundred-mile radius.” His piercing blue eyes glanced her way. “Why were you looking for me?” he asked.
    “I’ve been here two weeks.” Her words were too shrill and shaky for her taste, but Jessie soldiered on. “I figured it was time I met the long-term hut monger under my command.”
    He let out a low, gravelly chuckle, “Long-term hut monger?”
    “What do you expect? No one has seen you in months. Your reports come in regularly, but you do not. You’ve been shacked up in that tiny cabin—”
    Derek interrupted her official reprimand. “A monger is a trader, a dealer, someone who maintains goods for sale. That is not what I do.”
    The man obviously had way too much time on his hands. She pictured him sitting alone by the fire, reading a fucking encyclopedia. The asshole obviously thought it was a fitting time to correct her syntax even though she was bleeding all over her truck and fighting to maintain some semblance of self-control. In a flash of anger, any sympathy she had for the dick-brained ranger was gone. Jessie couldn’t wait to fire the son of a bitch. Budget cuts were slated across the board, and his position with the Forest Service was about to come to an end.
    She drew in a deep breath and counted to ten. Derek Foster had rescued her from a terrible death. Praying for patience, she clamped her mouth shut and stared blindly out the windshield.
    A deer darted across the road.
    Derek hit the brakes and swerved to avoid a collision.
    Jessie had not buckled her seatbelt and her forehead slammed into the dashboard. “Heaven help me,” she moaned. “I survive a mountain lion attack only to die from blunt force trauma to the head, while on the way to the hospital. This is not my day.”
    But Derek didn’t take her to the hospital. Somewhere along the way, Jessie lost consciousness. When she woke, she found herself in his bed, in the small cabin the Forest Service provided him. The wound on her arm had been cleaned and bandaged, and an ice pack had been placed upon her forehead.
    Derek loomed overhead and handed her some pills. “These will help.”
    After swallowing the tablets, things got seriously weird. Horny did not accurately describe the feelings that came over her. Jessie Marcus, divorced woman, age thirty-five, who battled her way up the ranks of the Forest Service, had jumped the bones of one of her underlings. Not just once, but three times. No thought of propriety or consequence, either professionally or personally, had entered into the equation. It was hard to understand how a person could go from being totally rational, with an overabundance of caution, to being out of control with lust, all while practically bleeding to death.
    In the throes of passion, the chimera of a mountain lion appeared above her. The coarse coat pricked her skin, but instead of fear and panic, the pleasure factor quadrupled and sent her orgasms to places she never dreamed existed.
    •   •   •
    JESSIE RAN HER hands over her tender breasts and tried to