The Omega Team: Spurs (Kindle Worlds Novella) Read Free Page B

delighted to accept his hand back to clamber onto the heap of boulders. Settling onto the biggest one, jutting out into open air, she gasped.
    “I hope you don’t have a thing about heights,” he said, dropping next to her, one leg extended straight out. “I should have asked.
    “No…not at all.” She’d never have been accepted into her training group if she had a “thing” about anything. “This is breathtaking.” The mountains rolled out above and below them on the other side of the narrow valley they perched over.
    “It is a couple of thousand feet down.” He grinned. “Last time I coaxed a girl up here, back in high school, she took one look and ran all the way back down the trail.”
    “Not this girl.” She took in the panorama of dark, brooding pines, aspens with their light-green quivering leaves catching the sunlight, and bare-rock formations. “I love climbing, but this is my first time in the Sierras. You’re so lucky to have grown up here.”
    “So I remember from time to time.” He rubbed at the extended leg, and she frowned. Really, their climb was not one someone with an injury should have attempted.
    Lips parted to ask if he was okay, she snapped them closed. No fussing. She wouldn’t want it and neither would he. Old soldiers’ code—even if she wasn’t a soldier, exactly.
    Casting a glance at her, he smiled. “Thanks for coming up here. It reminds me of the good things in life. Nature and the blue sky and the breeze.” He lowered his voice, and she had to lean in to hear over the wind. “And the company of a beautiful woman.”
    Heat flushed her cheeks, and her body went on alert. He looked good, he smelled good, and she was ridiculously glad he called her beautiful. Could almost believe the words when accompanied by the open admiration in his eyes. His mouth hovered inches from hers, and she licked her lips, dry in the low humidity. Her lids fluttered as he closed the distance and kissed her, tentative, at first, as if waiting to see if she’d object, but when she opened her mouth, he took advantage and deepened the kiss. His tongue lapped at her teeth and passed inside to twine with hers.
    Fear of heights…no, the tremors starting in her core were related to a much more insidious terror. Not only her body but also her heart awakened when his arms closed around her. He smelled like the mountains, the pines, and the clear water and the fresh air. His big, muscular frame made her feel small and protected. Safe.
    Heart thudding, she jerked free and gave a shaky laugh. “We’d better be careful or we’ll roll off into the valley.” Like falling was her concern.
    He eyed her, and she wondered how much he bought of her explanation, but he didn’t ask. Instead, he did something much worse and pressed his advantage. “Maybe we can take this up again somewhere with a shorter drop in case we lose control.”
    The fall waiting for her had little to do with the altitude of the boulders and much more to do with the crack in the walls she’d erected around her heart. So she changed the subject. “How much of what I’m looking at is part of the ranch?” She opened her water bottle and took a deep drink.
    Thank heavens he went along with it. “Everything you see to the left, the foothill area, all the pastureland, that’s our property. The little dots are the stock and that…. Shit!” He was on his feet with only a wince to show he’d slammed his weight on his wounded leg. “We have to go.”
    She scanned the area he’d pointed out, trying to determine what got him going then, following the sound of an engine, leaped up and followed him, sliding on her butt down the slope in her hurry to keep up. Somehow, despite his injury, he took the slippery pebbles without losing his footing.
     
    Ryder paused at the bottom of the slope, but Isbet hollered, “Go ahead, I’ll catch up,” and he took her up on it. He’d already overdone it, and his leg told him so as he limp-ran along