Instant Gratification (20 page)

“Yes.” A wry smile twisted his lips. “You’ve mentioned a time or two.”

“Or a thousand.” She sighed at herself. “I planned to hate every single day and be resentful while I was at it.”

“Which seemed to work for you for a while.”

She had to smile. “I know. I really did pull that off for a good long time, didn’t I?”

He cocked his head. “Is that a past tense I hear?”

She paused. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I don’t fit…”

“You look like you fit to me.” He looked her over. “You’re not nearly as pale as when you first got here, which means you’re not all work and no play anymore. You sure as hell aren’t as edgy and in such a hurry as you were, which means you’ve learned to let your hair down.” He smiled. “I’d say you fit in just fine.”

“Let’s just say that this place and I have come to an agreement. Of sorts.”

“Which is?”

“I stopped taking myself so seriously, and it stopped mocking me. People don’t care where I got my degree, or that I run an ER, or even what my specialty is. They care that I open the Urgent Care at eight sharp, that I’m flexible when it comes to payment…” She shot him a long look that had him choking out a laugh and scratching his head with a wry/guilty expression. “But mostly, they care about you, Dad. And they care
about each other.” She shook her head. “It’s truly the oddest place I’ve ever been, and honestly?”

He grinned. “You will. You’ll miss it.”

“Yeah. And you. I’ll miss you.”

“Same goes, Emma. Same goes.” He cleared his rough throat. “I have something for you.” He pulled a small gift bag from a pocket of his jacket.

“What’s that for?”

“A good-bye present.”

Her gaze flew to his. “I don’t need a going away present.”

“It’s not a going-away present. It’s a
good-bye
present. There’s a difference.”

There sure as hell was. “I’m not pulling a mom here, Dad. I’ll come back. I already figured out the weekends over the next six months where I could grab three days in a row. There’s at least one every other month.”

“Look at you, with all your careful plans.” He smiled. “I’ve made my own careful plans.”

“You don’t know the meaning of the word,” she teased joking around the ball of emotion in her throat.

“I didn’t, no. But you’re not the only one who could block out dates.” He reached into a different pocket and pulled out a small calendar, flipping through it, revealing several highlighted weeks. “I’m going to try to work two to three days a week. Here’s the weekends I can get to you. We won’t be strangers again. Now open the bag.”

He’d sent gifts over the years. Sometimes a medical book, sometimes a piece of jewelry. She’d liked everything while secretly wishing for his presence instead. She opened the gift bag and pulled out a T-shirt, which read:
I SURVIVED THE SIERRAS
.

She stared at it for a moment, and then looked at him. There was a sparkle in his eyes as his mouth slowly curved, and she laughed.

Laughed with her father.

And in that moment, she felt a new inner peace. She could leave, it was going to be okay. He was going to be okay.

The question was, was she?

That night, Stone knocked on Emma’s door, feeling both anticipatory and a little off his game knowing this was, in all likelihood, their last night.

She opened the door looking a little unsettled herself.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey. I didn’t know what to wear for our…training session.”

Ah, yes. Not a date. A
training session
. Interesting that she felt the need to play word games with herself to keep from jumping in with both feet.

As for the attire, she’d settled on a simple white t-shirt, denim shorts and sandals. She looked good enough to eat, and his evening, spent on paperwork, was most definitely beginning to look up. “You’re a sight for sore eyes, Emma.”

“I didn’t know I’d feel this way, but right back at ya.”

Doc had stopped off to see Stone earlier, so he knew father and daughter had spent some time together. There’d only been one thing Doc hadn’t wanted to do—sell—and yet in spite of doing it anyway, he’d seemed in relatively good spirits, which meant the visit had gone well.

It meant something else, too, something he’d already figured out—that though Emma was adept at hiding her soft side, it was there.

Too bad they didn’t have more time to explore it, and not for the first time he wished he’d found a way to help Doc convince Emma not to sell. “Were you busy today?”

“A case of chicken pox and a well-baby check,” she said. “Oh, and Missy Thorton letting me know that my dad paid for my entire education. Yeah, that’s all.”

He lifted a brow. “I take it that was news to you.”

“Uh, yeah. Big news.” She blew out a breath. “Listen, I really need to get out of here for a while.”

“I have just the thing. I asked you once before and you said hell no, but let me ask again.” He held out his hand. “Trust me?”

D
id she trust him? Emma stared up at Stone.

Hell, no
, came her mom’s voice.
Don’t trust any man that good looking with those wicked badboy eyes and the smile that promised all sorts of naughtiness. Say no and get the hell out of Dodge, darling
.

Emma had always listened to her mom, always.

But she’d also always followed her gut, and her gut happened to have the louder voice. It was saying that her mom had always acted out of love but that she hadn’t always been right. It was saying that Emma had to decide for herself what was right.

But mostly, it was saying you aren’t done with this man.

“Emma?”

“Yes. I don’t trust me, but oddly enough, I trust you.”

With a smile, he took her hand and pulled her outside. “You should know, I’m grumpy,” she said.

“Shock,” he said.

“And irritated.”

“More shock.”

That tugged a laugh out of her. “And I don’t think anything
about us being alone together is a good idea, much less being naked.”

He slid her a speculative look. “No one said anything about being naked except you. And you keep saying it.” He flashed one of his slow, killer smiles. “You’re going to miss me.”

“You think so?”

“Oh, yeah.”

Oh yeah was right. She was going to miss him. So damn much it hurt to think about, so she’d managed not to think at all for the most part. “Did you bring me the instructions you promised?”

“Worked all afternoon on it,” he said, and gestured for her to get into the Jeep.

“Isn’t this TJ’s vehicle?”

“Yep. He has my truck.” The top was off, but the evening was warm enough. She got in and let the light wind roll over her as he took off. “Where’s my instructions on relaxing?”

“Coming.”

But he just kept driving.

Just outside of town, on the narrow two-lane highway cutting up through two majestic mountain peaks, he finally handed her a folded up piece of paper.

She unfolded it. He’d written only one line:

Close your eyes.

“Sort of self explanatory,” he said when she just stared at him.

Fine. She closed her eyes.

“How do you feel?” he asked.

“Silly.”

“That’s because you don’t like to follow directions, you like to make them.”

True enough.

“What else do you feel?”

“Dizzy. The road is curvy.”

“You can get car sick if you need to, it’s TJ’s Jeep.”

She laughed, and heard the smile in his voice when he said, “What else, Emma?”

“Well…” Sometimes after a day off from her ER, she’d come back and stand in the middle of the place and close her eyes, just breathing it all in. The rush of rubber soled shoes, the sounds of the equipment beeping, the scent of antiseptic and rubbing alcohol…It’d always been nirvana to her.

It couldn’t be more different here. She could feel the warmth from the remnants of the setting sun on her face. She could hear the whistle of the wind, the screech of a bird, the hum of the Jeep’s engine. She could smell the fresh dirt, the pine trees. “The air up here always makes me think of Christmas.”

“Yeah, that’s the thing I miss the most when I leave here, and the first thing I notice when I come back,” he said, and turned down a dirt road, shifting into four-wheel drive, taking her up a trail she wasn’t sure she’d even be able to hike.

She opened her eyes again. The Jeep rocked from side to side, and on the next turn, she’d have sworn two of the wheels left the ground. It wasn’t what she’d expected, the whole four-wheeling thing, but in truth, she’d never been, never even thought about it, had only seen pictures in a magazine, or the occasional story on TV, but the reality was…

Bigger.

The Jeep was versatile and tough, taking the roads with ease. Or maybe that was Stone himself. He handled the wheel as if he’d been born with it. She watched his big hands, one on the wheel, one on the stick shift, not white knuckled like she was, but handling the job while remaining cool, calm and collected.

In easy control, as she would be in the ER.

Yet unlike how she’d be at work, he was also relaxed. Laid-back.

All the things she wanted to learn to be. “What’s next?”

He handed her another little piece of paper, which she unfolded.

Be patient.

Ha.
“If I knew how to be patient,” she said, “we wouldn’t be doing this.”

“Wouldn’t we?”

She met his gaze, his clear and green, and so direct it was hard to take. He allowed her to see his affection, his need for her, the heat, and she found herself swallowing hard. “I meant, I wouldn’t be here in Wishful. I’d have hired someone for my dad instead of coming to help him out.”

“Would you have? Really?”

She blew out a breath. “No.”

He smiled and reached for her hand. “Hi.”

“Hi?”

“Hi to the
real
Emma. Now stop thinking so hard and look around.”

She didn’t want to, because she instinctively knew that she was vulnerable to him, but she did as he asked and looked around. They were surrounded by woods, deep, dense, overgrown woods, and she could see nothing but pine and Manzanita bush and—

And suddenly, with one last turn, it all fell away and they were on the edge of a cliff.

Looking down. And down. And down…

It was staggering. Heart-stopping. She’d never in her life seen anything like it.

“The Tahoe Rim Trail,” he said quietly, turning off the engine so that the air was filled with nothing but a bird’s cry, the hum of unseen insects, the light brush of a breeze.

He hopped out of the Jeep and she followed him, walking to the edge of the drop-off, where hundreds of feet below, she could see the huge expanse of Lake Tahoe, spread out like some magnificent feast for her eyes.

“This way.” He led her along a very narrow trail that had her huffing and puffing in two minutes flat while his breathing remained perfectly steady.

“I could have relaxed easier at a spa,” she said, huffing like a freight train.

“Consider this the Wilder spa, and you’ve booked the Stone Special.”

She gasped for breath for another few hundred feet. “I think I’m dying.”

“It’s the altitude.” He opened his backpack and pulled out a water.

“You came prepared.”

“Don’t look surprised. It’s my job.”

It was, she realized, not just to have a good time, but to be ready for anything. Like her job, his required him to have whatever they’d need. She might have just gotten in the Jeep without thinking much about their plans, but he’d put thought into it, as he did into every trip he made because it was up to him to be in charge.

It was odd to think of his work that way, to compare it to hers, even in broad scope. But it reminded her that when she’d first come here, she’d seen him as a mountain bum. How perceptions change. She couldn’t help but wonder, had his perception of her changed too?

He pulled a third piece of paper from his pack and handed it to her:

Stop over-thinking.

“You think you know me pretty well, don’t you?”

Smiling, he handed her another.

Go with your gut instincts.

He’d kept walking while she read that last one. She eyed him just ahead of her, moving along with an easy confidence that was so sexy he made her mouth dry. His shirt was stretching the limits at the shoulders, playing over the muscles of his back, half tucked into his Levi’s, which were all in themselves a gift to her eyes. The jeans were loose and low on his hips, nicely taut across his extremely fit butt, and emphasized his long, powerful legs. “Go with my gut instincts on what?”

He kept walking.

With a huff, she shoved the notes in her pocket, downed some water, and followed. “Are there people up here?”

“Not on this trail, it’s hard to find.”

“I think TJ could probably find it.”

Stone flashed her a grin over his shoulder. “He’s in Desolation Wilderness on a group trek.”

“Ah. A great date trail, then.”

“You’re the first woman I’ve brought up here.”

She stared at his back in surprise, and then tripped over her own feet.

“Careful. I have an in with the doctor, but she wields needles and knows how to use them.” When he stopped, she nearly plowed into the back of him. He shifted to the side and she saw that they were in a sort of rock alcove, once again looking down at the Tahoe Rim Trail but from a far more private, secluded spot.

“My God,” she whispered, feeling like they were on top of the world. “It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

“Agreed,” he said quietly at her side, but when she turned to him, he was looking right at her.

“Stop.” She ran a hand over her hair. “I’m dusty and hot and icky.”

He smiled and grabbed her hand. “You can be the boss of your world all you want, Dr. Emma, but even you can’t tell me how to think.”

“I’m merely questioning your eyesight.”

“Twenty-twenty.”

“Ah.” She sipped some water. “Then you’re warming me up, thinking you’re going to get lucky up here in the middle of nowhere. Luckier than the last time you had me in the wilderness.”

He looked at her and slowly arched a brow. “You have it all figured out then?”

“Yeah. But let me assure you it’s not happening. My mind would be on all the bugs, and where they could crawl into, and you wouldn’t get very far with me.”

“Trust me, your mind wouldn’t be on the bugs.”

While her knees wobbled over the inevitable truth of that statement, he slid an arm around her. “I realize you like to be in charge, Emma. Always in control. But you’re supposed to be working on that. That’s what we’re doing here. Relaxing. Letting go.”

Right. Per the written instructions, she closed her eyes and actually
heard
him smile.

“You reaching for some patience?” he murmured.

“I am. And it would help if you could possibly shut it while I do so.”

She heard his low laugh, then felt him step into her. “Bossy,” he whispered. “Pissy, stubborn as hell, and…”

“And what? Annoying?”

“Well…”

“Always right?”

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

She snorted out an unexpected laugh and opened her eyes, catching a new light as it came into his, more than simple affection, more than casual fun. “Stone.”

“You’re beautiful, Emma.” He slid a hand around the back of her neck, stroking her jaw with his thumb. “Made all the more so because you don’t even know it.”

Things were happening inside her—besides just the physical response of his touch. She was softening, unveiling the real Emma, without her protective walls. It brought an edge to her arousal, and an odd sort of panic. “I don’t need pretty words.”

“No? Maybe I do.” A callused fingertip ran over her cheek, skimmed her ear.

She shivered. Pretty words, amazing touch…she was a goner. “Seriously, Stone.”

He was looking at her as if she was so important. And also as if he was amused. “I’m afraid of needles, Emma, which is ridiculous enough, but look at you. You’re afraid of niceness.”

“Am not.”

He let her have the lie, moving onto a devastatingly tender, gentle sexiness she had no defense against. “You have the most amazing eyes,” he whispered.

Oh, God.

“Yeah, and a smile that always puts one on my mouth as well, and a way of looking at me that weeds through all the bullshit and sees the real me. You make me laugh, you make me think. You turn me on, Emma, in every way.” As proven when he settled his hands on her hips and pulled her into him so that she could feel him, fully aroused. “You are truly the most beautiful woman I’ve ever had the pleasure of kissing.” He kissed her then, and God his mouth. He made a sound deep in his throat and turned deeper into the kiss.

He had a way of making her feel like there was nothing but
her, but them, and by the time he pulled back slightly, she wasn’t worried about bugs, but how fast she could get her clothes off.

Which was bad. Very, very bad. Her knees were liquid, her body revved for action.

“Your eyes are closed, what’s next?” he asked.

“Be patient.”

“And…”

“Don’t over-think it. Go with your instincts,” she repeated obediently. “But my instincts…”

“What are they telling you?”

To strip naked
. “Nothing.”

“Liar,” he chided gently, looking at her from sexy, heavy-lidded eyes, his mouth still wet from hers, his hands—

God, his hands.

They were spread wide on her ribs, his fingertips almost brushing the undersides of her breasts.

“I blame the kissing,” she decided, her voice a little shaky.

“For…?”

“For me losing my head. Look, you need to back way up.”

He merely smiled and pulled her closer in, and somehow her brain got mixed signals from her body and went with the flow, which wasn’t good. Not good at all. She was going to miss him, miss him so damn much, and that thought wasn’t comforting. She’d miss his humor, his voice, how he made her laugh, the way he looked at her, everything. “Stone.”

“Emma,” he said sweetly.

As if he was sweet! “Okay.” She fisted her hands in his hair. “You know what? Fine. Have it your way. I’m going with my instincts.”

“I like the sound of that. What are they saying?”

“They’re saying we should have sex right here, right now.” She smacked a hand to his chest when his eyes flashed with
triumph. “But you should know, we are not cuddling afterwards. Not this time. Not—” She’d been about to say ever, because she was leaving, and cuddling with him messed with her head big time, but he smiled soberly, whispered, “Shh,” and kissed her again.