Stuck on You (21 page)

“You don’t really know anything about me. How can you know that’s not how I am?”

She thought back to the night before when they’d been together. He’d been gentle and giving and not the least bit overbearing or demanding. Not to mention how he’d taken care of her after she’d fallen in the lake, literally giving her the shirt off his back. And how he’d carried her after she’d slid down the hill in her heels so she couldn’t slip again.

Those weren’t the actions of a man who didn’t care about the people around him and how they felt. So what had happened tonight to spark this change in him?

“I know you’re a good man who’s had a shitty night. The only thing I don’t know is why? But you can tell me. I want to know. I want to understand why you spoke to us the way you did. And I want to help you sort out whatever it is that’s going on with you tonight.”

Miles stared at her for a moment and she thought she might crawl across the bed and right into his lap and comfort him. The way he looked at her with pain in his eyes instead of the lust she’d grown accustomed to was surprising.

He sighed. “I’m sorry for the way I acted. But I’m not going to change my mind. I can’t let either of our teams attempt that cache.”

She felt her annoyance level start to rise. “But it’s not your choice what Zoe and I do. We are our own team. Don’t you get that?”

He pushed away from the wall, leaning toward her, anger flashing in his eyes. “Don’t you get how dangerous it is? Do you really think I’m going to let any of you get hurt just to try and win some stupid prize in some stupid game?”

“Why is it suddenly your responsibility to keep us all safe?”

“It’s always been my job to keep my team safe, and now that I’m involved with you and … ” He paused, sighing. “Zoe’s on your team. Your team is my responsibility too. I’m not going to fail again.” The anger creasing his features faded with his words and he rested his head into his hands, his shoulder slumping.

“What are you talking about? You haven’t failed anything.” She inched closer, placing her hand on his knee.

When he looked up at her, she gasped. The pain, the deep-rooted sorrow etched in his very being, was laid out for her to see.

“Ben’s accident. The accident that nearly cost him everything … ” Miles’s voice wavered. He cleared his throat. “It was my fault.”

“No. I’m sure it wasn’t. And I’m sure Ben doesn’t think it was either. If he did think that, he’d never have agreed to do this show with you.”

Miles shook his head. “It doesn’t matter what he thinks, I know the truth. That day, I knew there was a good chance the weather could change, but I ignored the reports.”

Paige didn’t say anything. His eyes glazed over as if he was reliving the memory. She took one of his hands in both of hers, holding it tightly while she waited for him to continue.

“We were so close to the top. I knew we’d make it to the summit that day. And if we didn’t go then, the storm blowing in would prevent us from continuing and we couldn’t wait it out on the side of the mountain for days. I thought we’d make it up and back with plenty of time to spare. Then we’d make it to the lower base camp to ride out the storm before heading home.”

Miles met her gaze and she wanted to take his pain away. Her breathing quickened with his story, unable to imagine living through the scenario he described.

“I was right about us being able to make the summit at least. We were on our way down when the winds picked up without warning. The storm came hours earlier than it was supposed to. We tried to get down the mountain faster, but the terrain was really rough. Ben slipped. He slid down the side of the mountain, loosening rocks along the way. And when he stopped against an outcropping, a large boulder tumbled after him, narrowly missing his body, but catching his foot.”

Paige sucked in a breath, fighting back the tears pooling in her eyes. She couldn’t even imagine what that must have been like for Ben. Or for Miles. Any anger or annoyance she’d felt coming to talk to Miles was long gone.

“The boulder crushed his foot and ankle bones so badly that by the time we finally got him to a hospital, they had no choice but to amputate. He is the way he is now … because of me.” He sat up straighter. “I can’t let something like that happen again. To any of you. I won’t make another mistake like I made with Ben.”

Paige didn’t say anything as she climbed into his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him close. No wonder he was always so worried about everyone. He’d been carrying around his guilt about Ben for a couple of years now. But it wasn’t his fault. Accidents are called accidents for a reason.

He wove his hands around her waist and buried his head in her neck. She stroked her hands up and down his back, comforting him and fighting back her own tears.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” she whispered in his ear. “The accident wasn’t your fault. Ben is a grown man who makes his own choices. He chose to go up to the summit with you that day.”

Miles didn’t reply so she took his face in her hands, forcing him to look at her. “You are one of the kindest and most caring men I’ve ever met. I may not have known you for very long, but I’m certain you would never do anything on purpose knowing it would hurt someone else.”

She didn’t wait for him to respond. She pressed her lips to his, kissing him tenderly as if doing so might somehow ease away his pain. The tension in his arms around her waist disappeared.

She pulled back to look him in the eyes again. “You’ve carried this around too long already. It’s time to let your guilt over an
accident
go. I’m sure Ben would want that too if he knew.”

Miles brushed his fingers along her cheek. “I’ll try. But only if you agree not to put me in the position of having to get over another accident. Agree not to attempt that cache.”

Paige thought about his request. Could she convince Zoe not to go for the cache?

If Zoe knew why, then maybe she’d agree. “I’ll talk to Zoe about it and see what she says, but we’ll still have to consider what’s best for our team. If your mind is set, then you’re going to have to tell Ben the reason your team can’t do it. And ‘because I said so’ isn’t going to cut it. You need to tell him how you feel.

Miles smiled for the first time since Paige walked into his room. “You want me to talk to another guy about my feelings?”

She nodded, smiling back. “It would do you both some good.”

“I can think of something else that would do me some good right about now.” He shifted her in his lap, the evidence of his intensions pressing into her. “You’re an amazing woman, Paige. I’m lucky to have you here tonight.”

Paige wiggled in his lap, teasing him while he gripped her hips in his hands. “I think a little stress relief is just what the doctor ordered.”

• • •

Sun streamed in the through the window, casting the room into a bright yellow glow. Paige squinted against the offending light and peered at the bedside table clock. Time to get up and ready if she wanted to eat before the race day started at eight.

Under her cheek, Miles shifted. “Time to get up already?”

“Looks that way,” she said with a yawn, carefully turning away so she wouldn’t accidentally blow her dragon breath on him. Morning breath was so not sexy. But it also wasn’t correctable at the moment considering she wasn’t in her own room and didn’t have her own toothbrush handy.

After spending another few hours with Miles last night, making sure all of him felt better, they’d passed out from exhaustion. She couldn’t remember a better night. Ever.

“I should go,” she said, crawling over Miles to get out of bed. “I need to get back to my room before anyone sees me do the walk of shame.”

“Nothing shameful about what we did last night.” Miles stretched and walked Paige to the door. He bent, giving her a quick kiss on the lips. “I’ll see you at breakfast and we’ll talk to Zoe and Ben together about the cache, okay?”

Paige groaned. “Great. Just what I need to go with my breakfast — a splash of bitchy Zoe. She’s never going to listen to us if her mind’s already made up.”

“Don’t worry. Zoe will listen to me. She never wants to, but she always does.”

Odd comment to make when they’d only known each other a few weeks.

“Why do you always make it sound like you’ve known Zoe for years when you only met when the show started?” Paige asked. A sinking in her stomach warned her that she didn’t really want to know the answer.

“I’ve been waiting for the right moment to tell you — to explain about my past with Zoe.” He sighed and wrung his hands together as if he was suddenly nervous about something. “I didn’t tell you at first because I was worried you’d look at me differently once you knew, but I didn’t mean to keep it a secret this long.”

Nervousness made Paige’s voice shake. “Tell me what exactly?”

“Zoe’s my sister.”

Paige closed her door and leaned her head against it, letting her eyes flutter shut. She’d walked down the hall in a daze, not caring if any of the other teams saw her leave Miles’s room in the same clothes she’d been wearing yesterday.

Zoe and Miles were siblings.

Holy shitballs.

Well that explained how they were both so damned good-looking. And why they spoke to each other and about each other as if they’d known the other for years. Because they had.

How? How was that even possible? He was Jack Miles. She was Zoe Oliver. They didn’t even share a last name. Maybe he’d been joking.

“Look what the cat dragged in,” Zoe said, walking out of the bathroom with her hair and body wrapped in a towel as if she’d just gotten out of the shower — her makeup perfectly applied already as always. She flopped down on her bed and started massaging moisturizer onto her legs. “Someone had a good night.”

“I, just … ”

“Don’t bother. I noticed you weren’t here when I got up to shower.” Zoe walked to the closet and pulled out her outfit for the day. “No sense in trying to deny your walk of shame.”

Paige didn’t bother. She had no idea what to say to Zoe.

“Your brother just rocked my world,” didn’t seem entirely appropriate. “I can’t believe you’re from the same family” seemed rude. Her initial reaction of “Holy fuck!” seemed really hard to explain in other, more eloquent words.

“Miles is your brother.”

“Oh good. He finally manned up and told you.”

“We’re partners and you knew but you didn’t tell me.”

“Of course I knew. Brother. Sister. That’s not something I could un-know.”

Paige felt her annoyance with Zoe rising exponentially with this conversation. Perfect timing for the shower she needed to have anyways. As she ducked into the bathroom, she heard Zoe chuckle from behind her. She shivered as she stepped into the shower.

Zoe and Miles — family.

And she really liked Miles.

And she really didn’t care for Zoe so much. Not that she was as terrible as Paige had originally believed. If being forced to be together for the last few weeks did anything, it was show that maybe there was a teeny tiny real person inside of Zoe buried under the giant, sarcastic bitchy outer shell.

Hoping for a relationship with Miles outside of the show also meant accepting a relationship with Zoe as his sibling. Could she sign up for that? Was Miles worth it?

An image of him from the night before flashed through her mind.

Maybe he was worth the annoyance of Zoe.

Paige stepped out of the shower and toweled off, sad that she couldn’t smell Miles’s cologne lingering on her skin anymore. Maybe she’d have to stop by his room to check on him later for another quick dose of his cologne to take with her for the day. She could already imagine his lips trailing along her neck as he kissed her in the spot behind her ear that tickled.

Tonight couldn’t come soon enough.

But then Ben would most likely be back in the room with Miles. That could make fooling around awfully tricky. Maybe she could plead with Chip for a spare room of her own … claim Zoe was driving her crazy. That would be believable. Then she could spend another amazing night in his arms.

Of course that would also mean she would fall a little harder for him and risk getting closer to Zoe by proxy. The question popped into her mind again as she dug through her closet for something cute to wear. Was Miles worth it, knowing he was forever attached to Zoe?

Yes.

Maybe.

Zoe couldn’t possibly be that bad once they got to know each other better. Already they were getting along better on this show than they had on
The One
. Surely, if they were connected because of Miles, they could figure out a way to be around each other without fighting or constant sarcasm, couldn’t they?

“Apparently screwing my brother leads to an inability to hold conversations,” Zoe said, sarcasm at full throttle. “If I’d known how quiet it would be, I would have gotten you two to hook up sooner. I wonder if there’s a way to accomplish this level of speechlessness without having to make you squeal with ecstasy? I’m not sure I like you that much.”

Paige’s mouth dropped open. She needed to say something back but what could she say to that? The longer she sat there thinking, the more Zoe’s comment rang true. “I. He.”

“Bumped uglies last night? Yep, old news.”

“I’m not quiet because of sleeping with Miles, which is none of your business by the way. I’m quiet because I can’t believe that you and he share the same genetic beginning. You’re so completely different from each other.”

“We’re really not that different actually.”

She bit the inside of her cheek thinking about Zoe’s comment. If they weren’t so different, then how exactly were they the same? And could she live with Miles’s similarities to Zoe?

Damn it. How the hell out of all the people in the whole world, had she ended up in bed with Zoe’s brother? Fate was a cruel, cruel bitch.

“How exactly are you like him?”

Zoe shrugged. “We’re both determined and driven. We’re both independent. We’re both hot.”

“At least he doesn’t share your amazing modesty,” Paige mumbled. “How are you guys siblings when you don’t even share the same last name? That doesn’t make sense.”