Northern Encounter Read online

  “I’ll just settle for thawed.” Even her smile felt frozen. “I still can’t feel my fingers.”

  “Take off your gloves and put your hands in your armpits.” He hesitated and then continued. “Or your crotch. They’re the two warmest spots on your body.

  Just so you know.”

  “Well, that’s an interesting survival skill tip. I’ll opt for my armpits this time.”

  “I think that’s a good choice,” he said, poking at the fire one last time before closing the stove door.

  Good grief. He was dead serious. There was an impish part of her that wanted to ask if his hands were cold and offer up her crotch since her armpits were otherwise occupied. And while the thought might dance through her head, no doubt due to oxygen deprivation compliments of the frigid temperatures, she kept the thought to herself. And actually it almost did as much to warm her up as the fire that was snapping and popping in the stove.

  She’d known she was in trouble…well, actually, she’d known she was in trouble from the moment she’d met him. But she’d known she was in seriously dire straits when they were sitting in that tent this afternoon and all she could think about was how much she’d like to kiss him. He had the most tempting mouth she’d ever seen on a man. A full lower lip that just begged to be licked and nibbled.

  She sucked in a deep breath. She obviously was in need of additional oxygen.

  “Are you okay?”

  No. She was not okay because even the extra oxygen wasn’t alleviating the desire to back him up against the wall and have her way with his sensual mouth. “I’m fine. How about you?”

  That earned her a strange look. “I’m fine. Are you sure you feel all right?”

  “No. Not really. Is there some kind of mental condition induced by the cold?”

  “Hypothermia. Do you feel drowsy? Confused?”

  “Maybe a little confused.” Because surely she was confused as hell if the only thing she could think about was kissing Clint Sisnuket.

  “Let me check your heart rate,” he said, placing his fingers against the underside of her wrist while he watched the second hand on his watch. A frown drew his midnight black eyebrows together. He shook his head. “With hypothermia, the pulse rate slows but your pulse is racing.”

  No kidding. He was touching her. He was within heart-thudding, hormone-revving striking distance. Of course her pulse was racing.

  “Uh-huh.”

  He let go of her wrist and tested his fingers against her forehead, her cheek, her neck. “You don’t feel clam my,” he said.

  She was seriously in danger of melting into a puddle at his feet. Surely to God, she wasn’t in this alone. She looked into his dark eyes with their thick fringe of lashes and saw what she needed to see. “You feel warm.” He brushed his fingers against the line of her jaw. Oh, no, she definitely wasn’t alone in this. “What kind of confusion are you suffering?”

  She drew another deep breath with no better results than before. “I seem consumed by the need to kiss you.”

  He tensed, much like the malamute had when it had sensed a threat, but instead of retreating, he winnowed his hands into her hair, testing the strands between his fingertips. “I’ve had the same bout of confusion. But I think it’s a bad idea.”

  “I’m sure it’s a terrible idea.” She couldn’t help herself. She reached up to trace her finger against the fullness of that lower lip that tormented her. She could barely breathe. “You have the most beautiful mouth I’ve ever seen on a man.”

  With a muted groan he lowered his head and she wasn’t sure where his breath started and hers ended. And then that incredible mouth was on hers, his lips melding against her own.

  Sweet.

  Hot.

  Arousing.

  Again. And again. And one more time. She buried her hands in his thick, dark hair.

  She caught the sexy fullness of that lower lip between her teeth and nibbled. With another groan, he probed at her lips with his tongue.

  She opened her mouth to him. A firestorm swept through her at the sweep of his tongue into the sensitive recesses of her mouth. “Mmm.” She took him deeper into her mouth, her tongue tangling with his.

  She strained against his erection, canting her hips, and his hands skimmed beneath her layers of clothes to cup her breasts. There was a franticness that had ignited from the first moment she’d seen him.

  Finally they broke apart, and as if he’d come to his senses, he withdrew his hands from beneath her clothes. Tessa leaned her head into the strong column of his throat, his heart pounding against her cheek. “Oh, God…”

  She didn’t realize she’d spoken aloud until he answered her. “I know,” he said, his breath stirring against the top of her head.

  He gently but firmly set her away from him. “And that’s why that’s a bad idea. We’re both here to work. You’ll go home in a week and I’ll stay here and anything else is a bad idea.”

  “But—”

  He stopped her with a finger to her lips. “No. I’m not a casual man,” he said. “I never have been. It’s just not me. And there’s no room for anything but casual given how long you’re here, so there’s simply no room for anything. And that got way out of hand way too fast. I just couldn’t…”

  She knew he was right. It sounded right. But it didn’t feel right. But she thought about grinding herself against him and felt the heat rise in her face. “Me too…I couldn’t…”

  They each took a step back from the other, as if knowing if they stayed in that close proximity they were going to be right back where they’d just been…unable to keep their hands off of each other.

  “Maybe there’s room for friendship,” she said.

  His hesitation stretched between them, broken only by the snap and crackle of the wood. Finally he said, “We could try for friends.”

  She nodded, feeling as doubtful as he sounded. She didn’t normally want to kiss her friends over and over and over while they got naked together.

  ONCE AGAIN, THE SUN had sunk below the horizon, casting the world in shades of black and white. Clint and Tessa had ventured out again earlier for her to film in yet another area. He stoked the cabin’s fire. It’d need to burn all night. Actually once he started the fire, he never let it go out completely. It was far easier to rekindle than to start another fire from scratch. And the wood stove wouldn’t be the only thing burning all night.

  Dammit to hell, he’d known kissing Tessa was a bad idea. No, it wasn’t just a bad idea, it was a disaster of an idea. Make that a disaster of epic proportion. All damn afternoon he’d tasted her against his mouth, his tongue. Her scent had seemed imprinted on him, marked as clearly as the alpha wolf had marked their tent earlier. That kiss had ignited a fire in him as surely as when he’d held the match to the kindling. And just as he would keep the wood stove going, Tessa would keep him going. His fire wasn’t likely to go out as long as he and she were sharing space.

  And he’d better just get the hell over it because he’d meant what he’d said earlier. He wasn’t a man given to casual relationships and he’d known better than to begin something with her. But he hadn’t just wanted her, the need to kiss her had been a hunger gnawing at his gut. And rather than feeding and satisfying that hunger, it had merely intensified it.

  And now here they were, cozied up in the cabin for the night and tomorrow night as well, hoping the aurora borealis made its appearance. And there was no forgetting that kiss. But he’d agreed to aim for “friends” so that was the direction he’d take.

  “Are you pleased with the footage you got today?” he asked, putting their dinner on top of the wood stove to heat. Gus supplied her dinners frozen, and with the temperatures being what they were, they stayed frozen on the trip out.

  Tessa was skimming the day’s taping. She sat cross-legged on the top bunk opposite the window that would offer the best view of the northern lights.

  “I’m very pleased. There’s a nice shot with two of the wolves. Hang on a sec
and I’ll show you.” She glanced down at a notepad. “Here, let me back it up to this stop.” Remaining seated, she angled the camera with its lens viewer his way. It left Clint with no option except to step closer. Holding the camera, she pushed a button and he watched as a rangy gray wolf and a heavier white-flecked wolf loped across the clearing and dodged into the copse of snow-laden spruce.

  It was a beautiful scene. However, Clint was more tuned into the delicate bones of Tessa’s wrist, the elegant line of her hand. She was like an ivory carving—pale intricate curves and delicate lines, yet resilient and strong.

  “Nice, huh?” she said.

  “Very. Lots of people who live in Alaska have never been so lucky as to see that.” He stepped away to stir the stew that was beginning to burble on the stove’s cast iron ledge, eager to put the cabin’s distance between them once more.

  “And now lots of people will get to see it. Isn’t that cool?” Her smile reflected satisfaction. She clicked the camera off and unfolded her legs, dangling them over the side of the bunk.

  “You really love what you do, don’t you?”

  “I do.”

  “It means you have to travel a lot, though.” He would be miserable. He loved the Alaskan wilderness. He’d hated Montreal. Fairbanks had been better but he’d still been happy to come home. “Do you ever get tired of that?”

  She shrugged, a guard sliding into place. “Not really.”

  “Anyone special waiting at home for you?”

  “No. I’m something of a wanderer. I move around pretty often.”

  “But there’s nothing interesting enough to make you want to stay, obviously.”

  “Obviously not.” She jumped off the bunk, landing lightly on her feet. “Wow, dinner smells great. What are we having?”

  He followed her lead. Obviously that particular topic was closed. “Gus’s caribou stew.”

  The wood popped and snapped in the stove. Between the fire and the stew and Tessa it felt homey in the cabin. He ladled stew into a melamine bowl and passed it to her. “The spoons are in that cup on the shelf.” The cabin, which mostly housed hunters and fishing enthusiasts, didn’t have a table. “If you use the edge of the shelf as a table,” he said, “you’ll have a great view of the night sky.”

  She took his advice and propped her hip against the window frame and studied the sky while she took a bite of their dinner. “This is better than the finest restaurant I’ve ever been in.”

  “What? The food or the view?”

  She smiled at him over her shoulder and it felt as if the plank flooring beneath his feet shifted. “Both.” She turned back to the window, her expression of awe reflected back in the window. “Do you ever get used to it? Take it for granted?”

  “No. Never.” Even though he’d only been a kid, his time in Montreal had taught him to never take the place he called home for granted. Right along with the lesson that not everyone would love this place as much as he did.

  TESSA BURROWED INTO the sleeping bag thrown onto the top bunk and watched the night sky through the window. Outside, the wolves called to one another with a series of howls. There was an almost comforting element to the sound of the wolves. She issued a sigh of contentment.

  Clint spoke up. “You okay? You don’t need to worry. The cabin’s safe. You’re safe.”

  She had deliberately looked out the window rather than at him. He was in the lower bunk directly across from her. She assumed because it afforded him the closest access for stoking the stove. She didn’t want to think about the fact that only seven feet separated them. If she didn’t look at him lying in his bunk, then she was less likely to think about what kissing him had been like. She wouldn’t think how easy it would be to slip into his bunk with him and touch her lips to his, to run her fingers through his straight, thick hair, to trace his high cheekbones, to slide her fingers down to the penis she’d felt outlined so perfectly between her thighs earlier today.

  “The cabin seems perfectly sturdy and the wolves don’t scare me. I like to hear them.”

  “My people tell a legend of the origin of the wolf if you’d like to hear it.”

  “I’d love to.”

  There was a soothing cadence and rhythm to Clint’s voice as he recounted the folktale. Much as she was enjoying the story, Tessa’s eyelids grew heavier and heavier. Her last thought before sleep claimed her was that the cabin would protect her from the wolves but who would protect her from this attraction she had for Clint?

  “THAT WAS FUN,” TESSA said with a radiant smile as they returned to the cabin the following day. “And I’m starving.”

  Smiling, Clint hung his coat on the peg by the door and pulled off his snow crusted boots. “Your snack will be served momentarily, madam.”

  Kobuk waited patiently on the mat at the front door. Clint wiped the snow from his coat and paws with a worn towel.

  “It’d better be,” she said with a smile as she unwound a bright pink scarf from around her neck.

  He’d learned a long time ago that guiding in the winter was much better if he took his clients out for brief periods of time and then brought them back to warm up. This morning they’d headed south, following the river’s winding, iced surface while she filmed.

  Unlike the previous day which had been quiet and still except for the presence of the wolves, the area they’d found had been busy—or relatively so, as busy as Alaska could be in winter—with an abundance of small chirping chickadees and a few magpies. Tessa had been delighted by the presence of the chickadees. They actually reminded him of her—small, happy, social. And on the way back, they’d seen the wolf pack again.

  Humming beneath her breath, she crossed to the bunks on the right and plopped down on the lower platform. She pulled out her cameras and did whatever it was that she did to them. She took meticulous care of them, which he respected. He’d seen far too many people in his years as a guide who were careless with their things. And inevitably those were the people he was glad to say goodbye to by the time they left.

  He stood for a moment, watching her, almost trans-fixed by her hands. Her nails were short, neat and unpainted. He wanted to touch her and be touched by her. He longed to trace the delicate blue vein from the back of her hand to the tender spot of her wrist, to know the texture of her skin.

  He turned abruptly to the supplies stored on the kitchen counter. He was hungry for her and she wanted cheese crackers and some dried fruit. This was a helluva time and place for him to develop this crazy attraction. And it was crazy, insane…but very real, very intense nonetheless.

  Her footsteps sounded on the cabin’s wood floor as she crossed to stand in front of the wood stove, backing her nicely curved rear up to the heat, holding her hands behind to absorb some warmth, as well.

  Clint wasn’t sure how it happened, unless he was simply careless in his distraction, but as he turned he dropped the dried fruit. Apple rings and banana chips scattered over the floor. “Damn,” he said.

  They both dropped to the wood that had been worn smooth over the years and began to pick up the pieces. Wasting food out here simply wasn’t an option. “I’ll eat this,” he said, “since it’s been on the floor.”

  She picked up the last piece, returning it to the bowl.

  “Heck no, you won’t,” she said with a smile that turned him inside out. “I’ve been eyeing these apple rings. A little floor time never hurt anyone.” She leaned forward and the curve of her shoulder brushed against his arm. On their hands and knees in front of the wood stove, the only sound the sizzle and pop of the green birch he’d loaded earlier, their eyes met and held and it was as if time hung suspended.

  And in that moment everything that had been dancing between them, the furtive looks, the brief touches, the longing that was an almost-palpable force roared to the forefront.

  Like the winds that could tear across the open expanses at times, desire and need hurtled through him. And an answering hunger gleamed in her eyes. With mutual groans, they reached f
or each other. Their kiss was frantic. Her lips seemed to feed on his even as he devoured her mouth with his own. Still on their knees, they pressed against each other, her hands tangled in his hair, and he molded his fingers against the fine bones of her skull, her hair a silken mantle against the backs of his hands.

  Her breasts pressed against his chest and blood pooled hot and thick between his legs. Their tongues tangled and she arched against him, sending even more heat spiraling through him. She swallowed his groan as he smoothed his hands over her back, quickly learning the curves he’d admired.

  She slid her hands beneath the edge of his shirt, under his thermal top, and the sensation of her fingers against his bare skin was even better than he’d imagined.

  “Clint,” she said, her breathing as ragged as his own.

  His brain fogged with want, he didn’t know whether she was asking him to stop or not stop. And he ought to have the internal fortitude to call his own halt, but God help him, if she wanted him, he could no longer deny how much he wanted her, as well.

  “Yes…should I…”

  “Take off your shirt…please. I spent all last night lying in my bunk…wondering.”

  He knew, had known from the moment he’d seen her that he didn’t need to do this. And there was a part of him that had known from the moment he’d laid eyes on her that this was inevitable. There came points when freewill and destiny and desire crossed paths to only one possible outcome.

  What the next outcome would be was yet to be seen, but for now, here, there was only one thing he could do and it wasn’t to walk away.

  “I will if you will,” he said. “Because I too have wondered.”

  With a slow, sweet smile, she grasped the hem of her shirt and the undershirt beneath it and slowly slid them up and over her head. His mouth went dry and his blood ran hot at the perfection before him—the delicate expanse of her neck, the slope of her shoulder, the curve of her breasts spilling out of the top of a white and pink bra, and the indent of her waist that gave way to the flare of her jeans-clad hips. “Your turn.”