Maybe it had been a little bit of a lie when Drake had said they’d have to push hard to make it to the falls before sunset. He wasn’t going to have to push too hard, but she was working through a twisted ankle and a sore body. Even on the half a night’s sleep he’d gotten, he could have made this walk without exerting too much of an effort. If he pushed it, he could have done the entire hike out in one day rather than two, but the falls were worth twice the walk. They were absolutely gorgeous, and there was a reason he had chosen them.

Some part of him wanted to share all of this with her. He wanted her to see what he loved the most about Colorado, and how there was nothing that Hollywood could manufacture that held a candle to the things that nature provided for anyone who took the time to notice. Some part of him wanted to convince her to stay, to prove to him that she was more than the first impression she’d made on him.

He could have been a fool to give her that chance, but maybe it would work out in his favor. He had no way of knowing until he pulled it off or didn’t. Besides, he was having too much fun at teasing her after the dream he’d been subjected to the night before. He just wasn’t going to admit to her that he’d had his arms wrapped around her just as tightly when he’d woken up from the broken sleep he’d been able to get. It wasn’t exactly what he wanted to think about. He didn’t have time for feelings. This could be all fun and games, but if it got to be more than that, maybe he needed to stop himself. Waking up with her in his arms had been a little more real than he wanted to think about.

This morning, he let her walk behind him, keeping her own pace, but never getting too far ahead to talk to her. The first hour was spent working out the sore muscles she’d earned from the day before. There were a couple of ways he could have worked them out. This wasn’t the one he would have preferred, but she was still far too uptight to be fine with the other options. That didn’t mean he wasn’t going to give her a hard time about it.

“So Princess, you know there are better workouts you could be having this morning. Well, at least ones you wouldn’t have had to leave your bedroom for. I hope you know that.” He was careful not to say outright what he meant, but he was going to plant the seeds of it in her head whenever he got the chance.

“Yeah well, my yoga instructor doesn’t do house calls, so I’d have had to go into the gym, anyway.” She deflected it again. She was sharp. He liked that about her even if she was using it in all the wrong ways.

“Touché, and at least out here you’ve got the view as a concession for having to drag yourself out of a warm sleeping back fifteen minutes after sunrise on a Saturday, right?” He knew that most of her view consisted of looking at his backside while he walked just ahead of her on the trail, but there was more than that coming. Besides, it fit entirely into the game he was trying to play.

The snort that escaped her half open mouth was worth all the effort this was taking. It was good to listen to her let go and just be a damned human for once.

“Yeah. Your ass is worth all the trouble.” The humor in her voice was evident. She knew what he was playing, but at least now she was playing along a little. He chuckled along with her, making sure to flex his backside just in her line of vision.

“I’ve worked hard at this physique. It takes at least a six pack of beer every Saturday night and steady regimen of cheeseburgers and bratwurst to stay in this pristine condition.” None of it was a lie, and it was the exact opposite of what one of those guys back in the city would have said under the same conditions.

“Oh, I’m sure. It’s really impressive that you have that much stamina. I honestly don’t know how you find the time to be so manly! ” Finally, she was playing along. This game was a lot more fun when there was someone to play with instead of just a blank wall to annoy.

“It takes real commitment, but I’m all in when it really matters.” That statement was a hundred percent true, at least. He didn’t do things by halves. When he put his mind to something it was all or nothing. That had been true of his professional and personal life. Even if his marriage to Vanessa hadn’t worked out, it wasn’t from lack of effort on his part. He’d moved to Los Angeles for her and stayed much longer than his better judgement wanted to agree to. In the end, it had been her who’d sent him back here to Colorado. She’d known he was miserable without him saying a single word about it. She wasn’t cut out for Colorado, just like he wasn’t cut out for California. Maybe it was better that the two of them had separated.

He’d seen some of that same streak in Celeste, but there was something else there too. She was comfortable with the city because it was where she was born, but she had the determination to make it anywhere if she could get her head out of her ass long enough to really look around and see what she was capable of.

Part of him wanted to tell her that, but he knew it was just going to earn another sarcastic snap from her. He’d managed to rile her up pretty damned good along the hike, though, and he was at least enjoying the fact that he could have some kind of effect on her while she was conscious too. He knew that dream wasn’t something she was ever going to mention out loud while she was awake, if she even remembered it. Though, something about the way her cheeks flushed when he mentioned something about how she must have had some pretty damned good dreams last night told him that she remembered more than she was going to admit.

Mostly, he kept the two of them walking at a pace he knew was going to be comfortable enough for her that she wasn’t going to pass out at the side of the trail but would still get them where they were going. The joking around was half motivation and half entertainment for Drake. He wanted to keep her mad enough to keep pushing on and trying to prove that she was just as good as he was at whatever she set her mind on doing.

She was stubborn, he had to give her that, and she wasn’t giving up easily. It was a good trait. It meant she’d make it anywhere she set her mind to. He was also half trying to prove to her that maybe the priorities she’d set into place for herself weren’t the ones that were right for her. Choosing a city just because it was the place you’d lived all your life made just about as much sense as wearing a pair of shoes two sizes too small just because you’d worn them in high school or running off and marrying your high school sweetheart just because they’d been your first love. The things that fit perfectly at one point in your life weren’t going to be the best fit once you grew into something else.

Drake knew that better than most people. He’d learned some of those lessons the hard way. He just didn’t want Celeste to have to learn them that way. He had no idea why she was so interested in what she wanted to do with her life. He should have just butted out and let her go back to the city while he looked for another attorney to replace her when she went. She was good at her job. She’d done the work that it would have taken Sam Albertson three weeks to finish in less than two. He had to give her credit where credit was due, and she was smart, even if she wasn’t practical. Maybe it wasn’t her fault she didn’t know a damned thing about the weather here in Colorado and insisted on driving a car that was absolutely useless every time more than three or four flakes of snow fell to the ground.

He wanted her to stay, and it wasn’t just because she was good at her job. Drake was just as good at pushing away the real reasons why he wanted her around to the back of his mind while he focused on giving her a hard time with every step they took closer to the falls. It was something he wasn’t even going to admit to himself even if some part of him knew it. He could cover it up with the half veiled flirting and the annoyances that he was inflicting on her for the time being, but the problem with putting something like that on the back burner was that you forgot about it until the pot was boiling over and you’d lost control of it.

Maybe that was why when the two of them stopped at a clearing to take a breather and drink some water he couldn’t stop himself from getting closer and closer to her with each and every one of her snappy comebacks until his nose was only a few inches from hers. They were arguing by the time he’d realized what was going on.

“Listen here, Princess, if you think for one damned minute you’re anything that special just because you want some kind of a life back in that yuppie day care center that they call a city, then you’ve got another thing coming. I promise you that you wouldn’t make it a night out here on your own without me no matter how bad ass you seem to think you are. I’m damned surprised you didn’t show up out here in a pair of stiletto heels and try to skip your way up the mountain.”

By this point Celeste was up in his face, waving a finger around like she meant business.“I swear to god if you bring up those shoes one more time I’m going to kick you off this mountain, Drake. I had no way of knowing what I was walking into out there, and you can say whatever it is you like, but me being ignorant of how things work out here in the sticks doesn’t mean I can’t cut it. I’m smart and capable. I just need to figure things out for myself without some jackass like you trying to mansplain everything under the sun to me. I can manage to work a water bottle without instruction and maybe I can even walk more than five hundred feet without you telling me what the hell I’m doing wrong! I’m over this shit. And stop calling me princess you misogynist prick!”

She moved to throw her hands up in the air and turn away from him, but he wasn’t having it. He moved to put a hand on her shoulder because he wasn’t done arguing with her, and he wasn’t going to let her just turn away and walk off from this before he was done. The next thing he knew, her hands were knotting into his shirt and pulling his body into hers, crashing her lips against Drake’s with a hungry sound that escaped her at the same moment his lips met hers.

He had no idea what was going on, but his hands most certainly did. It was like his body and brain parted company in that moment. He was fully aware of what was going on, but there was no way he could stop any of it, even if he tried. He would have been a damned sight more effective at stopping a train by standing on the tracks and putting a hand out.

Instead of his body obeying his rational brain, his hands were busy wrapping themselves around her body and splaying his fingers across her back to pull her body even closer into his and deepen the kiss. He expected her to stop, pull away and land a sharp slap across his face for allowing this to happen, even though she’d been the one to initiate it, but she was going right along with all of it. He fingers had managed to wind their way into Drake’s hair, giving it a sharp tug that should have brought him back into his senses. The rush of adrenaline and endorphins that came along with the slight pain of the sharp pull just sent him even further into a spiral he wasn’t going to come out of.

Before he really registered what was going on, the two of them had dropped their packs at the side of the trail and somehow managed to wind up with Celeste pinned between Drake’s body and a tree at the edge of the path. His hands were all over her body, and he was absolutely lost in her. He knew he was attracted to her. He wasn’t blind, and she was admittedly gorgeous. She’d have fit right in back in Hollywood, but there was more to it than that. He wanted her, and he’d pushed that to the back of his mind and tried to forget it until it broke him. Right now, she was wrapped up in his arms, and it was the first time in this entire process that he’d been a hundred percent honest with himself about what he wanted.

He had no idea what was going on in her head. All he knew was that she was encouraging him with every step. Her fingers were working at the buttons on his pants at the same moment he was fumbling with hers. They were gone, and there was no coming back until this entire process was over.

He ripped the buttons off her blouse as he tore it open with a hungry growl. Her breasts heaved as she continued to grasp at his waistband. He wrapped his hand firmly around her neck and pulled her to his mouth again. This time he thrust his tongue into her mouth, massaging her tongue with his own. Her hands clutched his shirt as he trailed his lips down her exposed neck and on to her breasts. With one hand firmly clutching her neck he used the other to pull down the cups of her bra licking and nibbling her erect nibbles.

The part of Drake’s brain that was in control pushed his rational mind out of the way, and proceeded to move to wrap Celeste’s legs around his waist, not caring that the two of them were out in the open in the middle of nowhere stripping each other’s clothes off while god only knows what was going on in the woods around them. There could have been other hikers on the trail, bears, a mountain lion, hell a snake could have fallen out of the tree right on top of his head, and it wouldn’t have slowed him down even a little bit. This part of Drake’s brain had a singular purpose, and it was hell bent on claiming Celeste Teller.

“Just a minute sweetheart, we need to get you ready.” Drake pulled her off of him and proceeded to sleep his hand down the front of her jeans and into her wet panties. He eagerly stroked her slit before slipping a finger inside her. She moaned loudly as her knees buckled and she let her head fall against his chest. He continued to thrust his finger in and out of her before she began to frantically pull at his arm.

“I’m ready, please I need you inside me now.” She pulled her jeans and panties the rest of the way down her legs as he struggled to extract his thick cock from his jean before she climbed back up his body.

When he finally wrangled a condom out of his pocket and on to his rigid length and slid inside her, it was like coming home. It did little to soothe the blood that was raging through his veins and roaring his ears though. Mostly it just spurred him on into a more feverish state as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and used her legs to pull him deeper inside her as she let out a desperate moan against his ear.

He wouldn’t have pegged Celeste as the type of girl who enjoyed getting pinned against a tree in the middle of nowhere, but she was surprising him at every turn here. Every surprise was just fuel to the fire that the irrational part of his brain had set. By now, it was an absolute forest fire that he was only stoking with every forward surge of his hips into her body. He couldn’t keep his hands off of her, and she was hungrily matching every single motion of his as best she could until she was moaning his name so loudly that it echoed off the trees at the other side of the clearing and hit his ears again as she fell apart wrapped around him. It was more than he could take as he slammed deep inside her one last time and tightened his grip on her hips enough that he was afraid he was going to leave marks behind where his fingers had dug into her fair skin.

Even when the two of them started to catch their breaths and untangle themselves from around each other, he was still not fully in control of his faculties. He certainly wasn’t able to do much more of the teasing that had driven the two of them this far up the hill. He wasn’t even sure what he should say to her. It hit him like a freight train that maybe both of them had been foolish, but that Celeste was going to regret every minute of what had just happened, even if he couldn’t bring himself to apologize for it or even feel bad out it. He just hated the thought that she was going to do that to herself.

He turned to her with a plastered on smile, trying to reassure himself that the two of them hadn’t screwed up any chance they had at having a good working relationship just now and trying to make sure that she didn’t feel like a fool. But he really had no idea how to do that or what he should say to make sure she didn’t hate him or hate herself for what had happened between the two of them, so he fell back on what he did know.

“Come on, Celeste. We’ve got another mile to go before we get to the falls and the sun is sinking. I wouldn’t want to be out here hiking after dark.” It wasn’t entirely true. They were going to make it to the falls well before sunset, even with their little detour, but Drake didn’t know what else to do besides direct them both back to the reason they were out here in the first place and hope he wasn’t screwing everything up.