Michael (Wild Men #8)

Chapter 21

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Michael

“Where are you taking me?” Emery laughs and tries to pull off her blindfold.

“Not yet.” I pat her leg with my free hand, keeping the other on the wheel of the truck. “We’re almost there. You’ll like it, I promise.”

Three more turns and we’re there.

My cousins are always around, and I love it. But tonight, I felt the need to have Emery all to myself.

So, I talked to the owner of Wild Ranch—otherwise known as Luke—and pulled a favor.

I just hope Emery likes it as much as I want her to.

I park the truck, hop out, and go around to open Emery’s door. I help her out of the truck, and she holds onto my arm while I guide her forward.

“Okay.” I stop. “You can take off the blindfold.”

Emery’s beautiful eyes widen as she spins around.

We’re standing just outside a remote fishing cabin with a lake off to one side and a meadow on the other with tall pines encircling it. The smell of pines and wildflowers and mountain air is intoxicating.

“Is this still Wild Ranch?”

“Yep. It’s a remote cabin that Luke never rents out. Honestly, I can’t believe he let me come up here. He usually keeps this place just for himself when he needs to get away.”

“It was certainly kind of him.”

I grab our bags out of the truck bed and follow Emery to the cabin.

I don’t know what to expect when I unlock the door, but I’m pleasantly surprised to see a kitchen, bathroom, plus a bed with a sofa against the opposite wall in the main room.

“This is adorable.” Emery steps inside and wanders around the small space. “It’s like we’re tucked away in the middle of nature but with modern appliances.”

I gesture to the fly fishing equipment in the corner. “You wanna fish?”

“I don’t have waders. You need waders for fly fishing.”

I beckon to her, and she follows me to the closet by the bathroom.

“Luke said he left a couple in the closet.”

I open the door and…success.

“Hopefully these will fit you,” I say as I pull out the smaller size and hold it up to Emery. “Luke said his parents fly fish, so he hoped his mom’s waders would fit.”

Emery digs her teeth into her bottom lip adorably.

“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” I don’t think I’ve ever seen her truly nervous. “I can teach you how to fish.”

“I don’t think you know what you’re getting yourself into.” She stops biting her lip and laughs. “I’m good at plenty of things. Tennis? Check. Bowling? Check. But fishing? My dad tried to teach me several times. I can honestly say it is something I genuinely suck at. Even my dad agreed. And that’s saying something because he usually at least tries to be supportive of his only child.”

I break into a laugh. “Come on. Let’s try. If it doesn’t work, we’ll have a picnic lunch instead.”

“That sounds more like my speed, but I’m game to try.”

“That’s my girl.”

Shit . The phrase just popped out of my mouth. My girl.

Emery’s eyes flash with what I assume is surprise, but she smooths her expression over with a friendly smile. A casual smile. Just like we’d promised we’d do.

I turn away and go about putting on my waders.

But my mind is a mess.

Because there I went word vomiting again.

I can’t seem to stop saying shit out loud whenever Emery’s around. Whether I’m talking about my dad or how I feel about Emery, my normally locked-down mouth has had a mind of its own since I met her.

We dress, gather the fishing poles and bait along with a picnic blanket and basket filled with lunch courtesy of Wild Ranch, and head for the lake.

An hour later, I have a sense of what Emery’s dad might have felt when he tried to teach his daughter how to fly fish.

She can’t do it.

I don’t know why.

She’s coordinated, athletic, smart, and she knows exactly what she’s supposed to do. The issue is that her body and brain don’t seem to want to cooperate with the fishing pole. Or with her waders, which she struggles in like they’re a strait jacket rather than protecting her from the elements.

When she finally flings her fishing rod onto the bank in frustration, I fall back onto the grass and laugh my ass off.

She joins me on the bank with a hefty sigh. “See what I mean now?”

I wrap my arm around her shoulders. “I kind of do. It almost seems impossible you’d struggle this much at anything.”

“You’re sweet. But I fear we’ve found a point of contention. It’s only been a few days, but you now know the truth—I am terrible at what you do for a living.”

“Babe, I don’t fly fish.”

“I know that, of course, but fly fishing would fall underneath the category of fishing, and so would being a fisherman with a boat in the Atlantic.”

“I guess so, but they’re really very different from one another.”

“Could you do fly fishing competitions? You’re really good.”

“Thanks. I guess if I stayed in Montana for stretches of time, I could. It’s relaxing.”

“For you, it’s relaxing. For me, it’s high anxiety.” Emery leans her head against my chest.

A few seconds later, she sits back up and curses as she fiddles with her hair.

“Michael?”

I turn toward her. “Yeah?”

“The buckle on my waders is stuck in my hair. Can you help?”

“Sure.” As I work on extracting her hair from the buckle, her scent engulfs me.

Vanilla and floral mixed with danger.

Our pact of no strings was supposed to help me make sure I played it safe.

But every moment I spend with Emery makes it clear that she is the opposite of safe.

She feels like the biggest risk I could take.

And despite my mind warning me over and over to back off…

I can’t .

I want her.

I like her.

And the more time we spend together, the more I worry I could actually feel the most dangerous emotion of all.

Need .