Chapter 12Goldie

Chapter 12

Goldie

T his man is fascinating. This man and all of his brothers are fascinating, and I'm gripped with a mad curiosity. I have to know everything there is to know about Lynx Bj?rnsson and his brothers.

Not that this is going to keep me from doing what I came to the mountain to do. I will find the Sasquatch that saved me. I will make my documentary. I will fulfill my life's destiny.

Out of all the things humans are tasked with keeping in order, a tidy list of priorities is perhaps the most crucial. Someone named Van Von Vaughn said that. But they also supposedly said, You must never become so singularly focused on the peak of the mountain, you neglect to pay homage to the mountain itself.

So…a little detour never hurt anyone, right?

I mean, I'm on a literal mountain. How better to pay homage to it than by getting to know these men who call it home?

Besides, I'm building up such a rapport with Lynx and the conversation is going swimmingly. There's a genuine connection! The back-and-forth feels natural and I'm getting him to open up to me.

Then all of a sudden, something shifts and he goes quiet.

"Probably need to concentrate," he says, ducking his head, and that's that. He focuses on fishing, catching one, then two, then three brown and gray spotted, slimy fish in quick succession, without any fanfare.

I do a mental rewind through our conversation, trying to pinpoint what I said to shut him down.

We were talking about love. Yipes. I told him I don't like messiness. Did he think I was talking about the way he and his brothers live? He's probably so insulted. But I wasn't. At all. Yeah, it's atrocious, but most messes can be cleaned up and all is well. Messes created by hearts are a whole different story.

I wonder about what college Lynx went to and why he didn't see it through. He was accepted to his top choice, he said. But he didn't even finish the first week. Could it have been a matter of him simply being homesick?

No, there's more to it than that. There's got to be.

He reels in, casts the line again, but he barely gives me a glance. A muscle works in his jaw.

"Lynx, if I said something that upset you—"

"You didn't," he says. I don't think he's telling the truth, but his tone of voice doesn't give me much to go on. It's matter-of-fact. But as soon as the words are out, his jaw is clenched, working.

I have to get us back on track and I don't know how, other than to get physically close to him again.

I walk over to the spare pole, careful not to put all my weight down on my bad foot, and grab it.

"Can you show me how to hold it again?" I ask coquettishly, batting my eyelashes. If all else fails, it doesn't hurt to flirt. —my mother. "I don't have it all figured out just yet."

"I'd be happy to show you how to hold it," a voice rumbles, and I glance back to see Nash ambling toward us. There's as much innuendo in his words as there was in mine, if not more.

I swear Lynx growls. Unless there's a bear hiding behind a nearby tree. I hope it isn't a bear, for multiple reasons, including 1) I don't want to be mauled by a bear and 2) I think that growl made me ovulate. So I hope the sound was made by a human.

The next thing I know, I'm enveloped in Nash's arms. His body, even larger than Lynx's, floods every one of my senses, eclipsing everything else, while his great big hands maneuver mine, arranging and rearranging my fingers 'til he says, "There you go. Now what you do is—"

"Goodness gracious, you smell like a man," I blurt.

His laugh rolls through my back like the briefest massage, sending shivers down my spine.

"Is that a bad thing?" he asks.

No. No, it is not. I mean, it's a bad thing in that it makes me want to turn around and climb him like he's a damn tree and bury my face in his neck and sniff him like a creeper, inhaling the delicious scent of him 'til my nostrils hurt. But the smell itself? Not a bad thing at all.

Rusty and Buck smelled the same way, kind of. Different, but still, they each smelled like a fucking man.

That's it. That's what it is.

I realize he doesn't smell like cologne or aftershave or products, the scents we're told men should smell like.

"You're doing it all wrong," Lynx says. Then he growls again. This time I'm sure it was him.

Wait. Let's forget Sasquatches for a minute. All this growling! All this hairiness! Is it possible I stumbled upon real-fucking-life werewolf shifters?

And…why am I not turned off by that?

"Move," Lynx barks at Nash, and Nash releases me, stepping back. But he, too, makes a guttural noise that rises from somewhere deep in his belly up to his throat.

Damn, boys, there's enough of me to go around , I think giddily. Some Goldie for Nash, some Goldie for Lynx, some Goldie left over for…oh my God.

The combination of the mountain air and the altitude and the manly, manly masculine pheromones are going to be the death of me. Or at least the death of my virginity.

I shake my head. It may be on life support when I leave, but I am leaving this mountain with my virginity.

Lynx wraps his arm around me, his biceps boulders. "You need to be careful," he tells me. "There's a dangerous hook at the end of that line. And you don't want it to wind up swinging back on you."

"No, I definitely don't want to get caught," I say with a giggle, and what the fuck, I have a case of heaving bosoms, but Lynx smells like a man too. And something about the protective side of him…well. I might just growl soon myself.

"This is serious," he says. He extracts the rod from my hands and leans it against a tree. "You could really hurt yourself."

He spins me around so my bosoms are heaving against his chest. Pointing at the edge of his bushy eyebrow, he says, "Do you see this scar? This scar is a result of Ranger being careless. Half an inch over and I would've had a fishing hook embedded in my eyeball and probably would be staring at you out of my one eye right now."

He leans down, down, down so his face is close to mine, and he scrunches one eye closed to make his point, and he looks so dang cute. Despite the bigness and the burliness and the beardiness. I really don't know what comes over me except he's right there, and I wrap my arms around his neck so that when he returns to his full height, my feet come off the ground.

Dangling in the air, Lynx wearing me like a necklace, I press my lips to…his beard.

He turned his head and I kissed his beard. So much beard.

"What are you doing?" he asks. But he doesn't put me down. His golden-green eyes are imploring.

I'm shaky. Like, my insides are shaky. And I feel weak-kneed. And you could probably fry bacon in my panties, that's all I'm saying.

"I don't know," I admit, because what the hell am I doing. I'm not impulsive! I don't know how to be impulsive. And yet…

"I thought you didn't like messy," he says.

I shake my head.

"I don't." My voice is raw and throaty and I have no idea what I'm doing or what's happening here, but all the blood in my body is zooming to my clit. "I just…I just wanted to kiss you."

"If he doesn't want to kiss you, I will, ma'am," Nash says.

"Oh my goodness. You guys have got to stop calling me ma'am."

"What would you prefer we call you?" Lynx asks.

I'm about to say that I liked it when Lynx called me Sunshine, but…

"I don't know," I say. I swallow hard. "Actually…" I pause. I inhale, then exhale. "Actually. I don't want you to call me anything right now. I just want you to shut up and kiss me."

Lynx hesitates. Then he gently puts me down.

He shakes his head.

"No you don't," he says.

I'm about to argue. Oh, yes I do. I really really really do. Put your big old hand down my panties and see how very much I do! This girl is wet for you, Mountain Man! Wet and sizzling.

But his eyes are so sad.

"And I don't want a pity kiss," he says.

I look up at him and frantically shake my head. "It's—"

"I'll take a pity kiss," Nash says. "And don't you dare judge me, Lynx. You can live like a fucking monk if you want to, but I never took a vow of celibacy."

"You took a vow of celibacy?" I ask Lynx. I glance back—and up—at Nash. "But—"

Oh my God. Is that why all these brothers live up on this mountain, isolated, together? Because they've taken vows of celibacy? Have they built their whole lives around avoiding the temptation to give in to their carnal needs? Is that why Luke is so against me being here? He's terrified my feminine wiles will break him?

My God, they grow more and more fascinating with every second that ticks by!

But no, if that's the case, the exchange between Lynx and Luke in the kitchen, about whether or not I'd let one of them fuck me, that would make no sense.

"No, I didn't take a vow of celibacy," Lynx says. Is that annoyance in his tone? "But I'm not the kind of man a gal like you wants to kiss and we both know that. Luke was right about that much."

"Oh, yeah?" I draw myself up to my full height. "Put your hand in my panties and find out how wrong you and Grumpy Luke are, Lynx Bj?rnsson. I dare you."

My hands are on my hips and there's a stare so intense and challenging in my eyes it's giving me a little bit of a headache.

Wait…what?!

His big juicy lips, nestled in all that beard, snarl. But in a sexy way. He turns and walks a few steps away, leaning the fishing pole against a tree.

"If he doesn't want to take you up on that, I will," Nash says from behind me.

My head is spinning, whirling between Oh my God, I want one of these men touching me, one of their massive fingers inside me, now and Wait, wait, wait!

Lynx has made his way back to me. "Well, unbutton your pants."

I gulp. I feel panicked and I know he can see it in my eyes. He nods.

"Didn't think I'd call your bluff, did you, ma'am ?"

He wouldn't believe me even if I told him. Would he?

"You don't want Luke to be right, but he is." There's a finality in Lynx's nod I don't like at all.

"He's not," I insist. "The truth is…"

The truth is, other than some unfortunate fumblings with a high school boyfriend who handled my girlparts like they were a slippery football, no one's ever touched me there. And that was so long ago, it doesn't even count, right?

"The truth is…"

I'm not impulsive. I'm just not.

"The truth is…"

Despite the fact that I am not impulsive, now I kind of just want to throw caution to the wind, embrace the moment, and embrace one or both of these Bj?rnsson brothers…in a naked way. Right here. Right now.

I deeply wish I was the kind of woman who could do that.

But I deeply know that I am not.

Yet, there's no harm in fooling around. It's not like I'm actually going to have a threesome with Lynx and Nash right here and right now. Obviously, I wouldn't let it go that far, but…

Holding Lynx's gaze, I unbutton and unzip my pants.

"Nash," I whisper. "Come here."

When he's standing right behind me, his body brushing mine, I reach around and grab his arm.

"Do you want to touch me, Nash?"

Who am I? Did I leave the real Rose-Gold Amber Locke in my car?

"Yes, ma'a—uh, yes, Goldie."

With my comparatively small hand, I guide his massive hand—oh fuck, one of his fingers is big as a cock—in between my belly and the fabric of my panties. He takes it from there, dipping one of those giant fingers in between my folds.

"Do you think you guys turn me on, Nash? Do you think I genuinely want to kiss Lynx? And you?"

Okay, when I smashed into Luke's knee, I was knocked unconscious, and I'm still unconscious, and dreaming. This has got to be a dream. I'm in a coma and this is a dream.

Please don't let me wake up now.

The tip of Nash's finger teases my opening. "You're damn near wet as the river, Rose-Gold Locke."

A heat appears in Lynx's eyes that makes my belly turn over. One step closes the gap between us.

"Are you actually attracted to me, Sunshine? Are you wet for me?" he asks, his voice quizzical, and there's a little bit of awe in there too.

I nod, speechless.

"How is that possible," he whispers, but before I can answer—even if I had an answer, which I don't—Nash has withdrawn his hand, causing me to whimper. Lynx picks me up. His hands grip my hips. I hold on to him with my arms and legs.

It may not be perfect, but damn if something doesn't feel so right about it as his mouth crashes into mine. I part my lips, suddenly feverish and desperate for the feel of his tongue tangling with mine. He doesn't make me wait, but he's as playful as he is passionate, teasing and taunting, and tasting like maple syrup and cinnamon. Someone taught this man to kiss.

But who?

I push my curiosity away, surrendering to the near-feral part of me these mountain men have awoken, or discovered.

His beard is coarse against my skin but I don't care. I press my body against his, wiggling to get closer even though that's not possible. He holds me tighter against him. My nails rake down his back as he growls low in his throat, sending shivers down my spine.

"Y'all want some privacy?" Nash's voice is uncertain.

It pains me to break the kiss, to pull my mouth away from Lynx's, but I do.

"Lynx," I whisper, remembering what he said earlier, about how if I'd been romantic with Buck, he didn't want to step on his brother's toes. "Will it be stepping on your toes if I want Nash to stay? If I want to, um, get romantic with both of you?"

"Not if that's what you want, darlin'." Lynx's voice is husky, raw with desire.

My hands have gotten tangled in his jet-black hair and I free one, reaching back, beckoning for Nash.

I want him too. I want one of those big fingers back inside me. Now.

His hands are almost immediately roaming my ass. His lips trail hot kisses down the side of my neck while I return my own lips to Lynx's with tenderness that immediately succumbs to the ferocious passion I'm feeling.

My nipples are such tight buds, my breasts ache and the desire pooling between my thighs is unreal. Sandwiched between two men, both of their mouths exploring my skin…it's sensation overload and yet, it's not enough.

What the hell am I doing?

"What the hell are you doing?"

At first, I think I thought it out loud, but nope, that was a man's voice. A grumpy man's voice.