She threw Declan a quick glance over her shoulder as she started unbuttoning her uniform top. “You think you have a dry T-shirt in your pack I can wear while my stuff dries out? The extra ones I have are wet.”
He looked confused for a second, and she wondered if maybe she wasn’t the only one affected by the cold.
“Um, yeah. I think I have one left I haven’t worn.” He propped his weapon against the cave wall and dug through it. “Hold on a second.”
The idea of getting out of her wet clothes and into something dry was too enticing to resist, so she yanked off her uniform top and immediately started in on her boots. If it meant getting warm and dry, she was willing to strip naked in front of the big bear shifter. But the stupid laces were all knotted up and her soggy, cold fingers couldn’t seem to get them loose.
“I told you to hold on a second,” Declan scolded. “Here, let me get those. Your hands are shaking too much to do it. Hold this.”
He gave her a T-shirt—oh God, it was completely dry—then sat down in front of her. She felt silly sitting there with her wet boots in his lap, but Declan got the laces undone much faster than she would have been able to. He had her boots and socks off in seconds instead of minutes.
While Declan spread out a poncho for them to sit on, Kendra turned her back and shucked her wet T-shirt. She pulled Declan’s on and almost laughed when it fell all the way to her knees. She imagined she looked a little goofy, but who cared? She was warmer already.
It took a bit of work to get her pants off, but thankfully Declan didn’t ask if she needed help with those. That would have been too embarrassing.
She arranged all her wet clothes on the rocks littering the cave floor, then went back to dig a pair of her panties out of Declan’s pack. It wasn’t too hard to work those on under his big T-shirt, and a few minutes later, she was seated comfortably on Declan’s poncho.
“You think we’re safe here for a while?” she asked.
“Yeah, I don’t think there’s any way for the hybrids to track us through the stream, and I doubt they’re going to stumble on this cave.”
Declan had pulled off his T-shirt, pants, and boots, and was sitting across from her in nothing but his boxer briefs, facing the cave entrance. His crossed-legged position gave her a nice view of rippling abs, defined pecs, and bulging thighs. And speaking of bulging, those tight underwear looked like they were hiding a serious bulge of their own. She’d never seen this much of him before and he looked good—really good.
Kendra tried not to stare at all that nakedness, but he caught her. “You don’t mind, do you? My stuff is soaked, too, and the T-shirt you have on is the last dry thing I had in my bag. I can put my clothes back on if it bothers you.”
She shook her head, forcing herself to focus on anything other than all that exposed skin. “No problem. You’re fine.”
Yeah, you’re fine all right.
She pulled her knees up to her chest and tugged the bottom of the shirt down to her ankles. The thing was so big on her it was like wearing a bathrobe. “Sorry to steal your last dry shirt.”
He chuckled. “Don’t be. It looks better on you than it does on me.”
And you look better without it. But she kept that to herself.
As they settled into a comfortable silence, Kendra wanted to laugh. Here she was, sitting half-naked in a cave while a gorgeous, equally naked guy sat only a few feet away. This would have been a sexy scenario if it wasn’t for two simple facts: one, Declan wasn’t interested in her, and two, there were dozens of hybrids out there right now who would love to come charging in here and tear them apart. It was difficult to focus too much on sexy thoughts with things like that hanging over her head.
Chapter 8
She pulled out her ponytail holder and ran her fingers through her hair, shaking it out around her shoulders. “How far do you think we got today?”
Declan snorted. “With the early start, I thought we’d get at least ten miles in, but we barely made five. Worse, we’ve been driven way off course,