LOST WITH YOU - Lisa Ann Verge Page 0,13

He followed her slim back with his gaze as she headed to the kitchen. “Get some rest, Casey.”

You’ll need it.

He doubted he’d sleep a wink.

CHAPTER FIVE

Dress this brawny historian in buckskins, and you might mistake him for a character from The Last of the Mohicans…

Casey cut off the mental narrative as she jogged down the country road. Did anyone read James Fenimore Cooper anymore? Probably not. She’d have to dream up another opening line. She’d lost count of how many she’d attempted since she’d closed herself into the bedroom last night. But every time she ventured to describe Dylan MacCabe, she hit a mental wall—or slid into torrid fantasy.

She dragged in a deep breath so she wouldn’t pass out on the last lap of her run on the country trail. Jillian, her therapist, had warned her that her body would eventually come back to singing life. You still have a beating heart, Jillian had insisted. You still have a woman’s needs. Her therapist had been referring to sex, but Casey had crossed that barrier with a minimum of emotional upheaval. She could handle a night’s pleasures. But on a three-week camping trip with Dylan, she couldn’t just slide out of the sleeping bag and make a discreet exit.

She grunted and focused on the ground flying beneath her feet and then on the rush of air in and out of her lungs. This wasn’t the time to second-guess the decision to join the expedition, or churn herself into a frenzy with doubts. She caught sight of the graveled driveway ahead and turned up the path with new determination. She’d committed to this venture. Today, they were launching, and she would be in that canoe.

She was halfway to the front door when she slammed into a man’s solid chest.

“Whoa, Casey!”

She bounced back. Two strong hands clamped around her arms, stilling her recoil. Suddenly, she was inches from the solid chest she’d just been thinking about, as if Dylan had rolled out of the steamy bedroom of her imagination.

“Hey,” she said, stumbling back, seeking balance as an excuse not to look at him. “Am I running late?”

“You were running, all right.” He smelled of shower soap. His worn-to-softness tank showed off the naked bulges of his deltoids. “Hard and fast.”

“I figured I’d do a few miles while you were showering.” She darted around him to step onto the porch. “I’ll shower quickly and be ready to go—”

“Take your time,” he called over his shoulder. “It’s the last hot shower you’ll get for a while.”

She ducked into the house and rushed through the shower anyway, because the shower smelled like his soap, and it was unsettling to be cocooned in the mist that still held that scent. Within twenty minutes, she was outside, carrying the backpack he’d lent her, packed tight with only the stuff she would need. She flung it in the back of the Jeep as he checked the bungee cords that held down the birch bark canoe. He was all business. He didn’t even glance at her cutoff shorts, the loose tank, the peek of the yellow bathing suit, as he locked up the cabin and fired up the Jeep.

Not long later, Dylan drove into the area where they’d launched the aluminum canoe yesterday. A small crowd stood by the riverbank.

Dylan grunted. “Looks like we’ve got a bon voyage party.”

A few members of the crowd turned at the sound of the Jeep’s tires biting the gravel. They moved as a group to meet them where Dylan parked, close to the water.

She said, “Friends of yours?”

“Mostly family.” He shoved the door open and shot her a wary look. “Did I mention I have seven siblings?”

“Seven?!”

“Brace yourself, Casey. You’re about to meet the MacCabe clan.”

The crowd rushed the Jeep, shouting greetings. Children of stair-step ages swarmed. Teenagers hung back, absorbed in their phones. A group of adults, some clutching cups of coffee, sauntered over, while several folks lagged behind with an elderly man in a wheelchair. One broad-shouldered bull separated and surged toward Dylan, catching him around the torso. The attacker heaved Dylan up onto the hood of the Jeep. Dylan shoved him off, and by the time Casey rounded to the driver’s side to see what was going on, the two of them were wrestling like mountain goats. The kids shouted and giggled, but the rest of the clan formed a circle around the pair as if this was all in good fun.

Casey sensed curious attention as she joined the crowd. The