Storm in the Rockies

  Storm in the Rockies

  By

  Sable Grey

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  STORM IN THE ROCKIES

  Copyright (c) 2005 by Sable Grey

  Cover art and design (c) 2005 by Sable Grey

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form without permission, except as provided by the U.S. Copyright Law. Printed and bound in the United States of America.

  For information, you can find us on the web at

  www.VenusPress.com

  * * *

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  * * *

  Chapter One

  January 14, 2005

  Boulder, Colorado

  “Wait!”

  Rex Reynolds was just about to head home, when a woman’s voice caused him to turn. Tall, slim, with curves that bounced with every step, Rex’s body hardened with lust as he recognized the woman running across the small runway towards him. Cee Leigh Farrah. She was a renowned romance author from Denver but had a cabin she escaped to in the mountains each summer. Rex always looked forward to flying her up and then driving her from his place to hers. What a pleasant surprise to see her lugging that old suitcase towards him in January rather than five months later in June.

  Jogging out towards her, Rex fought the urge to laugh when the heel of her pump rolled over and she stumbled, the loose blonde bun on the top of her head slipping farther down. As she steadied herself, and Rex neared, her cheeks colored slightly.

  “Let me help you with that.” Rex reached down at her side and grasped the worn handle of the suitcase. “You just caught me. Five minutes more and you would have been stranded.” As he straightened, he caught a whiff of her familiar lilac perfume.

  It was silly for him to react to her the way he did. Ten flights, twice a year, and it would seem he’d be used to it and over his infatuation with her. Besides, he chided himself, he was thirty-four years old–too old for a crush.

  “Thank God that didn’t happen.” Her soft, feminine voice brought his gaze to her oval face. Large hazel eyes, smiling full lips that pulled back just enough for her small even teeth to show. Rex suppressed a groan. It didn’t help that he had read every book she’d ever written after he’d first met her, fascinated with the steamy love scenes she involved her characters in.

  “There’s a storm blowing in from the west, but we should be able to at least make it to my cabin in time.” Rex told her as he led her towards his small bush plane. He couldn’t help hoping that the weather would stall the thirty minute drive to her cabin.

  “I hadn’t considered the weather this time of year,” she admitted as he tucked her suitcase into the storage compartment of the plane.

  “No problem. I’ve plenty of room for you to bunk down for the night, if you need to.” He opened the door and held out his hand, praying he didn’t sound too hopeful. Her slim fingers slid against his palm and she climbed into the plane.

  * * *

  Cee Leigh gazed out the window once they were high above Boulder and well on their way. She enjoyed the short flights into the mountains. The view was always impressive. Today a slight white haze filled the air, promising snow within a couple of hours.

  She stole a glance at the pilot. Rex Reynolds was the sexiest man she’d ever laid eyes on. He had thick brown-black hair and a strong jaw, high cheekbones, and defined lips that were an appealing collage on his square face. However, it was his intense blue eyes that attracted most of the attention, peering out thoughtfully from beneath his thick black brow. What a hunk.

  She tore her eyes back to the mountain peaks that rose up above the low clouds. She’d thought the same thing when she first laid eyes on him five years before. He always dressed the same–fitted tee shirt that complimented his lean, but firm torso and jeans that fit snuggly around his ass and wrinkled around the tops of his tan hiking boots. A far cry from the picture of him she had hanging in her office at her loft apartment in Denver.

  It was so like her sister to send a calendar of men – not just any men – 2005 Sexiest Bachelor Calendar. It was her sister’s way of bluntly telling Cee Leigh she needed to get laid. But the fire that found her when she flipped to the first month of the year was nothing compared to her sister’s idea of a little heated rendezvous. There he’d been. Mr. January. Rex Reynolds. Leaning against his plane.

  Cee Leigh couldn’t count the times she’d looked at his picture. Strong arms folded over the small triangle of hair that dipped into a thin line down his stomach and into the band of a pair of blue boxers. Good God, just thinking about it now, made her sex tingle with yearning.

  “I read your book.” His deep voice interrupted her thoughts.

  She blinked back to reality. “A romance fan?” she asked, surprised that a man would admit to reading a romance novel.

  “Maybe.” He smiled, glancing at her, lines creasing around his mouth. Her heart quickened. “I’ve read a few anyway.”

  “I don’t get much feedback from male readers. What did you think?” Cee Leigh’s gaze dropped to his lap, and then she looked away from him. She prayed he hadn’t just seen her do that!

  “Hero seemed a little stiff. Heroine was hot.” He grinned when she looked at him. “I’m a guy. I read it for the sex.” He shrugged and Cee Leigh felt her cheeks warm. Why should she be embarrassed? She wrote great love scenes. It was one of the reasons that her books were such a great success.

  “I think a lot of the women do too,” she forced herself to answer.

  He chuckled. “Well, you give it to them.” He reached up to adjust one of the gauges. “I only read your books because you were the only celebrity type I’d ever met. Once I read the first one though, I was hooked.”

  Cee Leigh didn’t answer as he reached for the CB radio and spoke into it, asking about the weather. All clear was the response. She tried to imagine him without his shirt now and felt her nipples harden and press against her blouse. Quickly she crossed her arms.

  “It’s kind of early in the year to see you up this way.” He spoke without looking at her. “Working on a new book?”

  “Not really, though my editor would be happy if I took advantage of the time I spend here to come up with something,” she offered, wondering if she should elaborate on exactly why she was making the early trip. He was her closest neighbor in the mountains. It might be a good idea to let him in on what was going on.

  She took a deep breath. “I…I have a stalker.”

  Rex looked at her.

  “For a couple of years now, actually,” she continued. “It started with letters that seemed to be from an overly dedicated fan. But…a month ago…” she took another breath and tried to steady her hands as they began to shake. “A month ago he broke into my home, masturbated on my bed, and left a fan letter in my bathroom.”

  Rex’s face twisted with disgust. “You know who it is?”

  “No. He’s always just signed his letters as ‘Yours’. Nothing more. Most of the letters were sent through my website from different email addresses so they couldn�
��t be traced. The few written letters I’ve received were just in the last two months, and they were placed in my mailbox by…him. I alerted the police, but there was really nothing they could do about it until…well, until he’d been in my home.”

  “You live alone?” Rex looked surprised when she nodded. “Thought you were married.” His gaze dropped to the ring on her finger and she smiled.

  “My safety net,” she dropped her attention to her hands. “You write steamy sex scenes and you get all kinds asking you out. Wear a ring and it makes it easier to decline.”

  “Ah.” For a moment Rex looked guilty. “You don’t think he’ll find you up here?”

  “The only people who know about the cabin is my sister and my editor…well, and you,” she answered.

  “You aren’t afraid I might try to stalk you while you’re here?” He cut his eyes to her, causing her to laugh.

  “I doubt Mr. January would get many customers if he started stalking women.” She couldn’t help it. It was out before she could stop herself.

  Rex groaned, a low sound that sent shivers over every inch of Cee Leigh’s body. “You’ve seen that?” He made a face. “I thought it would help the business. It has but not as I’d hoped. If you pose for a calendar you get all kinds too.”

  She giggled. “I would imagine you weren’t trying to attract male thrill seekers when you posed in nothing but your underwear.” He grinned mischievously at her.

  “Welllll, maybe I was hoping for a few females to fly around the mountains with,” he admitted. “I certainly wasn’t looking for three proposals, two of which were from men.”

  Cee Leigh laughed out loud before thinking, but his grin remained in place. “I’m happy you find it amusing. I didn’t. That’s a lie. One of em wore a dress. He was kind of cute. But he retracted his proposal when he found out I wasn’t gay.” Cee Leigh laughed again.

  “I’m surprised the police would let you come up here by yourself,” he said after silence settled between them.

  “They didn’t. I ran away,” she admitted guiltily. “It was just too much for me. I was afraid and needed to feel normal again. And I’ve always felt safe at the cabin. I told my sister where I was in case the detectives thought I’d been kidnapped or something, but I just didn’t want to stay there another night. I’d planned on calling once I got here and letting them know myself.”

  “Good plan.” Rex nodded. “Hopefully the weather will hold out long enough for you to make the call.”

  “I can call tomorrow…if I’m staying at your cabin tonight.” Cee Leigh wouldn’t look at him, too afraid he would see the wild thoughts that filled her mind even as she said the words. Rex in boxers, stepping out of the darkness into the light of the moon was too much to ignore completely. Thankfully, she’d packed her vibrator and enough AA batteries that she wouldn’t have to ignore her imagination for too long.

  Normally, she wouldn’t dare stay with a man she didn’t know very well but with a stalker behind her and the second calendar she bought before she left Denver in her suitcase, she was going to see what happened with Rex the pilot. After all, she’d created the hero in her last book around what she did know of him. But, he’d said the hero was stiff. Of course he was. Her character, Robert, would never have posed nearly nude for a calendar. She hadn’t seen that bit of devilment in Rex over the years. Now, she wondered how much devil could be found behind the pilot’s cool exterior.

  “You said my hero was too stiff. How do you mean?” she asked tentatively.

  “I offended you. I’m sorry.” Rex reached over and touched her knee. “I didn’t mean to do that. Hell, I’m a science fiction guy anyway. What do I know about heroes?”

  His touch sent fire from her knee up her thigh.

  “No. I’m not offended at all. Just curious,” she told him quickly. “I…throw a man in a pair of boxers and give him a plane and women are satisfied. But now that I know I have men reading the books, I’d like to get it right.”

  He looked at her. No. He was staring. Had that been too brazen? Her sister was the one who knew how to flirt with men, to sleep with them. Cee Leigh could only write about it.

  His hand left her leg. Oh God! She’d been too forward. She wouldn’t blame him if he handed her a parachute pack now and pushed her out over her cabin. The plane suddenly dipped and without thinking Cee Leigh grasped his shoulder.

  “Just a bit of wind,” he said calmly. She nodded, releasing him, but grabbed him again when the plane took another dip. “I’ve flown in worse. This is nothing. I promise,” he looked right into her eyes and smiled, “I won’t let you die today.” She laughed nervously and let her hand fall back to her lap.

  “He was too hesitant.” Rex spoke again after a moment.

  “What?”

  “Robert…from your book. Once he had her in his bed, he was too hesitant. It made him seem stiff.”

  Cee Leigh tilted her head. “He was just trying to make sure she wanted him as much as he wanted her.”

  Rex grunted. “She wasn’t a virgin. She’d come to his bed, not the other way round. Why would he need to make so certain?” He glanced at her. “Men don’t think like that.”

  “If she didn’t want him, he would have been raping her.”

  “That’s where women get men wrong. It’s because of assholes. Men know when a woman wants sex and doesn’t want sex. Assholes make it seem like they don’t, hoping a woman will give in to him. Robert is a cop. He reads people for a living. He’d have known long before the bedroom if the woman wanted him or not.”

  “Not all men know when a woman wants them,” Cee Leigh argued, but her breath caught when he looked at her again.

  “Yes they do. All it takes is one look.” He didn’t release her gaze, as if wanting her to see that he knew she wanted him. She swallowed. Before she was made to answer, he looked away. “Plus, I thought Robert needed a hobby. It would have made him seem a bit more human.”

  “I didn’t think of that.” Cee Leigh breathed out, thankful he’d changed the subject. Those intense eyes had bore their meaning right into her. If she could get to her vibrator right now, she was certain she would get herself off right in front of him. “Do you have any hobbies?”

  “A few.”

  She smiled. “You aren’t going to tell me?”

  He grinned without looking at her. “You gonna write a book about me?”

  She almost laughed. “Maybe.”

  “What’s the title?”

  “A Fire in January.” She couldn’t help the little chuckle that bubbled up her throat and he grinned, exaggerating a groan.

  “Forget it.”

  “Forgotten,” she agreed, looking out at the small runway when the plane glided downward. She noticed that a few snowflakes had started to fall. “Just in time.”

  “Seems like it.” Rex nodded.

  Cee Leigh said nothing else as he landed, trying to calm the beating of her heart. She would be staying in his cabin tonight. And he knew that she was hot for him. Would he come to her or wait for her to come to him, as Robert had waited for his woman?

  She imagined him on a bed of red satin, waiting for her to pull off his boxers. Maybe he would even grin as he had minutes before. Her body temperature rose. Would his intense gaze wash over her? Would he ask her to climb on top of him?

  “We’re here.” His voice interrupted her fantasy, causing her to look up. They’d landed, the engine was dying. She’d lost herself so far into the image of him on the bed that she hadn’t even noticed. She waited until he climbed out of the plane before taking a deep breath and following.

  He reached up before she could step down and lifted her to the ground, his strong hands leaving her giddy with lust. “Safely on the ground, in one piece.” He winked before he released her and turned to pull out her suitcase. She followed when he headed towards the cabin.

  They’d almost reached the porch when a large German Shepherd bolted from the porch, barking loudly, tail wagging. She fell back a
step and watched Rex reach down and run his hand over the dog’s head.

  “Hey there, boy.” Rex chuckled when the dog jumped up, resting his paws on his chest. “Yeah, I know. Gone all day.” He looked back at her. “He won’t bite unless I tell him too.”

  “Good.” Cee Leigh laughed nervously as the dog fell back to all four paws and walked up to her, sniffing curiously.

  “Leave her alone, Jones,” Rex called and the dog backed off, but watched her closely as she echoed Rex’s steps onto the porch and into the cabin. It was smaller than the one she had, but she discovered during his quick tour, that it had a similar floor plan that included a large kitchen, living, and dining area, a tiny bathroom, and two small bedrooms.

  “You live alone?” Cee Leigh asked when he opened the door to the spare room and dropped the suitcase at the end of the bed.

  “Not to worry. I don’t stalk women until after the third night.” He grinned when she slapped at his shoulder as he straightened. “I’ll let you get settled in. Don’t worry about electricity. I have a generator if the storm is too bad. Plumbing should be okay, but you might want to go ahead and take a shower now just in case.”

  She nodded as he slipped around her and out the door. “And don’t forget to call the Denver Police and let them know where you are. The last thing I need is to be arrested for kidnapping,” he called over his shoulder as he headed back towards the front door, slapping his thigh so that the dog bounded after him.

  She felt cold after he was gone, as if the heat he’d filled her with had radiated directly from him. She turned and hefted her suitcase onto the bed. She retrieved her laptop, tossed it onto the pillows, and then searched through her clothes for something to wear to bed that night. She held up the pajama shorts she always slept in, wishing desperately she’d packed something sexier. But why would she? Tossing them onto the bed, she sighed and closed the suitcase. She might be reading too much into what Rex had said to her anyway. He could have been genuinely trying to help her write better heroes.