"Eight-hour workday? Girl, you"re saying you want to hang with me. We"re talking twelve or fourteen. We have a timeline, remember?"
She grabbed a handful of what looked like M&M"s from a pocket and tossed them all in her mouth. "I can go fourteen hours without blinking."
He knew she could. Even without chocolate. She was tough, and she was in better shape than any of the guys he had working on his crews-here or in Oklahoma.
"Okay. But no whining," he told her.
She flipped him off.
He grinned unabashedly at that.
He moved under the spot in the roof he was concerned about again and looked up. "See that spot up there? The ring? It"s probably water damage, and it could be old-there might be shingle issues or something up there-but we need to know for sure. And get it fixed. Need some measurements. And we"ll have someone check out up on top, too, of course."
"Up on top? The roof?" she asked, studying the spot.
"Right."
"Who are you going to have check it out?"
"One of the guys. Whoever I hear from first." He made a note on the clipboard.
"Why one of the guys? Why don"t you do it?" she asked. "You need a ladder or something?"
She looked around the interior of the barn.
"I"ve got what I need. Someone else will come check it. I"m just here making notes on things of concern."
"But how do you know it"s a concern unless you get up there?"
Max rolled his neck. "We need to repair it either way."
"And you need to know about the integrity of the wood and shingles, don"t you?" she asked. "To see how much needs replacing and stuff?"
"Yes." And if she was going to nag and question everything, this mentorship was going to be short.
"You suddenly afraid of heights or something?" she asked.
His knee never bothered him until he was around Bree. Whether it was landing after a jump or storm chasing or crawling around in barns, it bugged the s.h.i.t out of him that he was being held back. So he pushed. Often way too hard.
The barn had never been an actual livestock- or hay-type barn, but it had been built to look as authentic as possible, and that meant there were beams everywhere, crossing the ceiling, running along the walls. There were plenty of hand- and footholds-at least for someone used to climbing and who was able to stretch and who had some decent core strength.
If it wasn"t for his d.a.m.ned knee, he"d climb up into the loft, get up on the first crosswise beam, reach overhead, pull himself up onto the beam along the top of the wall where the roof started, and then swing up onto the closest beam that ran across the room. It was narrow, so he would belly crawl out to the spot right below the damaged area of the roof. Then he"d stand, grab the beam above, and take photos of the damage with his phone. He could upload those and do measurements from there.
"No," he said calmly. "You have to be flexible and sure on your feet to get up that high safely."
She met his gaze and hesitated for a moment. Then her gaze dropped to his knee, and he knew she"d put it all together.
He knew that she knew about his injury. It had made the paper, not just in Chance but in the Omaha World Herald. He was a local guy who"d been injured helping with rescue-and-recovery after Katrina. It had been a feel-good, local-hero-type story. He"d been in the Army National Guard. He"d fallen from a roof, and then a metal beam had fallen on him. There had been broken bones, torn muscles, multiple surgeries, and pins and plates. He"d been in the hospital for a week, then rehab for months.
But he and Bree never talked about it. She"d never asked him about it and never asked if he was sure he could handle any of the things they went to do. He"d always appreciated that.
"Lucky for you, I"m sure on my feet and very flexible," she told him.
She unbuckled her tool belt and let it drop to the floor with a thunk.
"No f.u.c.king way," he said. Still calmly but with a firmness he knew she wouldn"t miss.
She gave him a grin and headed for the wooden ladder that led to the hayloft, anyway. There was no hay stored there, of course, but the loft had been added for the sake of authenticity and to give them more storage s.p.a.ce.
"Come on. Hands-on is the best way to do things," Bree told him.
Flexible. Hands-on. Yep, it all still sounded s.e.xual.
"You"re not climbing up there, Bree," Max said with a sigh. "Let one of the guys do it."
She was two-thirds of the way up the ladder when she looked down and asked, "Why?"
"Because they"re . . ." Do not say "men." Do not say "stronger than you." Do not say "Because I don"t care as much if one of them breaks his neck." He did, of course. But they were highly trained and experienced. They wouldn"t fall. "They"re highly trained and experienced."
"And how did they get that way?" she asked as she reached the loft and headed directly for the wooden beam he"d identified as the best one to climb up on.
No matter how highly trained or experienced you were, you always took the shortest, easiest path.
Unless, of course, you were mountain climbing with Bree McDermott.
But that was another situation entirely.
Or was it? Max felt his heart thumping as he watched her scale the barn wall and swing herself up onto the first crossbeam.
She had always been smart even when taking risks. She used the best equipment, always wore protective gear, did double checks on everything, and took things slowly and easily when needed.
Max watched her reach for and climb onto the beam that ran across the room. His mouth got dry as she held the beam with her hands and legs and scooted carefully along.
She didn"t have equipment or protective gear this time. She was going slowly and easily, but she could easily slip and plummet to the floor. The fall might not kill her, but she"d break something. More than one something, probably. And if she landed just right on her head or neck, she really could . . .
Max made himself suck air in through his nose and shut down those thoughts.
She was doing exactly what any of the guys who worked for him would have been doing to get to the spot, and he wouldn"t have been standing there hyperventilating watching them do it, either. She was lighter than he or any of the guys were. She was an experienced climber and an intelligent woman.
And as oxygen started flowing to his brain again, he couldn"t help but notice how s.e.xy she looked.
Her body was toned from all kinds of physical activity, and he couldn"t help but think about how those thighs would feel gripping his waist. She was, as she"d promised, very flexible, which led to many other very nice images. Her blue jeans seemed to love her a.s.s, which made his jeans fit a little tighter in the front. And, most of all, she was clearly having a great time. Even from where he stood on the floor below, he could see her concentration, her excitement-that heady mix of fun and fear that was so familiar to him as well-and then her feeling of achievement when she got to the point under the damaged part of the roof.
She grinned down at him. "Piece of cake."
"Well, it"s clear that the cake and gummy bears haven"t attached themselves to your a.s.s. And from this angle, I would notice." Joke about it. Keep it light. Not only would it hide that he"d been nervous about the climb, but it would hide his attraction. As usual. If he joked about it, she wouldn"t take it seriously. It had worked for years.
Bree pushed herself up so she was sitting on the beam, straddling it. "Is that right?"
"Why do you think I always let you climb up in front of me?" he asked. "Mountains, ladders, steps into airplanes?"
"You like my a.s.s, huh?" she asked. "And here I thought it was my b.r.e.a.s.t.s."
Max"s grin faltered. So she remembered his comment in the mayor"s office that morning. He"d tossed that out like he did all innuendos, but there had been something in her eyes that time-like she was thinking about it and wondering about it.
Her comment now was the most direct either of them had been about what had happened in the ditch. And that brought to mind just how much he"d liked her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Seeing them. Feeling them. Tasting them.
He cleared his throat. The ditch had been a fluke. A tornado-induced fluke. "I"ve never had a problem with your front or your back," he said easily. Or he made it sound like it was easy.
"Well, thank you very much. I like your front and back, too."
As he was blinking at that-because there had never been a hint between them that she was physically attracted to him-she shifted so she could get her feet under her and stretched to standing on the beam.
Max"s heart rate accelerated so fast he felt a little dizzy. Her feet were positioned as if she were standing on a balance beam in a gymnastics compet.i.tion, and she quickly grabbed onto the metal bracket above her head, but there had been a tick of time where she"d been simply balancing on a foot-wide piece of wood sixty feet off the ground. Where she could have plunged to the ground. Where she could have- Max worked on reeling it in. Jesus. He did this stuff all the time, and he never worried about his guys. Was he a chauvinist? Maybe. Or maybe it was just that this was Bree.
You"ve seen her throw herself out of an airplane. Calm down.
Yeah, with a parachute!
And now he was arguing with himself. Great.
But he was right. If she had a parachute up there, he wouldn"t be worried. Bree was a great jumper. Better than he was. She stuck the landing every time.
Now, though . . . well, he wasn"t sure what to think of her shimmying up the wall and walking out over the hardwood floor sixty feet below with no equipment, having never done it before, having never watched someone else do it before.
This woman-she twisted up his guts, his brain, his heart. No matter what she was doing.
"Get the photos and then get down here," he ordered as he worked to not overreact to her balancing precariously completely out of reach.
"Just photos of the damaged spot?" she asked, letting go of the metal support to reach into her back pocket for her phone.
Max breathed in and out, nice and steady, twice before saying, "Yep. A couple snaps. We can upload them and go from there." Down here on the floor. The solid, flat, unrisky floor.
"Okay." She held up the phone, swiping over the screen with her thumb. Then she moved the hand holding the phone toward her other hand, which was gripping the bracket.
"What are you doing?"
"Zooming. Can"t do that one-handed."
Max scowled as she used both hands on the phone. Sure, she was technically still hanging on to the metal piece, but not as tightly. She wasn"t concentrating. She was too worried about the phone and the photos.
"Don"t need the f.u.c.king thing zoomed," he said loudly. "We can enlarge it on the computer."
"It might be blurry."
"I need simple dimensions. Quit messing around!"
"I"m not messing-"
Max saw the phone slip from her fingers and the instinctive jerk of her hand to try to catch it. He also reacted instinctively, taking two steps and then diving with his arm outstretched.
The phone fell into his palm and then bounced out onto the floor. But he"d cushioned the blow. The phone was in one piece.
He looked up. Bree had grabbed the bracket with both hands and was staring down with wide eyes.
"Get your a.s.s down here now!" he ordered.
He pushed himself to his feet, wincing as a pain shot through his knee. He"d probably torn some scar tissue landing on it like that. That had happened before. Not a big deal. In fact, sometimes people had manipulations done on their joints for that very purpose. So no damage done. But it hurt like a mother.
He looked up to see Bree on her b.u.t.t on the beam, inching backward the way she"d come. He glared at the phone and then stooped to pick it up.
He"d saved the phone.
If that had been Bree falling, he wouldn"t have been able to save her.
f.u.c.k, this working-together thing was a really horrible idea. She was a smart woman who could do a lot of this job. But he wasn"t sure he could let her.
Let her.
Ha.
As if he had any say in what Bree did or didn"t do.
That was the problem, really. He had no say. He was her friend, his opinion mattered to her, but he had no right to hold her back from things she wanted to do.
And it had never been an issue before. Before she"d kissed him.
That kiss had made him actually acknowledge that he didn"t just care, didn"t just love her as a friend, didn"t just want adventures with her. He wanted it all.
f.u.c.king sonofab.i.t.c.h.
He"d been okay until she"d kissed him.
By the time Bree was back on the floor of the barn, Max was worked up and p.i.s.sed off. He stomped over to her and thrust her phone out. "Don"t you ever-"
"Oh my G.o.d, that was fun," she gushed, her cheeks pink and glowing, her eyes bright.
She was gorgeous like this, and for a moment, all the air was sucked out of Max"s lungs.
He"d seen this look so many times. At the bottom of a snowy hill, at the finish line of a racetrack, in the middle of a gra.s.sy field with a parachute billowing behind her.
In the ditch off old Highway 36 as the ripples of her o.r.g.a.s.m faded and the clouds roiled above.
Max tore his eyes from her face and dragged air in. Dammit.
Adrenaline.
That"s what it was. That"s what it always was. Her addiction to it fueled his. Because, while he loved the rush, too, he loved seeing her like this even more.