Untouchable: A Billionaire on the Run Romance Read online

  Except that’s more than just sweat.

  He scoops out more water, this time splashing it on his face, the water creating a temporary mask over his smooth features and dripping down his jaw line.

  My hand goes back up, a finger trapped between my lips as I watch him wash his arm, his hand running over the curves of muscle from his shoulder to his wrist. He does the same to his other arm then bends over the water, splashing some on his back.

  After that, he gets out of the water slowly and my eyes grow wide as they go over the parts of him previously concealed by the water, particularly the part hanging between his legs, long and thick and…

  I take a step back as I tear my gaze away from it, telling myself I mustn’t be looking at it, not just because it isn’t right, but because my body is starting to go crazy. My veins are buzzing and my breasts are tingling. I knock over a watering can, which clatters to the floor.

  Shit.

  “Who’s there?” he asks.

  I don’t answer, my heart pounding even harder in time with his approaching footsteps. Is he clothed? Or is he still naked?

  Wait. Is that what I’m worried about? He’s a stranger, for heaven’s sake. Worse, he’s a trespasser, a criminal.

  Worst of all, he’s a man. The worst kind of beast, my father always says. A savage animal. And, judging from the wounds on his body likely from a fight than from an accident now that I think about it, I think Dad’s right.

  Just as the door to the tool shed opens, I grab the closest thing I can – the gardening spray bottle – and point it at him.

  The moment he’s in front of me, all of my thoughts vanish. His eyes, staring back at me, are the color of the cloudless summer sky.

  He opens his lips. “Um…”

  “Don’t come any closer.” I hook my finger around the trigger of the bottle.

  Those slightly upturned lips of his curve into a grin. “Go ahead. Shoot. I don’t mind getting wetter.”

  Right. He was just bathing, so his skin is still moist and beads of water are glistening on it. He hasn’t had time to dry himself up, though he’s thankfully managed to put on his pants. My eyes travel up to the tapestry of muscles on his torso. The sight of them is even more tantalizing up close, and it makes my mouth water.

  I’m the one who’s getting wetter.

  “It seems to me you need that bottle more.”

  His eyes go to the stain in front of my shirt just above my breasts, those wide turquoise pupils gleaming. I place my hand on my chest, well aware that my sweat-drenched clothes are sticking to me. Next to his body fresh from a bath, I feel such a mess and I suddenly wish I had taken that shower first before meeting him.

  Still, he has no right to stare.

  “What are you looking at?”

  “You,” he answers simply, touching his chin.

  He’s not even trying to hide it. Despicable. And yet, I can’t help but blush.

  “Who said you could look?”

  “I think it’s only fair,” he says. “No, actually, I think I’m still at the poorer side of the bargain. After all, you were watching me earlier, weren’t you?”

  My cheeks burn even more.

  Glancing at the wall, I see the trowel hanging on it and I quickly swap the spray bottle for that.

  “Get out of my tool shed.” I brandish my new weapon.

  It’s not as good as a knife or the hand fork but it’s still better than a spray bottle.

  He takes a step back, hands up. “Whoa. Easy.”

  “Out!” I repeat, stepping forward. “I want you off my property.”

  He stops, thin eyebrows creased. “Your property?”

  “Yes,” I tell him. “You’re trespassing.”

  He pauses then nods. “I see.”

  What does he mean?

  “You’re wrong. I’m not trespassing.”

  I’m wrong? Who does he think he is?

  “Put down that tool and I’ll explain.”

  “Like hell.” I shake my head. “I don’t trust you. Now, get out!”

  I step forward, lunging but this time, he doesn’t step back. He steps to the side, avoiding the trowel, knocks it out of my hand, grabs my wrist, and turns me around. He holds me against him, his other arm wrapping around my chest.

  The moisture from his chest seeps into my back. His warm breath tickles my cheek. The smell of his skin, fresh from his bath, wafts into my nostrils. I can feel his heart pounding behind me and I wonder if he can feel mine, my pulse racing as I become all too aware of his arm pinning my breasts, of his crotch against my backside.

  It’s terrifying having a man this close to me for the first time. And exciting.

  The tool shed suddenly feels smaller, hotter. A fresh bead of sweat trickles down the side of my face.

  “Let me go.” I struggle, afraid he’ll feel my nipples poking against the pads of my bra, but he holds me fast.

  “Not until you listen,” he says, his lips close to my ear. “You’re Lauren Calver, aren’t you?”

  My eyebrows go up. He knows my name?

  “Who are you?” I ask him.

  “Chase Donner,” he answers. “I work for your father, Isaac Calver.”

  “Liar,” I spit. “My father hasn’t had a farmhand in months.”

  “Which is why he needs one.”

  “And he would never hire someone like you.”

  “Someone like me?”

  “Someone who doesn’t have any manners,” I say, struggling to free myself from his grip again.

  He holds me tighter and I try to ignore the fact that his crotch is buried against my backside even as I try to push the memory of what it looks like aside.

  “You’re the one who attacked me,” he points out.

  “You trespassed!”

  He sighs. “Like I said, I work for your father. He’s in his late fifties with gray hair, a beard, and…”

  “Anyone who’s seen my father knows that,” I tell him. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “Your father has a dog, a border collie named Smoke.”

  “Everyone knows that.”

  “And does everyone know Smoke hates the sound of wood being chopped? Or that your father likes to take his afternoon naps in the stable? Or that he can’t carry his alcohol and yet, he still drinks, even though he sometimes suffers from gout, which gets so bad he can hardly walk?”

  I relax. Only someone who’s spent a reasonable time on the ranch with my father would know those things, which means he isn’t lying.

  “Fine.” I exhale. “Let me go.”

  He does, and I quickly distance myself from him.

  He smiles as he offers his hand. “Nice to meet you, Lauren.”

  What did he say his name was again? Chase?

  I don’t care.

  I don’t return any of those gestures,. Instead, I grab my hat before marching off. I may believe that he’s working for my father at the moment, but I still can’t believe Dad hired him.

  It’s time I have a long talk with him.

  ---

  My father is fifty-four, his hair more the color of ash now than the chestnut brown it used to be. There’s less of it now, too, his hairline having receded so far with only a round patch remaining above his forehead that it looks like a crown on his head. His thin beard hangs from his chin, forming a silver and brown curtain over his neck and stopping just above the base of his throat. His black eyes look paler, more gray now, too, lines beneath them and stemming from the corners.

  When did he get so old?

  Indeed, staring at him as he sits beside me around the small, round table for four just as we’ve finished lunch, I feel like he’s suddenly aged. I knew he looked different when I arrived home yesterday and now, I realize what that difference is.

  He looks older, more tired.

  I wrap my fingers around the handle of the pitcher. “More water?”

  “Sure.” Dad pushes his empty glass toward me and I stand up to pour. “It’s a hot
day.”

  “You don’t say. I just took another shower.”

  That’s why I feel better.

  My hair is still moist as it cascades freely down my back, my shirt, now a white one with two buttons down the middle of my neckline, fresh and smelling of soap instead of sweat.

  “Maybe I’ll take another one later after my nap,” my father says, grabbing the front of his own white shirt that is permanently stained with mud and moving it back and forth to fan his chest.

  “You should.”

  The chair creaks under my weight as it sit down, Smoke resting his head on my lap as soon as I do. I pat his head.

  “How has Smoke been?” I ask as I stroke the soft fur.

  “Good.” Dad takes a sip from his glass of cold water. “His appetite is bigger than ever.”

  I grin. “Does he still hate the sound of wood being chopped?”

  “You bet. He whines like an old lady.”

  I chuckle. “Some things never change.”

  As I look around the room, I notice that it hasn’t changed. The same black lamp hangs from the wooden ceiling above the center of the table, swaying slightly whenever a strong breeze makes it past the pale green curtains. The same wood-carved figures that my father and I whittled when I was a child are lined up in a row on the table by the window. The same white porcelain plates and frosted glasses, given to my parents on their wedding day, stare out from the wooden dish cabinet behind me.

  A few feet away, the same blackened kettle sits on the silver stove beside the shiny black refrigerator that’s more than a decade old, the cupboard above it still with its broken lock. The same rusty pots and pans hang above the long, rectangular table across it – my mother’s favorite table where she used to spend most of the day chopping and mincing vegetables or mixing and kneading dough.

  I smile, imagining her there in her pink and yellow apron that still hangs on the wall beside the table, an untouched relic.

  Yes, most things haven’t changed inside this house. But some have changed outside.

  “You hired someone,” I bring the topic up.

  “You met Chase?” Dad asks as he reaches for the small bottle of toothpicks in the middle of the table.

  “Yes,” I answer, placing my hands on the table. “I saw him while I was picking vegetables.”

  Naked and bathing in the creek before I attacked him with a spray bottle and then a trowel. But there’s no need for my father to know those little details.

  He sticks the toothpick between his teeth like a cigarette. “I see.”

  I place my hands on the table. “Why?”

  “Why did I hire someone? Because I’m not as young as I used to be, and my foot hurts sometimes.”

  I’m well aware of that. “What happened to John and Huey?”

  “John got married. I fired Huey after he got one of my sheep killed.”

  I tap my fingers on the checkered tablecloth. “Where did you find him?”

  He pulls the toothpick out from between his lips and starts picking his teeth.

  “He came here, said he needed a job.”

  I raise an eyebrow. “He just appeared out of nowhere?”

  He tosses the used toothpick on his plate. “He said he just lost his wife.”

  Chase was married?

  That doesn’t explain the injuries I saw while he was bathing, though.

  I stand up and pick up his empty dish, putting on top of mine. “He doesn’t seem like he’s in mourning.”

  “Why? What did he say to you?” Dad asks.

  “Nothing,” I answer quickly, bringing the dishes and utensils to the sink.

  “He said he felt like he lost everything after losing his wife and needed a fresh start. So I gave him one. Nothing wrong with that. We all need some help at one point or another. Plus, he’s cheap.”

  “Cheap?”

  “I only pay him the minimum hourly wage for seventy hours a week and he doesn’t mind cash. He insisted on it, in fact.”

  My eyebrows furrow as I turn on the faucet. “Well, I don’t trust him.”

  “Why not? Did he do something to you?” I hear the protective tone in my father’s voice that I know so well.

  Immediately, I remember how he held me against him, how his wet body felt against my sweaty one. I blush so it’s a good thing my Dad doesn’t see. As much as I don’t trust Chase, I don’t want him to lose his job, especially if what my father just said about his past is true.

  “Nothing,” I answer, picking up a fork to wash. “I just… Well, I don’t know him.”

  “I’ve told him to stay away from you, so you won’t be seeing much of him.”

  Really? I think I’ve already seen plenty.

  Out of nowhere, the image of his cock comes back to haunt me and my cheeks grow even hotter, the fork I’m washing slipping from my fingers and clattering on the sink.

  “Shit.”

  “You all right?” Dad asks.

  “Yes,” I answer, picking up the fork and washing it again. “I’m just surprised, that’s all. You didn’t tell me about him.”

  “I forgot.” He throws his hands up in the air. “Like I said, I’m getting old.”

  “You are,” I agree.

  “Anyway, don’t worry about Chase. He’s a good man to have around.”

  Remembering the quickness he showed in the barn, the efficiency with which he disarmed me, I nod. At least, he seems to know how to fight.

  “And if he causes the least bit of trouble, I’ll get rid of him without thinking twice.”

  “I know you will.”

  Count on Dad to get rid of anything that seems a threat to me, be it a buzzing mosquito or a sexy farmhand.

  Sexy.

  Fine. I’ll admit he is that, maybe the sexiest man I ever met, not that I’ve met many men. In fact, he’s probably the most exciting thing ever to happen on the farm.

  Chapter Two

  Chase

  I wake up shivering, feeling a strong gust of wind over my bare legs.

  Sitting up on the creaky cot, I rub my eyes and squint through the darkness, realizing that the window has been blown open – again – and that my blanket has been blasted to the floor.

  As I pick it up, the door to the barn opens, Isaac standing there in his blue robe, holding an electric lantern.

  “Get up,” he says, a worried look on his face. “There’s a tornado coming.”

  And he’s gone.

  I scramble to put on my sweater and shoes so that I can follow him, running toward the light gleaming in the darkness.

  A tornado? At this hour?

  Another gust of wind hits me, slapping a leaf against my cheek. I stop to brush it off, staring at the horizon. The skies, clear when I went to bed, seem covered in thick clouds now, the moon and stars obscured. They rumble restlessly. A bolt of lightning cracks, revealing their greenish hue.

  A tornado is coming, all right. And fast.

  I put on the hood of my sweater and sprint to catch up to Isaac, listening to him bark his instructions. As he secures the sheep shed and the cattle barn, I secure the stables, hastily hammering down every loose piece of wood and making sure the door to each stall is locked so that the horses don’t run away. The animals already look like they’re ready to bolt at the first opportunity, whinnying and stomping restlessly in their stalls. I pause to stroke the mane of Alexander, Isaac’s black stallion.

  “Shh. Everything will be all right.”

  The horse calms down but only for a moment, aware that something’s coming. Horses are smart creatures, after all.

  By the time I come out of the stables, the wind has picked up, beginning to howl. Another gust blows my hood off.

  I don’t bother putting it back, running to check the locks on all the tool sheds, making sure they’re firmly in place. Then I circle back to the house. Lauren is outside it in her rose-colored pajamas, perched on a ladder while she’s putting the shutters on the upstairs windows. She’s clearly struggling, the
wind sweeping her hair over her face. The ladder quivers, too.

  “I’ll do it.”

  She comes down the ladder and I take her place, securing the windows while she keeps the ladder steady, a task which Isaac helps her do when he returns. The wind is even more furious now, branches snapping and floating around. One almost hits me but I manage to duck, gripping the ladder as I nearly lose my balance.

  Whew. That was close.

  With the upstairs windows secure, Lauren, Isaac, and I make quick work of the ones downstairs. Then we all make a run for the storage barn.

  I hold Lauren’s hand as the wind threatens to sweep us away along with everything else, already whipping against our clothes. She holds her father’s hand, the sash of his robe already undone.

  “Smoke!” he shouts behind him.

  The dog darts ahead.

  Reaching the storage barn, we rush inside then head into the storm cellar hidden there, Isaac closing the hatch above us as I set the lantern on a table in the middle of the room, letting out a sigh of relief.

  Finally, we’re safe.

  It’s a small room, maybe eight square feet, the cement walls and floors making it cold. I grab the pile of blankets on the table, handing one to Lauren, who’s already huddled in a corner, shivering.

  “Are you all right?” I ask her.

  She nods even though her hands are shaking, her hair in complete disarray. “Thanks.”

  She wraps the blanket tightly around her shoulders and I do the same with another after handing Isaac his.

  “Do you get tornadoes often?” I ask him.

  “No,” he answers, sitting in another corner, Smoke curling up beside him. “But when they come, they come.”

  “They don’t usually come at night,” Lauren adds. “The last one that came at night was when…” She pauses, looking at the floor. “When Mom was still alive.”

  The strain in her voice makes my chest a little tight. Isaac told me his wife died ten years ago but Lauren makes it sound like it was just yesterday.

  She coughs and I go to the crate of supplies under the table, finding a bottle of water there. I hand it to her, sitting beside her, though I move a few inches away when I notice Isaac looking.