They’d stared at each other silently for a while until he asked in a sleep-rusty voice, “Need money for a cab?”

She’d shaken her head, her iron-straightened hair swishing against her arms.

When he hadn’t said anything else, like “What’s your last name or phone number?” she’d backed out of the bedroom and fled the hotel, mortified to her curly roots.

She’d never gone home with a stranger before… or after.

Would Hunter believe her if she told him that?

Why did she care?

Because he’d surprised her last night when she’d been close to panic in the dark. He’d soothed her when he could have ordered her around. He hadn’t handed her over to a bunch of strangers. Somewhere hidden inside that emotionally isolated operative was a man capable of tenderness even if he kept it well hidden.

She remembered being kissed, but alcohol had wiped out one amazing memory if he’d kissed her like that six years ago.

Inside that lethal package was a Hunter she wished she’d met under different circumstances.

And, yes, as long as she was out here alone with her thoughts, she’d admit one more truth. She’d like another shot at getting her hands on all that naked male for one night.

But if he’d been interested in her that way, he’d have taken advantage of what she’d offered six years ago.

Talk about a washout in bed. The charming and funny “Samson” hadn’t jumped on what she’d offered, but the gun-toting, private-jet-flying, too-sexy-for-her-sanity Hunter sure as hell had kissed her.

She slapped a low-hanging pine branch out of her way. Melting snow sprinkled her head. When would this romantic hookup happen with everything she had on her plate, not to mention some lunatic who might be trying to kill her?

Oh, and she was currently heading away from Hunter, which would make any interlude a bit hard to orchestrate.

Besides, she had a higher priority than finding out what it would be like to peel Hunter down to that buff body again. Such as finding a way off this freezing-ass mountain.

Had to be a neighbor somewhere or hikers or a fire tower. Didn’t they have radios in fire towers? She hadn’t seen anything in the dark last night, but she was fairly certain this was the direction they’d come from after leaving the Jeep. The minute she found the truck, she was so gone. Her dad had taught her a lot about old trucks, like how to hot-wire the ignition.

Wind ruffled pine-needle fingers on branches behind her and cut through the layers of cotton shirts she wore. So damn cold.

She rubbed her hands and picked up her pace, squeezing through the next thicket of bushes, and picked her way six steps to the left before she could turn downhill again.

How far was she from the cabin now?

She took a step down. Something made a snap sound.

Loose sand and gravel fell away from beneath her foot. She jumped sideways to grab a swooping branch on a tree. The one-inch-thick limb bent with the strain and swatted her hands and face with pine needles.

Ground disintegrated under her backpedaling boot heels.

The branch creaked with strain, wood fibers separating.

“Don’t you dare break,” she worried aloud.

She flailed one hand for another branch just out of her reach and twisted her body. Her knee bounced against the ground. Pain shot up her leg. She snarled at the worthless piece of vegetation and lunged for the waving branch again.

And missed.

Blood pumped loud through her ears. She tried not to breathe hard for fear of disturbing her tenuous position, but hyperventilating required some amount of priming.

The wind cried her name.

She paused, listening, her heart thundering with hope.

Hunter might be pissed off, but he wouldn’t let her fall to her death. Screw it. She couldn’t help her mother if she ended up in a body cast… or worse.

Licking her dry lips, she opened her mouth to call out.

The limb snapped.

She took off down the hill like a bobsled.

Abbie grabbed at anything to slow her down. She slid over snow, then hit rock and sand patches. The world barreled by at lightning speed. Momentum flipped her onto her back. All three shirts climbed up her body, letting the scrub-board-rough mountain scrape a streak of pain along one side of her back.

She spun sideways, then slammed into a snowbank… hiding a boulder. The world wobbled unevenly, trying to level out. She gasped cold breaths that burned her lungs and groaned, but damn, what a good sound. Meant she was alive.

She lay there, gulping for air.

Talk about a huge flaw in her escape plan. She took mental stock of her body and considered sitting up, but not just yet.

“Abbie!” a voice roared from way up above her.

She covered her eyes to look up against the glare of sunlight. Hunter charged down that incline like an enraged bull, almost as quickly as she had, but he wasn’t bodysurfing.

She took stock of the damage now that every raw nerve wanted to report in, screaming with pain. One patch on her side felt seared, but the layers of clothes had protected the rest of her skin. Her knee throbbed. She wiggled her feet, lifted her legs, and stretched her shoulders.

Hallelujah. Nothing broken.

Branches snapped above her. Boot heels pounded against rock-hard ground toward her. Interspersed with cursing.

Better get ready to face Hunter.

Using the hem of her shirt, she wiped her face, hands, and clothes. Blood seeped from the scratches on her palms and wrists, but not so badly.

She pushed up to a sitting position and tugged her shirts down, gritting her teeth when cloth touched that one abrasion on her back.

Hunter jumped the last six feet, landing in a skid close to her. “Did you break anything?” He sounded panicked, which sort of surprised her since he’d been so calm with the killer. He squatted down next to her and examined the tear in her stolen jeans, then gently touched her leg above and below the rip.

If he kept acting so concerned and careful with her, she’d lose her grip on her shaky control.

“I don’t think I broke anything. Help me up.” She meant for him to give her a hand, but he hooked his hands under her arms and lifted her to her feet. When she pushed his arms away to prove she could stand, she hissed at the ache in her knee.

“You hurt your knee,” he accused.

“No worse than getting knocked around in a pen full of sows,” she muttered.

“What the hell did you think you were doing?” Muscles along his neck flexed with each breath he shoved in and out.

She jutted her chin up at him, in no freakin’ mood to be criticized. Especially when she noticed he’d made it down the same incline without even getting his jeans dirty. “Don’t yell at me when I just survived a near-death experience.”

That might have been the wrong thing to say.

The brown chamois shirt practically vibrated with energy rippling off his body. He lifted his hands to touch her, then pulled back and crossed his arms. “I told you last night to stay in that bedroom until I came for you.”

She’d had enough of this. “I don’t give a damn about your orders. When will you get it through your thick skull that I have my own set of problems?”

His lips pressed tight, caging the fury riding his shoulders. “Do you realize you could have been killed?”

“No, that was just a practice run. I’m thinking about trying it again because it was so. Much. Fun!” she shouted, now shaking with anger. “What the hell do you think?”

His eyes had widened with each octave her voice jumped until he just shook his head. A vein pumped in his temple. He stood there all intimidating, which was a waste of time.

She was too damn hurt, tired, and spent to be intimidated.