dream job. The travel and new experiences comprised a part of that, but secretly, the real appeal was Ty himself. Kate looked him over again, eyeballing the man who’d easily become her best friend these past couple years. The closest friend she’d ever had…though she’d never told him as much. She took a seat on the log, stretching her achy legs out in front of her.
“You may not be grooming me for a gig as an agent,” Kate said, “but I’ll settle for executive producer.”
“You’re practically that already.” Ty jogged to the tree and retrieved his knife, slid it into its sheath as he trudged back. “I know you thought you’d be choosing my thousand-dollar wristwatches instead of pulling leeches off me, but no one can deny you’re still an ace at running my life.”
Kate smiled with indulgence. “And that’s exactly what I wanted.”
“Control freak.”
“Death wish,” she shot back. “And like it or not, you’ll be in GQ before you know it. The glamour will follow,” she murmured, dreamy, holding her hands out as if envisioning their future rendezvous with stylists and PR agencies.
“So you say.”
“Plus this gig is a fantastic workout.” She flexed her arm. Her figure had certainly benefited from two-plus years of this demanding lifestyle. “And my passport’s got an enviable collection of stamps.”
“Good to know there are some positive side effects to putting up with me,” he said. “And you’re always up to the challenge.”
“I survived three nights in Death Valley, Ty. I think I can handle the likes of you.”
Kate wrapped up their banter with an emphatic slap of her hands on her thighs and stood, refocusing on the task at hand. She grabbed a half-frozen protein bar out of her pack, gnawing on it while Ty stowed the tripod.
“How do we get your shirt off in this episode?” she asked, chewing.
“I’m thinking sweat, hypothermia danger, drying clothes by the fire?”
She frowned. “We do that in like, every single snow scenario.”
“Yeah, and it’s the most legit rationale.” He let slip a hint of rare irritation. “But I’m listening. What’s your brilliant idea this time?”
“You want to fall in an icy river?”
He finished tidying the campsite and stared at her, arms locked over his chest. “I don’t, but I’ll bet it’s top of your list.”
“Use your shirt to rig a makeshift fishing net?”
“Better.” He took a couple steps closer.
“Torn off by a cougar in a fight to the death?”
He stopped right in front of her. “You’re way too young to qualify as a cougar, Katie.”
“Cute,” she drawled disapprovingly, but The Shift had already happened. That’s how Kate described it to herself, this change as Ty went into his shameless playboy shtick. To him this flirtation was a game, a distraction she was certain he only orchestrated to get on her nerves. But its effects ran deeper than she’d ever let him know. Ten thousand women probably had school-girl crushes on Dom Tyler, and Kate didn’t need him knowing she was among them. Still, when he got that gleam in his eye and lowered his voice to that devious hush, he was more than just Kate’s friend and boss. He was the man who set her on fire off camera, no flint or tinder required.
“We need at least another couple hours of footage today,” she said, easing the zipper of his vest halfway down his front. “So get that look out of your eye.” She jerked the zipper back up to his stubbly chin and gave his cheek a couple of light slaps.
“Taskmaster.”
She sighed. “Somebody has to be.”
Still mired deep in The Shift, Ty ran his hands up and over Kate’s shoulders, his calloused thumbs pressing the pulse points of her jugular, as they always did at this moment. A moment that been taunting Kate continually for the past two years and then some. God, two years…
His smirking mouth inched closer as he stooped to eclipse the considerable difference in their heights. The weather-roughened skin of his lips grazed her temple, her cheek, her jaw. His lips neared hers until their noses touched, and then he smiled. This was the point when he always smiled.
“Oh,” he said, pantomime realization furrowing his brow and dampening the growl in his voice.
“What?” Kate prompted, her refrain weary.
He sighed with theatrical regret. “Forgot I just ate those raw eggs.”
“Yes, of course.” She rolled her eyes.
Ty withdrew, just as he’d done in exactly this same fashion a hundred times before. “Can’t risk giving you salmonella.”
“No, obviously not.” But Kate wouldn’t mind giving him blue balls. Was there a female equivalent? If so, she’d had a clinically dangerous case for a long time now.
The first time he’d done that, when they’d been filming the first season’s final episode, she’d fallen for it. That mouth, sliding down past her good ear, those fingers on her throat—hook, line and sinker. Close enough to feel his breath heating her cheek, and then, “Katie?”
And then her breathless, “Yes?”
And then, “I’ve just remembered. We haven’t checked our shoes for scorpions. One of the leading causes of avoidable tragedy in the desert.”
Infuriating. Who flirted like that? Week after week after week? A stunning Australian sociopath with a risk predilection, apparently.
Before the show had come about, Ty had been a fringe celebrity in Australia and in certain sporting circles. He’d gone to school in Sydney for filmmaking then spent several years as a quasi-professional free climber. He was a bit of an anomaly—or a moron, as some asserted—as he’d climbed in remote areas, without a partner or any safety precautions. He’d taped himself as he was climbing, much like the show, one camera capturing the scene, the other recording from his own vantage point as he dangled from cliff faces. Kate had tracked down a bunch of those videos back when she’d been looking into this job. Watching them, she’d known some of what she was getting herself into, dangerwise. Attractionwise she’d been woefully unprepared. Her less professional feelings for Ty had trickled in slowly, grown as their friendship did and as their joint project gained success. Those feelings had eventually snowballed into a full-blown infatuation, but potent or not they were nothing compared to Kate’s fear of rejection. She’d been left by enough people already…her father when she was tiny, her fiancé at twenty-five. Plus her mother, who’d technically always been around, but had never really ever been there. History had taught Kate that whenever she let herself grow attached to somebody, they ditched her, and she’d left that pattern behind her, along with the rest of her crappy former life on the outskirts of Boston.
Here in the present, Ty flashed her a merciless smile, his eyes lit up in the cold northern sunlight. “God, that was a close one.”
She rolled her eyes again—like hell it was.
