“You’re managing without your glasses?” he finally asks.

“Yes. Contacts.” As if reminded that they’re there, I blink repeatedly. I’m not used to wearing them all the time.

“Good. I was afraid you’d be blind.” He glances over at me. “You look different with them off. Your eyes are...”

“Too big for my face?” Kids used to tease me about them growing up, especially the boys. They called me “Bug Eyes” and “Owl.”

He doesn’t answer. Instead he asks, “How is everything so far? The food, the accommodations? Do they suit your needs?”

“Everything’s great.”

“Everything can’t be great. Everything’s never great.” His lips purse. “Tell me the truth.”

“Is this Mr. Wolf asking? Or Henry?”

He turns to spear me with a glare.

“The food is great. The cabins are good, if not a little bit crammed.”

“And your roommates?”

“Um. They’re...fine.” Thankfully Katie and Rachel were still asleep this morning when I ducked out.

He frowns. “That doesn’t sound convincing. We’ve never utilized a staff village like this before. I was worried about such close quarters, but my team promised me it would work out, with the way scheduling will be managed. Why? Are you having a problem with someone already?”

“No. Not at all. It’s just...” I hesitate. I shouldn’t be telling him this, should I?

“It’s just...” he pushes. I glance at him, and see the genuine worry etched in his face.

“I think two of them have sort of a thing going on.”

“Oh.” Henry’s brow pops over his sunglasses as realization dawns on him. “And it’s making you uncomfortable?”

“No. Well, not really. Last night, I kind of saw them in bed together.” I can’t believe I’m telling him this. I had no intention of telling anyone. But apparently I don’t have to be drunk to say inappropriate things around this man, after all. “I didn’t mean to, but their bunk is right next to me, and they didn’t pull the curtain around.” I blush with the memory. “One of them crawled into the other one’s bunk.”

He pauses for a moment, his eyes trained on the road. “So you saw two of your roommates fucking?”

Just the way he says that, so casually, sends heat through my core. I can’t believe I’m reacting this way to his words alone. I clear my throat. “Yes.”

“And you have a problem with that? Two women?”

“No! Not at all.”

Henry’s mouth opens then closes several times. When he finally speaks, his voice has turned low. “So you watched them?”

Is that an appropriate question for the owner of the hotel to ask me? I look out the window, my cheeks heating. “I didn’t mean to.” Please don’t ask me if I enjoyed it. Now that the moment’s over, I’m embarrassed about what I witnessed last night, and what I did afterward. But I also can’t ignore how alive it made me feel, how in tune with their pleasure my body was. How much I wanted to feel that.

How I came thinking of the man sitting right beside me.

“That must have been a shock for someone like you.”

I frown. “Someone like me?” It takes me a moment to understand what he’s saying.

A virgin. Someone who’s never even had a guy’s hand in my pants. That’s right. I told him that, too.

Henry pulls the truck to a stop near a logging road on my right. “Hold on. It’s going to get a little bit bumpy.” Throwing it into four-wheel drive, he then eases the truck through the deep divots in the muddy ground.

“Whose land is this?” I ask, grabbing on to the door with one hand and wrapping my other arm across my chest, the rough bouncing hurting my breasts.

By Henry’s sideways glance, he notices and slows down a touch. “Mine.”

“Your family’s?”

“No, mine. My grandfather left it all to me.”

So I guess that particular rumor was accurate. As we ease deeper into the woods, I can see the devastation where chainsaws cut into hundreds of years of growth, mowing down mass clearings. “This is so sad.”

“The hemlock and cedar used for the lodge was sourced from in here. Why buy from someone else what I have right in my backyard.”

“Yeah, I guess. You’re going to replant it all, though. Right?”

“Eventually. When I have the staff to do it.”

The wheels in my brain are turning. “I could do it.”

He stops the truck next to a fallen tree and turns the ignition. The deep rumbling stops, leaving us in eerie silence. Peeling his sunglasses off his face, he turns to level me with his beautiful eyes. “You’re going to plant all these trees yourself?”

“I could. It would take me all summer.”

His head tips back with his laughter, and I marvel at the sight of his Adam’s apple, the way it juts out. “You really don’t want to be in Housekeeping, do you?”

My giggle escapes me unbidden. “Like I said, I’m better suited to the outdoors.”

His gaze does a lightning-speed assessment of my body before muttering, “Come on.”

The second I crack the door, a cloud of mosquitos swarms me. It’s like they were waiting for fresh blood. I swat as I walk around to meet him in front of the truck. The bugs are way worse out here. “You’ll need these.” He tosses me a pair of work gloves. “And this. The stuff they gave you isn’t strong enough.” A can of bug spray sails through the air.

I quickly douse myself from head to toe while Henry disappears behind the truck. He emerges with an ax.

“We’re cutting wood?”

“Have you ever swung an ax before?” He strolls over to a massive stump nearby and rests the blade against it.

“No.”

“Then I’m cutting wood. You’re going to stack it in the back of the truck.”

“Really?” The guy’s a billionaire and he’s out here, chopping wood?

“Do you think you can handle that?”

I snort. “I bail hay at harvest. I can handle this.”

Again, another quick scan of my body, only this time his gaze slows over my thighs. I was in such a rush to get out of the cabin this morning, I grabbed a pair of jeans that are a tad too tight for outdoor work.

He gives his head a little shake. “There’s a cooler of water in the cab, if you need one.” He slides a bottle from his pocket and, unscrewing it, brings it to his mouth, his plump lips wrapping around the end.

My thoughts from my drunken night come sailing back into the forefront of my mind.

What would it have felt like to have him kiss me back?

Or to have his tongue working me like I saw Katie do to Rachel. Or more?

Is this well-groomed billionaire in front of me into the kind of kinky stuff that my roommates are clearly into? Is that what everyone’s into, and I’m just that clueless?

I don’t realize I’m staring until he turns to face me. “Is something wrong?”

I feel my cheeks burn bright. “No. I was just...” Imagining the owner—my boss—sticking his tongue in me. There is no good answer here, so I let the words hang and head for the truck to grab a bottle of water. The air is still chilly, but I’m sure once I start moving, I’ll break a sweat.

There’s a small pile of split wood off to the side, so I move for that, cradling a piece. “What’s this for, anyway?”

“What is firewood usually for, Abigail?”

I don’t miss the hint of mocking in his tone. “It’s Abbi. And I figured you’d have firewood delivered.”

“Because I’m wealthy?”

“No, because it’s a big hotel.” And because you’re wealthy.

I watch him bend and heave a large piece of tree trunk onto the stump, wishing he didn’t have that bulky jacket on so I could watch his muscles strain. If the feel of his body wasn’t a drunken illusion on my part, then he’s got plenty of them, and they’re nicely honed.

He grips the ax handle. “We do have logs delivered for wood-burning fireplaces. Today is for me. It’s great exercise, and I like to come out here to clear my head. The quiet is like nothing, anywhere else. Especially when I’m stressed.” With a mighty swing, the blade of his ax cracks the hunk of wood, splitting it in two pieces. The sound ricochets through the valley, sending several birds squawking away.