That’s when he starts unbuttoning his jeans.

“W—what are you doing?” I stammer.

I never fucking stammer. I’m a lawyer. I’m endlessly articulate. But as Raylan unzips his jeans, I couldn’t form a sentence to save my life.

“I’m gonna cool off in the water,” he says, his mouth quirked up in a half-smile. “Care to join me?”

He drops his jeans. Then, keeping his brilliant blue eyes fixed on mine, he hooks his thumbs in his boxer shorts and pulls those down, too.

His cock hangs down between his legs, thick and heavy and uncut. It’s even darker than his tanned body, with trimmed black hair around it, as thick as the hair on his head.

My heart is hammering against my ribs so fast that it feels like one continual beat. My mouth is salivating, and I can’t stop staring at his cock. I’m flushed with heat and I feel an aching, clenching sensation between my thighs.

I have never felt this response to a man’s cock. I don’t know what the fuck is happening to me.

Maybe it’s because I’ve never seen one that big. Or that animalistic. It’s making me respond like I’m in heat.

This is so unlike me. I’m never rabid. I’m never out of control.

I rip my eyes away from his body. I’ve seen Raylan nearly naked several times. But completely naked . . . that’s a whole different thing. There’s something about seeing him stripped down outdoors, in his natural element. It’s vastly more powerful.

I’m in his space now. On his land. In his control.

As if sensing the same thing, Raylan says, in his deep, commanding voice, “Take off your clothes.”

He’s never ordered me around before. Nobody orders me around.

My natural inclination is to toss my head and tell him to fuck off. That’s what I’d usually do.

But then Raylan takes a step toward me, and more gently—in the same tone he used with Penny—he says, “Come on. Strip down. Get in the water. You’ll like it.”

And like he’s fucking hypnotized me, I find my fingers unbuttoning my shirt. Baring my skin to the sunshine and the breeze. I take off my shirt, and the bra underneath.

I can feel Raylan’s eyes roving hungrily over my bare breasts. My breasts are small and extremely pale. The nipples are light pink, barely darker than my flesh.

I unzip my jeans and pull them down, my underwear too.

I have a tuft of trimmed hair as vibrantly red as the hair on my head. Men go insane for it. They obsess over it.

I look at Raylan’s face, to see what he thinks of my body.

His eyes are so bright that they look as if they’re on fire, like the blue flame under a gas burner. His lips are parted hungrily, and I see a glint of those sharp white teeth.

“Come on,” he says huskily.

He steps down into the stream, to a place where the river widens and flattens, creating a small pool. The water is perfectly clear, so you can see the smooth stones beneath.