Fucking lovely. I didn’t realize Deputy Douchebag actually knew what he was doing with this. I can only hope that the few times I helped my dad chop wood down at the cabin come in handy so I don’t make a complete fool out of myself.
“Sure am, Lucy,” he replies, but his smarmy smile is pointed at me. She gives him a number to pin to his red and black flannel shirt.
Nate moves to take up a position beside one of the logs and snatches a pair of leather gloves from his back pocket.
Shit. Everyone has gloves. Everyone but me.
“Name?” the smiley young woman asks from the other side of the table.
“Dylan King.”
Her brow furrows as she jots down my name and hands me a number. Lucky me: I’m in the spot right beside my new best friend. The only plus side is that I’m close to the barrier, and Jade is standing on the other side. Sunny whoops and shouts, “Go Dylan!”, reliving her cheerleader glory days. Jade’s head whips toward Sunny before returning to me, her brows pinched and her lips pursed.
Lips I wouldn’t mind feeling pressed against mine again, only minus the interruption.
The sun breaks through the heavy layer of clouds that has lingered all day. I peel off my leather jacket and hang it over the barrier right in front of Jade. Then, I lean so close that her little gasp of air fans against my cheek. “If I win, do I get another kiss?” I ask under my breath so that only she can hear.
The flushed red cheeks are a really good look on her. “I don’t want your mega-fan to get jealous,” she murmurs back.
Oh, please. Sunny isn’t a mega-fan. She’s only hanging out with me because my sisters organized it. “That’s not an answer.”
Jade bites her bottom lip, leaving behind a cute little indentation. “You’re not going to win.”
“Then I guess you have nothing to worry about.”
One of the announcers calls all of the contestants to their positions.
I cock my head and gaze into her eyes. “Yes or no, Jade?”
She holds my stare, and one side of her mouth turns up a touch. “Okay.”
When I return to my spot, fighting away a smile, my bestie looks like he’s about to chop me in half instead of the log laid out in front of him. I grip the handle of the ax and heave it over my shoulder, testing its weight. It’s heavier than it looks, which doesn’t bode well for my shoulders.
The first person to cut their log in half wins the grand prize. Seems simple enough. Every other contestant has a pretty focused expression on their face, so maybe this isn’t going to be a walk in the park. The bell sounds and I take my first swing, realizing I may not win that kiss after all.
This is nothing like splitting logs for a fire. This takes precision and power and endurance that I don’t fucking have. You know what I do have? Enough hatred for the sneery asshole beside me to keep chopping until I can feel the skin of my palms melting off. Do I stop when my hands are more blister than skin? Hell fucking no. I keep going, swinging again and again, until my arms feel like wet noodles and sweat burns my eyes.
Knowing the champ isn’t much further along spurs me on. I begin knocking away at the opposite side until the log resembles an hourglass. Fuck me, this is hard. As much as I hate to do it, I let my ax down for a second to wipe my eyes with the hem of my shirt.
Catching Jade’s gaze skimming across my abdomen gives me the strength I need to lift the ax in my crying hands and keep going. The crowd’s cheering builds to my right, where some burly asshole with shoulders so big he has no neck is hammering away, bits of wood flying around him.
A few more hits are all it takes for my arms to start trembling. Shithead curses when he realizes how close I am to finishing, his own ax swinging haphazardly in front of him.
Four more swipes, and I hear the telltale crack.Holy shit, the top half of my log slams onto the pavement.
The crowd falls silent, and all the other contestants freeze, some with axes in midair, all of them staring slack-jawed at me. It’s so quiet that I can hear the sweat dripping off my forehead splatter onto the concrete. My arms tremble, and my heart hammers as I stare down at that broken hunk of wood.
Shithead Williams lets out a feral growl and chucks his ax to the ground, narrowly missing my foot. He stomps out of the ring like a toddler who didn’t get his way.
“L-looks like we have a winner!” the announcer stutters, clearly as stunned as everybody else, as he carries his microphone over to my station to inspect my work.
Blood drips down my hands, and it’ll be a long-ass time before I’m able to jerk off again, but the spark in Jade’s eyes makes all the pain worthwhile.
CHAPTERSEVENTEEN
JADE
I won’t denythat watching Dylan King hack a chunk of wood into two pieces was the X-rated fantasy I didn’t know I needed. He was all muscle and sweat and determination as he split that log to bits, and I might’ve drooled a little.
