The broom stills as I do too.
I stare at the surface of the lake, gently rippling with the breeze that always seems to turn up here late in the day.
My gaze moves to the swept deck. The loaded ice chests. The readied fishing poles.
And darn it all if I don’t want to treat Zach Rousseau as an honored guest.
ChapterThirteen
ZACH
I may wantto be perfect. I am not perfect.
While I may know everything there is to know aboutrunninga high ropes course—after working at Camp Rocky Top in Tennessee for three summers back in undergrad—I’ve discovered I know jack shit about building one. And, no, I’m not dumb enough to think I can design a safe system on my own.
I wouldn’t dare.
I’ve purchased architectural designs for all the courses we will run—along with designs for a three-sided climbing wall. The challenge is getting the materials. For the high ropes course, you can use telephone poles, but it’s not like you can just run over to Lowe’s and pick up a dozen of them. Delivering a load like that requires an eighteen-wheeler flatbed, an oversize load, an approved delivery route, insurance, permits, waivers. The list goes on.
Once I can actually get them here, the rest of the job will be manageable. I hope. I’ve contracted with some guys who work for the city. They repair and replace telephone poles as part of their job. When the base poles are erected for the dual catwalk, the incline log, the lily pad lane, and the zipline, I can put up the standing platforms, the cabling, and the climbing cleats myself.
I’m mentally calculating when I could get myself into a harness to test out any of the courses when I spot Greta. And I freeze in my tracks.
She’s sitting on the edge of the dock, her feet stripped bare, her toes breaking the surface of the water as sunset turns the surface a rippling pool of gold.
All thoughts of rope course construction collapse like screws and nails never existed.
Damn. Why does she have to be so beautiful?
Somehow, I take my eyes off her profile long enough to notice the picnic blanket spread beneath her, the two ice chests nearby, and the two fishing poles leaning against one of the dock posts.
A painful squeeze seizes my heart.
She did this for me.
Out of friendship. Partnership.
Would she have done it if she knew how often I think of her? ExactlyhowI think of her?
Call it what it is, Rousseau. Lust. How you lust after her.
The chiding voice speaks against my ear, and I want to throttle it.
No.
No.
It’s not lust. Or it’s notsimplylust.
Hell, yes, I’m attracted to her. Greta is attractive. Empirically. Beautiful by any standard humankind could fathom.
But even if I were a blind man, she’d be interesting.
No, fascinating.
Magnetic.
I unfreeze my body and continue moving toward her, slower now, savoring this view of her without being seen.
