Page 12 of Summer Camp with the Mountain Man

I don’t feel forgotten or underappreciated.

I’m right where I belong, with the kind of woman I didn’t think existed.

I don’t know what tomorrow brings, but I know today makes all my yesterdays worth it.

SIX

Rayne

Is it normal to be so smitten with someone you just met?

Asking for a friend, I don’t get smitten. The closest I’ve been was with this absolutely delectable cinnamon raisin bagel. It’s discontinued now but when we were still seeing each other, it was a match made in heaven.

Cade is my cinnamon raisin bagel. He’s funny and smart, rugged yet refined, interesting in a way that makes me want to get my doctorate in him. It doesn’t hurt that he’s strong and handsome and smells like he sleeps in a cedar closet. He’s sweet and considerate. But I think what draws me to him more than anything else is the fact that he’s misunderstood and underappreciated.

I’ve never really fit in anywhere and if I did, it wasn’t somewhere I wanted to be. But right here, snuggled up against his arm, I fit perfectly. I’ve always been a square peg trying to fit in a round hole. Except I’m less of a square and more of a dodecahedron and I swear Cade already sees all the different sides of me.

I’ve been the weird one. The smart one. The funny one. The fat one. The skinny one. I’m not a yo-yo dieter, it just depends which group of friends I’m around. I’ve been labeled so many things, most of them true, but most people only see one of them at a time. How could I not want to be around someone who sees all of them at once?

He doesn’t bat an eye when I make comments considered by some to be off the wall. Cade just goes along with it. He doesn’t look at me like I’m nothing more than a goofball, I know because sometimes I catch him checking me out. It makes me feel like an ice cream cone on a hot day, about to dribble down his hand, so he eyes me intently before darting out his tongue and swiping it along…

What were we talking about? Right, somehow, even when he’s staring, he still catches every absurd thing that comes out of my mouth.

“Is that sunlight on the horizon?” he asks in that sexy voice of his, melted butter being poured over an amethyst geode.

“Oh my god, did we just spend the whole night talking on the pier?”

“I want to say no, it’s only been an hour, tops, but my tailbone says otherwise. The lines from this bench will be permanently tattooed on my ass. Do you think George noticed you were gone?”

“He knew I wasn’t coming back tonight. Last night I had to go to his tent because everyone was around the campfire late, not only did he try to seduce me, he farted while doing it. Yep, lifted his leg and ripped one while explaining in intimate detail how he could rock my world.”

“And they wondered how I could possibly think his fiancée was imaginary. You didn’t slap him, did you? Because he’s been known to pay ladies of the night to do that.”

“Why am I not surprised? No, I tried to fart back but it’s not a skill I can call upon on demand, so I just made a strained grunty face and left. But when I emptied the trash, I found a nice big fresh turd from Sir Charles the Fourth, I dropped that off outside his tent door in the night. Don’t worry, Charles is a raccoon, not royalty, it’s not as weird as it sounds.”

“That’s perfect.” His laugh is comfortable and inviting, so sincere I can’t help but join in. “George hates animals.”

“He what?” I squeal, nearly choking on the words.

“Yep, he hates ’em all and everything about them. Especially when they poop in inconvenient locations, like his windshield. I once saw him try to strangle a blue jay for unloading on his freshly washed car. I’m sure he was fuming.”

Laughing with Cade feels like walking on a cloud in moonshoes. I don’t want tonight to end but I guess if the sun’s coming up, it’s too late to find a shooting star to wish on.

“We should probably get back before someone notices we’re gone.” The lament in his voice makes me feel like the most important person in the world. “Can I walk you to the campground?”

“Uh huh,” I nod, eager to spend any second I can with him, even though it’ll be somewhat inconvenient when I have to turn around and march back to the pier to get my car. I drove here when I realized how late I was, hoping he didn’t give up on me.

Walking hand in hand down the dock is dangerous, anyone could see us, anyone insane enough to be up at this ungodly hour, but it feels too right to let go. We’ll wait for it to happen naturally, when my palm gets so clammy he slips right out of it.

My brain isn’t nervous around Cade but my body’s climbing an electrical fence in a thunderstorm with a kite tied around each nipple. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with these feelings. Is this what my teacher friends mean when they say they need to get laid and let off some steam? If so then I’m a nuclear reactor ready to blow.

His hand is monstrous around mine, and so strong I catch him releasing his grip gently from time to time so he doesn’t turn my hand into the dust at the bottom of a box of Mini Wheats. The muscles in his arm flex beneath his tight t-shirt, and I swear every time our arms swing his pecs jump like they’re dancing to my elevated heartbeat.

I want him to manhandle me, spread me like soft butter on a hot biscuit and melt into me. How am I supposed to think about anything other than letting Cade defile me in ways my body will never recover from?

Does my pulse always sound so loud in my ears? Are they vibrating? And my saliva, good lord, it’s like someone won’t lay off the button at the water fountain. I may as well be swallowing water balloons.

Crap, he asked me something and I couldn’t hear him over all the horny. And now I’m just staring at him blankly, hoping my throat cooperates so I don’t drool when I finally figure out what to say.