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“Hi.” Evie waved.
“Looks amazing.” She leaned over to Evie and said with a quieter voice, “Between you and me, I would never have suspected otherwise.”
Genesis was looking at me when she said it and winked. Evie giggled.
“My brother, especially,” Evie added.
“Hey,” I responded to their offensive attack.
They shared a laugh.
I peered up toward Charlee’s trailer apprehensively. “Is Charlee coming?”
“Oh, yeah, for sure. She’s just feeding Midnight. She’ll be right down.”
I shot her a concerned look, but I didn’t want to say what I was thinking in front of Evie.
“She’s fine,” Genesis reassured me.
After she voiced her concern about Charlee, I wasn’t thrilled about her being left alone. It was ridiculous, really, because Charlee was an adult, but her behavior since I met her made sense now. We had a valid reason for concern.
I went back to work on the fire, but I was struggling.
“May I?” Charlee asked.
I turned to her and smiled, happy to see she had joined us. “Please.” I gladly passed the lighter over to her.
As she took it from my hand, our fingers touched lightly, sending a familiar charge of energy through me. We exchanged a knowing glance and then she continued working on the fire, gathering paper plates from the stack Evie brought and tearing them up and scattering them around the base of the wood and restacking the wood into a more pyramid-like shape. She was a natural fire builder. She lit the pieces of plates and stepped back, watching the wood catch fire quickly. She moved with calm and ease and a confidence that I hadn’t seen before. Almost like she was at peace right now.
She handed back the lighter. “You’ve done this a few times,” I stated.
“Just a few.” She winked.
“Charlee was always in charge of building the fires after the first bonfire incident,” Genesis announced, smirking.
Evie’s eyes lit up. “Oh? What happened?”
Genesis exchanged a look with Charlee, who nodded approvingly.
Genesis continued with her story. “Well, these guys we were dating when we were teenagers put so much wood and lighter fluid on the damn thing, it caused a huge fireball. Everyone within a few feet of the fire got singed.”
“Oh, no! Was anyone hurt?” Evie inquired.
Charlee answered, “Most only lost some arm hair, but one of our friends was closer than the rest, and let’s just say he had a freshly shaven head the next day.”
The girls laughed. Charlee’s eyes glistened with joy under the glow of the setting sun. She was even more radiant when she smiled.
Charlee caught me adoring her, and she shyly looked away. When Evie started a conversation with Genesis, I took this as my opportunity to steal Charlee away.
“Do you want to take a walk?”
“Sure,” she said easily.
My heart was racing from my anxious nerves, and my palms were sweaty. I had slept with this woman twice now, yet she still made me shake like a little schoolboy in love. We walked in silence for a couple of minutes as we headed toward the cliffs and the sunset.
“It’s beautiful,” she said, referencing the sky.
“It is,” I agreed and then took in an anxious breath and exhaled lightly. “I need to tell you something.”
