“I feel like a cadaver dog sniffing for dead bodies,” I said indifferently. “This can’t be good for my lungs.”
“I can’t wait,” she carried on jubilantly, “to wake up to a morning fog caressing the giant trees and mountain ranges. To see long misty shadows flowing through the rocky rock formations and the mountainy mountains.”
“Rocky rocks and the mountainy mountains?” I said in a toneless voice. “Sound the alarms! Watch out, world, we’ve got a geologist right here. You know, instead of Gorillas in the Mist, you could be the breakout star of Geologist in the Mist with your superlative vocabulary.”
“Edric.” Her voice held a note of warning. “Do not ruin this for me right now, okay? Do me a solid and stop talking.”
“Or?”
“I will destroy all you hold dear.”
“Got it.” I winked at her and made a zipping motion over my mouth. “Not another word.”
“Good.”
After a quiet beat, I added. “You know, I’m just an inert object occupying the ether. Simply pretend that I’m not even her—.”
“Nyet,” she cut me off. “Zip it.”
And so for a time we hiked in silence, drinking in the sights and sounds of the forest. Not the smells, at least not for me. It was a steady hike through redwood groves and bushes bright with berries. I listened to frogs creaking in chorus and saw the occasional grasshoppers hop in front of me before disappearing into the thick ferns.
“Hey,” I said as the trail took us across a babbling creek. “Do you think there are bears around here?”
“I think so.” Lucy crossed over the shallow creek, stepping from one rock to another. “I believe black bears are on the move right now. They’re hungry after hibernating for the winter, but I’m not too worried.”
“You’re not?” I stepped onto a half-submerged log.
“Nope. If we came across a bear, it would eat you first, pinning you down and peeling you like a banana, giving me plenty of time to run away.”
“Why me?” I walked across the log, making small balance corrections along the way. “Why would the bear eat me first?”
“Um, you’re like an edible bear snack.” She looked on as I skidded across the log, showing off my superb balancing skills.
“Look at me,” I said. “I could probably crush the American Ninja Warrior obstacle course.”
“I am looking at you and all I see is an animated bear snack, bobbing along the creek.”
The log dipped under my weight. “I’m strong, agile, and quick on my feet, so I’m pretty sure a bear would eat you first.”
Sighing, she shook her head slowly “You really are clueless.”
“Huh?” I began to roll the log with my feet, backward, then forward. “What are you talking about?”
“Hiking in bear country.”
“What about?”
“Bears are attracted to strong odors. And you, my friend, have sprayed cologne on every inch of your body.”
“It’s just body spray.” I vaulted off the log and scaled up the embankment to join her on the other side.
“Same thing.” Her eyebrows lowered ominously. “Two words: bear snack.”
A shiver ran up my spine. “You know what? I heard that loud noises keep away curious predators. So if I make a shit-ton of noise, I’ll be just fine.”
As we wandered through the landscape of towering giants, lush ferns, and thick vegetation, I yelled out, “NO BEAR!” at regular intervals, which equated to about every ten seconds.
Lucy stopped to admire the rhododendrons sprinkled across the forest floor. “Look at these pink flowers,” she gushed. “Aren’t they so pretty?”
“NO BEAR!”
A flicker of amusement passed across her face. “You really are special.”
I remained hyper-alert as we moved through the forest. Each crack of a twig underfoot, each brush of a branch snagging my arm, even the rustle of leaves in the wind—it set my teeth on edge.
Cupping both hands around my mouth, I shouted, “NO BEAR,” letting my voice carry out into the forest like a blast from an air horn.
I imagined my call traveling far and wide, rolling and echoing through the trees and creeks, a loud warning to all black bears to stay away.
“Edric.” The reproof in her voice was mild, but it was there. “That’s not going to stop a mountain lion from attacking you.”
I froze in my tracks. “Wait, what? There are mountain lions out here?”
“You know how you can tell if a mountain lion is nearby?” She walked ahead and tossed a glance over her shoulder.
“How?”
Looking me dead in the eye, she said, “When you’re trying to rip it off your back.”
I gulped. “Are you being serious now?”
“Deadly.” She let a slow, ominous grin slide across her face. “Mountain lions are stealthy predators. They lie in wait for prey and they will silently stalk you before pouncing on you from behind, delivering a lethal bite to your spinal cord before ripping your spleen out of your body with their massive claws.” After a charged pause, she said, “Mountain lions will definitely kill you dead.”
With my mouth agape, my blood pressure went shooting through the stratosphere and that was when Lucy completely lost her shit.
“Oh, my stars.” Tears of laughter began streaming down her cheeks. “You should see the look on your face right now. It’s making me puma pants.” She was in stitches now, cracking herself up and dissolving into a spasm of giggles. “Because pumas are mountain lions. Get itttttttttt?”
“Stop fucking with my head.” A muscle ticked in my jaw as my ego plummeted to the subterranean floor. “And next time, do me a solid and leave the dad jokes to me.”
“Oh, Edric.” She continued to cry-laugh, wiping tears from her eyes. “That was priceless. You were hustled, scammed, hoodwinked, bamboozled, and led astray.”
I shook my head slowly. “You did not just quote Ja Rule at me.”
“I... I... di—did.” She stuttered and snorted at the same time. “You looked like you tore your sphincter and shat out half your body weight.”
Stone-faced, I cut her a look that said, I am not amused.
“You were so scared.”
In reply, I squared my shoulders, puffed out my chest and roared like I had balls made of fuckin’ steel. When in truth, I would’ve probably regressed to the state of a little boy had a puma pounced on me.
“What are you doing?” She looked at me askance as I used my arms like a swinging machete. “Who are you right now?”
“I’m Steve Irwin, mate.” I cut through the brush with my bare hands, whacking away at the tall ferns that stood in our path. “I have no fear of the wildlife.”
“Err... Steve Irwin is dead. A stingray killed him dead. Just like a mountain lion would kill you dead.”
“Lucy.”
“Yes?”
“Please stop saying ‘kill you dead’”
“Kill you dead.”
“Nyet!” I went on swinging my arms like a machete, hacking through the towering ferns. “Zip it!”
“Aren’t your arms getting tired yet?” she remarked lightly.
“Naw.” I grunted.
“I’m pretty impressed, dude. My arms get exhausted from putting on a scrunchie.”
“NO BEAR!” I karate-chopped a giant fern.
Abruptly, Lucy let out a shriek unlike anything I had heard before.
I didn’t even flinch. “Was that supposed to sound like a mountain lion?”
“Hah!” She gave a short, hiccupping laugh. “Did it scare you?”
“It sounded like a dying walrus.”
“So... no?”
“No.”
The trail switched back and forth through a concentration of ferns and huge spidery-shaped maples with moss-covered branches reaching out in all directions. At last, we burst through the thicket into a sunlit clearing to behold a grove of old-growth redwoods.
“Noooicceeee
e,” Lucy pronounced. “This is perfect. We’re in a real life Bob Ross painting.”
“Well said, Lucy.”
“Well fuckin’ said,” she agreed, patting herself on the back—quite literally.
I walked to the edge of the clearing to an area that was flat and free of sharp foliage. “Let’s camp over here.” I slid my backpack off my shoulders.
“Okay.” Lucy stood with her hands on her hips and lifted her chin at me. “I’ll help you pitch the tent before it gets dark.”
“Nah,” I said with an air of machismo. “I got this.” Dropping down to a crouch, I unzipped my backpack and dug out the tent and the stakes. “We make a pretty good team out here in the wilderness, wouldn’t you say? I’m the shelter-builder and you can be the hunter-gatherer.”
“I don’t want to be the hunter-gatherer,” she grumbled. “I’d rather be the stay-at-home cavewoman.”
“Too late,” I said. “I already called dibs.”
As I began unfolding the tent and then rolling it out on the ground, Lucy sent me a quizzical look. “Where are the poles?”
“What poles?”
“Mother of God.” She winced a little and slapped her forehead. “You forgot the freakin’ poles!”
“Oh... heh heh heh.” I wore a sheepish grin. “No wonder my backpack felt light as a feather.”
“Pfft!” She huffed out a sigh of frustration. “Well, we can forget about sleeping in a tent tonight. We’ve got no shelter now, which leaves us exposed to a slew of harsh elements. Water. Earth. Air. Fire.”
“Ah, don’t sweat it.” I made a dismissive gesture. “This just means we have to sleep closer to the campfire. And we get to sleep under the stars. How romantic is that?”
“So romantic.” A ragged sigh deflated her chest. “I guess I can rough it out and brave the elements. Hopefully, we won’t fall prey to the wild beasts that wish to devour us.”
“We’ll be fine,” I said, foraging for firewood. “And quit talking about wild beasts.”
To take my mind off of bear attacks and mauling mountain lions, I kept my eyes trained on Lucy as she went about gathering broken branches and chunks of downed wood not far from our campsite.
Each time she bent over, the tightly stretched fabric showed off... well, pretty much everything.
Taking a deep breath, I placed my right hand over my heart and said, “God bless this country for skintight athletic wear.”
She looked over her shoulder briefly and treated me to one of her wide, sunny smiles. “God can bless Kate Hudson for these Fabletics.”
Speechless, I stood rooted to the spot, drinking in her tempting curves as she bent over to pick up another branch. Those leggings hugged her body real tight, the fabric so thin, so sheer I could clearly see her ass cheeks.
Damn. I sucked in a breath. Dat ass is a peach emoji, for real. So ripe, so juicy, so—
Lucy looked over her shoulder and caught me drooling. Her lips tipped into a flirtatious grin and she began squatting each time she picked something up.
And she continued in this eternal rhythm...
Standing upright, then squatting real low.
Standing upright, then squatting real low.
Again and again, she’d stick her butt out, flexing those pelvic muscles and working those inner thighs.
That cheeky little minx.
She knew exactly what she was doing to me. If she kept this up, I was going to cum in my pants.
Mid-squat, she caught and held my gaze, looking at once impish and innocent. Ever so slowly, her lips fell apart, plump and pink, and she moistened them with her tongue.
It caused a spiral of heat to surge straight to my groin.
Why are you tempting me, Mata Hari? You are an agent of seduction.
Staring at me with drowsy lust, she watched my reaction, mesmerizing me with her heated stare as she popped her booty in a low squat and twerked those perfectly round, juicy glutes.
At once, my cock leapt like an overly excited goat. “Lucy,” I gritted out. “I’m ready to be teleported to the next realm where only squatting peaches exist.” I swallowed with a dry throat, striving for composure. “Squatting peaches in skintight athletic wear.”
Her lips formed a small smile. “It’s called athleisure.”
“Ath-lei-sure,” I repeated slowly, just so I had something to say while I openly stared. “What a ridiculously nonsensical made-up word.”
“Says you.”
“They already have a name for it and it’s called athletic wear. Or active wear.” I shrugged. “But I guess that’s just too pedestrian and dull for some people.”
“Athleisure is a growing trend,” she quipped. “Who doesn’t like gym-to-office wear? Oh, and close your mouth, Edric, or a mosquito might swoop in. Haven’t you heard that mosquitoes are to blame for the spread of flesh-eating bacteria?”
I snapped my mouth shut.
Gathering up all the dry wood in her arms, she said decisively, “I think I’ve got enough wood.”
“That’s what she said.” I laughed. “I have enough wood, too. In my pants.”
“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that,” she said, shuffling over and dumping all the dead wood in a heaping pile at my feet. “Build me a fire, slave.”
“Stop calling me ‘slave.’”
“What should I call you instead? A caveman? I can crack a caveman joke right now and I’ll bet it’ll be pre-hysterical.” She cackled loudly.
I looked at her as if she had just gone mad. Perhaps she had. “I’m still waiting for the punchline.”
“That was it.”
“Oh.”
“What?” she asked. “What?”
“You really need to stop with the dad jokes. You’re embarrassing yourself.”
“C’mon now—pre-hysterical? That was a good one. Admit it.”
“Err...” I cringed. “If you say so.”
“You think you can do better?” Her voice held a challenge.
“I do.”
“Then hit me a with a caveman joke.”
“Baby,” I deadpanned. “Do you really want to know why they call me homo erectus?”
“Ew. Ewwwwwwww,” she shrieked and now it was her turn to cringe. “Stop it now and I’ll stop.”
“Deal,” I said. “Let’s build a fire.”
We started digging a fire pit and making a circle with rocks. Then Lucy stacked some tinder in the pit while I made a teepee configuration around it, starting with the smaller sticks and working up to the larger ones, leaving a little gap so I could light the tinder.
When that was done, I rummaged through my backpack for matches.
Lucy watched me. “I hope you didn’t forget the matches like you forgot the tent poles.”
“Got ’em right here,” I said as my hand found the box of matches. “Now just you wait and see, this is gonna be the most epic fire ever.”
“Mmmmmmkay.”
“And God said...” I struck a match against the box, watched it ignite and tossed it into the pit and yelled, “Let there be perfection!” as the tinder caught fire.
“Err, that was pretty weak.” Lucy added kindling to my puny fire until she had a solid bed of embers and flames going. “I’ll take care of the fire. You go get dinner ready.”
“Yes, boss.”
While Lucy busied herself with the campfire, I shook out a large blanket and laid it on the ground. Then I went about arranging the cheese platter, along with some cut-up fruit and a basket of croissants.
Lucy sat down just as I was pouring myself some wine. “Is that for me?” she asked.
“Yep.” I handed her the metal goblet and poured myself another one. “What do you think?”
“Very medieval.”
“I meant the wine, not the goblet.”
“Oh.” She raised the goblet to her lips and nodded with approval. “Not too overpowering.”
“Good,” I said. “I think it should pair well with the cheese.”
“Oh, m
y word!” Her eyes widened with surprise when she took in the dazzling assortment of cheese. “I see Gouda! And Brie and cheddar and Havarti. Camembert, asiago, fontina, and blue cheese. Gorgonzola and Gruyère, too. Ahh... even some Pecorino-Romano and Parmigiano-Reggiano. Bellissima!” She clasped her hands together and held them over her heart. “Edric, this is wonderful!”
“Ehhh.” I shrugged, brushing it off like it was no big deal. “This is nothing.”
Lucy waved my words aside. “This is not nothing. It’s like Christmas, only better.” She popped a slice of Brie into her mouth and moaned softly, the sound both breathy and arousing in ways it shouldn’t have been.
“Aren’t you gonna eat?”
“Yeah,” I said too quickly, and grabbed a croissant.
“When I get married someday, I want my engagement ring to be a wheel of cheese.”
My mouth twitched at the corners. “Why am I not surprised?”
For a little while, we ate in silence and Lucy remained quiet, too, as if sensing my silence was not from lack of conversation.
Her eyes roamed my face as if she were reading my thoughts, or wanted to. “You’re still worried about the mountain lions, aren’t you?”
“How can you tell?”
“The lines of tension in your shoulders.” She began to rub small circles on my back. “Well, if you ever encounter a big cat, you should never run. Face the cougar, speak firmly and slowly back away. You want to appear as large as possible—stand on a rock, or a stump, and open your jacket wide.”
“I don’t have a jacket.”
“Your vest, then. The idea is to convince the cougar that you’re not prey but a danger to it. As a general rule, if it’s a mountain lion or a bear, you fight. If it’s a grizzly, you don’t. And if it’s a crocodile, you cover its eyes.”
I squinted, confused. “Cover its eyes?”
“Correct. That will usually make the crocodile more sedate.”
“Yes, Lucy.” I flattened my voice. “I’m sure these redwood forests are just teeming with crocodiles. And when you say covering its eyes usually makes it more sedate, it implies that sometimes it doesn’t. It actually makes the croc kind of crazy.”
The Good Mistake (Hemsworth Brothers #3) Page 22
