Falling for the Groomsman

by Diane Alberts

  “I’m a dumbass.” He caught her by surprise, sweeping her into his arms again. “You can’t walk there on your own. Let me help you.”

  She should probably protest and assert her independence…but she didn’t feel like it. It was freaking scary out here in the dark. Maybe in the morning she’d be all independent and fiery again. “If you think I’m letting you watch me pee, you’re mistaken. I’m not that kind of girl,” she said, her hands on his chest.

  His laughter rumbled under her palms. “I have no intention of watching you pee, but it’s good to know you don’t have any weird fetishes. I’ll drop you off and come back once we’re both done. Just stay here and wait for me.”

  “Okay.”

  He set her down and headed back the way he came. She glowered at the forest floor before forcing herself to take care of business. Once she finished, she moved as far away as her gimpy leg would let her and braced herself against a tree. This was so not how she’d envisioned this week going, thank you very much.

  She was supposed to have fun and let loose with some men she’d never see again. Cross items off her list, and move on to the next one when she was finished. The thought of moving on from Tyler didn’t fill her with joy as it previously did, though.

  Instead, it felt…wrong. Just wrong.

  What if screwing him didn’t get him out of her system? What if it only let him worm in even deeper, and he never let go? What if she was never free? Even now, as she panicked over how strong of a hold he had over her…she wanted more. Wanted him.

  He was like a drug, and she needed another hit.

  She leaned against a tree and waited for him to come back. She felt ridiculous standing in the middle of the woods hugging a roll of toilet paper to her chest. And oh so vulnerable, too. What if a bear came at her? How would she protect herself? Throw a roll of toilet paper at it? Yeah. Because that would help.

  The mental image of her pelting a bear in the nose with a roll of Charmin made her snort. A twig snapped behind her, and she jumped. She licked her lips. “Tyler?” she croaked, half expecting a gigantic beast to come out from the darkness instead of the man who plagued her thoughts nonstop. “Is that you?”

  “Yeah.” He appeared from the shadows, and she wanted to fling herself at him and thank him for being there. But she didn’t. She’d already crossed too many lines. She wouldn’t cross another. She couldn’t allow any more contact that wasn’t strictly sexual. It wasn’t on her list. “Hold out your hands for me.”

  “Um…okay.”

  She adjusted the toilet paper and held her hands out. He squirted hand sanitizer on her hands and did the same to his. As they cleaned up, she watched him watch her. “How’s your back feeling?” he asked.

  “A lot better than my ankle and my pride.” She rubbed her hands together some more, even though the sanitizer was dry. “Thanks for taking care of me.”

  “It’s ingrained in me.” He lifted a shoulder. “Scrapes like that should be cleaned out right away to stave off infection. You can never be too safe.”

  “Well, you did your doctoral duty.” She swiped a stray hair out of her face. “I haven’t succumbed to malaria or typhoid or hay fever yet.”

  He laughed, his eyes lighting up. He needed to do that more often. What would he be like it he didn’t carry the weight of the world on his shoulders? She kind of wanted to find out. “Hay fever? Seriously?”

  “Sure. Why not?” She rubbed her hands together, trying to warm them up and failing. “God. It’s not supposed to be this cold in June, is it?”

  “At night? Yeah.” He tucked the sanitizer into his pocket, grabbed her hands, and blew his hot breath on them. His lips touched her wrist, placing a fleeting kiss over her pulse, and he looked up at her. “Better?”

  “Y-Yes,” she said, her voice wobbling. She was scorching hot now, thanks to him. “What do we now?”

  He didn’t drop her hands, but kept them pressed in between his. “Now you need to eat while I set a fire to keep you warm. Then you sleep.”

  “And you?”

  He lifted a shoulder. “I’m not worried about me.”

  Typical. “I am.”

  “Well, don’t be,” he said, bending down and sweeping her into his arms. “I’m not the injured one.”

  “I’m not so sure about that.” She looked up into his bright-green eyes, wishing she could see the man behind the actions. He shouldn’t be so hard to read. “I think your injuries are just hidden better than mine.”

  Where the heck had that come from? Since when did she care?

  He averted his eyes and stared straight forward. His jaw worked, and his fingers flexed on her. “What makes you think I have injuries? I don’t.”

  “We all do. It’s just a matter of what kind, and how deep they cut.”

  He stared out into the woods, not moving a muscle. “Are you going all investigative journalist on me? Trying to figure me out?”

  She fell silent, not sure if she should continue in this getting-to-know-you type of vein. It would only make walking away from him harder in the end. But there was so much she wanted to know about him. So much she needed to figure out still. Maybe, for one night, she could forget about everything else and just…be with him.

  When he lowered her onto the sleeping bag, she slid inside it and met his eyes. “Maybe. I won’t lie, I want to know more about what makes you tick.”

  “I don’t know why. I’m pretty simple to figure out.” He squatted at her feet, his eyes on her. “But go ahead. Ask me something if you want. I’ll answer.”

  She swallowed hard, but didn’t drop her gaze. “What’s new with your life? Anything exciting going on?”

  “That’s all you’ve got?” He blinked at her, the mockery clear in his voice. “I thought for sure you’d ask me something about my dark and stormy past to prove that your theory that I’m broken is correct.”

  She shook her head. “I think we talked about the past enough, don’t you?”

  “I suppose we have.” He cleared his throat. “I got a job in Portland. Now that I’ve been offered the position as chief, I’ll stay there for, well, maybe forever…if I can stand the domesticity of living in the good ol’ USA. I’ll still go overseas every once in a while, but I’ll be here more than there, if that makes sense.”

  She pictured her favorite show, Grey’s Anatomy. If she were completely honest with herself, she’d admit she watched it because it reminded her of Tyler. But she didn’t like being honest with herself when it came to Tyler. It was too real. “Wow, that’s great. You must work crazy hours, huh? Like Dr. McDreamy and Meredith Grey, on Grey’s?”

  “Yeah, it’s even worse than you see on TV.” His fingers flexed on his knees. “But we don’t have sex in the on-call rooms. We just snore, drool, and sleep.”

  She bit down on her lip. Without even trying, she could totally picture him stripping some hot nurse’s scrubs off, and she kind of wanted to stab her eyes out. “My hours aren’t quite so hectic as all that.”

  He averted his eyes. “Do you…date much?”

  “Not really.” More like, hardly ever. None of the men she met interested her. Not like him. She bit her tongue. “Just here and there. Like I said, not much going on in the love department for me.”

  He flexed his jaw. “I’m not going to lie. I like that answer, for selfish reasons. I don’t like sharing what’s mine.”

  “I’m not yours.” She laughed. “I haven’t seen you in years.”

  “I know that all too well.” He glanced down at the forest floor, his shoulders tense. “I hear you have a new roommate now that Kady’s with Colt?”

  “Yeah. She’s awful.” She hesitated. “I don’t know why I followed Kady out here in the first place, besides out of habit, but it’s time to live alone. To have my own place. I already told my roommate I was leaving once I get back.”

  She declined to mention the fact that she was moving to Maine, but it didn’t matter anyway. It didn’t change a thing between the
m at all.

  “Is this the first time you’ll be alone?”

  “Yeah.” She glanced away, her cheeks heating. “At first I didn’t want to live by myself because it made me miss my parents too much. I got used to having Kady around, so we moved in together out of college, too. But now…”

  “She’s getting married.”

  “Yeah.” She lifted a hand and let it fall back to her lap. “And I’m stuck with the roommate from hell. She hasn’t paid her portion of the electric bill in three months. And she took my favorite nail polish, and denied it.”

  He leaned closer and closed his fingers over hers, squeezing. “She sounds like pure evil.”

  “She really is,” she said, laughing. “It’s time for me to go it alone, for once. I didn’t think I would be, but I’m excited.”

  His eyes latched onto hers, understanding shining from within their green depths. “I definitely get that, more than you’d think. It’s why I left the States. I needed to be on my own. Have no one waiting on me…needing me…you know? Be free.”

  “I know.” She met his eyes and held her breath. “I get it.”

  And she totally did.

  He held her gaze, neither one of them moving for a while. “Good.”

  She knew what just happened there. She hadn’t misunderstood the weight behind those words. He’d been explaining why he left, and she really did get it. They’d been so young back then. What had she expected from him? A proposal?

  That would have been a disaster.

  He looked down at his lap before handing her a protein bar. Once she took it, he stood up and stalked toward the shadows with a flashlight in his hand. “Stay there. I’ll be right back.”

  Her heart faltered. “Where are you going?”

  “To collect firewood.”

  As he disappeared into the shadows, she nibbled on the protein bar. He’d left four on the sleeping bag, but she planned on eating one. He needed to eat, too, and who knew how long it would take for them to find their way back to the resort? No matter how hungry she was she had to control her portions as best as possible.

  As the time passed, and she was left feeling even more alone than when she’d been in the trees, she fidgeted with the empty wrapper. Tyler’s backpack rested a few feet away, so she dragged it over and pulled out the other flashlight. After turning it on, she shone it into the shadows to search for any signs of movement. Nothing.

  No bears. No wolves. No bigfoot. He lived in the forest, right? At least she didn’t have to worry about the abominable snowman or the Loch Ness monster.

  Her heart sped up with each passing minute, but she didn’t know what she was worried for. It’s not like Tyler would leave her out here alone to die or something. But…he could have fallen down a cliff or gotten eaten by a bear…

  Why did all of her thoughts end with someone getting eaten by a bear?

  She swallowed the rising panic and shone the flashlight into the backpack. What else was in his bag, anyway? That’s just the distraction she needed. Placing the flashlight in between her teeth, she dug around a little bit. There was a handful of condoms in blue wrappers, a few more protein bars, a thermos, and…a bottle of vodka.

  Damn, he’d been holding out on her. She pulled out the liquor and undid the lid. This should warm her right up. As she lifted it to her lips, a twig snapped behind her.

  She spun and shone the flashlight in that direction—right into Tyler’s eyes. He flinched and squeezed them shut. “Jesus, Christine. Can you remove the spotlight, please? I can’t see a damn thing with that shining in my eyes.”

  “Oh. Sorry.” She shone the flashlight toward the middle of the clearing instead, watching as he made his way there and arranged the logs and sticks in his hands. “So…vodka and condoms. Is that standard Boy Scout fare?”

  “No.” He looked over his shoulder at her. “I’d been planning on maybe camping out here today. The vodka was my company.”

  Interesting. “And the condoms…?”

  “Left over from an excursion in Africa.” When she opened her mouth, he held up a hand. “No, not an orgy. I was giving them out to teenagers to try to help prevent the spread of STDs. That’s all.”

  “Hmm.” Every time he told her something he did, she admired him more. She lifted the bottle to her mouth and took a tentative sip. “How long were you in Africa?”

  “A year.” He looked up at her. “Then I went to Brazil for six months. I just came back from there.”

  “Business or pleasure?”

  He set twigs up on the ground. “Business. Always business. But I tend to stay in whatever country I’m in for a week after my assignment is over for pleasure.”

  Jealousy hit her with its big, ugly, sharp green nails. “What kind of pleasure? Do you have a woman in love with you in every country?”

  He snorted. “No.”

  “Then what do you do?”

  “Skydive. Bungee jump. Hike.” He glanced her way. She wished she could make out his expression. “Basically, if it can kill me? I love doing it. Probably why I’m addicted to you.”

  She swallowed hard. Jeez, maybe now she preferred him sleeping his way around the freaking world. At least it wouldn’t kill him. Time to change the subject. What had they been talking about? Oh. Right. His alone time in the woods. “Sorry I interrupted your man time.”

  He chuckled and piled a bunch of sticks on top of one another. “I think I’ll survive. I happen to like my present company.”

  Her cheeks heated. Was she actually blushing because he said he liked her? Holy crap. She was a goner. Silently, she watched him pile more and more wood on top of the pile, seeming for all the world as if he knew what he was doing. “What do you have to do to start a fire? Rub two sticks together or something? Bang some rocks against each other?”

  He laughed and reached into his pocket. “Sure. Or you could use a lighter and some dry kindling.”

  Her cheeks got even hotter. “That works, too,” she said, nodding as if she had a clue what he was talking about. She so didn’t. “Once you get that going, you need to eat.”

  “I will once I’m ready,” he answered dismissively. He piled a bunch of dry leaves in a heap, and held his lighter beneath those. Smoke rose from the bottom, and he picked up some more leaves, turning them in his hand until they were aflame. “You can eat some more though.”

  “No, thank you.”

  He didn’t look at her, just kept feeding leaves to the fire. After a little while, he tossed a few small twigs in, adjusting where needed. Seeing him working like that, making a fire in the middle of nowhere while she huddled in his sleeping bag, made her realize how resourceful it was.

  And it turned her on. She couldn’t help it.

  His competence out here in the wild was hot.

  Something about watching him make fire with his hands made her all warm inside. Or maybe it was the vodka. She shrugged and took another swig. Either way, she wanted him more than she should. “It’s only a matter of time ’til they notice we’re missing. Worst case, I’m supposed to meet Kady for a workout session at seven tomorrow morning.”

  He nodded. After a few more minutes of adjusting, Tyler sank back on his heels. “I think we’re good now.”

  She pressed the lip of the vodka bottle to her mouth. “Looks good. I can feel it already.”

  “You need to come closer to the heat. It won’t bite.” He grabbed a hold of the bottom of the sleeping bag and dragged her across the clearing. “But I might.”

  She let out a squeal and clung to the bottle. As soon as she was within reach, he snatched it out of her hands and took a hit. Swiping the back of his hand over his lips, he eyed her. She fluttered her lashes at him. “I don’t mind it when you do it.”

  “Yeah.” He took another swig and handed it back. “I know that, too.”

  “You think know everything, don’t you?”

  He shook his head, studying her in the firelight. “About some things? Sure. But I don’t know enough abou
t the things that matter.”

  Oh, God. He was talking about her, wasn’t he? Her heart picked up speed and raced off into the shadowy woods. Swallowing hard, she peeled the corner of the sleeping bag back. “This thing is big. I bet we can both fit. Climb in.”

  “Yeah, I don’t think so.” He eyed her as if he wanted to take her up on his offer, but he looked away and held his hands out to the fire. “I’ll be good out here. You stay warm.”

  She knew what he was doing. He was always so worried about everyone else’s safety and comfort that he never stopped to care for his own. If he got in, she might be cramped. So…he wouldn’t. Well, with her, that wouldn’t fly. “You’ll get in the sleeping bag, or I’ll refuse to stay in it.”

  “You wouldn’t.” He turned to her and scanned her face. “You’d freeze your pretty little ass off. An ass I happen to love.”

  “You better save it. Either we’re both comfortable, or we’re both cold. It’s that simple.”

  “There’s no way we’ll both fit in there, Red,” he said, his voice low. “We’d be plastered to each other all night long, unable to move a single limb. I could kick your ankle and hurt you again. It’s not happening.”

  “I can handle that risk.” She tipped the edge back more. “Can you? Or are you scared?”

  He raised a brow. “Do I look like I get fucking scared to you?”

  “Prove it. Get in.”

  “Why do you care so much?” He dragged a hand through his hair with a quick motion. “I told you not to worry about me.”

  “You’re always so busy seeing to everyone else’s comfort.” She cocked her head to the side. “Who worries about you?”

  “No one, but I don’t need anyone to.”

  “Yes, you, do,” she said, holding his gaze. “We all do, sometimes. Get. In.”

  He took a deep breath, mumbled something under his breath, and crawled up to her. After handing her the bottle, he slid inside. He was right. They were glued to each another, from head to toe. Or more like from head to calf, since her toes reached halfway down his leg. “There. Happy now?”