Chaos Theory (Nerds of Paradise #2)(44)

He fought to ignore the softness of her body pressing against his, the sweetness of her sleepy, cheerful tone, the allure of her not-quite-as-flowery-as-before scent. He took off his glasses, hoping that if he couldn’t see her clearly she wouldn’t have as much of an effect on him. No such luck.

“There’s no point in reinventing the wheel or rediscovering territory that’s already been mapped out,” he said. “And before you tease me about it, yes, rules are there because someone already figured out the best way to do things, and they should be followed so that everything doesn’t fall apart.”

“Yes, Dad,” she chuckled.

In an instant, every rush of desire, every hint of tenderness that had stretched its warm fingers toward him was shut down, cut off. He was not his father.

She must have felt his body harden, and not in the way she was probably expecting. “What?” she asked, trying to prop herself on one arm, but being constrained by the sleeping bags.

“Nothing,” he clipped, then flipped to his side, facing away from her. “Go to sleep.”

He zipped the bag up the rest of the way, enclosing them in a nylon cocoon together. She didn’t say anything, but he could feel her pounding questions. As quickly as he could, he found a comfortable position and closed his eyes, although he didn’t expect to sleep.





Chapter Twelve





Well, she’d really stepped in it. That was the last thought Melody had before she fell asleep, her back pressed up against Will’s instead of snuggled in his arms, the way she’d hoped to be. It was the first thought that met her when she woke up the next morning, her nose nearly frozen through. At least the rest of her was warm.

Without opening her eyes, she rolled to her other side, facing Will and burying her face against the warm crook of his shoulder. He flinched when her nose touched his skin, belying that he was awake.

“It’s cold,” she muttered, throwing caution to the wind and snaking one arm over his side to hug him close.

He didn’t answer, didn’t move. His chest rose and fell slowly. Maybe he was still asleep after all. That was fine as far as she was concerned. She snuggled closer to him, warming up nicely.

But that didn’t change the fact that she’d stepped in it. Royally. She shouldn’t have called Will “Dad.” She shouldn’t have skated anywhere near that sensitive subject. The man had daddy issues for days, and she’d just made it worse. Granted, he really needed to deal with those issues if he was going to grow as a person. Maybe there was some way she could help that process along, by getting him to talk about his father more or share some experiences from his childhood. He couldn’t go on the way he was.

“What the—”

Melody was jolted out of the sleep her thoughts had lulled her into as Will jerked. He started to squirm and fight with the sleeping bag, probably looking for the zipper. For half a second, Melody was hurt by his rush to get away from her as fast as possible, until she realized that wasn’t what he was doing.

He found the zipper and freed them from the sleeping bags, grabbed his glasses, then scrambled to his knees. Melody lifted herself on one arm, shivering against the blast of cold that hit her. Then she noticed.

Their backpacks had been dragged out of the lean-to and opened. The contents were spilled across the muddy ground. All of the tools and clothing, first-aid kit, and smaller pouches of random useful items lay scattered around their camp.

“What happened?” Melody scrambled out of the sleeping bag and put her icy-cold, damp boots on. It was one of the most miserable sensations she’d ever felt, but she had no choice.

Will had shoved his feet into his boots and stood without tying them. He marched out past the edge of the lean-to and picked up the mostly-empty husk of his backpack, checking the inside. By the time Melody pushed herself up and fetched her own empty backpack, Will had begun gathering their scattered supplies and lining them up next to their washed-out campfire.

“The food is all gone,” he said, scowling at their muddy spare clothes, which were now all soaked.

“The food?” Melody brought her multi-tool and the plastic box where she’d put the camera and waterproof matches to the lean-to, lining them up with the rest of their things.

“Yep.” Will looked around, searching for anything left scattered across the forest. “And all of the water containers that we didn’t have with us in the lean-to.”

Melody glanced into the far end of their shelter where the sleeping bags formed a rumpled pile. There were two bottles half-filled with water tucked into the corner. Neither of them were the big camel bags that held a day’s supply. “What the heck?” she sighed, running a hand through her hair. It was beyond tangled after two nights in the wilderness without moisturizing shampoo, but that was the least of her worries. “Do you think it was bears?”

Will sank to his knees, rubbing his stubbly chin and running a hand over their remaining supplies like he was counting them. “No. If it was any sort of wild animal, there would be torn up packages scattered around. Animals don’t take packets of dehydrated food to save for later.”

Melody swallowed. “So it was people, then.”

“Yep.”

She stood straight, taking a step away from the lean-to and searching the area. The rain must have stopped sometime during the night. As the sun rose, it lit the remaining raindrops clinging to the pine branches above them into cascades of diamonds. The greens above and around them seemed richer, more vibrant, and the browns of the earth deeper. Birdsong filled the air, and the occasional shake of something taking flight or scurrying between branches sent drumming raindrops down on the undergrowth.