Chaos Theory (Nerds of Paradise #2)(49)
“Hmm.”
That was it? He’d blurted out the story of his life in one gulp, and all she could do was hum?
“You know what I like best about this whole event?” she said several minutes later as they reached the edge of the forest.
“What?” Will asked, distracted. He’d been right about the stream curving, but it was more than just that. In their hiking, they’d moved farther up the ridge they were traversing than he’d anticipated. Below them, the stream had widened. He could see where it dumped into a long lake ahead of them to their right. Now they just had to figure out how to climb down to the water.
“I love the fact that it’s knocking me outside of my comfort zone,” Melody went on. “I like how it’s making me push myself, physically and mentally, to do things that I wouldn’t otherwise do. Isn’t it cool when you do something that you think is going to be really hard, maybe even impossible, but instead it gives you that satisfying feeling of stretching yourself?”
He turned away from studying the landscape problem in front of them and looked at her. The sunlight had nothing on Melody’s smile. She looked perfectly at home, perfectly comfortable in the wilderness. Her positivity radiated from her.
And he was jealous. So incredibly jealous that it gnawed at his stomach and made his joints ache. He wished he had that kind of hope in him, but it’d been crushed out of him ages ago. He wanted to have hope again. He wanted to feel the satisfaction of rising to a challenge, not the anticipation of failure and punishment.
Mostly, he just wanted her.
And she knew it. He could tell by the way her smile grew that his thundering desire for her was written on his face for her to read like a book.
He cleared his throat. “I think we can afford to make camp down by the lake tonight. It’s early, but we can try to dry our clothes out the rest of the way, and maybe you’ll get your chance to catch some fish.”
Her grin was so wide that he moved on before she had a chance to zing him with a sexy comeback. She did say something, and in that tone of voice too, but he’d moved far enough ahead that he couldn’t hear it.
The sun was well past its zenith by the time they made it to the edge of the lake. All in all, the view was breathtaking. From above, the lake sparkled in the sun as it stretched through the valley. From the lapping edges of the water, it seemed to expand for miles, toward pine-green shores. There were plenty of warm, flat rocks for them to lay their clothes on so they would be truly dry, and there were also several spots not too far back from the lake shore that could provide them with a natural shelter for the night.
“Wow!” Melody voiced what he was thinking. “I’ve never seen anything so beautiful.”
The second Melody shrugged off her backpack and took a step out onto the edge of the rock, joining the pristine landscape, Will was seized by the urge to say that he had, and she was standing right in front of him. But that was way too corny for him.
“Let’s pick a spot to camp for the night and set things up now so we can focus on catching supper for the rest of the afternoon,” he said instead.
“You got it, Clementine.” She took one more lingering look at the lake and the mountains beyond, her hand raised to shield her eyes, then let out a sigh and turned to him. Her smile filled him with light, chasing all the rest of his worries far into the back of his mind, if only for a moment.
“What about that spot right there.” He turned and pointed to a slightly scooped section of clear ground surrounded by trees and a few bushes.
“Looks good.” Melody nodded, then started for the spot. “Actually, it looks like someone has made camp here before.”
They picked up their pace, Will lagging behind a bit with his backpack still on, until they came to the likely camping spot. Sure enough, there was a ring of stones indicating an old fire pit, the ground around it too clear and firmly-packed to be an accident.
“Do you think one of the other couples camped here last night?” Melody asked, kicking some of the brush that had blown into the spot.
Will shook his head. “There would be signs of a recent fire.” He scanned the area, looking for other clues. “I’d say that someone has camped here before, but not for a while.”
“Then we’re really good at picking spots,” she said, turning to him and winking.
In that moment, Will would have given anything for the competition to evaporate, for the two of them to be out on their own, enjoying a vacation, no troubles or worries or ticking clocks to bother them.
“Let’s lay out the sleeping bags, get a fire started, and put our clothes and boots out to dry.” He hated how businesslike he sounded, but pipe-dreams or not, things had to get done.
They set to work, but no sooner had Melody walked back down to where she’d left her pack on the rocks then she came marching back, sleeping bag and pad in hand. “Make sure you zip these suckers together again,” she told him with one eyebrow arched.
Will clenched his jaw, fighting the wave of desire that washed over him at the picture of the two of them, warm and cozy together. “We probably don’t need to share body heat tonight. It’s warmed up considerably, and I don’t think it’s going to rain again any time soon.”
“Better safe than sorry.” Melody tossed him her sleeping bag—which he was at least on the ball enough to catch—dropped the pad beside the fire pit, then turned to sashay back down to the lake.