Rushed (Adventures in Love #1)(14)

“I’ll help you,” Avery says, and Cybil shakes her head.

“I appreciate that, Avery, but this is not the first time Lauren has implied that I’m getting off easy because I have Tanner as my partner, so hopefully after I do this, she’ll stop bringing it up.”

“Cybil, you don’t have to do that,” Oliver says quietly.

“It’s fine.” She moves to where Blake is now standing at my side, watching what’s going down. “Can I please get a tent so I can get this over with?”

“Sure, babe.” He unties one from the back, and once he hands it to her, he adds, “I also got your camera back from Mav.” He hands that to her as well, and with a lift of her chin, she takes both and stomps off.

“You’re unbelievable,” Parker hisses to Lauren before he takes a tent from Blake and walks off with Jacob following, and Lauren turns to watch them go. Then she grabs her own tent and Oliver’s hand to drag him off.

“I really do not like that girl.” Avery sighs, and Grant shakes his head.

“Leave it, baby.”

“I am leaving it, Grant, but that doesn’t mean I can’t say I don’t like her.”

“Right.” He presses his lips together like he’s trying not to laugh, and she narrows her eyes on him.

“You’d better not even think about laughing right now.”

“Baby, I see you’re itching for an argument, but how about you put all that energy you have into helping me set up our tent?” he suggests.

“How about you sleep outside tonight?” she hisses before stomping past Blake to grab her own tent from the back of the four-wheeler and carrying it away.

“So I’m just gonna put this out there. Maybe you two wanna rethink adding this kind of situation into your future retreats,” Grant says, looking between Blake and me before turning on his heel and following after his wife.

“So I see Lauren is still adding her special brand of joy to every occasion,” Blake mutters from my side.

“The woman doesn’t know when to stop,” I grumble back.

“Well, something tells me that Oliver isn’t going to care how pretty she is, if she isn’t careful,” he says. Then he adds, “Damn, Cybil’s got a lot of pent-up anger.”

I follow his gaze to where Cybil is and curse under my breath when I see her using a large rock to pound the poles into the ground with a little too much force. “You’re gonna have to replace those stakes tomorrow.”

“Yeah.” He sighs. “Let’s get dinner on. Hopefully some food will cheer everyone up.”

For the next hour, I help him get dinner ready over the fire as each couple works on setting up their tent, and I’m proud as fuck to see Cybil is keeping up with everyone else, even on her own. When she finishes, all the other couples have already gathered around the fire and are starting to eat.

I want to pull her into my arms when she walks over to join us, and it pisses me off that I can’t.

“I’m not sure our tent will make it through the night, partner,” she tells me quietly as she takes the bowl I hold out to her.

“That’s okay. I prefer sleeping under the stars anyway.” At my statement, her eyes drift up to meet mine. “I’m fucking proud of you, sunshine.”

“Thank you.” She drops her gaze to my mouth, and my fingers clench into fists. Every fucking time she does that, it takes all my willpower not to tangle my hand in her hair, tip her head back, and kiss her like I know she wants—like both of us want.

“You need to eat,” I order softly, and she rubs her lips together before nodding and taking a seat on the log behind us. Sitting next to her, I dig into my bowl of stew, while she eats some broccoli cheddar soup that smelled delicious as I was heating it up. When we both finish, I take our bowls and dump them in the cooler on the back of the four-wheeler, then grab a plate of chicken and corn for myself and the single-size pizza loaded with roasted vegetables for her.

“I don’t know who your guys’ chef is, but I want to take them home with me,” she tells me after she finishes off half her pizza.

“That would be Blake’s mom, Janet.” I smile as she rubs her stomach. “When we started running guided trips, she told us that if we wanted to be successful, we needed to offer five-star meals for clients to enjoy at the end of each day. We thought she didn’t know what she was talking about, but we’ve had a lot of people come back just because of the food.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. The meals would be one of the reasons I would want to come back.”

“What are the other reasons?” I ask curiously.

“Honestly, everything. I didn’t think I would enjoy this trip, but it’s actually been fun trying new things and pushing myself. Plus, you’re not so bad to hang out with.”

“Good to know.” I chuckle, and she bounces her shoulder off mine. “Are you done eating?” I ask, eyeing what’s left of her pizza, and she laughs.

“You want my leftovers, don’t you?”

“I’ve always been a guy who enjoys meat, but every time you get your food, all I can think is I’m missing out.”

“You are. Vegetables are delicious.” She passes me her plate, and I take a large bite and groan in approval. “Told you so.”