“Gimme some.” He plops himself down in the hammock with me and of course I tumble into him.
The second I push my hand onto his thigh—his hard as rock, tree trunk thighs—to sit back up, he jolts out of the hammock.
Now I’m face down in the hammock with my ass in the air, and snickerdoodles are strewn about.
“I gotta go jump in a lake,” Jack announces.
After a few seconds of struggling to regain my balance, I sit up and address his spectacularly odd announcement. “What? Now?”
“Ya. Like a shower. Before bed.”
“Okay.” I stand up. “Well, you’re not going without me.”
“Oh, yes I am. I wouldn’t have invited you to shower with me at home, why would I invite you to this.”
“Because I don’t care how dirty you are, I’m not staying here alone as bear-bait.” I turn around to riffle through my bag and grab a towel.
As I’m hovering, I feel Jack come up behind me and touch the back of my shoulder. “Booksy, I hate to ask…but what’s this?”
When I turn around, I’m greeted by a bright pink sticker. A sticker I removed from a box earlier today.
This can’t be happening. But it is. There in black text on a hot pink circle are the words9” Dildo. How long has that been there? Of course I know how long. Pastor Ray. Espresso Yourself. Pie in the Sky. Did they all see it? If they did, surely they would have said something. Oh my God. I’m mortified.
And Jack is just staring at me, like, I don’t know, a guy who’s wondering why a girl would bring a dildo on a camping trip. What does that look look like? It looks like Jack looking at me like I’m some kind of…cookie. How did I become the snickerdoodle in this situation?
He drags his tongue along his bottom lip.
“I have a confession to make,” I say.
His silence is probably the safest response.
“I bought a—um…I bought a dildo.”
“Looks that way, but you don’t really need to explain yourself.”
I reach out to touch his forearm. I have no clue why I did that. Now I’m touching the man I was going to think about when I used that dildo. And a blaze of fire shoots up my arm.
“I have another confession to make.” He just stands there with that stupid sticker between his index finger and thumb. “I’m an author.” Whew! That was hard to say, but what a relief. Someone finally knows.
“I’m not surprised.”
“You’re not?”
“I mean, you love books. You worked at a bookstore. You don’t remember all the times I visited you there?”
“To buy books?”
“Ya. Totally.” He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Seeing your passion for books, I figured you might do some writing on the side.”
“I have…another confession to make. I’m a romance author.” And just because all the secrets are coming out, I might as well let loose. “A steamy romance author. I write about sex.”
“Damn, Booksy. I didn’t know you had such a steady stream of inspiration.”
“I don’t.” I snatch that stupid sticker from his fingers. “That’s um…where the dildo comes into…um…play.”
Shit. Shit. Shit. I can’t believe I just told him all of that. What the hell am I thinking? What has this mountain air done to me?
I blame the vanilla matcha latte.