Page 25 of Just One Summer with the Grumpy

Ty looked at me. And frowned.

I yanked my gaze away, willing my cheeks not to blush. This was not the time to ogle over my target. This would be difficult enough with Chase watching my every move. Even now, as Chase spoke with the guide, his eyes flicked to me.

I would stop worrying about the heights issue and focus on the goal. Operation Wedding Crash began now.

No, that was wrong. Operation Groom Stealer? Operation Groom…Retrieval. That didn’t quite work either. Operation Boomerang?

“Let’s go,” the guide said and gestured to a bus that couldn’t decide whether it was white or gray and looked to have survived World War II.

Ty pulled Veronica on before anybody else and made a beeline for the back of the bus. I tried to follow, but the tourist crowd pressed against the doorway, making it difficult to make any headway. When I finally made it on, there were only two seats left, right behind the driver and guide.

“After you,” Chase said from behind me.

So much for casually chatting it up with Ty in the back. I slid against the window and waited as Chase sat next to me. I pressed against the patterned metal wall, putting as much space between my leg and his as possible. If he noticed, he didn’t show it.

“That’s eighteen,” Chase told the driver. “We’re good to go.”

The bus started up, and we were on our way. The instant the bus lurched forward, my stomach lurched with it.

It would be just my luck if I came all this way to plummet to my death right in front of both the man I planned to marryandmy boss.

Chase glanced at me several times over the next few minutes as the bus rounded a massive hill, climbing to the top while brushing past numerous tree branches. That certainly explained the missing paint on the bus’s exterior, not that I could focus on the view with Chase watching me.

The guy had such a disorienting stare. Like he was trying to pry my own exterior apart and see what lay beneath, and he wouldn’t be happy until he’d solved the mystery.

Finally, Chase leaned over. “I have motion sickness pills if you need a couple. They’re stored in the back.”

I looked at him in surprise. The second our eyes met, the full force of his gaze hit me like peering into the sun after dodging it many times before. It held an intensity that grabbed my attention and refused to release it. Did he approach everything in life this way, with such laser focus?

“I’m not motion sick,” I managed, each word a struggle. “Why do you say that?”

“Because you’re turning a darker shade of green by the minute. You aren’t going to…?”

“No, no,” I said quickly, a furious blush likely adding to the green tone of my skin. “Just a little worried. The guide said we’d be as high as a hundred feet above the ground.”

“That’s when we go over the valley. The rest of the canopy is closer to forty feet. But that only matters if you look down. The view is better if you look up anyway.”

I’d managed to yank my gaze away, but at the termLook up,I found my eyes jerking back to his. A part of me had to admit that he was right—the view was pretty darn good. Chase’s jaw flexed, emphasizing the stubble that he’d trimmed back but not eliminated completely. My fingers ached to run along his skin and feel the roughness there. His eyebrows were thick yet well-trimmed, framing dark brown eyes that looked brighter in the center. They reminded me of those pieces of amber on the dinosaur movie with the bugs inside.

Oh my gosh, Daphne,I chided myself.You’re such a nerd.

“There’s something I’ve been wondering,” I said, the words coming out in a rush. “You don’t need this. You could retire comfortably in New York without the company. Or here, even. So why do you care so much about keeping this company afloat?”

I instantly regretted the question when he tore his eyes away and looked forward again. It could have been my imagination, but his shoulders seemed to tense a bit.

“You don’t have to answer that,” I said, leaning against the window once more. “That’s a pretty personal question.”

“It is, but I’ll answer it,” he finally said. “Just not here. Later.” His face turned slightly over his right shoulder, as if eyeing the tourists across the aisle and behind us.

“Of course.” I tried to concentrate on the trees flashing by the window.

Just not here. Later.That sounded an awful lot like a conversation outside of work. The type of conversation between friends, not boss and employee.

Suddenly I felt far more nervous about that than anything else that lay ahead.

All too soon, I found myself hooked up to a zip line, standing on a high platform just beneath the thick forest canopy with a line of other people already zipping down. Ty and Veronica positioned themselves two couples in front of us, speaking in comfortable whispers, his hand around her waist or rubbing her arm or touching her whenever possible. The memory of his hands on me in exactly the same way, whispering things in my ear that he was likely whispering to her right now, made me want to punch her petite little face.

In a professional way, of course.

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