Page 27 of Playful Kris

The door chimes, and I see his eyes narrow briefly before he takes a step away from me and Kris comes around the corner.

“Hey, you ready?” he asks, pausing to look between me and the sleazeball.

“Yeah, babe.” I cringe on the inside, calling him babe, but I need the clerk to realize I wasn’t playing around. Looking back at the sleazeball, I don’t smile as I say, “Excuse me.”

Kris takes a step back, letting me have room to step between him and the end of the shelving toward the door. I stop at the door, looking over my shoulder when I realize he isn’t right behind me and see him in a stare off with the clerk before he shakes his head, stepping in my direction.

He pushes the door open, his back pressed to my front as we step through. He doesn’t break contact though, the hand that was just on my hip moves to the small of my back before taking my hand in his. We walk to the truck, where he opens the passenger door for me and helps me inside, pausing as he’s face to face with me.

We’re so close, I could just barely lean forward and close the distance between us.

“What the fuck happened in there?” he asks, glancing back at the front entrance before returning his eyes to mine.

“I’m not even sure.” I release a breath, and my lungs slowly fill with air again.

His eyes slowly bounce between mine, trying to tell if I’m being honest with him. “Did he do anything?”

“No, no. I’m fine. He just scared me, that’s all.”

Kris doesn’t take his eyes off of me, he waits as if I’m going to give him a different version of events suddenly.

When he realizes I’m being truthful, he steps back, breaking whatever connection was happening between us and slowly shuts my door.

He’s in his seat, starting the truck and pulling away from the pumps when I lay my head back, feeling all the adrenaline surge through my body from what could have happened.

Maybe I was being dramatic, maybe the guy was lonely and didn’t mean any harm. But what if his intentions were more than that? And thank God Kris walked in when he did.

Not long after that I fall asleep, trying to rid myself of the interaction I just had.

11

KRIS

We only have an hour left into our trip until we arrive at the cabin I’ve booked us for the long weekend.

My brother and his fiance, my mom and my dad all have cabins as well, but I purposely put us in a more secluded section of the mountain. Mostly so they don’t bug me, but I’m not exactly hating the idea of the privacy it’ll give me and Kameron either.

After the last stop, she passed out next to me. I feel a surge run through my body thinking about that gas station. You hear all the time on the news and social media about women going missing from truck stops and slimy gas stations, and I have no doubt that was probably exactly what that scenario was.

Or just a really weird dude that had no sense of talking to a beautiful woman and he just creeped her out. I’m not naive enough to think one way or the other, but… the vibe was definitely off in there when I walked in.

A few hours after she fell asleep, she twisted and her head landed on my arm that’s resting on the console. It’s been asleep for the last twenty minutes, but I don’t have it in me to move it.

She looks beautiful with her hair falling around her face, and her top lip twitches slightly in her sleep.

I smile down at her before forcing my eyes back to the road. It’s something I’ve been struggling with the entire time. I’m drawn to her, and I can’t seem to stop myself from fixating on her.

That was never the problem between us though. We were great in that aspect, we just weren’t great in others.

I wonder what she’s going to think when she realizes the cabin only has one bed. There’s a couch, but I really hope I don’t have to spend the next four nights sleeping on it.

My mind wanders to her and what she’ll be sleeping in.

Does she still sleep in oversized t-shirts? Or will she wear one of her grandma’s “moo moos” just to annoy the piss out of me?

I smile at the thought, it wouldn’t matter if she wore a trash bag to bed, I’d still know what was under it, and that thought makes me shift in my seat.

Regretting the movement immediately, I glance down when Kameron begins to stir. Her eyes flutter open, then squint as the light from the windows hits her. She sits up slowly, rubbing a hand over her cheek that was pressed to my arm.

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