Page 22 of Me and Mr. Just Right

“How could I forget?”

“Do you have any magazines back at the cabin? I’d love to see your work.”

“I do. But whatever you’re expecting based on what my brothers have said, lower the bar to where limbo would be impossible.”

“Well, I happen to be an expert at limbo. I can go super low.”

They both paused a beat.

She groaned while he laughed. “That was weird. Let’s pretend I didn’t say that.”

“Can’t. Already pictured it.”

“What happens at the cabin stays at the cabin,” she said in a warning tone, but she knew the smile she couldn’t hold back took out any actual weight in her words.

Still, Haydn held up his hand to his side. “Your limbo secrets are safe with me.”

She pushed at his chest playfully. “Never say ‘limbo secrets’ again.”

He shook his head regretfully. “That is a promise I’m unwilling to make.”

She snorted out a laugh and then covered her mouth as if that could undo the sound. Her stomach twisted. She could just imagine that ugly laugh becoming a sound bite all over social media.

Haydn pulled her arm down gently. “Why are you hiding?”

“I just … I have to be careful, Haydn.”

“About what?”

“That laugh—I snorted. I don’t do that.”

“Why not? Everyone has a snort-laugh inside of them,” he said, like it was no big deal.

She let out a small huff. “It’s hard to explain, but my image is very important.”

“These bones don’t care what you laugh like. My brothers don’t care.” He leaned close to her, bringing with him the scent of his coconut sunscreen. “And Ilikeyour snort-laugh. It felt real.”

It had been real, and that was the problem. It made her feel vulnerable in a way that opened her up to hurt, and she didn’t want to hurt again. As he stared at her, the air between them thickened and seemed to vibrate with some sort of palpable magic. Like a flower drawn to sunlight, she found herself leaning closer to him.

“Ready to head back?” Jules’s voice thundered through the cabin, and Lia tried not to notice how quickly Haydn sprang away from her and to his feet. Lia got to her feet more slowly, watching as Haydn busied himself with tucking his camera back into the case and definitely not looking her in the eye.

Interesting. She was not accustomed to men springing away from her like that. But it was definitely for the best. Whatever haze had sat between them dispersed into the air of the cabin, and now that she could think clearer, she was glad that Jules had interrupted before anything had happened.

Mostly glad.

She could not jump into another relationship so soon after Bo. She didn’t want to. And even if she did want to, it wouldn’t be fair to Haydn, though he was doing an excellent job of keeping a significant distance—an entire cabin’s distance—between them. She didn’t want to get hurt. She didn’t want to hurt him. It was all good.

Mostly good.

She walked past Jules, who eyed her carefully, and onto the front porch. She glanced behind her to make sure Haydn was coming too—and, okay, to drink in the sight of him one last time before she really, truly put a stop to this growing … bonding turbulent plane thing, or whatever it was she was feeling for him.

Which was her first mistake.

Her second? Forgetting Haydn’s earlier warning.

Because while Lia was distracted by Haydn’s perfectly kissable jawline, her foot hit a rotted plank on the porch that gave way and dumped her right into a thorny patch of devil’s club.

Chapter 10

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