Page 67 of Head Over Heels

“Minus the toilet, the warm bed, the electronics, the hair dryer, and all the other trappings of civilization.”

He makes a face. “Civilization is overrated.”

“I think it’s underrated.”

His brows draw together. “Let me ask you this. Why did you do it? Why did you buy the placemats and make the nice dinner? Why did you redo the guest room? Did you do it to torture me?”

I don’t have to think too hard about the answer. “Of course not. I did it because it was important to me. Beautiful things are important to me.”

He nods, as if that makes perfect sense. “That’s how the woods are for me. Important. And I want to show you why.”

I open my mouth to protest, to say that he cantellme why, he doesn’t need to show me.

“Also,” he says, quickly, “I’ll make you s’mores with really good dark chocolate and then we can go skinny-dipping and I can spread you out on your sleeping bag in front of a blazing fire and eat you out in view of the sky and God and the whole world, while the cool breeze makes your nipples hard.”

I’m honestly not sure if it’s the marshmallows and oozing chocolate or how hard my nipples now are, but I’m a goner.

“Chase, I hate you.”

“I know, babe. I hate you, too.”

He doesn’t say it like he means it, though. He says it like he means the exact opposite. And for a moment, not even a whole second, I wish he did, and then I stop, because—

Because he’s him and I’m me and I’m leaving.

It’s my mantra now. It would be so damn easy to forget.

He says, “So you’ll still go with me this weekend?”

“Fuck you,” I tell him, but we both know I’m going camping with him.

Because Chase possesses the ability to convince even the smartest girls to leave their in-case-you-fall-in-the-lake panties home.

Chapter 35

Chase

We’re a couple hundred feet into the woods and already I’m feeling like a whole new man.

Nothing else is like this.

I love the forest. The way everything hovers dark and close, sun filtering down like it’s been tossed in handfuls. The trees are older than the Constitution, their trunks bigger around than I can wrap my arms, muzzy with lichen and moss. Overhead, the treetops spear patches of blue sky, and you get dizzy from the sensation of falling upward. And there are the smells. Leaves and needles and hardwood and loamy dirt and life and decay.

Also, Liv’s hair is in aponytail.A high ponytail, which, if anyone’s polling, is the sexiest kind.

I watch it swing behind her as she walks, long and thick and the color of copper.

I am so going to wrap that ponytail around my hand later and hold her head still while I kiss her and fuck her.

The thought makes me want to whistle.

Ahead of me, Liv pauses.

“You okay?”

“Is it supposed to hurt?”

“What hurts?”

---