Page 50 of My Star-Crossed Summer

“I’ll manage.” My shrug feels more like a shiver.

“This is silly,” he says. “We’ll switch tents.”

“My tent has a pond in it by now. So unless you brought a snorkel with you, that option’s out.”

He lifts a brow. “Then sleep in my tent. There’s plenty of room.”

“Omigod. No.” The thought of sleeping next to Noah is too much. Squeezed against all of that hard muscle with only a little flannel between us? My heart might actually explode.

“What are you so afraid of?” he says, his voice low.

“What if someone saw us?” I say, my voice trailing off. “Sophie or one of the kids—” I shake my head because this is dangerous territory. He knows as well as I do that anyone who saw us sharing a tent would immediately think we were breaking the number one rule.

And they might not be wrong.

We’d both be fired. His camp days would be over. And I could kiss any future job with the program goodbye.

“Is that all?” he asks.

He saysalllike it doesn’t meaneverything.

I bite my lip, wishing my heart wasn’t thundering in my chest again. Thankfully, the interior light has clicked off, so he can’t see the heat rising in my cheeks.

“Look,” he says. His voice sounds so close to my ear, but I know he’s still on the other side of the car, his hand resting by the door handle. “You need sleep. I have a warm, dry tent. I’m your colleague right now, offering you a safe place to spend the night. That’s all.”

Of course, he makes it sound like the logical solution. Still, I can’t help but fear the worst.

“What happens if someone sees us?” I ask.

He shrugs. “We tell them the truth. That you got a D-minus in tent set-up and I took pity on you and saved you from drowning.”

I smack him on the shoulder, and he snorts.

“Let me worry about that,” he says. “Part of my job is to take care of my staff, okay? So let me take care of you.”

His words fall like warm hands on my shoulders. When was the last time I let someone truly take care of me? Even if it was just offering a soft place to land?

“Okay,” I say. “But you have to wake me before it’s light out.”

“Well, obviously. If we sleep in, we miss Sophie’s ranger coffee and campfire donuts.”

“I’m serious, Valentine.”

“So am I. Those donuts are to die for.” He gives me a playful smirk as he opens the door, and I follow him out into the night, trying to quiet that voice in my head that’s screamingThis is the worst idea in the history of bad ideas!

We turn our flashlights off as we approach his tent. The rain’s falling softer now, and the campground is quiet. Noah unzips the tent flap, and when I’m convinced no one is watching us, I climb inside after him.

Technically, it’s a two-person tent. Apparently, that classification assumes you’ll be super cozy with the person you’re sharing it with because we’re already tripping over each other. Noah unzips his sleeping bag and spreads it out so we can share. As he sheds his rain jacket, I settle in under the extra blankets and try to ignore the flex of his biceps and the way his snake tattoo curls around it. He keeps the flannel pants on, along with the thin tee shirt that’s stretched taut over his muscular frame.

It’s criminal that he can look so alluring in an old tee shirt and pajama pants, his hair soaked from the rain.

When he slides under the covers next to me, his lip ticks up in a tiny smile, and my whole body lights up.

“Isn’t this better, Griffin?” he says, his voice a low rumble. “Warm and dry. Not at all like a pretzel.”

“Are you waiting for someone to give you a medal?” I roll my raincoat up until it’s mostly pillow-shaped and curl up on my side, facing Noah.

The last thing I see before I close my eyes is his deadly smirk and that dimple that haunts my dreams.

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