Page 76 of Lady and the Camp
Across from me, Hudson’s skin glowed from the fire. The pink in her hair had faded more, giving her a less polished look that was even more beautiful to me.
I could hardly be mad at her knowing what she’d been through. I wanted to shelter her in my arms. Tell her I’d keep her safe. Hudson’s pale face and frightened eyes haunted my thoughts. If real danger lurked, I had to protect her. She lived on camp property. She was my staff. My cousin’s friend. My…something more.
Our last few days together, our kisses, our touches. Okay, she meant more to me than simply being my staff and my cousin’s friend.
She caught my eye. Usually she’d throw me a smile, but now she looked at me with that neutral expression. She thought I was mad at her. I’d definitely growled once or twice in the office during that call with the agent. I didn’t know how to tell her none of that mattered right now. All that did was making sure she stayed safe. If someone was targeting Hudson, they’d have to come through me.
The guys had been quiet around the fire for a while now. Too quiet, hunched over their phones with occasional whining about bad cell service in the woods. If I knew my cousins and Patrick, they had shenanigans up their sleeves.
“Maybe stop texting and enjoy this beautiful night,” Marcy nearly yelled at them across the flickering flames.
They looked up. Guilty, each one of them.
“Who are you texting?” I asked.
Robby’s phone buzzed in his hand. I snatched it from him.
“Hey!” He lunged at me, but I moved fast and sprang out of reach.
The text came from Matteo, who sat right next to him.
We go at midnight. Hop the fence and form a perimeter
Shenanigans—I knew it. “You’re not going to the other camp.” No secrets, I’d call out their plan in front of everybody.
“I’m taking them,” Pete said, who true to his word, stayed for defense purposes. “I know the land.”
I pointed at him. “No.”
“Ah, a return to form,” Marcy mumbled.
“I heard that.” I cracked my knuckles. “No conspiring to sneak to the other camp. If Brycen sent that guy, we can’t stoop to their level. I’ll handle it myself.”
Arguments flew back and forth. Hudson and her friends huddled, speaking quietly. The quiet ones you had to watch for.
“That goes for you lot, too.” I nodded at the women. “I know you used to thieve from dumpsters.”
Noah busted out laughing. “It was garbage. And we were like, nineteen.”
Everyone talked at once, pleading their case for why we needed to confront the Trail Blazers. So much for a quiet campfire.
This was getting ridiculous.
But they had a point. A strange man had lurked on our camp property. We weren’t getting down to business sitting here stuffing our faces. The sheriff’s deputy doing a drive by the camp wasn’t enough.
I stood and clapped three times. “Here’s what we’re going to do. No sneaking. No hopping the fence. We’re going to the Trail Blazers’ camp and we’re going in through the front gate. All of us. Right now.”
We met a locked front gate at the Trail Blazers’ camp.
As it should have been, since it was night and a weekend. Same as our camp.
But the closed gate killed our roll up and intimidate plan, leaving us idling in my truck. Behind me, a car carried the women and Patrick. Pete followed in his own Jeep.
“This is a bad idea,” I admitted to Robby and Matteo stuffed next to me in the front seat. I would have preferred Hudson squished beside me instead of two full-grown dudes who’d been running around for hours, followed by devouring a bag of Doritos each.
Robby jabbed me with his elbow. “Don’t chicken out now. What will Hudson think?” He made clucking sounds.
“That won’t work on me.”
