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“You have an aura.”
“An aura?” I laughed. “I didn’t peg you for the woo-woo type, reading people’s auras and drinking kombucha.”
“Fermented foods are very good for the gut,” he informed me, a wry smile lifting the corners of his mouth.
“Right.” Cam was a contradiction. He looked so tough and serious, but every now and then something else broke through, a little glimpse of the light-hearted man he might have been once before.
“I lived in Hollywood, remember? We were very into living clean and healthy, yoga and all that.”
“Yoga. Really?” I grinned at him.
“I’m practically a yoga master. I’m like a black belt.”
“They don’t give belts in yoga.”
“They do if you’re serious about it.”
I gave him a level look and then couldn’t stifle the laugh that escaped me. “So do you still practice?”
“You don’t need to practice when you’re as good as I am.” He delivered all these lines with a perfectly straight face, and I giggled giddily.
“Demonstration please.”
“I don’t want to embarrass you with my skill.” He shook his head.
“Or embarrass yourself, you mean.”
“Ha. I bet you don’t even know the fearful possum pose.”
I crossed my arms. “That is not a pose.”
He stood and then crouched down, raising one arm over his face. Then he plopped himself back down in the chair. “Boom.”
“Oh my God.” I was cracking up now. It was good to see this side of Cam, relaxed and open. “You’re right, you’re clearly an expert.”
Cam was laughing too, the sound warm and low like distant waves. It washed through me and helped to lighten the worry I’d begun to feel about whatever lay between us. At least I knew it wasn’t something I’d just imagined—but Cam seemed intent on ignoring it most of the time. But now, with him clearly relaxed and open, now seemed like the right time to talk. I just had to think of exactly what I wanted to say.
We both became quiet and the night filled in the silence around us, distant birds calling through the cooling air and skittering creatures moving across the forest floor. And then, just when I was about to address the issue at hand, the unearthly scream I’d heard that first night shot through the silence, starting low and then growing to a final shriek that set my hair on end and shot me to my feet.
I stood next to the fire, having stepped forward toward Cam without even realizing it, and he was there. He’d stood up too, stepping close to me, and when I looked up at him, he pulled me into his chest, the strong arms circling me, the warmth of him against my cheek.
“It’s okay,” he whispered, and I realized my heart was hammering in a frenzied rhythm in my chest. “It’s okay. It won’t hurt you.”
“The mountain lion?”
I felt him nod against my chin. “I’ll talk to the rangers again tomorrow. It’s been on this hillside a while—it needs to find another home.”
I stepped back a bit, and his arms loosened around me but didn’t fall. I allowed my hands to rest on the broad planes of muscle across Cam’s back. “They won’t kill it, will they?”
“They’ll trap it, move it to the back country.” He was gazing down at me, the intensity in his eyes amplified by the firelight. His eyes moved across my face, landing on my lips, and the world stilled.
Everything that happened after that was instinct—I don’t remember deciding to tilt my chin higher, to move ever so slightly forward, to encourage Cam to follow through on the action I could see him contemplating.
When his lips brushed mine, it was like a distant whisper, a quiet room, a lull before the next wave crashed ashore. I felt the shiver run through my body, down my arms to my fingertips, igniting in the places our bodies connected—hands, arms, lips. He pulled me closer and his lips pressed more firmly to mine, the kiss deepening as I allowed my body to mold to his, let my hands roam his back, dropping lower until Cam groaned into my mouth.
The sound twisted inside me, wakening the yearning I felt for him, and even as my mind spun—telling me we really needed to talk, my body took over, and all I wanted was more of him.
But the kiss ended as unexpectedly as it had begun. Cam’s arms fell away and he stepped back, his hand covering his mouth, as if he could wipe away what had just happened. He wouldn’t meet my gaze, and I stood before him feeling abandoned. “Sorry,” he said, stepping back. “I told myself I wasn’t going to let that happen again.”
