Page 59 of You Know You Wanna

I cleared my throat, forcing myself to calm the hell down. It was a good thing I did because the girls ran over to grab some food before hurtling back to the water. Laurene glanced between Birdie and me, then gave Cassidy a mischievous grin. I wondered if they were up to something or if they just thought I had a crush on Birdie. To be fair, they would be right.

Still, it sure felt like they were up to something, but if their scheming bought me a minute alone to rein myself in, then I was okay with it. I could control myself for now, no matter how much Birdie awoke a wild animal in me, desperate for her.

30

BIRDIE

We were heading back to the resort in the morning. All things considered, I’d had a surprisingly great time with Remington and the girls. Laurene seemed to have made two new best friends and even Remington had loosened up significantly.

Unshaven and ruffled from two days spent camping, hiking, and swimming, I couldn’t help but think that he was the most handsome man I’d ever seen. The dark scruff on his jaw made him look less like a polished businessman and more like just another guy who knew how to rough it, and the fact that his hair wasn’t perfectly styled did all kinds of things to me.

With a lock of dark chocolate hanging over his forehead, he walked Laurene to her tent and hugged her goodnight, then made sure the others had gone to bed safely too. He’d gotten the hang of the chaperoning thing real fast, and having him here had made things a lot easier for me. But my god. Does he really have to be so freaking hot?

My stomach exploded with butterflies when he walked back to the campfire. His eyes were on mine and the flames caused shadows to fall over his features, making him look edgy, dangerous, and oh-so-safe and protective all at the same time.

I’m a lost cause. Really. I’m willing to admit it now.

“Are you staying up for a while?” he asked when he reached me, those eyes caressing my face as his gaze swept across it.

Or maybe I was just waxing lyrically about it in my head because my mouth had gone too dry to form actual words. Giving him a jerky nod in response, I picked up my water bottle and took a long sip, hoping the icy liquid would unfry my brain.

Remington’s gaze hooked on mine and he kept it there for a beat before he glanced up at the sky. “It’s a beautiful night. Do you want to take a short walk? We don’t have to go far, but the girls are down for the count and I’d really like to see the stars away from the fire.”

As if I was tied to his wishes by an invisible tether, I stood up and started walking, leading him a short way from the campsite to where the trees opened up to a view of the rolling hills below. It was a cloudless, star-filled night, and as soon as he started speaking, I was shocked by his knowledge of the stars.

Leaning with his butt against a boulder, he pointed up at the sky, naming several of the constellations and tracing them with his finger. I followed his hand, seeing exactly what he was talking about when he told me about their shapes and where the names had come from. I knew a few of them but not nearly as many as he did.

When he finally fell silent, I gaped at him. “How do you know all that?”

“When we lost everything, we moved to a house in a rural area, and I remember climbing out my window at night, looking up at the stars and wanting to become an astronaut.”

“An astronaut, huh?” I laughed softly, taking a seat next to him on the boulder. “You were such a boy.”

He chuckled, spreading his legs further apart where he sat so his thigh pressed against mine. His heat seeped into me, making my pulse spike and my brain go on the fritz again, but as he spoke, he was so open and vulnerable that my body calmed and my heart warmed.

“Nah, it wasn’t because of that. The stars were the only thing that had remained unchanged in my life, you know? Everything else around me was different, including the people. Even my own parents were unrecognizable to me sometimes in their own battles to wrap their heads around what’d happened, but the stars were the same as they’d always been. That gave me comfort, to know there was at least one thing that would always be consistent.”

My brow furrowed, tears even filling my eyes as I tried to imagine what that must’ve been like for him as a young boy. I sniffled, and he glanced at me, a soft light in his eyes as he smiled. “Earlier, you made me promise I wouldn’t pity you, and now you’re pitying me? No fair.”

I smacked his shoulder playfully, then swiped under my eyes and pressed down to stop more tears from forming. “It’s not pity. It’s empathy. I’m empathizing.”

“Empathy. Pity.” He shrugged, chuckling under his breath as he shook his head at me. “It’s all the same thing, isn’t it?”

“Not at all.” It could be, though. In this particular case, even I wasn’t so sure about the difference, but who cared? “What happened? Why didn’t you become an astronaut, then?”

“I considered studying aerospace when the time came, but then I decided to become an investment broker instead.”

“That’s quite a leap.”

“By the time I had to make the decision, it wasn’t so much about passion or consistency as it was about money,” he admitted easily. “I didn’t have any and I wanted some, so I chose the path of what I thought would be the least resistance to get there.”

“Wow.”

“Yep, but now I’m rich. Richer than rich. Richer than my parents ever were, and I feel like I missed out on something. It’s funny how life works in that way, right? I have everything I ever thought I wanted, and now I’m wondering why I wanted it so damn much.”

“I told you there were things more important than money,” I teased lightly. “I’m glad you’re finally coming around to my way of seeing things, Mr. Ford.”

“Thanks for giving me the perspective, Miss…” His eyes suddenly widened as he turned his head to me. “Shit. I just realized I don’t even know your last name.”