"You should do it," Trevor said, breaking me away from my thoughts.
"Do what?"
"Push the button."
"If the guests were supposed to push it, they'd have it labeled to tell us its function."
"But if they didn't want us to push it, they shouldn't have placed it there. If they didn't want us to touch it, they should have put that on a label."
I laughed. "Okay, you push it."
He leaned over, pushed the button, sat back, and then we both ducked when we heard small motors begin running. The overhead canopy began to retract slowly, sending us both into laughter.
"Phew," he said with exaggerated relief. "Glad we didn't blow up." He smiled and regarded me for a second. "Do you feel better now that you know what it does?"
I grinned. "Yes, actually, I do." And then, I decided to take the opportunity to break the physical ice between us. I sat up, took off my top, and wiggled out of my shorts before reaching for my bag. I put my clothes inside and grabbed the sunscreen.
His face had registered shock, until he realized that all I was revealing was the bikini I was wearing underneath the outfit. Then he smiled and let his eyes sweep over me.
I spread on sunscreen over all the parts of myself that I could reach, then handed him the bottle and stretched out on my stomach. He accepted the bottle and then paused. He squirted some into his hand and began to smear it over himself. Then he picked the bottle back up, looked at me, and paused again.
"Did I forget to engrave the invitation?" I asked.
"Yeah, you did. But that's okay. I'll come to the ball anyway." And then he proceeded not to smear the lotion onto my back, but to massage it into my skin.
It wasn't a bad massage. I enjoyed it as I led the conversation into childhoods and family. When he was done, he handed the bottle back to me with a raised brow.
I got up on my knees and returned the favor. By the end of our time, I was feeling a bit less friendly and a bit more snuggly toward him.
"I hear tell the Harley on the lot is yours," I said before he could leave to let the next one have their turn.
"Yeah, it is. Did you like what you saw?" he asked, dishing out some flirty innuendo.
"Maybe the next time you come visit me, we could do something other than swimming or sitting in the dark."
"You wanna ride my hog?"
"Yeah, I really do."
"I'll talk to production and make it happen."
"Oooh, powerful," I said, batting my eyelashes.
His goofy grin was in place when he turned to make his way around the cameras to leave.
Mike strolled across the deck and then held his hand out for me. "You and I have done the whole harbor cruise and whale watching thing before."
I scrunched my face up in guilt. "Yeah, I know. Sorry about that," I said and took his hand and let him pull me up. "I didn't think about the connection between one week's date similarities and another. I just picked activities that looked good to me at the time."
"Well, I saw that they were offering a light lunch. I thought we could go below deck, and have a little lunch on our own."
"Sure."
He escorted me down two flights and into a private cabin that had a booth set up for us, with salads and fresh cut fruit laid out for us. It was tight quarters in there with our technological chaperones. Once Mike and I were settled, the cameraman and sound guy came in. There was just enough of a path for the waiter to get in, but there was no way Mike and I could get out without somebody else leaving the tiny room first.
He relaxed back against the booth, spread his arms across the back of the seat, and his feet came to rest next to mine, stretched as far as the bottom of the booth would allow. I did him one better, I slid off my flip-flops and put my feet up on the booth next to him. I'm sure the staff wouldn't be too pleased if they found out, but I was more interested in the smile I got from Mike over it.
"Did I mention that I have a habit of working near lakes, mountains, and sometimes even islands?" he asked.
"The National Park System, yes. I haven't forgotten. It's one of your perks."
"Were you checking out some of the rigs this morning? Inspecting your possible future homes?"
"You saw the direction I took off in, did you?"
He shrugged. "We all did. We were curious as to where you were taking Drake and Ardent, so Mitch and I ran up to the roof to sneak a peek."
"I wasn't checking out other rigs. I took them with me so they wouldn't have to stand there and be outcasts in the discussion. We went into my rig because I had some stuff to take care of. In fact," I said with a soft chuckle, "I left them in there, folding pamphlets and assembling press kits for me."
"Mixing business with pleasure?"
"You have to. I can bank as many articles and blog entries as I want, but something always comes up. I have to jot ideas down when they come to me, and notes about things I've seen. There's always something that has to be done. What did you do yesterday with the block of work time they gave us?"
He gave me a shy grin and dug his phone out of his pocket. "Rising to the Sun Road, in Glacier National Park, is having some issues." He brought up some video footage and handed it to me. "Water trickles down that rock wall, from the glaciers melting above. It seeps into the ground. It's been collecting in, and saturating, the ground underneath the road. Large pieces of the asphalt have been breaking off."
"Which isn't something you want to have happening ten feet from a cliff, with tourist drivers who aren't used to driving that high up in the Rockies where weather changes and wind speed fluctuates."
"Exactly. So, I was looking at this footage, and of some pictures they've sent me, and I've been using the time to come up with a plan for them."
"So I'm not the only one working."
"Nope. So, what's that grey thing secured to the back lift-gate on your fifth wheel?"
I laughed. "That's my boat."
"Your boat?"
"It opens up into a boat and folds back down for storage."
His face lit up. "I've seen those on the internet. Mine's inflatable, it's a pain to get out and get blown up and then collapsed and put back into its storage spot when I'm ready to move on."
"I like mine. It's heavy, but I enjoy it."
"You've got a good mountain bike on the back there, I saw."
I smiled. "You just went and checked out all my toys, didn't you?"
"You haven't looked around on the lot, yet?"
I shook my head. "I want to know who belongs to which one first. Then I'll start taking an inventory so I can associate the right rig to the right guy. And the mountain bike comes in handy for exploring. I'd be surprised if you didn't have one for getting down into the areas you have to for on-site planning."
"I do have one. I also travel around with a dirt bike. Makes getting from my campsite to the worksite a little easier when parking along the roads gets tight with all the construction vehicles."
"Nice. Sounds like you have plenty of toys of your own."
Our conversation continued and he showed me pictures of some other projects he'd worked on. I'd been to some of the same sites, and had undoubtedly biked, hiked, or driven over some of his handiwork. I did get the last few minutes of our time steered around to our childhoods and I came away with the impression that his family thought he had the ability to walk on water, they were so proud of him.
At the end of our time together, Mike did such a simple thing they threw me completely off-guard. I'd gotten to the point that I'd kind of figured that all my guys would start making the move to kiss me. And he did, but he didn't aim for my mouth. He pulled me to him and gave me a simple kiss on the forehead before releasing me to take my hand and lead me back upstairs.
I turned my head to the camera and grinned like an idiot. I'd found his simple gesture so endearing, it was ridiculous.
I met Tyler back up on the top deck for his turn. The yacht was now headed for a cove where the crew would anchor us, and we'd
be able to get off for the swimming and jet-skiing portion of the day. He'd found out that the area we were going through now was the best place along the route to look for spotting sea life. And so that's what we did as the conversation flowed between us. Once Tyler had the distraction of searching for wildlife, he seemed to relax and really talk to me for the first time.
At first, I had thought it was me, that something about me was the reason that we'd never connected. I'd invited him to stay last week simply because I couldn't find any fault with the man. But I'd half expected him to decline and go home. Now though, I was thinking that maybe it was the cameras making him hold back and keep conversations with me superficial. Once he was busy looking for the animals with me, he forgot about our audience watching from behind us. Fortunately, the chase boat was focused on capturing some wildlife footage of their own and so didn't come in close looking for a shot of us.
I found out that he was an efficiency expert for a firm that sends him all over North America. He also had a seven-year-old daughter who spends the summers with him, and the school year with her mother.
I'd been hoping that I could have just as enlightening a conversation with Mitch, but he'd made plans of his own for us. When his turn came up, he put us on a jet ski and we went exploring around the area. He did stop a few times, and we were able to have bits of a conversation. But then he'd scooter us off to another spot to check out.
Don't get me wrong, I had fun. And I was glad that they had thought to make sure I had a chance to experience all of the activities. I just wasn't able to end my time with him feeling much closer to him than I was before. Which was a shame, because I'd seen him beginning to open up to the group of guys more and more as the days went by.
Mitch motored us back to the boat and dropped me off with Phillip, who had a couple small rafts waiting for us. We climbed on and paddled around to a spot away from the others. The camera guys did their best with their zoom lenses to film us and catch our conversation. The chase boat proved to be annoying and loud, but they backed off once they had some quality close-ups.
"I feel like I should be feeding you," he teased.
"I feel like I need to have you over to the cottage and cook for you, just to try and be fair," I said.
"I'll come visit you any time you want."
"I may just take you up on that."
He reached over and flipped me off the raft. I let out a shriek before going under. I resurfaced giggling and flipped him into the water. When he came back up, he pulled our two rafts together, stacked one on top of the other, and held them between us and the boat with one arm, using them as a shield from the prying eyes of the other guys, and wrapped his other arm around me. "We can't have you getting all lonely, now can we?" he whispered.
I turned into his embrace and cuddled against him in the water. "No, that wouldn't be any good," I whispered back.
He leaned in and started making out with me. He proved his strength out there in the water, because I became so focused and involved with kissing him back that I forgot to help him keep us afloat.
We pulled apart eventually and paddled around with our rafts. When he spoke of his parents, I was smacked in the face with our age differences once again. His parents had waited later on in life to have kids. Mine hadn't. That meant that because of our age differences, added to our parents' age differences, there was an entire generation's worth of time between them and me. His parents were the same age as my grandparents. I might have thought Phillip's maturity was sexy as hell, but that one was going to take me a little bit to get past.
We all had to re-board the boat to continue with our journey for the day. Jared grabbed two bottles of water, and my hand, and led me back up to the lounge area. Jared and I were already ahead in the conversation department because of the rooftop the other night, and I didn't feel like there was much of a need to steer us in a particular direction.
I grabbed my bottle of sunscreen and started reapplying now that I was done being in the water. When I was done smearing the areas I could reach, I handed the bottle to Jared and lay down on my stomach.
He stretched out beside me with a devilish grin. He supported his weight with one arm, and kneaded my muscles as he massaged the lotion into my skin with his other hand. And in between, he leaned down and kissed the back of my neck so lightly I got shivers.
He stopped the intimacy there and my mind drifted back to a conversation I'd had with Troy. He'd told me that all the men had been given certain parameters to adhere to so that no one would cross any lines that would throw the rest of the pack of males into a frenzy. Nor did anyone want me to feel so pushed in a physical aspect too quickly. Nobody wanted to go home just because they couldn't keep their hands to themselves at a time when I had the potential for so many hands to be reaching for me that it might turn me off to all of them.
Jared seemed to like to put just a little bit of a different twist on our time spent together. He had us turn our backs on the ocean that we'd spent the afternoon watching, apart from each other, and do some cloud watching together. Arms touched and hands intertwined as the conversation flowed easily for us. We discussed favorite movies, foods, hobbies, and I found out that I wasn't the only one with a sister who insisted on constant updates.
"In all fairness," he said towards the end of his time slot, "I should tell you about my boy."
I turned my head toward his. "You have a boy? How old?"
"Oh, yeah. He's five. He's very well behaved and earns his keep."
The corner of his mouth lifted and I smiled in response. "What does he do to earn his keep?"
"He lets me know when other creatures are around, or getting too close to the rig. And, when needed, he can corral a wild animal well enough for me to get out of a dangerous situation."
"I'm almost scared to ask what species your boy belongs to."
"He's a black lab. His name is Buster. I take him into the field with me. He's the most obedient dog I've ever seen."
"He gets all muddy with you, doesn't he?"
"Yeah. And when you go to hose him off, he stands up on his back legs and turns in a circle for you so you can spray him down easier."
"He does not!"
"Yeah, he does. You want to see a video?"
"Uh, yeah."
He grinned and pulled out his phone, searching for the footage to show me.
"That is so awesome," I told him. "I should tell you that I have dog as well. Getting a big dog was one concession my father insisted that I make before heading out on my own."
"Boy or girl?"
"Girl."
"Is she fixed?"
"Yes."
"Too bad."
"Why? I didn't want her out there one-night-standing some poor lovesick dog and then finding out three states later that she was knocked up. Poor, fatherless, puppies that I'd have to find homes for."
"We could have bred our dogs, and trained them up. I know a lot of people who'd be interested in protective, obedient dogs for fieldwork."
"You didn't get your dog fixed? Isn't that just kind of a standard thing to do, especially if they'll be running around to find other dogs?"
He wiggled uncomfortably. "I couldn't do that to him. A vasectomy I could understand, but to chop things off and render him useless as a man-dog. I couldn't do it."
I laughed aloud. "With your work in the kitchen, or at least dining portions of the rig, and my stuff taking up a portion of the living room, plus two dogs trying to run in there, where would we have put the puppies?"
"I don't know. They'd probably have to be separated from the workspace for awhile."
"Well, that makes for a crowded bedroom."
He finally turned his head toward mine, "Yeah, too crowded. Maybe it's a good thing your dog was spayed."
"Hmm, that does beg a question though," I said as I totally turned on my own sultry/simmering gaze.
His eyes were moving from my gaze, to my lips, and back again. "What's that?"
"Where wou
ld we ever put a baby?"
His eyes flew to mine, searching for meaning, before they settled on my mouth and he used a hand to draw my chin closer to his. "I'm sure we could figure it out," he whispered before sealing his lips over mine in a searing kiss.
If there was one thing I felt with Jared more than anybody else at this point, it was heat. It might have come on in flashes with the other guys when certain qualities came shining through, but with Jared it seemed to always flow just under the surface. There was something about him that was different, and I liked it.
Liam was the last man standing. He approached with a rum punch in hand. I'd heard they were being offered on the main deck, but had forced myself to resist the urge.
"Thank you," I said, and tried not to wrinkle my nose at it as I set the icy cold concoction in a cup holder.
"It's non-alcoholic, if that's the problem."
My face brightened. "Oh, awesome." I picked it back up and took a few sips before I reached over and hit the button to put the canopy back up.
He looked up at the canopy and gave me a quizzical look.
"Your fair skin looks like it's three shades into a burn," I explained.
"Ah. I didn't think you'd do very well with alcohol, having been out in so much direct sun today yourself."
I nodded. "Not to mention the constant movement of the waves. There's no way to keep eight men attracted to me if I started throwing up all over one of them, so I've abstained completely today."
"No, but it would make for an interesting way of eliminating one of us."
I laughed and continued to sip.
"So are you going to be able to keep it straight, who did and said what, in your head after all this today?"
I paused long enough to stare at him over the rim of my cup until I believed I knew where this conversation was going to lead. "I admit I might confuse the finer details of things that were said. But if something someone said or did either impressed me or turned me off, I will remember which reaction goes with each guy. I'm getting much better at compartmentalizing everyone in my mind and associating certain personality traits and pieces of information with each face."
Walk of Shame Page 14