by Erin Wright
They finally pulled into a woodland clearing and Moose stopped under the shade of some tall pine trees, cutting the engine, the instant silence allowing the bird calls and squirrel chatters to be heard. It was…peaceful. And naturey. And calm. And remote.
In other words, it was not Sawyer or Boise or Salt Lake City or Denver or New York City.
Tennessee’s hands fluttered, not sure where to land or what to do. Why had she agreed to this? She couldn’t remember in that moment. There probably wasn’t a single mall within 200 miles of this campsite.
No, she wasn’t used to this at all.
Levi and Moose both swung out of the truck and hurried over to the other side to help Tennessee and Georgia out. Levi easily swung her down from the truck’s backseat, handling her weight as if she were nothing more than toddler-sized, and set her gently down on the ground. Their eyes locked for a moment, his hands on her waist, and then he moved away to help Moose unload the bed of the truck.
But the promise that had been there in his eyes when he’d been staring down at her…
Had she been imagining it? Maybe she had. Maybe she just wanted something so badly that she was starting to imagine it into existence.
So she could add delusional to her list of qualities that she only had while around Levi Scranton.
Awesome.
“You and Tennessee can set this up,” Moose said to Levi, jerking her out of her thoughts. Moose had tossed a long nylon bag to Levi that clinked as he swung it effortlessly over his shoulder. Levi looked over at her.
“Well, are you coming or what?” he asked her, startling her into action. She hurried over to his side, happy to be put to work on a project that did not appear to include killing animals. Levi walked over to the shade of some pine trees, the ground a bed of fallen pine needles, and grunted, “This looks good.”
Tennessee looked around and shrugged. Sure. Why not. She wasn’t entirely sure what they were doing quite yet, but she refused to admit her ignorance. She’d figure it out soon enough. She was a smart, capable woman. She could absolutely do this…whatever “this” was.
Levi opened the bag and dumped out a mass of metal rods and nylon fabric, with mesh and zippers going every which way. Tennessee looked at the pile wide-eyed. This was going to make something? She gnawed on her bottom lip hesitantly. She really didn’t know where to start or what to do, so rather than make a fool of herself, she decided to just wait for Levi to give her instructions.
He started rolling the fabric out, mumbling about facing the door the right way, and it finally occurred to Tenny that they were setting up the tent. Ohhhh…well, that made sense. Although, where was the other tent at? Were there two tangled up together?
“Are you going to help or what?” Levi asked, arching an eyebrow at her.
“Of course, yes!” she said brightly. She waited for him to tell her what to do. He waited for her to…what? He was just staring at her. She stared back.
“Have you ever set up a tent before?” Levi finally growled, frustrated.
“No?” she said, but it came out as a question instead.
“Have you ever seen a tent before?”
“No?” This time, her voice was even higher.
With a grumble about worthless women and some other commentary that Tennessee pretended she couldn’t hear, Levi started pointing out the parts to a tent. The tarpy stuff went on the ground, the nylon stuff went up in the air, and the metal poles held it all up.
Riiggghhhtttt…
Her mother’s comment about how only hobos lived in tents flashed through Tennessee’s mind. She’d made it her life’s mission not to agree with her mother on almost anything, but in this case, she was starting to believe that she might’ve had a point.
Levi showed her how the poles slid inside of each other, eventually creating a long bouncy arc that reminded Tennessee of a pole-vaulting stick thingy, and then together, they wrestled the pole into the long strips of fabric connected to the side of the tent. Once they’d finally gotten it into place, Tennessee stood back, sweaty but proud. She’d actually gotten the pole in where it was supposed to go.
Levi stopped and looked at her. “Well,” he prodded, “let’s do the next one.” He nodded to the folded-up stack of metal that happened to be laying next to her feet on the ground. She looked down at it, surprised.
“You mean we have to put more than one pole into the tent?”
“Yes, we have to put more than one pole into the tent,” Levi repeated dryly. He began mumbling more comments about having someone put her shoes on her feet in the morning, and Tennessee’s cheeks flamed a bright red. She didn’t have servants put her shoes on for her in the morning! Just because she didn’t know how tents worked didn’t mean she was completely worthless.
She struggled with the poles and the fabric and the metal thingies apparently called “stakes” and did her best to avoid Levi’s gaze as they worked together. She was in so far over her head, she was going to drown in ignorance at any moment.
And worst of all, she was about ready to wholeheartedly agree with Roberta Rowland on a topic, which as far as she could figure, would be a first.
Saying yes to going camping was absolutely a poor life choice.
Chapter 5
Levi
Levi knelt down and began pounding the metal stake into the ground to hold the guy-wire in place when he looked up into Tenny’s face and saw…absolute devastation. She had apparently heard his not-so-quiet comment about servants dressing her in the morning.
He groaned inwardly. He shouldn’t have said that. He just couldn’t…how was it possible that Tennessee had been born and raised in Sawyer, Idaho and had never even seen a tent in her life, let alone helped erect one?! Had her parents really sequestered her away from life that much? She hadn’t gone on any camping trips previously with him and Moose, but then again, she was a girl and up until this weekend, girls hadn’t gone on their camping trips. They had been blessedly free of the female persuasion. But surely she would’ve gone with someone else. Not camping at all…Levi’s brain didn’t comprehend that.
Tennessee snuffled, turning away from him and wiping her arm across her face, staring up into the trees as if suddenly obsessed with how the Western white pine grew straight and tall.
Levi wasn’t fooled one bit.
He pushed himself up into a standing position and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “I’m…I’m sorry,” he said awkwardly. “I’ve been going camping ever since my dad would let me,” which since his father didn’t give a rat’s ass about him, meant he’d been going camping ever since he could walk, “and so all of it seems natural to me.”
She gulped and continued staring up into the branches of the tree, studiously avoiding his gaze. He hurried on. “You were a fast learner, though,” liar, liar, pants on fire, “and pretty soon, all of this will seem like an old hat to you.”
She quickly and discretely wiped the tears from her cheeks, nodding as she did so. “My parents aren’t, uhh, big campers. My mother thinks that she’s being put upon if she has to stay at a four-star hotel instead of a five-star one.” She shrugged, still looking off into the trees. “My father’s mentioned buying a 5th wheel at some point but my mother said she couldn’t handle having a toilet that wasn’t hooked to an honest-to-God sewer system, so that’s never gonna happen. I think she’d rather off herself than sleep in a tent.” She said the word the same way a person would say pile of shit, and Levi grimaced.
What had he told Georgia? Despite his ex-girlfriend’s certainty and usual correctness, in this one particular case, Levi was right. He forced himself to not march over and say “I told you so!” to her, no matter how strong the temptation was.
And then, Tennessee’s next question caught Levi so off-guard, he completely forgot about his plans to rub Georgia’s nose in it.
“So where’s the other tent at?” she asked, finally turning to look at him.
“The other tent?” he repeated, confused.<
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“Yeah, the girls’ tent. Or, the boys’ tent. You didn’t say which one this one was, so whatever the other tent is.”
Levi struggled to follow her convoluted statement. “There’s a girls’ tent and a boys’ tent?” he finally asked, hoping that he was guessing wrong.
“Ummm…yes?” she said hesitantly, her huge green eyes – they were green at the moment, not blue – practically swallowing her face. “I mean, I’m not sleeping with you and Moose tonight, right?”
“Not with us,” Levi said. Her face brightened. “Not in our sleeping bags,” he clarified. “You’ll be in your own sleeping bag, but in the same tent.” Her face dropped.
Levi felt simultaneously like an asshat for disappointing her and completely confused by the line of questions. “Are you not allowed to sleep in the same tent as men?” he asked, trying to figure it out. She was 26 years old. She wasn’t Amish, born-again Christian, or a Mormon, at least as far as he’d ever been told. Surely she and Moose had been banging all along, so…why the hesitancy?
She shrugged. “It’s not a rule,” she said, her cheeks glowing a little brighter under his questioning gaze. “I don’t think my mother ever thought to specifically mention tents before, actually.”
“Are you allowed to sleep in a hotel room with a guy?” he pressed. He kinda felt like he’d been dropped down a rabbit hole. Or dropped on his head. Or maybe just whacked upside the head with a 2x4. Tennessee Rowland, the cause of wet dreams for every guy under the age of 98 in all of Long Valley County…she couldn’t actually be a virgin.
Could she?
“Oh no,” she said, shaking her head firmly. “My parents would kill me for that.”
“Do your parents think that you and Georgia are sleeping in a tent separate from Moose and me?” he asked, feeling faintly ill. Tennessee’s father was best friends with Moose’s father, and Moose’s father was Levi’s boss. Pissing off Robert Rowland seemed like a shitastically awful idea; a virtually guaranteed way for Levi to lose his job.
Tennessee shrugged. “Maybe,” she said, her gaze darting past him, her hands fluttering everywhere, smoothing down her shirt, running over her shorts, playing with a long lock of hair.
Tennessee Rowland, the implacable ice queen that no one can read, has a tell.
He had an almost overwhelming desire to go ask Moose if he’d ever noticed this before, but forced himself to stay on track.
“If your parents found out that you were sleeping in the same tent as Moose and me, would you get into trouble?” he pressed. It wasn’t too late to call the whole thing off. They could pack everything up and head back to town and try this another weekend. One where Moose was able to disconnect himself from Georgia’s side long enough to leave her at home.
“Oh. Well. Umm…maybe? I mean, probably, but I won’t tell them.”
“You’re going to lie to your parents?” Levi was surprised. Shocked, honestly. Tenny had the face of an angel; the one that said she’d never tell a fib, not even if her life depended upon it.
“I wouldn’t say lie. Just, not mention. They won’t ask, and I won’t tell.” A shadow flicked across her eyes at that, piquing Levi’s interest.
“How are you sure they won’t ask?”
“They’d have to be interested in me to ask,” Tenny replied, the pain in her voice painfully obvious. She straightened up and shot him a bright smile. “We should go see what Moose and Georgia are doing,” and headed towards the lovey-dovey couple, her perfect ass swinging with every step.
They’d have to be interested in me to ask…
The comment made no sense at all. Tennessee was one of the most coddled, spoiled people he’d ever met. Her parents gave her everything she wanted; she lived in a mansion; her family had servants, for God’s sake. He couldn’t think of a set of parents more invested in their child, other than Moose, of course.
Not interested? That was Levi’s dad. He didn’t give a shit about Levi, except as a source of alcohol.
Tennessee…her parents paid for music lessons and a new car and attended all of her music recitals and sent her all over the country to compete in competitions and had paid for her four-year college degree.
Those were not the actions of parents who didn’t give a damn.
Levi followed slowly after the enigma that was Tennessee Rowland. Damn girls. They never made sense.
Maybe another weekend by himself on his lumpy couch wouldn’t have been so bad. At least it wouldn’t have been so confusing.
Chapter 6
Tennessee
Tenny hurried away from the probing eyes of Levi, feeling his gaze on her every step. She felt wrung out, used up, and totally worthless. She didn’t know how to put up a tent; her parents were the very epitome of smothering; and she said way too much around Levi that she didn’t say around anyone else. Did he have some sort of magical hold over her?
This was not a positive development.
Georgia looked up with a big smile, one that faded once she saw Tennessee. “Is everything okay?” she asked as Tenny neared the two lovebirds.
Dammit. She’d been stupid enough to let her emotions show on her face for a moment. She was really starting to lose it.
She smoothed her face into the appropriate lines, sending Georgia a bland smile. “Of course,” she said. “The tent is up. What can I help with next?” Because I was such a giant help with the tent.
She pushed that thought down, too.
“Well, it’s getting late and I don’t know about you, but I’m starving,” Georgia said. “I was going to move all of the sleeping bags and suitcases inside of the tent now that it’s up – thank heavens it’s such a huge tent, right? – if you and Levi want to get to work on tonight’s dinner.”
Tennessee found herself torn between wanting to say, “That tent? That tent over there? It’s huge?” and “Levi? Really? Can’t I help you with dinner?”
But she shut her mouth. Whining and complaining wasn’t going to get her anywhere. Just because the tent they were all going to be sleeping in that night was roughly the size of her closet and just because Levi thought she was a completely worthless, spoiled brat didn’t mean that it was okay to whine and complain.
And anyway, no one wanted to listen to it. Her parents had taught her that a long time ago.
Levi spoke up right behind her, almost scaring Tenny out of her skin. “Sure, we’d be happy to. What are we having for dinner?”
“I packed everything we needed for tinfoil dinners,” Moose said. Tennessee blanched. Tinfoil? For dinner? Wasn’t that dangerous? “You don’t eat the tinfoil!” he said quickly, catching the look on her face. “You wrap the food up in tinfoil.”
“Of course,” she said regally, as if that was totally something she knew before he explained it. “Where’s the food?”
“Over in the coolers,” Moose said with a jerk of his head towards some blue-and-white coolers sitting underneath the shade of a pine tree.
Tennessee took off walking towards the coolers and then realized that if she got there first, then she’d have to pull the food out, and then she’d have to admit that she had no idea what food she was pulling out, and she’d already looked like enough of a fool for one day, thankyouverymuch, so a much better strategy was to fall into line next to Levi and then let him pull the food out. Once it was all out and spread out on the card table Moose had set up over by the campfire, it’d be self-explanatory from there.
She slowed her pace and shot a brilliant smile up at Levi. If she just flirted with him enough, he might forget to notice that she knew virtually nothing at all. Well, at least nothing at all that was helpful on a camping trip. She could lay out the silverware for a proper meal in the correct order and she knew how to arrange a vase of flowers for the most visual oomph possible, oh and she totally knew how to dicker with saleswomen at high-end department stores to get the best deals possible, but…
Yeah, nothing useful for a camping trip.
“Isn’t the John Deere
dealership busy this time of year?” she asked as Levi knelt down next to the coolers and began pulling food out, handing it up to her. Her brilliant plan had worked. She gave herself a mental pat on the back for that one. “How are you able to take Monday off?”
He shrugged, his shirt pulling tight across his delicious muscles as he continued to dig. The food just kept coming so Tenny had to turn sideways so she could continue to drool over him as he worked, but that view? Totally worth it.
“I’ve been there long enough that Rocky pretty much lets me set my own hours,” he murmured distractedly, rifling through the cooler with a muttered curse. Before Tenny could question him on that – Moose had never had that sort of latitude and it was his father’s dealership – Levi pulled out a bag of carrots triumphantly. “There you are, you little buggers.” He started to hand it up to her when he actually took a good look at her. “Oh, whoa!” he said, scrambling to his feet and beginning to unload her arms. A sack of potatoes, a bag of celery, onions and garlic and a few more items later that she didn’t even recognize, he could finally look her in the eye again.
He stared down at her for a moment, and then let out a small laugh. “If I’d handed you those carrots, where, exactly, would you have put them? On top of your head?”
She shrugged, which was considerably easier now that he’d taken half her load away. “I still had a pinky free. I was going to hold it with that.”
He shook his head, kicking the cooler top closed with his booted foot and then heading back towards the fire. “It’s okay to complain, you know,” he said as they walked. “You can say, ‘Levi, I’m drowning in food over here.’”
A second card table had appeared from somewhere, pushed up together with the first one, and they began laying out the food. As they did so, Tennessee contemplated his words. They were a foreign concept, to say the least. Complaining about something just meant that she’d have whatever it was piled on top of her twice over. Hate practicing the piano? Butt-on-bench time would be doubled from two hours a day to four. Hate caviar? That’s all they’d eat for a week until she could learn to swallow it without grimacing.