Loving Wild by Verge Lisa Ann

Author:Verge, Lisa Ann
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi, pdf
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2011-06-07T16:00:00+00:00

7

CASEY STEPPED OUT OF the canoe and splashed into the shallows. She sank ankle-deep into the silty riverbed.

“Great. Just great,” she groaned. She lunged toward the bank. Her heel slipped against a rock and sank deeper. She sucked her back foot out of the mud. The fine silt seeped in under the edges of her sagging socks. By the time she splashed to the dry riverbank her legs were black from the mid-calf down and grit seeped between her toes.

Dylan, tying the towrope to a branch overhanging the bank, cast her a vaguely amused glance. “Missed the rocks, eh?”

“No, Dylan,” she snarled. “I actually wanted to be exfoliated from the knees down.”

“That works better with your sneakers off.”

“No kidding.”

She cast him a black look. His boots were squeaky-clean. Of course he didn’t sink into the mud. Of course not. Mr. Sensible Nature Man probably mapped out the route before he stepped out of the canoe.

“Just think of it this way,” he said, tightening the rope with practiced ease. “The mud’s good for mosquito bites.”

She glared at him as she scratched her arm, where a series of welts glowed red along her elbow. She felt her cheeks flush with irritation and anger. She had a sudden image in her head of Wile E. Coyote, eyes red in fury, steam belching from his ears. She only wished she had the phone number for the Acme Company.

Mr. Optimist was beginning to get on her nerves.

Of course, everything was beginning to get on her nerves. First of all, the rain. Not drenching downpours of rain, no. Not enough to convince Mr. Nature Boy to put up the tent and take cover for a while, but spitting mist, instead. A spitting mist that made her normally straight, sleek hair kink and twist like Little Orphan Annie’s. A vague drizzle that seeped under the collar of her T-shirt and made her as itchy as if she had an all-body case of diaper rash.

For two days this haze had fallen on them. Two days of pewter skies and fog. Two nights of sleeping wet without a fire. Two days of living under this Saran Wrap rain poncho feeling like some kind of soggy leftover.

Two days of wondering what had possessed her to agree to take this trip with this infuriating go-go football coach, this disgustingly well-conditioned hunk who could still look heart-stoppingly good, unshaven and soaking wet, after a week of roaming the woods.

“I’m going to climb that rock,” he announced, checking the rope for tautness and eyeing the float of the canoe. “Maybe I can find that Owl’s Head landmark better from up there.”

“According to your inaccurate ancient map,” she said, kicking her muddied foot against a sapling, “we were supposed to be able to see Owl’s Head Rock from the river.”

“Yeah, yeah, but maybe the trees have grown. Maybe there’s a petroglyph we can’t see from below. Maybe the rock formation has eroded. We’re not getting anywhere looking from the river, so we might as well scout out the terrain.

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