Taking The Heat (Knitting Club Book 3) by Austin Bates

Author:Austin Bates [Bates, Austin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-06-07T16:00:00+00:00

I left Charlie to tend to the fire while I went to check the fish trap I’d set in the stream. The cold water bit at my hand and my bones ached as I reached into the current to yank out the sticks and stones that made up the contraption, and found nothing inside it but water-logged leaves and slime. Disappointed, my stomach growled, but when I got back to camp I found that Charlie was cooking up the packets of instant oatmeal that I'd brought as a back-up breakfast.

“No luck?” he asked.

He spooned a generous portion into my bowl while I rubbed my hands over the fire to try and bring some movement back into my stiff knuckles.

“Nope. Well, maybe the fish got lucky. You built up enough coals to get the water boiling?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Impressive.”

He beamed with an unapologetically proud smile that set my heart racing.

“How about some protein?” I asked, nodding toward the snake carcass.

Charlie turned up his nose “Go ahead. It’s all yours.”

“Don’t knock it ‘til you try it. You’ll be glad for the extra fuel once we’re a few hours into today’s trek.”

After gutting the snake, I tossed it in a pan over the fire and cut off a piece for Charlie to try.

“Looks...bony,” he declared after poking at it with his spork. I was already pulling the meat off with my teeth.

“The meat should be tender enough to pull off with your teeth.” He nibbled at it, chewed, then raised his eyebrows as he swallowed. “Okay. You’re right. That’s actually not bad! It’s a little dry, though.” He ate a few more bites hungrily, then poked at the skin and bones left in his bowl.

“If you want something else, we still have some graham crackers and chocolate left.” I reached into my pack and tossed him the sleeve of cookies, which he munched happily as we sat back by the fire in the same spot we’d taken the night before. I was chilly but Charlie had his jacket off, so I put mine aside too, just to feel his shoulder next to mine with less fabric between us. He was warm, and I scooted closer to press against him.

“Is there something you wanted to ask me today?” I asked quietly.

“Yeah, I have a question. Shouldn’t we be saving these for emergencies?” Charlie nibbled at the edge of a cracker with delicate bites.

“What kind of emergency would a graham cracker get us out of?”

“Like if we got stuck out here, for example. In the woods.”

“That wouldn’t happen.”

He huffed. “Well, what if one of us had an accident, and couldn’t get out of the forest?”

“We’d survive.”

He looked at me, his face so close that I could feel his breath, but I kept my eyes on my boots and chewed my cracker as excitement bubbled in my belly. I loved knowing he was looking at me, and I could almost feel his eyes dragging over my jaw.

“How do you know we’d survive? You can’t know that.”

“Didn’t I tell you? Nature always gives us what we need.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.