S'more of You (Summer Lovin' collection)(7)

My cabin is the first to arrive at the campfire. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t rush them to get here, out of pure agitation and confusion. A need to see Margot.

What the hell happened in the laundry hut?

Hours later, I’m still baffled.

She was her usual silly and upbeat self tonight at dinner. Her braid was back in place. She led the campers in her chants. All the girls in her cabin were crowded around her, vying for her attention, which she gave them in perfectly equal measure. She always does. For dinner, she had a handful of popcorn and a stray pizza crust dipped in ranch. All of her usual habits.

The balance of my universe, however, has totally shifted.

Actually, it’s gone.

Because I don’t know. What. Happened.

I wasn’t lying when I said I felt her hesitating while we kissed, but if our kiss was really, truly her first kiss, then everything I felt from her makes sense. How she jolted slightly in my arms when I sank my tongue into her mouth, how she seemed almost . . . surprised to be getting turned on the longer our mouths moved, her butt unable to stay still on the table. Antsy. Caught off guard by how good it felt.

She’s not the only one.

That kiss . . . I think it changed my life.

I’m dazed.

Kissing Margot tasted like inevitability. Being quenched. Woken up.

Welcomed home.

Imagine how embarrassing those feelings would be if she’s just pranking me.

There’s too much at stake not to be sure, so I questioned her one more time. I pushed it, to prevent myself from a long, painful fall. I’ve had a lot of loss recently, and that pain has made me . . . guarded. But now? Yeah, now I wish I’d kept my stupid mouth shut and glued to hers. Because what if she’s for real? What if this crush business isn’t a lie at all, but the truth?

What would have happened in the laundry hut?

Would she have let me go down on her?

I bury my face in my hands, scrubbing, refusing to let that thought land when I’m around a bunch of campers, but damn, it lands anyway. If our kiss made her body sensitive enough to tremble and wiggle around, my tongue between her legs would wreck her. Margot is all big reactions and drama, and I’m finding it very hard not to wonder how that would translate in bed. I’ve thought about it before. A lot. But I’m living it right now.

I’m also living with the misery of her being pissed at me.

Whether she’s pranking me or not, I dinged her pride somehow in the laundry hut. By pointing out her hesitation, I might have come across as criticizing the way she kisses (I definitely wasn’t). By calling her bluff, if she was, in fact, pranking me. By doubting her if she wasn’t. I don’t know the exact source of her anger, but I’m not going to relax until I’ve fixed things.

In fact, I hope she dresses like a bear tonight and scares me half to death, just so I can hear her laugh.

A few minutes later, a few of Margot’s campers come racing into the campfire clearing, skidding to a stop and cringing when they see my boys are already seated on their log. The boys scowl back.

I’m only half paying attention, though, because Margot comes skipping into view with a giggling ten-year-old on her back.

I rise to my feet, my pulse triggered, as if I didn’t see her less than an hour ago in the dining hall. But that pulse becomes a roar in my ears when I see Aiken is following a few feet behind Margot. Smiling. And carrying her camp-issued drawstring bag.

Aiken. Is carrying. Margot’s bag.

“What the hell . . .” I say under my breath.

Margot, seemingly oblivious to the fact that allowing someone else to hold her bag has just launched my blood pressure through the roof, sets the girl down and reaches over to take said bag back from Aiken. “Thanks, A-Man.”

I intercept the bag.

Not sure when I moved, but here I am.

Margot blinks up at me.

Aiken seems to be holding back amusement.

“I was thinking we could mix up the seating arrangements tonight,” I say, slinging the drawstring bag over one shoulder and consulting my clipboard without really seeing it. “Margot, your cabin will be beside mine.”

She does a double take while trying to snag her bag off my shoulder.

I easily evade her reach.

“But Unicorn Cabin always sits in the second row on the camp side of the fire,” she says. “It’s tradition.”

“We can break it for one night. I want you to help me with the story tonight.” I flash back to earlier in the afternoon when she showed off her bear noises. “I’ll tell the story, you act it out.”

I’m making this up as I go along, but my God, does the idea get her attention. Of course it does. I’ve just given her an opportunity to be a ham. “Really?” She shakes out her hands adorably, balancing on the balls of her feet. Why the hell was someone else carrying her stuff? “Oh my gosh, I’m in. What story are you telling?” She backpedals. “Wait! Don’t tell me. It’ll be funnier if I don’t know and have to improvise.”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking.” I nod at her milling group of campers. “And it’ll help if you’re sitting near me.”

“Right!” Margot herds the girls to the other side of the campfire and settles them onto the log beside my cabin, causing the Mighty Meerkats to stiffen in alarm and fall completely silent. Now that I’ve singlehandedly thrown the campfire into chaos, it takes an extra ten minutes to rearrange all the cabins into their new spots.