Page 11 of Only One Tent
“Yes, I work for Drew, and it’s Sky, please.” I echoed her words, receiving a big, wide smile in return.
“Great. Sky it is. So you work with Danny, then?”
“Some. We’re good friends. I kind of introduced him to Lee.” Thekind ofpart was that we were at the BDSM club in the Littles room, and I so did not want to get into that. Especially with her kids, although they seemed grown and also ignoring us.
Lilly looked like she could actually be sleeping, draped over the tube, and Landon was looking around at everything and taking pictures with his phone. I’d left mine at camp, not wanting to risk it getting wet. But to each his own. Landon looked a bit older than her. He might have been college-age, maybe, while she was likely a junior or senior in high school. Although, I wouldn’t put money on it.
Levi pointed out the prehistoric-looking birds drying their wings on the branches of a nearby tree. And Landon scrambledto get the picture. Then he pointed out turtles on the side and suddenly got very excited when he saw three otters ahead. Okay, that was exciting, but Levi’s voice changed, and he got that dreamy look on his face that Danny always did when he was in his Little headspace.
“Look. Bri, Sky. Otters. That one’s on the shore. Oh, the others are swimming.”
Landon chuckled at his excitement but didn’t stop taking pictures, either. “Don’t even think about getting close to them, Uncle Levi. They crack through oyster shells with those teeth and jaws. Your petting fingers wouldn’t stand a chance.”
Levi huffed. “If I stood a chance, they’d swim away. Lookie.” He pointed at them again, but this time behind us. One of them popped up in the water then disappeared in an instant. “Too fast for me. I’d never catch ‘em.” His voice slipped even more into Little-mode. I looked at Landon to gauge his reaction, but he only looked amused. As did Brianna. It was pretty obvious they knew.
“Hey, Levi?” I wasn’t going to ask who knew and who didn’t. I wasn’t going to out him if I was wrong.
“Yeah?” he answered, not looking at me.
“Where’s Hudson?” That was his partner.
The question made Levi pout. He was kind of cute. “He had stuff to do. Grown up daddy stuff.”
Well then, maybe everyone did know.
Then Levi smiled brightly. “He’ll be here tonight for dinner and after.”
Lilly’s head popped up from the other side of her mother. “Oh, are we staying for the karaoke? I want to sing.”
Bri rolled her eyes. “Sure.”
“Karaoke?” I hadn’t known that was the plan.
“Yeah. It’s special. I’m not ‘posed to tell. But it’s gonna be so fun. Please stay, Bri.” Levi pouted. He was cute, but it made mefeel sorry for Hudson. He probably gave in entirely too much with this one.
“I said sure.” Bri held up her hands.
“Yay!” Levi clapped. Then he went back to pointing out things for Landon to take pictures of. His attention span was short. Much like Danny’s. I could see why the two of them were such good friends.
I dropped into the water to cool off. And Landon offered to hold on to my tube if I wanted to swim a bit.
Levi called out. “Me too. Me too.” And splashed into the water. That kid had entirely too much energy. After swimming a bit, I climbed back up and held on to the tubes while Landon swam with Levi a little more.
“That was refreshing, Lilly. You should get in.” Landon splashed his sister as he crawled back up on his tube.
She wrinkled her nose. “No thanks.”
I stuck with Levi and his family for the rest of the trip. Then, finally, we got out downriver, where the vans were picking us up. The ramp had deep stairs at the very end because the water dropped off. I used them to get up on the ramp and pulled the tube with me, carrying it to the end of the dock where someone collected it.
We all chatted as we dried off, and I couldn’t help looking for Crow. I didn’t see him, but didn’t think he could have been terribly far away from me. Putting it behind me, I got on the bus. I sat back and closed my eyes. I hadn’t realized how tired I was from the water and the sun. Who thought you could get that tired doing so little? I mean, I practically reclined and relaxed the entire way.
Someone plopped next to me, and I opened my eyes. Crow. Had to be him, right? “What?”
“Just making sure you made it back all in one piece.”
“Sheesh. I am an adult, you know.”
His smirk said he didn’t, in fact, know that I was a grown-ass man and was probably about to rub my inexperience or naivety in my face. Or whatever his joke was going to be. Maybe my size since I was significantly smaller than him. I was almost as tall as him but built like a twink. Skin and bones with a bubble butt. My thighs were a little thick, too. But one hundred percent adult. It wasn’t my fault Crow was built more like a linebacker. With broad, muscular shoulders and…
