Page 3 of Mountain Man's Bonfire Beauty
Stranger. The word hit me like a slap. I’d been watching her every time I stopped by here this week. Thinking about her, imagining conversations we might have. But to her, I was a nobody. Just some guy who’d appeared out of nowhere to criticize her.
“Fine,” I said, backing away from the booth. “Just…be more careful.”
“I’m always careful.” She didn’t look up from her packing. “But thanks for the unsolicited advice.”
I wanted to say more, wanted to explain that I wasn’t worried about the market or the other vendors or even the property damage. That the only thing that had mattered in those terrifying seconds was making sure she was safe. But I’d already made a mess of things, and anything else I said would probably just make it worse.
So I turned and walked away, leaving Parker to clean up the aftermath of her accident and my spectacular failure at human communication. Behind me, I could hear my friend calling my name, probably wondering what the hell had just happened.
What had happened was simple. I’d finally gotten my chance to talk to the woman who’d been occupying my thoughts for days, and I’d blown it completely. Instead of the hero who’d swept in to save the day, I’d come across as an overbearing jerk who couldn’t mind his own business.
Perfect. Absolutely perfect.
Now I had to spend the next four hours setting up a bonfire, knowing that Parker Walsh thought I was an ass. And the worst part? She wasn’t wrong.
2
PARKER
I’ve never been happier to do manual labor.
I was hauling kindling from one pile to another. The first pile was one a group of super muscular construction guys were making from items they’d gathered from the woods. Our job was to move that to a much bigger pile of logs and limbs and branches that would become the bonfire.
All of us vendors were pitching in—even though I was a local and most of the others weren’t. For the past couple of months, I’d been staying at a cabin my parents had bought, planning to turn it into a vacation rental. Yeah, they’d quickly learned there weren’t very many vacationers in the town of Wildwood Valley.
“Let me help with that.”
My heart was racing as the gorgeous guy with soft brown eyes walked toward me. He had harsh features, but those eyes had gone straight to my soul—even when he was yelling at me for creating a fire hazard.
Okay, not yelling. I’d been corrected on that many times in my life. I was overly sensitive to a man raising his voice. I had reasons, and those reasons were nobody’s business but my own.
“I can do it,” I said, glancing down at the bundle of limbs in my arms. “It’s kind of precarious right now, so if I try to shift it to you, it’ll probably all fall to the ground.”
He nodded. “Fair point. I want to make it up to you, though.”
He was walking next to me now, the two of us as alone as we could be when there were dozens of people everywhere. Like worker bees, they rushed back and forth from the big pile to the small pile.
“I was kind of an ass.” He paused, then corrected, “Iamkind of an ass.”
The correction caught my attention.When someone tells you who they are, believe them.That was a saying I’d heard once, and I wholeheartedly embraced it. I’d spent the past five years since high school graduation deftly avoiding toxic relationships. I didn’t want to fall into the trap so many of my friends had of falling for a guy who was, well, an asshole.
The problem was, I’d avoided relationships altogether. I’d been on a few dates, mostly group things with friends, but guys usually had me running the second I recognized red flags.
But I’d never felt this before—this overpowering draw toward someone. It had me wondering if my “asshole alert” had ever worked in the first place.
“No, you were right,” I said. “I shouldn’t have had an open flame so close to kids. It could have gone sideways fast.”
“It kind of did,” he said.
“Yes, but nobody was hurt. Sorry about your jacket. I’ll buy you another one.”
I just hoped it was an inexpensive jacket, not some designer brand. From the looks of it, it had some age on it. It was army green, which probably meant he was ex-military. Most of the guys around here were.
“It came from a thrift store,” he said. “No big deal. I have a closet full of jackets.”
I set my kindling on the ground. The bonfire pile was so high now, I couldn’t just plop it down like I’d been doing. I had to add pieces toward the top, which was about chest height.
“Here,” he said. “You hand them to me, and I’ll pile them on top.”
