Page 19 of In Doubt
6
Jake
The next morning, the professor stops by to see how we’re getting on and to let us know they are serving cold drinks and snacks in the main tent.
She wags her finger at us when she sees how we’re working at opposite ends of the trench and reminds us that it isn’t the most efficient way of doing things. Giorgie nods along but I know neither of us are going to change things up.
I strip off my gloves, rest my hands on the edge of the trench and hop out of the hole. Giorgie peers up at me with those big caramel eyes of hers behind her glasses, chewing her lip and eyeing the climb out.
I harrumph and hold out my hand. I spent the whole of yesterday watching her struggle in and out of the trench. It’s ridiculous. She’s so bloody stubborn, refusing my help every time. But we removed several layers of dirt yesterday and the trench is even deeper now. As much as neither of us particularly wants to hold hands, I suspect she doesn’t want to stay trapped in the trench either and I’m not so much of an arsehole that I’d leave her there.
She reaches out her hand and for a moment her palm hovers over mine before I wrap my fingers around hers.
Immediately, electricity seems to spark between our skin, and I nearly drop her hand in alarm. It’s the first time we’ve touched. The first time our skin has connected. And that’s never happened to me before.
But then I realise it’s only static. The air here is bone dry after all.
With a heave I haul her out of the trench, ensuring she lands neatly on her feet.
As soon as she’s out, I drop her palm, and she jumps away. I flex my fingers, that strange sensation in my skin still there, and notice she’s doing the same as I follow her towards the tent.
I stare down at my hand, wondering what that can mean. Wondering if it means anything at all.
We don’t talk as we walk; the tension that hangs in the air between us is even denser than usual, and as soon as we reach the shade of the canvas, she spots her friends and hurries away.
I grab myself a can of coke from a stack on a trestle table, the tin cold against my tingling palm, and I crack back the pull. Then I take a long gulp. This morning wasn’t as bad as I’d feared, the air had frisked in my favour and whipped most of Giorgie’s scent away from me. And yet it was still there, ever present, still is now, tugging at the corners of my mind, stirring my consciousness. Stirring my cock!
Stalking to the other side of the tent, I pull out my phone and check my messages. My packmates rarely emerge into the land of the living until mid-morning on the days that we don’t have training so I’m surprised to find they’ve already sent me a string of pictures of them lounging by the pool, looking relaxed and happy. Arseholes. I step out into the sunshine and snap a few photos of my own. Of the half exposed temple and the never-ending desert, both shining radiantly under the fierce sun.
“It’s really beautiful, isn’t it?” Her voice is a whisper, sort of reverence and I can’t help but look at her. Those goddamn eyes sparkling in a way that has my stomach flipping.
“It is,” I whisper back, noting the way the light catches in the strands of her hair making them almost golden.
She shakes her head, dragging her eyes away from the site and offers me a small package of food. “Here,” she says. “I have no idea what it is, but it tastes divine.”
I take it from her with a little suspicion. “Did you lace it with laxatives?”
The corners of her mouth twitch. “Perhaps. Although it wouldn’t be very smart on my count, seeing as I’m sharing a trench with you all day. I think you’re safe.”
I give the package an exaggerated sniff, then take a tentative bite. I chew and swallow then freeze, clutching my stomach. “Urgh!”
“What?!” she cries.
“Nothing.” I grin at her and she swipes her fist against my bicep.
This time I freeze for real, trying really hard not to stare down at the point where her knuckles grazed my arm, at the point where my skin is tingling all over again.
What the fuck?
“Can we get back to it?” she asks, not seeming to notice. “You can eat on the way, right?”
I peer back at the tent. Most of our colleagues lounge on chairs, enjoying their break. I have to hand it to her, Giorgie is ambitious and hardworking, and that is something I can respect. I agree and soon we’re back at the trench. I jump back into the hole and once again lift my hand to offer my assistance.
She stares at my hand, her own twitching by her side.
“I’m really not going to pull you in and break your neck,” I say with more softness and less sarcasm than I’d intended, knowing I want to pull her in and rut her senseless.
“It’d be about the only way you’d steal that spot from the professor’s team from me,” she says with a teasing smile.
