“Nothing,” I said, closing my eyes briefly. “Nothing. Yeah, hiking! Let’s clean up and we can attack Jane’s Peak.”
“The Peak?” Brian whistled. “Feeling ambitious today, are we?”
I looked away and bit my lip.
Feeling like if I don’t physically exhaust myself, I’m gonna jump all over you.And wouldn’tthatbe a fucking nightmare? Because over the years, Brian Carr had shown interest in almost theentireunder-forty male population of CamdenandO’Leary…
With one glaring exception.
Yours truly.
And Itriednot to take that personally—to tell myself what Brian and I had was better because friendship waspermanent—but it got harder with every passing day and every newidiothe dated not to just grab the man and lay my heart at his feet.
And, you know, kill our friendship dead inmilliseconds.
Seriously.
Brian didn’t have a secretive bone in his body. If he was attracted to someone, he showed it, usuallytoomuch. I couldn’t imagine what it would do to our friendship if I just threw my feelings out there. He’d feel bad, and then he’d feel awkward… and the last thing either of us wanted was for Brian to have one more guy in his life who made him feel awkward.
Therefore, my rampant case offeelswas my problem and mine alone, and I was going to solve it. Step one, give Brian exactly what he wanted—Mark Whatever-his-name-was—on a silver platter. Step two, once Brian was as happy as I could possibly ensure him being and in love with a guy who loved him back, I’d have no choice but to let go and move on.
Yes, it hurt to even think about it.
No, that didn’t mean I wasn’t gonna do it.
“Darius? You gonna pass out on me before we even start?” Brian demanded.
I didn’t dignify that with a response. “We’ll only go as far as the first picnic area, okay? Short and fast. Unless you’re worried you can’t keep up?”
His brown eyes flashed with challenge in a way that wasso veryunhelpfulin my quest to lose my erection. “Think you’re gonna eat those words,Darius.”
Two hours later, after loading all his tools back into his truck, refilling our water bottles at the office, and hiking to our destination, Inearlyadmitted he was right.
“DUN! Dun dun DUN! Dun dun DUN! Dun dun DUNNN!” Brian lifted both hands in the air and danced around triumphantly as we crested the steepest rise in the trail and stepped off the path towards the picnic area.
“This is hardly an ‘Eye of the Tiger’moment, Bri-bri,” I said sourly.
Brian turned so he was walking backwards. “Um. Pretty sure it is. HereIam, a man who hasn’t been up this trail in like… a year? And I’m perfectly fine! Not even winded! Meanwhileyou, Survivor Man, kept gasping and huffing every two seconds! I think it’s clear whocan’t keep up,” he gloated.
I rolled my eyes and tried to restrain my smile.
The only thingpretty clearwas that letting Brian precede me up the narrowest, steepest part of the trail was a grave error. Watching that ass shimmy right in my field of vision had made breathlessness the least of my problems.
And it wasn’t going away.
Brian launched into the chorus of the song, dancing around the clearing, waving his arms and shaking his booty like a cross between Rocky and the lady from the Prancer-cize video Con Ross had sent to every resident of O’Leary. It was the single hottest, most ridiculous thing I’d ever seen.
Please, Jesus, explain to me why I find this so fucking adorable and sexy when it should logically be neither.
But the answer was in the question, wasn’t it? There wasnothinglogical about my feelings for Brian. They were justthere. Inconvenient and unreciprocated and unignorable.
“Wow! This victory routine of yours is majestic,” I said dryly. “And I mean majestic in the same way lions tearing apart a gazelle in a nature documentary is majestic. An epic, horrifying reminder that life is short and brutal.”
Brian shot me a look and kept singing, dancing close enough to bump my hip with his.
“So humble!” I cried, folding my arms over my chest. “So modest!”
He held my gaze and sang louder.
