As Blake turned back to me, he said, “I was just about to send out a search party for you.”
His dry tone tickled me, making my toes curl inside of my shoes. I loved a man who could banter. It was a rare quality these days, unfortunately. Usually, men were quick to either grow dismissive of a conversation if there was no promise of sex at the end, or—in a straight man’s case—the threat of emotional vulnerability was on the line.
There was probably some kind of pathology as to why I clung to Silas so heavily, considering he was the one that played with me the most. Avery was a touch on the sweet side, our emotional peach that needed to be handled tenderly in order to keep from bruising his pretty and delicate emotions.
I blamed that shit on his father, though. Getting beat down your entire childhood had to do wonders on the internal psyche.
The only silver lining was how well Brandon seemed equipped to cater to his boyfriend. That’s what I liked about him the most.
“Hope you had a K9 unit on standby. I hear these woods can be quite tricky.” I flashed Blake a grin.
His eyes narrowed slightly, the corners of his mouth fighting to remain flat. “I’m glad to hear you actually paid attention during the welcome ceremony.”
“Would you believe me if I told you I took notes?”
He spun around on his heel. “Glad to hear you’ll be passing my quiz, then. ”
With the last couple finally heading up the trailhead, I had to wonder what that meant for me.
Were we waiting on another staff member to snag me and escort me up the trail themselves?
Or was I going to be put on something else entirely?
Not that I’d mind, but I was kind of looking forward to seeing that waterfall.
“While we walk, you can point out all of the plants you recognize. Especially the poisonous ones.”
His answer had me stopping dead in my tracks. “Wait,you’recoming?”
He glanced at me over his shoulder. “Yep. Come on, don’t want to fall too far behind.”
I forced my expression to remain neutral while I shifted into walking behind him.
Interesting.
I didn’t hate the idea. Far from it, actually.
If Blake could entertain me until I found someone else to attach myself to for the rest of this vacation, why not lean into the offer?
He seemed more than willing to rib me in a weirdly professional way that kept me on my toes and my brain firing on all cylinders.
Out of anything, that was the one thing I missed about work. I was constantly challenged, forced to find new ways to beat the system all the while gambling with someone else’s wealth that could cost me a pretty penny in replacing if I fucked up.
Finance had just enough gambling and strategy to it to satiate that addict side of my mind that cravedmore, more, moreno matter how often I tried to feed it something healthy like puzzles and Sudoku.
The high that came with winning was unmatched in the worst of ways.
“Let’s start with the poisonous plants.” Blake’s voice ripped me out of my thoughts.
“Oh, you were actually serious about that.”
He whipped around to shoot me another look. “You ignored the welcome packet I painstakingly put together.”
“My apologies, Mr. Director.” I jogged up the incline to catch up to him. My breathing picked up a bit from the action. I was used to running on a flat incline. Walking up something that hadany kind of ascent was bound to get my heart pumping. “So, you actually own this whole place?”
He laughed, the sound flipping my stomach as he turned back around to face the trail. He didn’t seem at all affected by the rapidly warming weather or the gradual ascent from where we’d started back on flat ground. Barely a hair was out of place on that pretty head of his. “My granddad did. I’m the lucky nepo-baby who inherited it.”
“How old are you?”
