“Nope. No husbands, ex or otherwise. No kids. It’s just me and my parents and my sister and her family. That’s it. Other than that, what you see is what you get.” She gestured in the direction of her site when she said it. “What about you? Ever been married?”
“No. Never found the one, I guess. I thought I had once, but then I brought her home to meet the family. She didn’t really fit in.”
“Ouch.”
He tried not to think about Hannah and Gram, heads together over the recipe. “Well, it started with her launching into a lecture about how doom is actually a bad thing, and it went downhill from there.”
“It’s not as though you use the word literally. Nobody’s lining up to go on anactualCamping Trip of Doom.”
“Exactly. But I guess she needed to be right more than she cared if they liked her, and maybe it was wrong of me, but she knew how important my family is to me, so I took her lack of caring about them as a sign she cared less about me than I thought.”
“I’m sorry, but you’re probably right. I can’t imagine wanting a future with somebody who didn’t get along with my family.”
Right. Her family that was in California, all the way across the country. If she didn’t want to be involved with somebody who didn’t get along with them, she certainly wouldn’t get involved with somebody who lived so far away, she’d rarely get to see them.
But still, when he heard Brian’s truck turning into the campground, he looked over at her and grinned. “You want to go for a ride?”
Hannah should say no. It was only yesterday she’d had an entire conversation with her mother about how messing around with Rob wasn’t a good idea. Not that he’d invited her to mess around, exactly, but the more time they spent alone, the more inevitable it felt.
And the way he was looking at her now, with mischief and hope shining in his eyes? There was no way she could resist him in this moment. “A ride?”
“Yeah, in the truck, I mean. Not out on the ATV trails. Unless you want to, of course. They’re not open yet, but we can be a maintenance crew. But we can’t get to the spot I want to show you from the trails.”
She arched an eyebrow. “You and your brothers are convinced the campground must have a serial killer in it, but you want to take me on a ride to a secret spot somewhere?”
He chuckled, but then his forehead creased. “Wait. Are you implying I should be afraid to take you there, or that you’re afraid of going there with me? Which one of us is the murderer?”
“Well, I know it’s not me.”
“It’s not me, either.” He held up his hands. “I promise.”
“Oh. Okay, then.” When he laughed, she laughed with him.
“Meet me at my truck in ten minutes?” he asked.
“Okay.” She started to stand. “Do I need to bring anything?”
“Got trash bags, duct tape and a shovel?”
She laughed. “No, but I’ll bring water and some snacks.”
He grimaced and reached into his pocket to pull out a crumpled package of Oreos. “I forgot, I put your snack in my pocket and...they’re crushed.”
She took the package anyway. “That just makes them perfect for topping off a scoop of chocolate ice cream.”
After he drove off in the UTV, Hannah walked down to her camper. The Scotts were all inside, but Melissa saw her through the window and poked her head out of the door. “Thank you for watching the boys. Sorry about the boomerang.”
“No problem. Are you doing okay?”
“I’m fine, but I’m supposed to go to the ER anyway, as a precaution. We’re packing up to leave now, but we’ll see you next weekend?”
“I’ll be here,” Hannah said, and then she gave a little wave and kept walking.
By the time she put a couple of water bottles and some snacks in a small insulated bag and brushed her teeth—annoying herself in the process because she knew exactly why she wanted minty-fresh breath—Rob had his truck parked next to the store. She caught him in the act of trying to clean out the passenger side.
She picked up a hardware store receipt that had gotten away from him and was being blown in her direction by the breeze.
“Thanks,” he said when she handed it to him, and then he gave her a sheepish grin. “Got a little lazy, I guess, but it’s mostly coffee cups and receipts.”
