I stood up, and headed towards my bedroom because I didn't need to be sitting here watching those legs, being teased with the length of her dressing gown. I doubted any of what she was wearing was for my benefit. She wouldn't want me perving on her. Unless Sunshine Sparkles had a devious side that knew exactly how to get revenge.
“Early start. I'll see you in the morning.”
She responded with just one word. “Unfortunately.”
There definitely wasn't a devious side.
Unfortunately.
Somehow, Dee and I ended up sitting next to each other at breakfast. I hadn't been paying much attention, too interested in what I’d put on my plate from the buffet. I noticed Ryan sitting at a table that was fairly close to where the bacon was, and that seemed like an ideal place to sit in order to be able to get seconds. What I hadn't noticed was that Dee was already there.
She managed to give me a smile when I looked up at her. “We've got today's challenge.” She tapped an envelope that was next to her plate on the table. “And by we, I mean us. We've been grouped up with our roommates.”
“What for?” I put my plate down and reached for the ketchup. “Orienteering?” I hadn't thought too much about what we would be doing over the next few days. I'd been up this morning early, getting in a workout at the gym that was really well equipped.
“Orienteering,” Dee confirmed.
Izzy pushed a piece of bacon around her plate as if she was just toying with it and wasn't really thinking about eating it, which would be a crying shame. “Apparently, we're in teams competing against each other. The team with the highest amount of points by the time we head back gets a prize.” She looked far too excited for this time in the morning.
“What’s the prize?” I asked, before putting the first piece of bacon in my mouth. Neva was nowhere to be seen, meaning I could definitely lie about what I was eating now, if she was keeping track.
Dee seemed spellbound by the amount that was on my plate. “Are you actually going to eat all that?”
“Yep.” I watched her while I carried on eating, needing the food to feed my brain for whatever conversation we were about to have. Her hair was tied back in some form of fancy plait, and her face looked clean and make-up free. She couldn't have been any more different to Jade. She was wearing training gear, a T shirt that looked tightly fitted and a tracksuit jacket. Everything about her said active, someone who didn't stop moving.
Izzy was trying to strike up a conversation with Ryan, and it was amusing to watch him trying to be polite while clearly not interested. It was obvious that she fancied her chances, but it was also obvious that he wasn't interested. I didn't know what the deal was there, because while I knew he was single, he wasn't acting like a single man.
“So what is it we actually have to do today?” I looked at Dee; I already knew that she was competitive, so I was pretty sure she’d have memorised the instructions.
She pulled a piece of paper out of the envelope. “All the groups meet at nine where we pick up packs with food and a map set for the day. We then have to get to a series of points and scan in. We have a certain order to get to them in, which means every group is staggered. The quickest team gets the most points.”
Great. Another fucking competition, that was just what I needed, especially when it included Little Miss Fucking Competitive.
“They couldn't just let us train and enjoy the facilities?” Somewhere there was another version of me who was overjoyed at the idea of team building and being outside in the great outdoors. That version of me was not currently existing in this dimension.
Dee shook her head. “You'll enjoy it. Probably. We're starting off in Aberfoyle so you might need to eat quickly.”
I couldn't miss the almost hidden look of disgust as I pretty much shoved half a sausage into my mouth. I gave her a big grin, enjoying how much it was irritating her.
She looked away, shaking her head, and I carried on eating my breakfast, somehow looking forward to spending the rest of the day with Sunshine Sparkles, knowing I had the ability to challenge her patience in ways it seemed others couldn't.
CHAPTER8
Dee
“Do you think we’re lost?”
I looked up at the sky and wondered why Izzy had been put on our team. It was a stupid thing to wonder, because I knew why. The manager was worried about Izzy’s focus, and they were hoping I’d somehow rub off my vibes onto her, pretty much in the same way I knew they were hoping the same with Rowan.
At least Rowan didn’t think we were lost for the tenth time in half an hour. He was also fairly good at map reading, which was a bonus as I didn’t know my right from my left at the best of times.
It was a gorgeous day. Scotland was never the warmest of places, especially when you were fairly high up on what was probably a mountain, but it was warm enough for us to lose jackets and just be in T-shirts.
This shouldn’t have been a problem, except Rowan had biceps and shoulders that I was struggling not to stare at.
And he knew I kept staring at them.
Some men would say they were a leg-man or an ass-man. I was a biceps and shoulder-girl. You could keep your pretty boys and those chiselled jaws, as long as I had a bulging pair of biceps and a pair of shoulders that looked like they could pressmewith ease.
