“It is absolutelynota yes.”
“Great,” he said, ignoring me entirely. “I’ll pick you up this afternoon, once you close up shop. We’ll head out past the mill, hike a bit, head to higher ground, and set up camp overlooking the falls. Trust me, Brooks Beresford, nothing says romance like marshmallows roasting over a crackling campfire.”
I dropped my broom in horror. “Marshmallows? Oh god. Sticky fingers. Goo in the dark. You’re a menace.”
Cody leaned close, his grin infuriatingly warm. “Admit it, handsome. A little part of you wants this ‘menace’ oh-so badly.”
I could feel my pulse quickening. My bow tie felt suddenly too tight. I blustered, “If I die of exposure, I’m haunting you for the rest of your life.”
“You won’t die,” he said, patting my arm like I was a nervous poodle. “But if you do haunt me, make it sexy.”
I groaned, sweeping again just to have something to do with my hands. “Why do I let you talk me into these things?”
“Because,” he said simply. “You like me.”
And the worst part? He wasn’t wrong.
He sealed the deal with a quick kiss on my lips, then headed for the door, calling over his shoulder, “Oh, and bring your favorite ghost story. We’ll read it together by the fire. Give us even more reason to cuddle up close.”
And with a ring of the bell above the door, he was gone.
I spent the rest of the morning in a numb haze. I wondered if that’s how men awaiting their execution felt.
Every time I attempted to return to my normal routine—dusting shelves, aligning bookmarks, straightening a spine thatwas off-center by a full two millimeters—my mind was hijacked by images ofthe woods.
First came the pillow panic.
I am a man who sleeps with a carefully curated array of cushions: one for the neck, one for lumbar support, and one strategically placed at my knees to maintain alignment. What, pray tell, does one sleep on in a tent? A rolled-up jacket? A bundle of despair? I pictured myself waking in the morning with a cricked neck so severe I’d require traction.
Then there was the matter of attire.
What does onewearto camping? I glanced at my wardrobe and saw a neat row of pressed shirts and bow ties staring back at me. Would I be expected to trek through the wilderness in patent leather shoes? Would I have to place my row of coat hangers on tree branches? Would I be forced to wash my underwear in the river? I had visions of being chased through the undergrowth by a pack of possums while clutching my cufflinks. It was the stuff of nightmares.
Thoughts of a culinary catastrophe arrived next.
Cody had mentioned marshmallows, but surely he’d expect hotdogs too. Hotdogs from a can! Storage food, the kind that was designed to survive decades in a bunker. I could practically hear the sizzle as ash and soot contaminated every bite. And ketchup? I would have to eat ketchup out of a communal bottle in the dark. It was barbarism, pure and simple.
By mid-afternoon the soundtrack of doom had begun.
Every creak of the bookshop made me jump, imagining the forest amplified—snapping branches that weren’t branches at all but the ankle chains of some escaped convict creeping toward our tent. I imagined rustling leaves that weren’t leaves at all, but the hem of a ghostly governess drifting through camp in search of gullible children. I imagined the low hoot of an owl thatwasn’t an owl at all, but the death-rattle of my own lungs as I succumbed to pneumonia in a damp sleeping bag.
By the time the clock hands inched toward closing, my nerves were as ruined as a paperback left out in the rain.
I turned the Open sign to Closed, and then… there he was.
Cody filled the doorway, the golden light of late afternoon framing him like some sort of reckless saint. He had a backpack slung over his shoulder, his hair was wild, his smile utterly infuriating with ease and confidence.
I gulped.
God help me. I was going camping.
Anxiously I opened the door, where he stood leaning broad-shouldered against the doorframe.
“Ready?” he asked.
“No,” I said flatly. “Absolutely not.”
“Good.” He grinned. “Then we’re right on schedule.” Before I knew it, he was already stepping inside, eyes looking me up and down. “Please tell me you’ve got something other than that to wear.”
