"First of all, her ankle isn't broken. It may be sprained." I moved her delicate ankle around in my hands. "Secondly, I didn't mean to scare her. I was offering her my jacket because it was cold behind the waterfall."
"Oh." That was probably the shortest sentence I had ever heard Kat say.
"Let's head back to the camp so we can wrap this up. I have an ace bandage in my bag."
Kat and Erica stood up, and I shook my head as Erica began hobbling toward the trail. That woman was so stubborn.
I put my hand on her shoulder to stop her then stood in front of her. "Put your hands around my neck and jump on."
"What?" She sounded appalled. "You are not carrying me all the way back to camp."
"Yes. I am."
"Not happening, Gabe. Move out of my way."
I turned toward her and leaned in close to her ear so only she could hear me. "You either get on my back and let me carry you, or I'll throw that sexy ass of yours over my shoulder and I'll have an amazing view for the whole hike."
She looked stunned when I leaned back to see her face, but I didn't care. She wasn't wobbling her hurt ass down this trail. It would happen over my dead body.
I turned away from her again and reached my hands behind me to get her legs. Her soft hands snaked their way around my neck softly, and I grabbed ahold of her thighs and lifted her onto my back. She tightened her arms around my shoulders to hold on as I started toward the trail. For a moment, I felt like I couldn't breathe, but it had nothing to do with how tight she was holding me and had everything to do with how I never wanted to let her go.
With every step he took, my body bounced against his back. His strong arms held onto my legs as if I could fall off at any second, and I loved the feel of his rough hands against my skin. His scent surrounded me, and I couldn't breathe in any fresh air that didn't have the linger of Gabe in it. It was infuriating and refreshing. By the time we made it back to the camp, I was irritated, hurting, and completely aroused. It pissed me off.
He sat me on top of the picnic table as he went into his tent for his backpack. I watched his ass as he walked away from me. Good God. He may have been infuriating, but he was hot as hell. There was nothing that could change that fact.
He walked back out of his tent and toward me. He sat down on the bench in front of me. I pushed my thighs together to try to relieve some of the ache I was feeling between them, and his gaze was drawn to that exact spot. I took deep breaths as he grabbed my right foot and placed it in his lap.
I looked around for someone to help break this trance he seemed to have me in, but no one was around. Johnny and Cash were still fishing, and Kat and Blake walked down to the river to see how they were doing.
It was just me and the man I hated and loved more than any other.
He gently untied my tennis shoe and pulled it off along with my sock. He slowly ran his fingers of both hands from my calf down to my foot. I had to stifle my moan.
"What are you doing?" I asked breathlessly.
He looked up at me and his eyes shone with hunger. I started to press my thighs together again then I realized that my leg was still in his hold.
"I'm just making sure you haven't hurt anything besides your ankle. Does it hurt when I touch your leg?"
He watched my face, and he slowly moved his fingers back up my calf. I had to close my eyes at one point because I was getting so turned on. How could him checking my injuries be so damn hot?
"Did that hurt?" His voice sounded husky.
I opened my eyes and shook my head no. He slid his hands back down the back of my calf and reached beside him for the ace bandage. He diligently wrapped the bandage around my ankle and secured it with a small clip.
"Thank you," I said as I moved my leg around him to get off the table.
He stopped my movement with his hand on my thigh and pushed it back to the other side of him. He was sitting directly between my thighs now and his right hand was still on top of my thigh.
I tried to avoid looking down at him and prayed that Kat and Blake would come back at any moment. I was too overwhelmed with him this close to me. We hadn't barely said two words to each other since he had been home, and now here he was once again between my thighs.
"I'm sorry."
His words shocked me. I looked down at him half expecting to see someone else sitting there. Gabe didn't do apologies. At least not with me.
"What?" My question was barely a whisper.
"I'm sorry for everything. I'm sorry that I made you fall and hurt your ankle, and I'm sorry that I ever caused you any pain. I didn't mean for you to get hurt. I never meant for you to get in as deep as you did." He turned his face away from me as he said the last words.
"I didn't think I was the only one that was getting in deep. That was what hurt the worst." I knew I should have been ecstatic that he was apologizing, and I was, but I was also pissed.
"You don't think I was in deep?" He swung his bright green gaze around to meet mine. "Why do you think I had to leave?"
"I don't have a damn clue why you had to leave because you never let me in," I practically growled at him.
My anger seemed to shock him momentarily, but he quickly replaced it with his own anger.
"I left because I knew that if we went any damn further than we already were that we would get hurt. I would hurt you, and it would wreck me."
"Well, while you were protecting yourself, you managed to wreck me." I pushed against his chest and swung my legs around to get off the table. He stopped me before my butt ever left the wood and stood in front of me. He leaned so close to me that I had to catch myself on my hands before I fell backwards.
"You don't think I know that? You don't think I know that I wreck everything that ever really means anything to me? You are too fucking good for me, Erica, and I'm well aware of that. I'm sorry that I hurt you, but I'm not sorry for what led to the wreckage. Thinking about you underneath me, on top of me, and surrounding me is the only way I can keep the nightmares away at night. So I'm sorry that I ever tainted you, but I don't regret it for a second."
I sat in shock as he walked away from me and toward his tent. He jerked the zipper down with too much force as he stepped inside.
I was confused. My body was on fire and begged for me to go after him, but my mind had no damn clue what was going on. Gabe was like fire and ice. I could never tell if he wanted me or if he was trying to push me away with everything he had.
My legs felt wobbly as I stood from the table. I didn't know what I was doing, but I couldn't just let our conversation end like that. We had made so much progress on being able to be around each other today, and he went and ruined it.
I gimped my way over to his tent and was about to open the zipper when I heard laughter. Blake, Kat, Johnny, and Cash were all walking back up to the campsite. I abandoned my mission and hobbled toward them. There was no way we were finishing this conversation with all of their nosy ears around.
I sat down next to the unlit fire pit and rested my hurt ankle on the chair next to me. Staring into the ashes from last night, I thought about what Gabe had just said. He was sorry that he tainted me? How did he taint me?
It killed me to know how badly he thought of himself. He wasn't some bad guy who injected poison into anything he touched. Had he wrecked me? Yes. But the wreckage came from his abandonment, not from him letting me in. Those few moments that he had let me in had been the best of my life. I just wasn't sure why he couldn't see that.
That was it. I had made my decision. If he wanted to play bad guys, then that was what we would do. I was going to prove to him that he was worth more than he thought, and I didn't care if I had to play dirty to do it.
I knew it was pretty lame of me, but I faked a headache for most of the day and kept to myself. I could see Erica watching me every time I came out of my tent, but I didn't dare look her way. I couldn't believe I had said those things to her. I was trying my hardest to make her think I didn't give a damn, but I just blew that out of the water in one damn conversation.
At dinner, I sat as far away from her as possible and joked with my boys. It felt good to be with them and laugh. Laughing wasn't something I had been doing much of since I left. It was unusual for me. I was typically the one making everyone laugh. It made me feel bad. My bad mood wasn't only affecting me. It was affecting my friends as well.