All thoughts she kept to herself, of course.
Soon enough, the fire was crackling. Colt dragged two of the larger pieces of wood out and laid them flat, and they served as seats. They curled up near the fire on their logs, and pulled out two of the MREs and a bottle of water to split between the two of them. Colt showed her how to pull the tab on her MRE to heat it. The meal itself was kind of hideous if she stopped and thought about it, but she didn’t, and wolfed it down without complaint, noticing Colt did the same.
“Not the tastiest meal,” he said casually.
“Better than apples,” she said, and leaned over to nudge him with her shoulder teasingly. “Don’t knock it.”
At her casual brushing against him, he stiffened, and she internally winced. Okay, maybe she was striking out. He just wasn’t into her. That was fine, really. They could be friends. Being enemies made hanging out with Miranda and Dane awkward, anyhow.
“So what’s the plan?” she said, putting her hands on her knees and looking over at him.
He squinted at the skies. “It’s probably going to rain again tonight. We’ll stay here, warm up by the fire, and head into the cabin for the evening…once I get rid of your possum.”
She rubbed her arms. “Sounds just fine to me.”
He stood up and headed into the cabin. Well, while he was occupied, she could at least get rid of the shoes that had been paining her so much. For a few hours, anyway. She bent to wiggle one off her foot. The straps were caked with mud and when she pulled it off, she winced with pain, hissing as it felt like part of her skin came with it. Blisters, then. Or she’d rubbed her foot raw. With all that mud on her feet, it was impossible to tell. All she knew was that it hurt.
“Something wrong?” he said, startling her. She turned and looked over her shoulder and he hovered there, frowning down at her.
“Oh…” She turned back to her foot and began to pry the other strappy sandal off. “Just questioning my choice in footwear. They seemed fine when I didn’t have to slog through a foot of mud cross country. I’m going to be feeling this for weeks.”
“Hurts?” he asked.
She nodded.
He moved in front of her and sat on his knees. To her surprise, he reached for her foot and pulled it onto his lap.
She sucked in a breath of surprise at the feel of his strong, callused fingers against her foot, but winced when he grazed one of the raw spots on her foot.
“You tore them up pretty good,” he said with a drawl.
“I didn’t have another pair of feet to walk on,” she said with a laugh, then winced when his fingers swept over her foot and grazed another tender spot.
He didn’t seem to like her answer. His mouth compressed as he studied her muddy, dirty feet. “You should have said something.”
“There was nothing to be done with it,” she said calmly, and pulled her foot out of his grasp. “Complaining about it wouldn’t have fixed it.”
“Wait here,” he said, and got up, heading back into the cabin. He returned a minute later with a water jug.
“Oh, now, you don’t have to do that,” she protested as he sat in front of her again and grabbed her foot once more, then began to pour water over it to rinse it. His fingers scrubbed away the mud carefully, and Beth Ann’s job was to basically sit there, with her foot extended, as this big, muscular soldier cleaned her foot. It was silly. It was awkward.
It was…nice. He seemed determined to take care of her. When he placed her foot down and reached for the other, she didn’t even protest. It was too enjoyable to get her feet cleaned. “You sure we should be spending the drinking water on that?”
“We’ll leave the jug out overnight. It’ll refill.”
Good enough for her. She gave a sigh of pleasure as he swiped the mud off her ankle and calf, his fingers sliding up to stroke the mud off her smooth leg.
Once that was done, he took her other foot in his hands again and began to carefully knead the muscles.
A small moan of pleasure escaped her throat before she could bite it back.
His head jerked up at that, and he gave her a look of surprise.
“Sorry,” she said, blushing. “My feet are, um, sensitive.”
That, and she was finely attuned to his touch right about now.
His mouth quirked and she saw a flash of that dimple again. “I’ll be careful, then.” His fingers rubbed the ache in her foot even as he examined the places where her poor foot had been scraped raw and abused. She bit her lip as he continued to rub and brush his fingers over the skin. It was half massage, half medical examination. It shouldn’t have made her pulse beat low in her pu**y, sending shockwaves of heat through her body.
He leaned over her foot, then gave a snort of amusement and set it down, reaching for the other one. “You have a heart on your toe.”
“Fourth one down,” she agreed with a small smile. “It’s my signature.”
He looked up at her as he continued to stroke and rub her other foot. “Signature?”
Beth Ann shrugged her shoulders. “It sounds kind of stupid, but when I first started doing nails, I put a heart on mine because I liked it. I thought it was cute. Then when girls would come in, they’d ask for the same heart on their nails as mine. I didn’t realize it, but apparently that’s how people know that women in town get their nails done at my salon.” She wiggled her fingers at him, showing the tiny heart on the tip of her short nails. “I like it. I always get a kick out of seeing people out and about and finding that small mark I made on them.” God, now she was babbling on about manicures and nails. He was going to think she was the world’s ditziest woman. “Kind of stupid, right?”
His thumb pressed into the arch of her foot and sent another pulse of pleasure thrumming through her body. “Nah. Smart branding. It was a clever idea.”
Well what do you know. He thought she was clever. Between the foot rubbing and the compliments, she could have expired on the spot.
“All right, peas or carrots?”
She thought for a minute before responding. “I think I’d have to go with carrots.”
He nodded, hands behind his head as he stretched out on his back. “I’d have picked that, too. Your turn.”
“Hmm.” She shifted on the slicker. The ground was still damp, so they had spread it out and used it as a makeshift picnic blanket in front of their fire. They lay there now, staring up at the starry sky overhead. Sometime in the afternoon, the clouds had begun to disappear, and tonight it was clear and brisk and lovely. The fire was warm, and even though the ground wasn’t the softest, she was content. She also couldn’t think of a thing to ask him. “Boxers or briefs?”