Chapter 13
Finding a nice restaurant close to the highway, with a parking lot big enough to accommodate a twenty-foot camper is a challenge, but my Secrets of the Wandering Wild app does me a solid.
By the time Tessa emerges from the bathroom, I have reservations at a mom-and-pop Italian place just a short jaunt down the road and only a mile from a campground with plenty of sites available.
“Sounds great,” Tessa says, her gaze skimming up and down my frame, taking in my fresh jeans and a black button-down shirt. “You look nice.”
“So do you,” I say, taking the fact that she put on makeup as a good sign. She’s beautiful with or without it, but the extra effort, when there’s no one she knows around to see her, except me, feels significant. “Just give me a few minutes to shave and we can hit the road.”
“Or you could…not shave,” she says, with a breezy shrug. “I mean, if we don’t have time.” She shrugs again, her gaze lifting to the ceiling. “I don’t mind a little scruff.”
I arch a brow. “You don’t mind it?”
Her lips turn down at the edges as she shrugs again. “Nah, a little scruff never hurt anyone. And it makes you look a little bit like Bruce Willis from his action star days, when he’d get all sweaty and scruffy…”
My smile widens. “Yeah? I think that can be arranged. I looked at the weather forecast for the park. The average high is eighty degrees this week and not a cloud in sight. I can deliver sweat and scruff.”
She shrugs a third time—I think the lady doth shrug too much. “I mean, sure. If you want. That sounds nice. From a purely aesthetic perspective.”
“Purely aesthetic.” I reach over her head, closing the cabinet above the microwave, where I’m storing my toiletries until we have a chance to organize things. “Just a neutral appreciation of a man’s face sort of thing.”
“Right. It could be any man.”
“Really?” I flatten my palm against the cabinet as I lean in, bringing my face closer to hers. “Any man at all?”
She looks up, her lips parting. “I mean, not any man. Scruff wouldn’t improve Mr. Roid Rage. He’d still be an ugly meathead with a squashed nose.”
“He did have a squashed nose,” I agree. “With a weird texture, too. Like it had been run over by a dirt bike.”
“Right.” Her gaze slides down to my mouth with a sigh. “And I will admit, you do have very nice scruff. It’s very…even,” she says, her lips drifting closer to mine. “And dark, but not too dark.”
“That’s good to know,” I murmur, bending down, so desperate to taste her again that I forget Freya’s still loose until Tessa yips and pulls away.
A beat later, the ferret pokes her head through Tessa’s hair near her shoulder, watching me with narrowed eyes. “Oh my God, you scared me,” Tessa says, laughing as she reaches for her pet. “She’s never done that before. She just climbed right up the back of my dress.”
Freya dooks and clings to Tessa’s hand, shooting me a glance that lets me know I’m still on notice. But that’s okay. I’ll just add winning Freya’s trust to my list, right under convincing her mom to get on board with my crazy plan.
Fuck…I’m going to need all the help I can get with that one.
“How do you feel about red wine?” I ask as Tessa sits Freya in her little stuffed bed and we settle into our seats.
“I feel like it’s something we should have with dinner,” Tessa says. “Preferably two glasses, maybe three. After the past twenty-four hours, I think we deserve a wine buzz and a good night’s sleep with no alarm set for tomorrow morning.”
“Agreed. The reviews said the restaurant has a decent selection, considering it’s in the middle of nowhere in a two-room prison from the Wild West days.”
Tessa glances my way, excitement flashing in her eyes. “Yeah? That sounds interesting. I hope they have one of those menus that gives the entire history of the place on the back. I love a menu that reads like a novel.”
“I hope they have homemade gnocchi. And a killer charcuterie board.”
Tessa rubs her hands together as the engine rumbles to life. “Yes, please. I love charcuterie boards. I make a pretty mean one, if I do say so myself.”
“Oh yeah?” I pull out of our spot, guiding the camper toward the exit.
“Yeah. I know they’re trendy now, but I’ve been charcuterie-ing for decades. I made my first one when I was only twenty-three. It was Valentine’s Day, and my boyfriend did not appreciate my flower radishes and homemade pickles, but he did eat all the horseradish cheddar and leave me exactly zero slices.”
“Monster,” I say. “Horseradish cheddar must be shared.”
“I know, right?” She shakes her head. “I should have known the relationship was doomed right then and there.”
“But at least it wasn’t Stilton with dried apricots.”
She laughs as she shifts in her chair, facing me. “Oh my God, yes! Stilton is so good! But almost unanimously overlooked by charcuterie board makers everywhere. What’s up with that?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it sounds too British or something? It’s sad, really.”
“So sad.” She chuckles. “We should start a campaign to raise Stilton awareness. Maybe then Marcy would stock it in the cheese section at The Farmer’s Way. She eventually got on board with more than one kind of goat cheese, once I convinced her that there are actually several different kinds and they have wildly different flavors, textures, and cooking applications.”
“Love goat cheese. Slap it on a pizza with some arugula and a little fig jam…heaven.”
She moans. “Damn, that sounds good. In the summer I like to grill a little bit in a corn husk and then top it with a corn salsa and honey to make a dip.”
I curse in appreciation.
“Amen,” she agrees.
I shoot a glance her way. “I like it when you talk cheesy to me.”
Her enthusiasm dims as I merge onto the highway. She sits back in her chair, arms crossed over her chest. “Yeah, well, I do love cheese. It’s a very honest food. Cheese is never going to trick you into thinking it’s good when it’s not, you know? Cheese will start to stink to high heaven or grow visible mold of some kind. It gives very clear warning signs that you should stay away from it if you want to avoid gastrointestinal distress.”
Taking her meaning, I put my own twist on her metaphor, “But a little mold doesn’t mean the cheese is all bad. Slice it off and there’s still plenty of perfectly good cheese left to enjoy.”
“But the cheese is past its prime by then,” she counters.
“Past its prime cheese is still good cheese. And past its prime horseradish cheddar is still far superior to most other cheeses, even if they’re brand new.”
She arches a brow. “Now it sounds like we’re talking about me. I’m the only past their prime cheese in this vehicle.”
I shake my head but keep my eyes on the road as I say, “Not even close. You’re clearly in your prime. And besides, you’re not cheese, you’re a fine wine, who’s only going to get better with age.”
She snorts. “Now who’s talking cheesy?”
“Too much?”
“Nah. I’m a sucker for compliments, even cheesy ones. Especially after being called a wrinkled old prune last night.”
“Daria is a liar and an asshole,” I say. “That’s been proven in multiple clinical studies.”
Tessa laughs. “Can you imagine? She’d give the scientists heart failure.”
“Nightmare. But maybe not our nightmare for much longer. Christian texted earlier. Your door is all cleaned up, the security system went in this afternoon, and there’s been no sign of Daria. Hopefully, she sobered up, realized she was a maniac last night, and came to her senses.”
“Hopefully,” Tessa says with a sigh, “but she doesn’t seem like the kind of person who comes to her senses. She gave me more ‘gator with its jaws locked in the middle of a death roll’ vibes. And that mannequin…it gives me the willies just thinking about it.”
I want to reach out and take her hand. Instead, I promise, “If a week away doesn’t cool her down, I’ll camp out in your yard and keep watch every night until this is over.”
“You’d look pretty rough in court after a night in the front yard. And what about the gnomes? What if they come to life and attack you for calling them creepy?”
“I don’t care. I’ll brave a gnome uprising if I have to. I won’t let her get anywhere close to you again, I promise.”
Tessa’s posture softens, her arms slipping away from her chest. “Well, thanks. I appreciate that. I confess, I am glad I’m not spending the night alone for a while. I’m probably at least four inches taller and quite a bit heavier than Daria, but she could still take me. I lack the killer instinct.”
“One of the many things I like about you,” I say, pushing on before she can start comparing me to bad cheese again. “Would you mind pulling the directions up on your phone? I still can’t figure out how to pair my cell to the camper GPS. The name of the restaurant is Mama Maria’s. Should be about twenty miles up the road.”
“Oh, that’s close,” she says, quickly fetching her cell from the small black purse she pulled from her bag. Even with only ten minutes to pack, she did a much better job than I did. “I’m so glad. I’m starving.” She reaches for her coffee cup from the holder on the dashboard and takes a sip. “I probably shouldn’t drink this if we’re aiming for an early bedtime, but it smells so good.”
“We don’t have to have an early bedtime,” I say. “It’s going to be a clear night. If we want to hang out around the campfire and watch the stars for a while after dinner, that’s fine. Like you said, we can always sleep in late. We don’t have anywhere pressing to be tomorrow. Our campground reservation at the park doesn’t start until Monday night. They were full through the weekend.”
“Sounds nice,” she says. “It’s been way too long since I sat around and stared at the stars.”
Her words make me think about the night we spent in my tent, about opening the flap on top and gazing up at the dazzling sky with her in my arms.
It’s a beautiful memory, one of my best. It makes me want to make more memories with Tessa, but the moment we pull up to Mama Maria’s, I know tonight isn’t going to be an evening I look back on with fondness.
It’s going to be one I’ll be lucky to survive…