“We should probably get back to the cottage before Lily murders Randy, or Randy murders Bushman,” I mumble into her neck.

“Bushman?”

“Sorry. Kale.”

“Oh.” Sunny laughs. She leans back, her expression turning serious. She holds my face in her hands. “I’m sorry again that I used him to make you jealous. It was immature and stupid. I just . . .” She swallows hard. “I like you a lot, Miller. Like, really a lot. We fit, and that scares me sometimes.”

I pick up the end of the thin braid hanging in her face and brush the ends over my lips in contemplation. “I want this to be fun, not scary.” I put a hand over her heart. It also means I’m palming her boob. “I’m gonna do my best to keep this safe.”

It’s the closest I’ll get to telling her how I feel about her. For now.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THAT GIRL IS POISON

I help Sunny tie her bikini bottoms before I put my shorts back on. She picks up her top and shakes off the dirt.

“That isn’t poison ivy, is it?” I point to the plants her bikini top was lying on.

She barely glances at them. “It’s Virginia Creeper. They look a lot alike.”

The Boy Scout in me wants to question that, but she’s been up here enough to know the difference. She ties the string behind her back and adjusts the cups so they cover her nipples.

My clothes didn’t get too dirty, thanks to the moss. My shorts are damp, probably from the sex, even though it was tame. I’ll have to change when we get back to the cottage either way. My shirt is in far worse shape. When I aimed my jizz away from Sunny, I managed to shoot it all over my T-shirt rather than anywhere else in the damn forest. I rinse it in the lake, along with my hands. We follow the trail back to the cottage with my soaked and jizzy shirt in my hand instead of on my body.

“When do you think Bushman and Benji are gonna leave?” I ask as the camping trailer comes into view, still parked in the driveway. “They don’t need to be here anymore. We can take you and Lily back to Guelph whenever you’re ready to go.”

“Benji won’t leave until he and Lily are back together.”

“Is that gonna happen anytime soon?”

Sunny shrugs. “Who knows with those two?”

I grab my bag from the rental. “Does this break-up thing happen a lot?”

“I guess it depends on what a lot is. They break up three or four times a year.”

That sure seems like a lot. “What’s the point of getting back together at all?”

“Lily says the sex is really good.”

Really good wouldn’t be good enough for me to put up with that shit, but I don’t say anything. Lily is Sunny’s bestie. If I know one thing about girls, it’s not to talk shit about their friends.

I peek inside the trailer as we pass. Benji seems to have gotten his ass up. The question is, where is he now, and how soon will he be leaving? His location becomes obvious when we walk into the cottage. Lily and Benji are in the kitchen having an out-and-out screaming match. Actually, Lily’s the screamer. Benji leans against the counter while she gets in his face.

Randy sits at the table across the room, eating a bowl of cereal and browsing a magazine like nothing is happening. The weird dick sculpture wearing the superhero cape is still on the table. I need to check that out later. Bushman is nowhere to be seen.

“We’re done, Benji! I’m not doing this anymore with you! How many times do I have to say it’s over before you get it?”

“You say this every time, and then we get back together.” He’s cocky about it, smirking like a jackass.

“Not this time!” Under all that anger are tears. She’s fighting them. I can see the tremble in her chin, even from across the room.

Benji laughs. Maybe it’s because he’s got an audience. Then again, maybe he really is a giant dick. “If I leave, you know you’ll be calling me in a couple hours, crying like you always do. So why don’t you take the bitch down a notch?”

Now Lily has been a serious pain in my ass where Sunny’s concerned. But no matter how I feel about her interference, I’m not cool with guys calling their girlfriends bitches. It’s demeaning. And he’s doing it in front of other people, which makes me wonder what he says to her when no one else is around. I’m about to say something, but Randy beats me to it.

He pauses with his spoon halfway to his mouth. “The fuck you say to her?”

“Mind your own business,” Benji snaps.

Randy’s eyebrows lift, and he drops his spoon in his bowl. Milk splatters the table, his beard, and his shirt. He doesn’t seem to notice or care as he pushes his chair back. “Mind my own business?” Randy crosses the kitchen until he’s towering over Benji. Randy’s tall, but not as built as me. I tell him he’s skinny all the time. In hockey he’s lean; in the real world he’s intimidating, and he’s got about fifty pounds on Benji.

Randy thumbs over his shoulder at Lily. “You’ve been following her around the house like an untrained puppy for the past twenty minutes, needling the shit out of her right in front of me. Maybe it’s time you take a fucking hint and leave like she’s been asking you to.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

“You sure about that?” Randy cracks his knuckles.

“I have a brown belt in karate.”

“And I have a black belt in kick your fucking ass.”