Taming Hollywood's Baddest Boy - Max Monroe Page 0,33
lighting things?” I question with a tilt of my head, and she scowls.
“A lighter, okay? I couldn’t think of the word. Do we have one?” She holds out a hand to me instead of doing a single thing to get one herself, and at the sight of it, I can’t help the idea that takes root.
“Nope.” I shake my head. “Personally, I prefer to do things the old-fashioned way.”
“What the hell does that even mean?” she asks. “Like rubbing two sticks together until fire happens?”
I smirk to myself but move my focus back to her tent. “I guess that’s an option. But if you haven’t noticed, I’m a little busy here. You said you wanna help, so fucking help and figure it out yourself.”
“Goodness gracious,” she mutters.
“What’s the problem?” I challenge, looking back up at her. “Need my help to do that, too?”
She glares. “Of course not. And, for the record, I could’ve built my own tent. You just didn’t give me the chance.”
This woman sure as shit doesn’t like being told she can’t do something…
I tuck away that knowledge in my back pocket and finish setting up her tent while Billie turns on her heel and stomps away. I can hear her doing all manner of shit behind me, but I don’t bother to look up and check in. I have a feeling the fun will be so much greater if I wait until the end.
Not even ten minutes later, the pink monstrosity is all set to go.
I stand to my feet, brush dirt off my jeans, and turn around to find Billie hovered over the kindling and logs with Bailey lying behind her, snoring.
Her petite hands grip two large sticks, and her arms move furiously as she rubs them together. Her brow is furrowed and her eyes are focused and her teeth dig into her bottom lip as she tries like hell to move her arms faster and faster and faster.
For fuck’s sake, this woman is literally trying to start a fire the old-fashioned way with wet, soggy fucking sticks.
At this rate, we’ll have a fire sometime next goddamn century.
She pauses for a moment to brush a few pieces of her long hair out of her eyes before going right back to the madness. Harder and faster, she rubs wet sticks together in the stupid hope that it’ll lead to something fruitful.
I could probably watch her struggle for another hour or more, but the fact is, out here, fire is a necessity, and I’d like to relax sometime soon.
“Need help?” I ask, and she glares at me but doesn’t stop her arms’ momentum.
“No.”
This woman is so damn stubborn, I have to believe she’d die out here in the woods before giving up the good fight on this fire.
I sigh. Done with the games, I grab the pack of matches from my sack, step over to the logs and kindling, gently move Billie out of the way, and light the fire with one quick swipe of my wrist.
Her eyes go wide with surprise, and outrage makes her cheeks redden. “Are you kidding me right now?”
“What?” I ask and grab a stick to shuffle the kindling into the growing flames.
“I asked you if you had something!”
“You asked for a lighter.” I shrug. “I only had matches.”
“Oh my god! You’re such a dick!” she shouts and stomps over toward her tent.
Yeah, I am. And at the rate we’re going on this god-awful trip, it certainly won’t be the last time she feels that way.
Luca
Don’t have a phone surgically attached to your person? That evidently makes you a creepy fucking weirdo these days. But I don’t give a fuck. When the sole form of service is provided by carrier pigeon, the only thing a phone will add around here is extra weight.
When Billie steps out of her tent a few hours after stomping off to do God knows what inside, the temperature has dropped a good ten degrees and counting.
While I’ve been enjoying the brief reprieve from her chatty, sassy mouth, she’s evidently been using common sense to change out of her ridiculous jean shorts that showed way too much of her ass for my well-being and into a pair of stretchy black pants. The furry boots, however, are still holding strong.
The sun has begun her descent toward the west, and the sky is putting on a pastel show of pinks and oranges and blues. A cool breeze shakes the trees, and I sit by the crackling fire, perched on a log,