Batter of Wits (Green Valley Chronicles #22) - Smartypants Romance Page 0,25
next, and the first thing people need to know about being out in the mountains is that you get very little say about it. You're not sitting here alone for God knows how long, and you're not walking back to that parking lot by yourself."
Everything about that tone should have set the hairs on the back of my neck to standing. Everything. It should have had me imagining creative ways to stomp on his balls. Punch him in the throat. Jab him in the eyes.
Except it didn't.
It didn't do that at all.
Something twirled weightlessly at the base of my stomach. A fluttering where there shouldn't have been. A tingle where I didn't want one.
I huffed. The huffiest huff I'd ever huffed in my life, and I damn well knew it was to stop myself from popping more damn goosebumps at his bossy-ass declaration. "It's not your choice what I do."
Grady swiped a hand over his mouth. When he dropped it, he shook his head at me. "I don't know how this is possible, but I think you're more stubborn than you were three days ago when I last saw you."
Tucker lifted his chin and stared up at the trees, like they'd help him deal with me. When he looked down again, I blinked away, because something inside of me refused to look at his face where he towered above me. He was so tall that he was blocking the sun coming through the trees.
"What's my option?" I asked. "It's not like someone's going to chopper me out because I twisted my ankle a mile down the trail."
Tucker regarded me carefully, then nodded like he'd come to a decision.
"What?" I asked him.
"Hop on up," he said, turning to present me with his back, wide and strong and absolutely capable of bearing the weight of one gimpy girl.
"No freaking way," I said immediately.
Nope.
Not happening.
Not ever.
I clamped my teeth together and took a timid step on my bad foot.
It hurt. But it wasn't like I was bleeding to death.
I heard one of them sigh, probably my brother, because he knew better than to argue with me.
One more step, and then another, and another, keeping the majority of my weight on the uninjured leg.
Sweat was popping along my hairline when I reached the fallen tree. I sat down on it, closed my eyes and let out a deep breath. At this rate, I'd be back to the parking lot by midnight.
Someone hopped over the tree, and I knew it was Tucker from the scent that waived past me. It was the same scent from his truck, and I wished desperately that I didn't recognize it so easily.
This was my brother's fault.
"What?" he asked, when I told him so. "How do you figure that?"
I swung my good leg over the tree trunk and set my foot down on the ground.
"It just makes me feel better to blame you, okay?"
Tucker was watching me try to stand with an inscrutable expression on his face.
Grady hopped over the tree after me and kept pace with me for a few steps. "What's your deal with him?"
I shook my head. "Nothing."
"That was a terrible attempt at a lie, even for you."
"I don't know, okay?" I whispered, as we got closer to the man in question.
"What do you mean, you don't know?"
"I mean …" I searched for the right words. The ones where I'd sound the least insane. "It was like, I heard his voice, and I'd never reacted so strongly to someone in my entire life. I just … hated him. Everything he said drove me insane, like I wanted to jam my fingers in my ears so that I couldn't hear him anymore."
Grady gaped at me. "I think Tennessee zapped your brain."
"I think it did too," I said miserably. "And I don't really hate him anymore. It just felt so real yesterday. And I had no reason for it. That was the crazy part. Grady, I’ve never experienced anything like it. Like I’d been taken over by a pod person."
"Hate at first sight," my brother mused.
I shrugged. "I guess."
Grady laughed under his breath. "Maybe the Buchanan curse works opposite on women. Instead of love at first sight, you get the hate."
My elbow poked him in the side. "Not funny."
The jab wasn't worth it, even though he had to rub at the spot where I nailed him, because I lost my balance on the next step. Before I could grab Grady's arm, Tucker strode forward and gripped my elbow.