That Carrington Magic

chapter 12



Grant conjured up a folding campstool for each of them, which Jami gratefully accepted. Though not very big, the stool felt more comfortable than a rock. Wiggling, Toby collapsed his stool and tumbled with a giggle. Jami smiled with pride as he popped back up, soon mastering it.

“Ready to learn how to build a fire?” Grant’s gaze encompassed mother and son.

Jami shrugged, but Toby whooped in excitement. “Sure!”

“Help me gather firewood.” Using a branch, Grant brushed off a circle of dirt in a bald spot of the meadow close to their tents. “We’ll pile them here. Find dry pieces of wood–branches and twigs.”

“Okay.” Toby trotted toward the bushes.

“Be careful,” Jami admonished, thinking of snakes and spiders lurking where her child might grab.

“Yeah. We will.”

“He’ll be fine,” Grant assured her. She could tell he thought her over-protective, but refrained from stating it. In fact, the man had acted so darn nice since they had returned from the hike, she couldn’t help but be suspicious.

Toby stood at attention, clicked his sneakered heels together and saluted Grant. “Toby, Soldier of Zonar reporting for duty, Sir.”

“At ease, soldier.” Grant strode toward the woods, glancing back at Toby. “You’re in charge of twigs, sticks, and small chunks of wood for the kindling, and I will gather the larger wood.”

“Yes, Sir!” Toby hopped to Grant’s side.

Jami smothered her concern, watching the boy march after the man until they were both swallowed into the forest. She hoped they hurried. Evening shadows had lengthened and it would soon be dark. Trying to keep from worrying while the guys were scavenging firewood, she set up sleeping bags in the dome tent and the pup tent, then puttered around to keep busy.

When Toby and Grant returned, each with an armful of wood, she was sitting on her campstool applying insect repellent spray.

“Did you miss us?” Grant asked, shooting her a heart-stopping smile in the deepening twilight as he deposited his wood into a pile.

“You smell funny, Mom,” Toby announced as he dumped his wood into the pile.

She started to laugh, grabbing him. “You’re going to smell the same way.”

Toby’s wriggled nose as she handed him the bug spray. “Put this on, tiger.”

“Eww, yuk.” He tried to hand back the bug repellent. “No way.”

“Listen to your mother,” Grant ordered, to Jami’s surprise. “Or you’ll turn into dinner for mosquitoes.”

“I don’t wanna stink.”

“Would you rather itch all night?” Grant’s brow furrowed.

“Maybe.” Toby dragged his toe through the dirt, not looking up at the adults.

“You would not.” Jami took back the bug spray, popped the cap off and thoroughly spritzed her son, ignoring his objecting squeals. “There.”

“Spray Grant, too, Mom,” Toby wailed. “It’s only fair.”

Jami turned to Grant and, reading the challenge in his gaze, she took aim. He raised an arm to protect his face as she sprayed him from head to foot, before circling him and attacking his back as well. If she and Toby were going to smell to high heavens, so was Mr. Camp-out.

“Fair is fair.” Jami smugly recapped the bug spray container as Grant wrinkled his nose, much like her son had done. “Now we all can repel the mosquitoes.”

“We ought to repel any creature with a sense of smell,” Grant countered, sniffing his arm with distaste.

“I bought the brand recommended by Consumers Report,” Jami defended, resenting all their remarks about the odor.

“Ah, I understand why the stuff works.” Grant pinched his nose, grinning at Jami before turning to her son. “Toby, please run and get the old phone book by my backpack inside our tent.”

“Isn’t this an odd time to find a phone number?” Jami queried with an arched brow.

“Fire-starter,” Grant returned, carrying the kindling to the dirt spot where he’d had Toby help him form a rock fire pit.

“I crumple pages to light to start the fire kindling.”

Jami watched Toby skip out of the dome tent carrying a beat-up, dog-eared phone book.

“Okay, partner,” Grant said, crouching down as he spoke to Toby. “Rip out several pages and crumple them up for me.”

“Tear pages out of a book?” Toby gasped, worried brown eyes darting to his mom. “You should never tear books.”

“It’s all right, honey,” Jami replied, impressed the lesson was so ingrained in her son. “It’s a way to recycle the old phone book.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.” Jami smiled tenderly at her son.

“Cool!” Pages flew as he ripped and crumpled page after page.

“Whoa.” Grant gathered the balled pages. “That’s plenty. Now let’s build a campfire.”

“Okay.” Toby dropped the book, sprinting to Grant’s side to kneel in the dirt right beside him. “What’s next?”

“First, wadded paper.” Grant brushed the dirt surrounding the spot before arranging the crumpled pages. “Clear the ground for at least a foot all the way around to keep the fire contained.”

“Safety first.” Jami circled them nervously, not pleased to have her baby learning about fire.

“Aw, Mom, I’m going be a fireman.” Toby shot his mother a look of exasperation. “I know about Smoky the Bear and all that stuff.”

“Next,” Grant said, ignoring the exchange. “Grab that kindling you gathered. Let’s put the tiny twigs and wood pieces over the paper, then the bigger twigs and sticks on top of that.”

“It’s kinda like a tepee,” Toby announced as Grant placed a dozen sticks pyramid-style over the kindling.

“That’s so it lights easily.” Grant pulled out a slim metal canister full of matches. “Scoot back, and I’ll light our fire.”

With a whiff of sulfur and flash of flame, the paper ignited. Then the small twigs and wood pieces began to smoke and burn as Grant poked the fire with a long stick.

“Cool.” Toby’s eyes were huge as he stared, mesmerized.

Grant added thicker sticks and branches and then finally several logs. “Okay, got it. How about this fire?”

“Kinda small though.”

“Small?” Grant looked puzzled.

“Yeah.” Toby watched the flickering flames with fascination. “Campfires are bigger in the movies when people dance around them.”

Grant threw back his head with hearty laughter.

“Those are bonfires,” Jami explained, secretly sharing the amusement. “Campfires are that way for cooking and warmth.” She held her palms up to the fire, realizing the heat of the day had extinguished with the setting sun.

“Go throw on some jackets or sweaters. It gets cold in the mountains at night,” Grant advised before moving away.

Strange, he seems to always know how I feel, Jami thought, watching him arrange rainbow trout in a heavy, black cast-iron pan.

“Grant’s right, let’s find you something warmer to wear. Come on, Toby.” Jami pulled her key chain flashlight from her pocket, but didn’t need to turn it on when they entered the dome tent, since the doorway net allowed the firelight to illuminate the interior.

Toby found his Houston Rockets sweatshirt and tugged it over his head. “Now can I help cook supper?”

“Yes, only if you stay clear of the fire.”

“Right.” Toby skipped outside, just ahead of her. “I know, Mom.”

Her heart swelled with pride as she watched Toby eagerly help Grant dump a container of chopped carrots, potatoes, and onions into a piece of aluminum foil. They triple-wrapped the vegetables, then Grant let the child toss them into the outer edge of the flames. “Good job, buddy.”

“Thanks, Grant. I’ll even eat ‘em.”

“Brave kid, huh?” Laughing, Grant exchanged a glance with Jami.

She smiled back, hugging herself for warmth. She needed something warmer to wear, too. Delicious aromas of trout and vegetables drifted in the air following Jami, along with the smoke, as she made her way toward the pup tent. She opened the door flap, flicking on her tiny flashlight to aim the beam toward her tote bag. Half bent, she rummaged through the tote, extracting her sweatshirt and struggling into it. Her flashlight dropped to the floor, rolling away to cast the tent into darkness.

“Ouch!” Her elbow whacked into an end pole. The tent sagged with the impact, but instantly she steadied the metal support.

“Everything all right, Red?” Grant called from outside.

“Just fine,” Jami snapped, rubbing her sore elbow.

She felt around the ground until she found her key chain light, its tiny beam a relief after the darkness. Did she really want to spend the night in here? After the fuss she’d made about not sharing a tent with Grant, she couldn’t back down now. Why did she always embarrass herself around him? She’d been forced to be extremely independent since her divorce, so sometimes she took it a notch too far. Just like she occasionally did with her overprotective parenting. Understandable, since she didn’t have the luxury of relaxing and shifting the load to someone else. The responsibility remained all hers.

For a moment, she wondered how it’d feel to lean on someone, to share some of that responsibility. Especially with a man like Grant Carrington. Jami bit her lip as the thoughts collided. Instead of her berry lip gloss, she tasted the bitter bug spray. Ugh. The stuff certainly wouldn’t lend itself to romantic kisses. Kisses? Where was her head? Thank goodness, she had Toby along. Suddenly, she wanted to flee back to the lodge for a nice hot shower, leaving pup tents, insect repellent, and Grant behind.

“Dinner’s ready,” the devil himself hollered. “Come and get it, Red. There’s no room service out here.”

She climbed out the tent flap to succulent aromas drifting on the campfire smoke, making her stomach growl, announcing her hunger.

True to his word, Toby gobbled every bite of his veggies as well as his fish.

“Mmm, delicious,” Jami murmured in appreciation, as she savored her own. Their campfire supper tasted every bit as scrumptious as it had smelled. She enjoyed every bite, which buoyed her mood considerably.

So did gazing at the stars, spilling like diamond dust to sparkle across the velvety black skies. Way beyond the circle of firelight, the rugged mountains were cloaked by the darkness, but Jami could sense their eternal presence. Higher, the golden sliver of a crescent moon hung above the horizon, seeming to dangle in the sky at the whim of the crisp breeze that blew through the meadow. She now understood the allure of camping.

After dinner, Grant showed them how to poke marshmallows on to the end of a long, sharpened stick. He then waved them over the fire, roasting the treats into soft white puffs.

“Oh, no,” Jami cried, snatching hers back from the flames as the white ignited into a flash of fire.

“Not as easy as it looks, huh?” Laughing, Grant blew out the marshmallow to reveal black charred remains.

“That’s yucky, Mom.”

Ashes flaked off her burnt dessert, and she had to agree with Toby.

“I don’t think you better eat this.” Grant disposed of the charred dessert. “Let me roast yours. Cooking over an open fire is an acquired art.”

“Toby did his just fine,” Jami grumbled, feeling surpassed by a six-year-old in campfire culinary as he popped a perfect melted puff into his mouth.

Grant wiped her stick clean, poking two new marshmallows over the point. “He keeps his marshmallow at the edge of the flames like I do.” Grant smiled indulgently. “You drifted yours into the heart of the fire.”

“Where it’s too hot.” Jami watched him, wondering if his meaning went beyond roasting marshmallows. “Taste this.” He handed her one.

“Wonderful,” Jami gushed, after one bite, crisp-on-the-outside, but gooey, sweet, and heavenly in the middle. She reached for the second marshmallow he held out to her, his hand lingering as their fingers touched at the exchange.

“I knew I could please you.” Firelight and shadow played across Grant’s handsome face, disguising his expression. But the tone and texture of his voice conveyed his message—a message that sent hot desire flowing through Jami’s veins and a flush to her skin.

“Can I have more marshmallows?” Toby asked, a gooey white streak smeared from his chin to his cheeks as he waved his empty stick in the smoky air. “Please?”

“You ate four,” Grant replied, a good-natured grin replacing the sexual innuendo he had focused on Jami.

“That’s plenty, young man.” Jami took a deep breath of woodsy smoke instead of fresh air, setting off a coughing spasm she couldn’t stop.

“Can you breathe?” Grant patted her back, peering at her with concern. “Are you choking? Need the Heimlich Maneuver?”

“Breathing caused it,” Jami choked, impressed by his quick response and touched by his concern. If she was ever in trouble, Grant Carrington seemed a good man to have there. “I’m fine now.”

“Good. It’s story time,” Grant said, grabbing a blanket and tucking it around them.

Sometimes Grant could be so sweet, Jami thought as Toby leaned against her while Grant regaled them with camp-tales, edited for her six-year-old’s ears. In an odd way, it felt as if they were a family.

Eventually, Grant slid his arm around Jami, scooting close to her as they watched the firelight. Flames from the campfire flickered and flared, dancing with colors from blue and violet to scarlet and orange to yellow and white. Shadows grew to move eerily in the firelight, spooking Jami and her sleepy boy. Several times in the middle of Grant’s storytelling, she and Toby jumped as the fire cracked and popped or when they heard an animal skitter through the brush.

Despite the enthralling tales delivered in a skillful manner, Toby gradually nodded off, resting against her breast.

“Time for bed,” Grant announced, steadying Jami by the shoulders as he stood. He stretched and yawned, seeming enormous in the play of light from the campfire, his startling shadow even larger as it cast on the dome tent behind them.

Toby blinked open his eyes at that moment, then screamed and pointed at Grant’s elongated shadow, which to a child could be terrifying.

Jami jumped, then pulled her son tighter into her arms. “Honey, it’s okay. It’s just Grant’s shadow.”

“Looks like a grizzly,” Toby defended, his voice trembling along with the rest of him.

“Close,” Jami whispered, aware that Grant was equally as dangerous in a totally different way.

“I resent that,” Grant retorted playfully, boosting Toby up for a big hug. “This is a bear hug. Since you accused me of being a grizzly, you owe me one.”

“I like bear hugs.” Toby giggled, nuzzling against Grant’s broad chest and clinging tight.

Jami swallowed a lump in her throat as she again witnessed the bond between her son and Grant. How would the child respond when they were ripped apart? When Grant returned to his bachelor life and walked away?

“Be careful, Toby,” Jami admonished, schooling her emotions. “You’ll get Grant all sticky.”

“I’ll clean up the dinner mess, if you take charge of this one,” Grant said with a deep chuckle as he handed Toby over to his mother. “I’ll heat some water in a pan for you.”

“No need.” Jami took hold of Toby, but quickly lowered him to the ground. He was growing so fast and was much heavier now. “I have hand sanitizer and moist wipes in my bag.”

Grant mocked, “On melted marshmallow?”

“We’ll manage,” Jami muttered under her breath, guiding Toby toward her pup tent. Why did Grant have to challenge every decision she made? She’d cleaned worse messes off Toby before and certainly without Mr. Carrington’s help. Without anyone’s help. She didn’t need advice or intervention when it concerned her son.

Thank goodness they were returning to the lodge after breakfast in the morning. After wasting a half box of wet wipes cleaning off Toby, she’d be lucky to make it through the overnighter before her supply ran out. Maybe she should have accepted Grant’s offer of heated water.

“Here you go.” Grant appeared at the entrance of the dome tent offering a bottle of water.

“You read my mind?”

“I didn’t think wet wipes would be practical when you two brushed your teeth. Oh, I added some logs to the fire to give you more light.”

“Thanks.” Quickly, they were ready for bed and she tucked her sleepy one into a sleeping bag.

“Mom, Grant’s stronger than a bear, isn’t he?” Toby drowsily asked, eyelids fluttering closed.

“Maybe,” Jami replied, kissing her son’s now lemon-scented, but clean, forehead. “So don’t worry about bears or anything.”

“Okay,” Toby mumbled, scooting lower in the sleeping bag. “But I don’t have my dream-catcher.”

“Grant will keep you safe,” Jami whispered, knowing the words she spoke were true. Why had she insisted on sleeping in the pup tent? She glanced at the stack of camping things filling her spot and sighed. Too late to change her mind.

Isolated and alone in the stuffy, limited space of the dark pup tent, the tiny beam from her key chain light flickering around the interior like a panicked firefly, Jami held her breath. She identified the chirping crickets, the occasional hoot of an owl, and possibly frogs croaking, but many other sounds echoed through the night. Unidentifiable sounds.

Unaccustomed to such a state of nervousness, Jami twisted in her sleeping bag on the hard ground trying to get comfortable. How could a grown woman let a few cries of wild animals alarm her? Ugh. She was such a city girl! She snuggled down into the fleece lining of the slippery bag, wishing she had her pillow. And a decent flashlight.

She clicked off her poor-excuse-for-a-light, placing it by her sleeping bag, then shut her eyes. Yeowl! A distant howl echoed through the night to pop them back open, her heart pounding a drumbeat in her ears.

“How can I be such a wimp?” Jami whispered to the darkness, aware of only the thin, worn canvas of a rickety tent between her and creatures of the night.

Entire body saturated with tiredness, her mind drifting and floating as she tried to identify every noise, Jami again closed her eyes. She concentrated so hard on hearing the night sounds around her, she barely noticed as sleep gradually claimed her through gauzy layers of consciousness.



Inside the dome tent, Grant Carrington slithered into the last sleeping bag. Toby stirred, a bump in the blue bag a few feet away. “Hey, Grant?”

“What, buddy?”

“Think my mom’s asleep?”

“Probably. Unless she’s scared all by herself.”

“She’s never scared,” Toby mumbled, rolling to his other side and snuggling back down.

Grant kept his flashlight on until the boy’s eyes fluttered closed. Soon he heard Toby’s slow even breathing, punctuated occasionally by a tiny snore and knew the child was asleep. Shutting off the flashlight, he lay in the darkness wondering about Jami, berating himself. He knew her stubborn streak and should have found a way to allow her to gracefully back down from her decision to sleep in that pup tent. He’d felt sure she wouldn’t go through with it, but had underestimated her internal steel. She had more character in her little toe than most people had in their whole bodies. If only she wasn’t so stubborn.

He scowled, considering his own behavior. What a pair they made. Cupid’s perfect couple couldn’t even go one night without quarreling.

Turning onto his side, he faced the tent vent opening in a netted window toward the pup tent. It was too dark to see anything. If only she’d accepted his flashlight. Angry at himself, Grant grabbed his shirt, stuffing it into a ball under his head. If he didn’t get a moment’s sleep the entire night, it’d be his own fault. He never should have let Jami insist on that pup tent.

The howl of a wild beast reverberated through the night. Jami jerked awake, fighting loose from the clutches of the sleeping bag. Frantic, she kicked free. Swallowed by darkness and sick with rising panic, she tried to get her bearings. Where was the exit? She’d never felt so trapped. Or vulnerable.

Other howls joined the first with unearthly menace. Jami screamed, jumping to her feet, her shoulder whacking the side tent pole.

Creak, crack! The tent collapsed, burying her under old canvas and downed tent poles. “Ow! Help!”

Grant flew out of the dome tent with a frightened Toby on his heels. Aiming the brightest flashlight beam at the pup tent, Grant spotlighted Jami, her head poking up from the destructed tent as she floundered.

“What happened?” Grant scanned the area with the yellow beam of the flashlight and switched the light back on Jami. She looked like a wild woman with her hair tangled and hanging into her face, her eyes twice their normal size.

“Didn’t you hear those blood-thirsty creatures?” she demanded, full of as much fire as fright.

“We heard some coyotes howling, that’s all. Right, Toby?”

“Yeah, Mom, that’s all,” the child quickly agreed.

“That’s all?” Jami sputtered, struggling to get out of the tent wreckage twisted around her.

“The coyotes are more scared of us than we are of them,” Toby bragged, “Grant said so.”

“Nobody bothered to tell me,” Jami retorted.

“You didn’t ask,” Grant replied, trying his best not to laugh as the tousled redhead bobbed around the tent ruins. A bent tent pole was snagged in the back of her hair, as though she had a metal tail.

“Mom broke her tent, didn’t she?”

“She certainly did,” Grant agreed, illuminating the pup tent remains as he strode toward Jami.

She scowled, still tangled in the tent. “I didn’t.”

“Then why’d it fall down?” Toby asked, catching the key chain light rolling out from under the canvas.

“Because I bumped the pole.”

“See?” Toby shook his head at his mom, his own hair sticking out in places, but still much neater than his mother’s wild tresses.

“You head back to bed, partner,” Grant suggested, as he took Jami’s arm to help her shed the collapsed tent. “I’ll rescue your mother, and we’ll be with you in a minute. Okay?”

“Aw.” The child fiddled with the key-light, and it flickered on, accompanied by his mother’s grunt of disgust. “I gotta?”

“Toby, please go back to bed,” Jami said, keeping her voice soft to retain control.

“Okay.” Turning to Grant, Toby reasoned aloud, “We’ll have to let mom sleep in our tent now—since she broke hers.”

“True. Now hit the sack.” Grant stepped behind Jami as Toby disappeared into the dome tent with the key-light sending a tiny yellow beam to light the way.

“What’s in my hair?” Jami asked in panic as she felt something tug and pull every time she turned her head.

“A tent pole.” Grant’s chuckle rumbled through the suddenly quiet night. “Stay still while I untangle your hair.”

“Yes, sir,” Jami retorted, snapping a Toby-like salute which she immediately regretted as her head jerked back painfully. “Ouch!”

“I told you to stay still.”

She felt Grant’s sure warm fingers at the nape of her neck as he gently unthreaded her hair, strand by strand to untwine it from the pole. Trying not to think about his touch or his disturbing nearness, Jami gazed upward, the only direction available to her as he worked on her hair.

Stars twinkled in a billion points of fairy light against midnight skies as a peaceful blanket cloaked the mountainside. How had Jami imagined the mountain night frightening? She’d never experienced such a calm, serene place. It felt magical. So did Grant’s touch as he skimmed his hands from Jami’s now freed hair to caress her neck and then her shoulders. She shivered.

“Are you cold?”

“Maybe.” Jami pivoted upon the crumpled canvas as she turned to face him.

“I’ve been waiting for this opportunity,” he whispered against her ear in a low throaty growl.

“What opportunity?”

“This.” Grant bent his head, slanting his mouth over hers, his powerful arms wrapping around her as if he’d never let her go. His lips captured hers in a dizzying kiss, gentle at first, then increasingly demanding to rob her of breath and reason.

The world dropped away, nothing existing other than Jami and Grant, hearts and bodies entwined as his mouth plundered hers. Lost in the wonder of his embrace, she moaned as his tongue darted between her teeth to torture hers in an exquisite duel.

Jami melted against him, skin fusing skin as her body molded to his. Desire exploded inside her, surging up from her core like liquid fire. She wanted this man. She craved this man. She needed this man...

She loved this man.

Jami’s mind locked at her silent admission. She pushed away, tearing her lips from his. “Stop.”

“Jami,” he moaned, trying to reclaim her mouth. “You drive me insane.”

“Don’t blame me for your insanity.” She turned away, rallying her willpower as he caressed her cheek with his thumb.

“I’ve never known a woman like you.”

“You do now.” Jami fought her desire to throw herself back in his arms.

“I want to know you better.” His fingertips drifted down her cheekbone to skim her chin and send a trail of sparks along her throat. “I want to know everything about you.”

“You might not like what you find out.”

“Oh, but I will.” Grant’s eyes gleamed in the starlight. “I’ve spent my entire life searching for you.”

“You don’t mean that,” Jami replied, her voice shaky and her heart beating as wildly as a trapped hummingbird.

“Does it frighten you?” He slid his arm from around her back, but didn’t step away.

“Please, ah, we should find my sleeping bag and my tote.” Jami tried to keep the tremor out of her voice as she spun around distraught, reminding herself that he was a womanizer. “It’s under here somewhere.”

“Your sleeping bag?” Grant repeated, his velvet tones still rich with passion. “Fantastic idea, woman. Toby must be asleep by now.” He reach out to touch her face, then drifted a finger over her bottom lip, moist and burning from his kiss. Grant’s voice dropped even lower, tingling along Jami’s spine. “Ever made love under the stars?”

“No, and I don’t plan to start tonight.” Desperately trying to ignore him, she began searching the canvas for solid lumps. She stooped over to pat a large bump. “I think this is my tote bag.”

Grant aimed the beam of his flashlight on the spot. “Here. Hold this while I lift up the canvas.” Once again, he seemed to recognize her growing panic. “We’ll get you safely ensconced in the tent next to your son.”

Tenderly, he bundled Jami into the sleeping bag next to Toby, a bag still warm from Grant’s big body. In exchange, he commandeered her bag and took it outside the dome tent to settle in for the night, ignoring her protests.

As a rosy golden dawn spilled over the mountains, Jami lay wide-awake, still pondering the fact she could no longer deny. She was in love with Grant Carrington. More amazing still, what if Grant’s feelings matched hers? She savored the thought, examining and contemplating it as if it were a rare jewel to be cherished and secreted. Her mood buoyed, Jami decided to cook breakfast and prove that she could master camping, despite the tent fiasco. Without waking Toby, she squirmed out of her sleeping bag, flinching at the frigid morning air. Hugging herself and rubbing her arms for warmth, she padded over to the cooler. Inside, she found a plastic container of grated potatoes, a carton of eggs, and a bag of sausage links. A cinch!

Next she sorted through things to unearth the heavy frying pan Grant had used the previous night and some heavy-duty aluminum foil. Quietly, so as not to awaken her son, she hauled everything with her and tiptoed outside to build a campfire. Grant had planted the brown sleeping bag in a grassy patch on the other side of the tent, so Jami crept around carefully, hoping not to disturb him either.

After disappearing into the woods for several minutes, Jami returned to the campground, noting with satisfaction that Grant had not stirred. She wanted to surprise him with a delicious breakfast.

Grant heard Jami’s return and pretended he was still asleep, tracking her movements through slitted eyes. He wished he could wake up to the sight of her every morning. The realization stunned him. He was a die-hard bachelor who didn’t want to share his life with anyone. Especially a temperamental redhead and her son. So why did a future without Jami and Toby appear as bleak as a rain-drenched watercolor? Grant told himself to get a grip and enjoy the moment.

Jami certainly did add color to everything—even breakfast. Keeping quiet, Grant stifled a chuckle as she tried to build a fire. She’d obviously never been a Girl Scout, he decided the third time she attempted to strike a match. This time it lit. She yelped in pain, dropping the flaming match into the dirt. Then she stomped out the tiny wisp of smoke with her sneakered foot. He thought of getting up to volunteer to build the fire, but this ringside seat was too good to surrender.

Jami crumpled papers into a far-too-big pile, then sprinkled it with scarcely any kindling, finally stacking thick logs on top. Interesting, he thought with a private smile. A few burned fingers later, she finally got the paper to catch fire. Jami jumped back at the sudden burst of flame, which ignited into a temporarily bright blaze of paper. Grant hiccupped back a laugh. The puny kindling proved no match for the large hard logs, though a few spots of bark curled and smoked.

“It looked so simple when Grant built a fire last night,” he heard Jami mutter softly as she added sticks and branches, jamming them in between the other wood at random to coax the dying flames.

Grant watched from his sleeping bag, impressed as her latest attempts worked and she eventually coaxed the campfire to a healthy flame. He bit back a warning as he watched her take the raw grated potatoes he’d intended to fry into perfectly golden hash browns, and dump them into the foil in one big lump. She then threw the gob into the edge of the fire. Ah, well, he told himself as he watched the satisfied expression on Jami’s lovely angelic face, there were more important things than good hash brown potatoes.

He felt a sneeze tickle his nose and did his best to avoid it. Suddenly his loud “Ah-coo!” blasted through the quiet morning.

Jami flinched, then glared over at Grant. “You’re awake, aren’t you?”

“I am now.” Leisurely, he sat up in his sleeping bag, his broad shoulders wider than the bag, making Jami wonder how he had comfortably fit inside. The waves of his dark burnished blond hair tumbled over his bronzed forehead, but the way he grinned at her revealed he had indeed been playing possum.

“How long have you been watching me?” she demanded, thoroughly embarrassed at the thought that he’d pretended to be asleep while witnessing her struggle to light the fire. “You could have offered to help instead of spying on me!”

“I wasn’t spying.” He shed his sleeping bag as neatly as a snake sheds its skin.

“What do you call it?”

“Observing.” Grant stood and stretched, rumpled and gorgeous in his gray sweatpants, topped by a blue and silver sweatshirt. The shadow of a beard fuzzed his square jaw and a teasing glint lit his dark blue eyes. “I’ve been admiring your technique.”

“That’s a Texas tale if I ever heard one,” Jami countered, her cheeks hot as the fire.

“I am a Texan,” Grant drawled unrepentantly as he wandered over to poke at her campfire. Using a long, forked stick, he reached for the foil-wrapped grated potatoes, but she knocked his hand away as he smugly asked, “Where’s the coffee?”

“Coffee?” Jami blinked up at Grant. How had she forgotten such a morning staple? “Ah, I thought we’d just drink the orange juice you stored in the cooler.”

“Sure.”

“Is that a Dallas Cowboys shirt?” Jami asked, her eyes narrowing as she registered his attire.

“I like football,” he casually defended, reaching for the frying pan. “Besides, this shirt was a gift.”

“Hey, I’m cooking breakfast.” Jami reclaimed the pan and tapped the Dallas Cowboy emblem on his chest, not daring to ask who gave him the shirt. Probably a woman. Maybe the same one who’d given him the lighter. Or was it a different woman? Jami shook her head, wishing she could stop imagining the worst. Why couldn’t she believe that one of his brothers gave it to him? It didn’t have to be a woman. What did it matter, anyway?

In fact, Jami seemed to remember Sierra saying that Ty was a Cowboys fan. Ty probably gave Grant the sweatshirt, she repeated to herself. Twice. Still not totally convinced, Jami watched Grant circle around the campfire, prodding flames with a stick. “So, how do Dallas fans like their eggs?”

“Any way at all.” Grant chuckled at his own answer. He dropped the stick, gave Jami a quick kiss on the cheek, then disappeared into the dome tent.

Later, when Grant emerged from the tent with Toby by his side, Jami withdrew the heavy frying pan from the flames, announcing, “Breakfast is ready.”

Toby crinkled up his nose. “Something’s burnt.”

“I think that’s our breakfast,” Grant replied, sounding cautious as he accepted the food Jami enthusiastically shoveled onto his paper plate.

“Here’s yours, Toby.” Jami dished up two eggs and four sausage links for her son.

The child peered intently at his food. “What’s this brown plastic stuff?”

“Those are your eggs,” Jami replied, offended that he couldn’t recognize them. The eggs were tinted brown and strangely shiny, but she was certain she hadn’t broken the egg yolks. “Sunny-side-up, just the way you like them.”

Toby eyed his mom skeptically. “Then where’s the sunny side? I don’t see any yellow. I don’t see any white either.”

“Eat it, tiger. Oh, I almost forgot our potatoes,” Jami exclaimed, trying to retrieve the foil from the campfire.

“Here. Let me. You’ll burn yourself.” Grant extracted it, unfolding the aluminum to reveal a coagulated lump of fused potato, blackened at the edges.

“Yuck. I’m not eating that, Mom.”

“Me, either,” Grant confirmed, trying to separate the once-shredded potatoes with a fork, but the masterpiece had formed into a gummy clump, raw in the middle and crusty and burnt outside.

“How’s your sausage?” Jami asked hopefully, not anxious to taste the potatoes herself. The vegetables Grant had cooked in foil last night had turned out so differently. She couldn’t understand what had happened to hers.

Grant tried to stab one of his sausage links. His fork failed to pierce the tough, wrinkled brown-black skin. The sausage jettisoned off his plate and nearly hit Jami. The startled expression on his face mirrored her surprise.

Using his fingers, Toby picked up one of his sausage links and tried to bite the charred meat. “It’s too hard to eat, Mom.”

“Great,” Jami grumbled as her dreams for a wonderful meal dissolved.

Toby twirled the sausage link in his fingers, then grinned broadly. “But it’s just the right size. Let’s make a hat for it, then I could use it as the captain for my boat. Okay?”

Grant burst into laughter, his deep resounding chuckle a knife, deflating Jami’s pride as she groaned. So much for trying to impress them with her outdoor culinary skills. “There’s only one fate a breakfast like this deserves,” Grant announced as he popped into the tent. He sauntered back out, waving a white garbage bag.

“Really!” Jami huffed, hands on hips.

Grant grinned and shrugged his shoulders.

“I’m hungry,” Toby complained, dumping his breakfast into the plastic garbage bag Grant held open for him. “What’re we going to eat?”

“Give me the metal bowls from the mess kits, slugger, and I’ll show you an easy trail breakfast.”

Toby gave Grant the bowls and watched him combine oatmeal, water, slivered almonds, and dried fruit, quickly cooking the mixture over the fire. One bowl at a time, he stirred in a dash of cinnamon and brown sugar. “Try this.”

“Oatmeal?” Toby said, his lip curling with distaste. “I don’t eat oatmeal.”

“You do now, partner.”

“But it’s mush.”

“Toby, be polite,” Jami admonished with an ironic inflection. Grant hadn’t been very polite about the breakfast she had prepared.

Expression doubtful, Toby cradled his metal bowl in his hands, now protected from the heat by a folded paper towel. He dug a spoon into the hot cereal and tasted a bite. “It’s okay. I guess I’ll eat it.”

“Eat the oatmeal or try mom’s cooking.” Grant grinned down at Toby as the aroma of cinnamon and apples drifted around them.

“I’ll eat this,” Toby answered quickly, sparing a nervous glance at the garbage bag.

“It’s very good,” Jami admitted, testing a spoonful of the jazzed up oatmeal as hunger tempered her disappointment. She chewed the now moistened bits of fruit—raisins, cranberries, and apple—that blended tastily with the oatmeal. Her first foray into camping hadn’t ended so badly, she decided, her gaze drawn across the fire to study Grant Carrington.

He was like a Hollywood version of a mountain man as he perched on his campstool, unshaven, heart-stoppingly handsome and slightly rumpled, his long lanky, jean-clad legs stretched out as he munched on his own breakfast creation. Jami was a city girl, born and raised in Houston, with no camping experience. Someday, she decided ruefully, she hoped to cook for Grant again. In a kitchen, with a real stove. Then he would see what she could do.

And there were lots of things she’d love to show the man...

A smile played over Jami’s lips as her thoughts wandered into territory more amorous than the kitchen.