Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 94883 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 474(@200wpm)___ 380(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94883 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 474(@200wpm)___ 380(@250wpm)___ 316(@300wpm)
“You okay?” I start to sit up, careful of my knee. I took the brace off to sleep, a decision I’m beginning to think was a mistake out in the wilds of Louisiana.
“No, I’m not okay! There’s a monster in our bed!” She pushes up on all fours, my t-shirt riding up to reveal those La Perla panties that have haunted my dreams since the flood.
She shakes her hair out of her face and glares at the crawfish like it gave her restaurant a shitty Yelp review. “Come here, you little shit.” I move to help her, but she points a warning finger my way. “No, Parker. You stay there. Keep your knee safe. I’ve got this.”
“My hero,” I say, only half-joking.
She’s pretty magnificent right now—fierce and ridiculous and sexy as fuck.
“Stop staring at my butt and hold the light steady.” She army-crawls forward, trying to corner the crawfish between the cooler and the wheel well.
The campground is mostly quiet around us. Someone snores in a tent nearby. A dog barks in the distance. The night air hangs thick and humid, making everything feel like we’re moving through warm soup.
Mosquitoes buzz outside our mosquito netting, probably placing bets on who wins this fight.
The crawfish darts left. Makena dives right, flip-flop swinging wild. It scurries under our blanket. She rips the covers off like a magician revealing a trick, except the only thing revealed is that our air mattress is a rapidly deflating piece of shit.
“It’s heading for the cab!” She points a finger as the crawfish makes a break out from under her pillow, gunning for the gap between the cooler and the truck’s back window.
“Block it with something!”
She grabs the cooler—still full of ice and beer—and heaves it into the crawfish’s path, but luck continues to be on the mudbug’s side. The cooler tips, the lid pops open, and ice floods out. A PBR rolls past my hip as cold water soaks the bottom of the mattress.
“Shit!” Makena steps backward, out of the mess, only to trip on a pillow and go down.
I reach out to catch her, careful not to twist my leg. She lands on my other one, half on me, half on the rapidly deflating air mattress.
“Sorry!” She tries to roll off me, but there’s nowhere to go. The truck bed isn’t that big, and now it’s full of ice, beer cans, and one very annoyed crawfish. “Are you okay?”
“Perfect,” I say, and weirdly, I mean it. Even with ice melting under my ass and a crawfish on the loose, having her pressed against me feels right. “Where’d our friend go?”
She pushes up on her elbows, scanning our disaster zone. My phone landed somewhere near our feet, its beam pointing uselessly at the truck canopy above us.
“There! It’s back by your bag again.” She spots movement near the corner. “It’s making a stand by the tailgate.”
“Probably calling for backup.”
She snorts, already moving toward our escapee. “Let it try. I’m making it and all its friends into breakfast étouffée.”
Clearly sensing its days are numbered, the crawfish makes another break for the cab, shooting across the truck bed with surprising speed. Makena shrieks and falls backward, landing ass-first in the puddle of ice water. “Cold! Oh my God, so cold.”
I can’t help it. I laugh, a full belly laugh that makes my eyes water. She glares at me, soaking wet and indignant, then starts laughing, too.
“This is insane,” she gasps between giggles. “It’s three in the morning, and I’m fighting a crawdad in my underwear.”
“Okay, new strategy.” I sit up carefully, mindful of my knee. “What if we trap it? Like, humanely. Give it a nice home until morning. Maybe in my coffee mug? It has a built-in air vent at the top.”
She considers this, wringing water from the hem of my t-shirt. The move flashes her stomach, and I definitely don’t stare.
Much…
“Fine. I’ll herd, you catch?” She eyes my position. “Can you do that without hurting yourself?”
“Yeah, I’m good. The knee’s actually happy tonight. It’s just my pride that’s wounded from my crawfish defeat.”
“Our mutual defeat,” she corrects, as she reaches back, digging into the picnic basket for the travel mugs we rinsed out earlier.
I keep my phone light trained on our intruder, who hasn’t moved from its spot by the wheel well. It’s probably as exhausted as we are from this whole adventure.
“Okay.” She takes a deep breath, stretching her neck to one side as she sets the mug by my hip. “Operation Crawford the Crawfish Capture, take one.”
“Remember, gentle but firm. Like you’re catching a tiny, angry lobster.” I tuck my phone under my chin, holding the light relatively steady as I reach for the mug.
The final approach requires teamwork. Makena comes at Crawford from the left, flip-flop extended like a shepherd’s crook. I position myself on the right with the mug. The crawfish, sensing the pincer movement, tries to dart between us.