“Here we go,” Rhett murmured, kicking it into the next gear. He cut in and slid back onto the trail right in front of Kamp.
Juno squeaked and expected to crash at any second, but when she eased her eyes open, they were passing a second pink marker, and up ahead was a lantern and a hand-painted sign that said Stop Here Asswipes. Lovely.
Rhett hit the brakes hard, and they skidded to a stop. He jumped off just as Remi and Kamp slid to a halt beside them. Rhett held out his hand and helped Juno off, then they ran for the puzzle. He didn’t let go of her hand. He didn’t let go. She stared at their intertwined fingers as they ran, boots crunching in the snow, his big strong hand pressed against hers. So warm. So safe.
There were beers sticking out of the snow. It was a redneck cooler, ha. When Rhett let her hand go to pick up two of them, there was a little moment of disappointment. She’d liked that connection.
Rhett pulled a knife from his back pocket and flicked it open smoothly, as though he’d done it a hundred times before. And maybe he had. He tipped the first blue can on its side, cut a slice near the bottom, widened the hole with his thumb, and handed it to Juno. “Okay, you need to pull the tab at the same time you—”
Juno popped the tab as she put her mouth on the hole and threw it back. She gulped until it was done, spilling some down her face, and for a second, Rhett stood there with his eyes wide, looking amazed. He brushed a thumb across her chin, tracking the movement with his eyes as he murmured, “You are the perfect woman.” And then he did something that shocked her into complete stillness.
He kissed her.
Just…leaned in and pressed his lips against hers, held for a three count before he brushed his tongue against her bottom lip and sucked gently. And for those few seconds, Juno just was. She just existed. No problems, no cares, no worries over her future, just lost in a kiss with a sexy man.
He ended it all too soon. His hands gripped her waist and he eased back, looking as confused as a man could possibly look, eyebrows lowered over fiery blue eyes as he searched her face. “Temptress,” he murmured.
Breath shaking, she wanted to whisper something profound that would bind his heart to hers, but all that came out was, “I shotgunned a beer.”
Well, that broke the spell. Rhett laughed and released her waist. “Yeah, if you ever want this dick, just pull out the Bud Lights. Apparently, I’m that easy. Now stop distracting me. We need to win, and I can’t focus with your lips all pouty and cute and delicious looking.”
“Ha! Your turn, hurry! Pop that top.” She glanced at Remi and Kamp, but if they’d witnessed their little smooch-fest, she couldn’t tell. They were already doing their puzzle, twin frowns on their faces as they stared at a pile of wooden shingles with numbers painted on them.
Rhett shook his head hard as though trying to clear it, cut his can, and tipped it up, popping the top as he did. Beer spilled down his face like it had hers. She was grinning like a crazy person by the time he took his sleeve and wiped it across his chin, then tossed his empty can in the snow next to hers and tugged her toward the puzzle. It was a brain teaser with a pile of different numbers scattered in the snow and a sheet of directions. There was a wooden board with five empty rows, and they had to put five of the numbered pieces on each row that would add up to sixty-nine.
“I’m really shitty at math,” Rhett muttered when they were finishing the second row.
“I’m not!” The numbers clicked in her mind, and Juno pulled the remaining pieces from the pile and arranged them on the last three rows. “The fifteen goes on the end of that one!” she exclaimed, directing him. Remi and Kamp were at the same pace as them.
“Wait, this isn’t really that fair,” Juno shouted as she and Rhett raced for the ATV. “Remi and Kamp arranged the puzzles!”
“Nope! Grim did!” Remi called as she stumbled in the snow. She barely caught herself and then jogged toward her ATV.
“Grim put this together?” Rhett asked, but his voice was so soft Juno thought he wasn’t really asking anyone in general. Just himself.
“Is that weird?”
“Grim doesn’t play games. Or socialize with us in general. Or do anything nice.”
“Oh. Well, what does he do?”
“Yell and kill things.”
“Oooooh,” Juno said, disturbed at the description of this Crew’s Alpha. “Y’all are super fucked-up.”
“Amen!” He hit the throttle and swerved in front of Kamp, hitting his bumper with the back end of their ATV. When he glanced back over his shoulder, he was grinning from ear to ear. And his smile was stunning. Perfect, straight, white teeth and those glowing blue eyes. The scruff on his chiseled jaw, muscular neck, hair all windblown…the stage lights and cameras hadn’t done this man justice. In real life, he was even better.
By the third checkpoint, Juno was feeling the buzz from the drinks. She was giggling more and stumbling over the puzzles. Were they getting harder? Rhett was encouraging and supportive, telling her “Atta girl!” any time she helped their little team. On this one, it was cornhole, but they had to each throw in three beanbags in a row into the tiny holes on the boards before they could move on. She thought they would never get it because she kept throwing two in a row and missing the third. But they did and were somehow still neck-and-neck with Kamp and Remi. This was the last of the race, the final leg, so when Rhett hit the brakes and let Kamp pass them, she was confused.
“What’s wrong?” she asked as he stopped on the trail.
He pointed to a set of lion tracks in the snow. “We’re being hunted. Grim didn’t set this game up. The Reaper in him did.”
Up ahead, Kamp had slowed to a stop and looked back at Rhett, a warning flashing in his gold and green eyes. Whatever they said with that look, Juno didn’t know, but Kamp turned his ATV around and murmured something low to Remi. Rhett pulled Juno’s hands tighter around his waist. “We’re gonna finish the race up to the trailer park, sound good?”
“Wait, we aren’t finishing the game?”
Rhett didn’t answer, and as he turned the ATV, the headlights caught a reflection of animal eyes off in the trees. “Shit,” he murmured, gunning the four-wheeler so fast she left her stomach back on the trail. “Hey Juno? If I stop this ATV, you and Remi finish the race.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, if me and Kamp get off the ATVs, you stay on and don’t look back. You just get to the trailer park.” He cast a tight smile over his shoulder. “You win for us, okay? Win or we’re at war again.” He was teasing, but his voice sounded so serious, and whatever he saw when he looked behind them furrowed his brow with a frown.
And then she felt it. A wave of dominance, something big coming for them. She almost didn’t want to look back, almost didn’t want to know, but she thought to herself that imagining what was behind them would be way worse than actually seeing what was behind them.
She was wrong.
A massive, black-maned, scarred-up lion was charging them full speed and gaining on them. His face was snarled up with hatred, and his eyes glowed as yellow as the sun. His enormous paws and powerful, relentless stride catapulted him closer and closer to them.
“Oh my gosh,” she whispered. “Is that Grim?”
“No,” Rhett answered. “That’s the Reaper. Grim isn’t home tonight.”
Rhett never let up on the throttle through the turns, he never slowed, and he stayed right on the tail of Kamp’s quad. It was like a dance. A terrifying dance where both ATVs skidded to the side on turns together, spraying snow, and straightened out in unison. The boys could ride. But Juno was on the back of the second one, which meant the Reaper was going to eat her first. She could hear him now, his paws hitting the snow, his breath, his snarl. So close, she didn’t want to turn around and see her death coming. Something was wrong with him. So very wrong. He felt off. Dominant and sick, but not physically ailing…more like head sick.
“I need to Change,” she cried as she felt the first wisp of his breath on her back.
Rhett tensed under her embrace and said, “Go home!”