“Who’s here? We’re so far from everyone else.”
“For a few seconds.”
He didn’t reply. Instead, he turned on his flashlight and fixed the beam on my body, carefully avoiding my eyes.
In a strange, probably kinky way, it was hot having him watch me, illuminating me in that light. I watched his expression, watched the way his breathing changed.
“I will never get tired of staring at you. You’re so beautiful, it’s unreal. I still wonder how I got so lucky.”
“Funny, I was just thinking about how you have so many options.”
“Options?” He switched off the light, sending us into darkness again.
“Of girls.”
“I only want one, so that doesn’t mean anything.”
“I hope you’ll be able to say that in a few months.”
“Why? Are you nervous that I’m going to change?” He lay down next to me, gently running his hand down my arm.
“Yes.” It was so easy to be honest in the pitch blackness.
“Things might change for my music, but that doesn’t mean it changes anything for us. I’m crazy about you, Cara. And if we’re all about honesty tonight, I might as well lay it all out there.”
“Lay what out there?” I shivered again, but this time it was with nervousness.
He pulled me into his arms. “I’ve fallen in love with you.”
His words hit me hard, and I felt them deep in my chest. My reply came from my subconscious, but I’d already known they were there waiting to come out. “I feel the same way about you.”
“Oh, thank god.” His lips were on mine in a second. I returned the kiss, tangling my hands in his hair as his hands slipped down my body.
The whispered words in the dark had ignited something in both of us. His lips moved to my neck as his hand slipped between my legs. I stroked him, loving the way he came to life underneath my hand.
We didn’t spend much time on foreplay. He moved over me. “I love you, Cara.” He thrust inside me with an intensity I wasn’t expecting. The sleeping bags and mats below us were no match for the way he rocked me into the ground. I’d be sore the next day, but I didn’t care. All I cared about was having Chase on top of me and inside me.
“I love you, Chase.” My reply came late, when we were already moving together perfectly in synch and his mouth had returned to my breast again.
He groaned, my words seeming to turn him on more. His movements became deeper and faster as he filled me with the length of him over and over until he pushed me over the edge. Then he shuddered, and we both lay there panting and sweaty. The only sound remaining came from the cicadas.
He kissed me lightly. “I’m home.”
I grinned. I knew exactly the way he felt.
That’s when I heard the sound of twigs breaking.
“Chase, what was that?” I sat up, grabbing the first piece of clothing I could find in an attempt to cover myself up.
“Stay here.” He fumbled around in the dark for his underwear and slipped into them before walking out. He grabbed the flashlight.
I pulled Chase’s t-shirt over my head without worrying about a bra.
“Hey, you! What the fuck are you doing?” Chase’s voiced carried through the nearly silent night.
I heard more twigs breaking. Chase’s voice carried from slightly further away. “Give me that. Were you recording us?”
“No. Not exactly,” a young male voice responded.
“Not exactly?” Chase asked incredulously. “Then what were you doing?”
“Just seeing if you were going to play something exclusive or something.”
“You think I came out here in the middle of nowhere with my girlfriend to play exclusive music?”
I saw the illumination of a screen. “You recorded all of that? You fucking videotaped me with my girlfriend?”
“I couldn’t see anything. It was just sound.” The young voice quaked.
“And that makes it okay?”
Chase was screaming by this point. He was loud enough to bring everyone else out of their tents. I searched around until I found my jeans and shoes and left the tent.
I walked around the circle of people. Chase was still out there in his underwear. Poor guy.
Len turned his phone flashlight toward me. “Hey, Cara. I think you’re wearing the wrong shirt.”
I ignored him and turned to the guy I’d never met. The one who had evidently taped us. “You’re an asshole.”
Everyone laughed.
“No laughing. I’m being serious. Taping something like that is so far from cool it isn’t funny.” I grabbed the phone from Chase and stared down the kid who couldn’t have been more than sixteen or so. “You are not getting this back. You look younger than me. Hopefully, your mommy and daddy will buy you a new one. I’m sure they’d love to know what you were doing with yours to lose it in the first place.”
“You can’t take my phone.” He glared at me.
“Yes, I can. You violated my privacy.”
“You can just wipe the video.”
Chase put an arm around me. “Oh, I will, after you prove it’s not on the cloud. And then I need this to make sure I can find you if you’ve already backed it up and this shows up somewhere else.”
“You can’t even see anything!” His nerves had become anger, but his anger was nothing compared to mine.
“Not only did you film us having sex, but you filmed us admitting our feelings to each other. Those things are private.” I was fuming, and I appreciated having Chase’s arm for support.
I left the phone with Chase. I’d let him make sure the file wasn’t backed up somewhere.
I said good night to my friends again and waited for Chase back in the tent.
He came back, zipping the tent behind him. “I’m so sorry about that, babe.”
“Yeah, well. I think that’s an example of how things are going to change.”
He laughed.
“What?”
“Cara? You think that kid was paparazzi? It was just some stoned teenager who obviously followed us here.”
“Yeah, but.”
“No buts. This is our night, and we’re going to enjoy it.”
“You expect me to have sex with you again after what just happened?” I sat down, pulling my knees up to my chest.
“Yes. Yes, I do.” He gently pulled my knees down and eased me down on the sleeping bags.
“And you’re sure you’re feeling okay?”