and then Arthur rolled off and sat back down. His expression was smug.
“Never going to win, Barrett,” he said as his companion scrambled upright. “I keep telling you that.”
Barrett grinned at Jenna. “He’ll get old and slow first. I’ll have the upper hand one of these days.”
“Watch yourself,” Arthur growled. “Or you won’t live to see me get old and slow.”
“You see?” Barrett said. “He’s a tyrant.”
Arthur gave him a narrow-eyed look, but he was already sliding across the grass to sit nearer to Jenna, close enough that she could feel the warmth from his body.
“If you think she’s going to hide you, I think you’re mistaken.”
The sidelong look Barrett gave her then was definitely flirting.
“Not at all,” he told Arthur. “She’s just better looking than you are.” Another grin directed her way. “And she smells nicer.”
“Flattery,” Jenna said, “will get you everywhere.”
Arthur just stared at Barrett until he laughed—a low, surprisingly husky sound—and dipped his head, looking up through his eyelashes, one hand rubbing at the back of his neck. Typical country boy, Jenna thought, hiding a smile of her own. They all did that, she’d discovered, no matter which state they were from.
“So if I flatter you,” Arthur said, turning his gaze from Barrett to Jenna. “Will you let me sit beside you too?”
Somewhere, there had been a shift in the mood. It had happened, imperceptibly, between this moment and the last, and Jenna could feel the change like static charge in the space between them.
She smiled. “The more the merrier.”
Chapter Four
“You are,” Arthur said as he settled down on her other side, “a very beautiful woman.”
Jenna crossed her legs beneath her and looked expectantly at him. “Go on…”
"And you do smell good," Barrett said, his voice closer than it had been. "Really good."
She turned and looked at him, still grinning. "You used that one already."
"He reused what I said about you being beautiful and you let him do it."
"He changed the wording enough. You said I'm better looking than Arthur. He didn't compare me to anyone."
Barrett was quiet a moment, thoughtful.
"I think you have the best legs I've ever seen," Arthur said, shifting a little nearer.
Jenna turned her head to look at him, her smile widening.
"What is this? Compliment Jenna from every side time?"
"That's exactly what it is," Barrett said behind her, and she could hear the pleased amusement in his voice this time. "Especially if flattery will get us where we want to go."
She turned and found him sitting near enough that the heat from his body radiated against her side, his arm almost touching hers.
"And where is that?" she asked, knowing already where it was and more than on board with the situation.
"Oh," Arthur said, leaning in so that she felt the warmth of his breath against the nape of her neck in a way that made her shudder, his body close against hers. "I don't think you need to be told that."
Jenna eased back against his chest, and his arm wrapped around her waist, one big hand settling on her hip.
"No," she agreed. "I guess I don't."
"We have a very large, very comfortable tent," Barrett said, laying a hand on her knee and sliding it slowly upward until Arthur's hand caught it and stilled it.
"And if you would like to go there," Arthur said, "we'll gladly take you, before this goes any further."
"Unless you'd rather stay here," Barrett said.
"You two may be impervious to cold, but there is no way I'm getting naked out here where it's fifty degrees," Jenna said.
Arthur slid away from her, and when he stood he offered her his hand. "We'll go find somewhere warmer, then."
She took the hand and let him help her up, catching her bag on the way and slinging it over her shoulder.
It would have given her mother a fit, to see her heading off with two guys she barely knew, but Jenna wasn't really concerned about her mother's opinion this far away
Sharon Kleve, Jennifer Conner, Danica Winters, Casey Dawes