Once Upon a Campfire (Meet Cute Romance 6)
Once Upon An Heirloom
Once Upon A Coffee: Available for FREE!
Once Upon A Setup
Meet Cute Romance: Volume 1 (Meet Cutes 1-5)
Paranormal Romance
Mirus Series:
Genesis (an omnibus including, Forsaken By Shadow (Mirus 1.1), Devil’s Eye (Mirus 1.2), and Blindsight )
Riven
Whisper of Shadow(Also available in the Magical Mayhem anthology)
YA:
Red
Whisper of Shadow
~*~
“Welcome to our Retro Session at Camp Firefly Falls!”
Cheers practically raised the roof of the boathouse. Strands of twinkle lights were wrapped up the columns and around the rafters, giving the whole place a party vibe. The general jubilation of the campers added to the effect. Up on the little stage, Heather grinned from ear to ear. “Tonight kicks off two weeks of turning back the clock. We’ve got all your favorite, classic camp activities.” She listed off several options Audrey remembered seeing in the brochure. “—with a few more grown up options thrown in.” She gestured toward the bar that had been set up to one side of the dance floor. “My husband, Michael, is playing bartender tonight. We remind you to have fun and please drink responsibly. That said, let’s get this party started!”
The sound system rocked out with “Here’s To Never Growing Up” and people exploded onto the floor.
Audrey hadn’t expected quite this level of chaos. She leaned toward Sam, raising her voice to be heard over the music. “Is this a normal camp thing?”
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“Don’t know about here. Hale River had dances, but nothing like this.”
“This is a Camp Firefly Falls dance on steroids,” Charlie said.
“Let’s get out there!” Sam gave a little hop in time with the chorus.
“You two go ahead. I’m going to get a drink.” With a drink, she’d have reason to stay outside the chaos and observe. No way would her legs allow for dancing. Not after today.
Sam gave her two thumbs up and dove after Charlie into the gyrating crowd. Was this what a mosh pit was like?
Audrey edged her way around the floor, watching and absorbing body language, automatically analyzing with her scientist’s mind. It seemed a lot of these people knew each other. From what she’d heard, this was as much a reunion as a throw-back session, so that made sense.
What must that be like? To have friends you made as a child that either stayed with you for years, or who you could pick back up with after all this time passed as if it were yesterday. Audrey couldn’t imagine that. She had friends, of course. Plenty of them as an adult. But as a child, she’d been painfully self-conscious, shy, and so far above her peers intellectually they hadn’t been able to relate to her at all. She’d been weird. Awkward. A freak. It had been easy to retreat into her studies.
School was easy. School followed some sense of logic and rules, and her academic performance had delighted her parents. Continuing along that track had just made sense. College. Grad school. Going into research professionally had been a no brainer. Audrey had an aptitude, and, in the Graham family, ignoring that would’ve been considered a crime. Over the years, she’d quietly amassed a list of all the life experiences she’d missed out on because of a lifetime spent worshiping at the altar of academia—never with any clear idea what she was going to do with it. It was more as a form of observational research. After the accident, that list had become her Holy Grail.
“Hi there.”
Audrey slid her gaze up to the guy who’d paused beside her. He was attractive in a clean cut, Ivy League sort of way, with the kind of confidence she’d seen often during her stint at Yale. The jeans and Camp Firefly Falls t-shirt he wore saved him from being unapproachable. She wondered where she could get one of those and made a mental note to track down one of the staff to ask.
“I’m Brad.”
The correct social convention is to speak. Open your mouth, she ordered herself. “Audrey.”