The flames burned green, and Kati watched them distractedly, now tapping her feet along with Riffer’s impossible and obnoxious music without realizing it. Finally, the transformation she’d been waiting for: The Bake went instantly from jelly to syrup and then to vapor, and she sucked in a hot/cold breath of bliss.

Peace was a velvet glove with a horseshoe in it, clopping upside of her head and then sticking there, melting slowly down into her skin and through her blood. Good shit. She felt horny already.

Kati tucked her pipe away and retrieved her beer. She was in no real hurry. Probably as soon as one of the guys wandered up for a beer and saw her all dopey and grinning, he’d come over and get it on. There was nothing more arousing to the male mind than a girl blitzed out of her senses. And hell, she’d probably think she was getting banged by a talking tree by that point. Baked Alaska…fucking great!

Movement at the corner of her eye attracted her attention. She swiveled around and watched as three people she didn’t know came out of the woods. Two girls, one of them definitely too old for this scene, and a guy. Big guy, also no kid, not even a college kid, but no ranger, either. Gym-baby by the looks of him, in his best Matrix costume, all long coat and shiny pants and no shirt on, but he was sure built for it, so Kati wasn’t complaining.

Kati got up and headed over, still in the lazy stages of early high, to check him out close up. He was a big boy, tall and broad and muscles all over. He had a hard, plastic-looking suitcase or something on a strap slung over one shoulder, and he kept one hand resting on it. His chest was hairless, glassy with sweat, and Kati bit the tip of her finger coyly, resisting the urge to walk her hand up and down that interesting road.

“What’s up, stranger?” she said, flipping her hair back with practiced indifference.

The guy looked her over, giving one of his girls—the young one with purple hair—a nudge towards the shade. Purple wandered off and sat down on the ugly old couch Ray had dragged out here at the start of summer. She wrapped her arms around her stomach and curled up, looking flushed and pale and miserable. Neither the guy nor his blonde companion looked too concerned. Bad shit, was Kati’s guess. That happened.

“Haven’t seen you around,” Kati continued, her eyes traveling the intriguingly mountainous terrain of the front of his shiny pants. “Passing through?”

“Hunting,” the guy said. His voice was low and relaxed. Friendly.

Kati made it up to his face at last. Not bad. Weird beard, but he made up for it with good looks and a clear complexion. His eyes were black. Really black. To Kati’s pleasantly-baked brain, they almost looked like horse’s eyes, so black they had no white around them at all. He wasn’t looking at her, either. His gaze skipped around where the music blared out into the empty clearing.

“It’s the wrong season for hunting,” Kati told him. “You bad boy.”

Now he looked at her, his brows rising.

“Maybe you like getting into trouble,” she said, and winked.

His expression didn’t change, but he blew out a short, soundless laugh. There was interest in his gaze, but it wasn’t the kind Kati was used to seeing in a guy. It was more like the interest of a boy for a new kind of bug.

“What’s your name?” she asked, sipping at her beer and licking lightly at the opening of the bottle.

He told her. One word, a word Kati remembered from bible class.

“Cain?” she echoed, laughing a little. “As in, Cain rose up and killed Abel?”

His eyes flickered. He smiled. “Just like that,” he said.

“Well, hi, Cain. I’m Kati. Want a beer?”

He did something strange then, leaning forward and sniffing at the bottle in her hand, making her wonder for the first time if he was really there at all or if this were some Baked Alaska head-trip. Then he looked at her. “No,” he said. He got even closer then, enough for Kati to feel his breath on her cheek, and drew in another breath, a deeper one. He didn’t back away afterwards, either. “What do you want…Kati?” he asked, almost humming the words, or growling them. He sounded like he was smiling.

Kati felt a hot little thrill slide down her body. It was a weird come-on, okay, and more direct than most guys got so soon, but it was also sexy as hell. Well, two could play this game.

Kati held her bottle teasingly up between them, keeping him at bay, but reached down with her free hand and cupped his crotch. Immediately, her sly smile turned to wide-eyed surprise and she looked down, as if trying to see through his clothes to the monster she was petting. This had to be the Bake at work. Guys didn’t really come that big, did they?

And he wasn’t slapping her hand away, that was for sure. Not him, and not his blonde girlfriend, although she looked pissed enough to want to try. Kati gave Cain’s cock another disbelieving squeeze and then backed up, sipping at her beer to try and recover some equilibrium. She sure didn’t think she was fucked up enough already to be imagining this. And come on, if this was just the Bake, shouldn’t Blondie and Miss Purple be coming on to her, too? Blondie looked like she wanted to skin Kati alive, and Miss Purple was still curled on the couch, not even watching.

Uncertainly, Kati gave Cain another rub-down and then said, “Am I really here? I am, aren’t I?”

Cain took the beer bottle out of her hand and dropped it. He caught her wrist and pressed her hand tight to the bulge in his pants. “Having a little trouble, are you?” he asked, stroking her up and down on him. He glanced at his girlfriend. “Go take care of Raven.”

Blondie pouted. “She’s sleeping. Can’t I—”

Cain slapped her reaching hand away before Blondie could touch him. “I’m going to assume that you aren’t arguing with me. I’m going to assume you’re asking for clarification. So let me clarify. Wake her up. Now,” he said coldly, his lip curling. His teeth…now those had to be Bake. His hand never stopped moving Kati’s. He was hard as rock inside his tight clothing. “What do I want to hear you say?”

“Yes, Cain.” Blondie’s shoulders tightened and she turned away.

“That’s better. Take care of her. Wake her up if you have to, but take care of her. Do it right and maybe I’ll take care of you. Maybe. Behave yourself.” Cain took his hand off Kati’s at last, but she kept rubbing. He played with the tips of her hair in a distracted way, watching his girlfriend walk to the couch. Blondie bent over and put her hand up Miss Purple’s shirt. That was a nice wake-up for you. Cain said, “I know you’re not here alone. Where are your friends, Kati?”

“I dunno. They’re around. And you should know I’m not planning to behave myself at all.” She grinned when he looked down at her. “I hope you’re not too disappointed.”

“You should,” he replied seriously. “I don’t think you’d like me when I’m disappointed. Show me where your friends are.”

Kati slipped her hand beneath the tight waist of his pants and got her fingers around real, rigid flesh. “Wouldn’t you rather be alone?”

He drew back, blinking fast and frowning slow. “Alone?” he echoed, peering at her lips.

“With me.”

“Ah.” His smile reasserted itself. “That depends on a few things.” He took her wrist again, this time putting her at arm’s length. “First, show me where your friends are. Then we’ll talk.”

Okay, this was definitely not Bake. Fantasy fuck-buddies never gave a rip where other people were. They came, they fucked, they came again, and then they winked out. So Cain was real, which meant that fantastic cock of his was real, too, and if he needed a guided tour before he’d pull it, so be it. Kati took his arm and led him over the ridge and down the path to the water.

The sun was just low enough in the sky to turn the diminished river into a ribbon of blinding white running down the middle of a hellish landscape of cracked earth and skeletal logs. Tabby and some of Ray’s cousins were still splashing around and shrieking at each other. Just about everyone else was coupled up on the small sandy edge that was the river’s real bank. Even Danny had his tongue down someone’s throat. Sarah Ann was completely naked and had two more of the cousins feeling her up with that sleepy fascination that said Green Dragon to Kati. Riffer, who was, as far as Kati knew, straight as a ruler, was receiving a blowjob from Tabby’s boyfriend with an expression of pleasant surprise. Good party, in other words. It was almost enough to make Kati want to wander over and join them.