Page 29 of Hooked
His smile nearly took her breath away. “Good.” Jeremy reached across and popped her door open. “First stop, let’s get you that pretty picture.”
He led her toward a gate in the barbed wire fence, and she followed him over a dirt trail across a pasture teeming with wildflowers.
“Are those cows?”
Jeremy smiled. “Yes. The friendly kind.”
“Is there an unfriendly kind?”
“Any cow with a calf,” he said. “Bulls sometimes. If you end up in a pasture with either of them, stay away. Even if the babies are cute.”
“Or just stay away from any animal larger than you?” She held his hand as they walked. The path was fairly even, in a mild rising slope. She could see oak trees in the distance and wildflowers were everywhere. “How about here?”
“Let’s see.” He let go of her hand. “Give me your phone.”
“Okay.” Tayla handed it over and slung the backpack over both shoulders, adjusting the straps. “How does it look?”
“Cute,” he said. “Not as cute as you.”
“You got all the lines, Mr. Allen.” She was wearing her sunglasses and took them off to check her appearance in the lenses. “Is my makeup okay?”
“I’m probably the wrong person to ask about that, ’cause I always think you look great.” He narrowed his eyes. “But for now unlock your phone and walk ahead of me.”
“Oh, gotcha.” She grabbed her phone back and opened the camera. Then she hooked her fingers in the straps of the backpack and started walking up the slope, surrounded by flowers.
She could hear Jeremy moving around behind her. “Walk back a little and do that part again.”
“Okay.” She turned and saw him sitting on the ground.
“I’m trying to get the tree in the distance.”
Tayla glanced at the tree. It was a good idea; the sky was bright blue and fluffy clouds rose over the mountains on the horizon. “Cool.”
She continued walking up the hill, keeping her eyes on the tree and ignoring the sound of Jeremy taking pictures. She stopped when she heard him running to catch up with her.
“Check these out.” He handed her the phone. “I think they’re good.”
They were good. He’d captured several pictures of Tayla walking up the verdant hill with swaying red and yellow flowers surrounding her. The flowers in the field echoed the flowered pattern on the backpack. The twisted oak tree created a focal point in the distance.
“These are great.”
His smile lit up his face. “Excellent. Let’s keep going.” He grabbed her hand and kept walking. “So what’s this I hear about you not liking the outdoors?”
“I have no idea. I love dining alfresco. Visiting beach clubs. Enjoying an irish coffee at a ski resort. I’m practically a Girl Scout.”
“Were you really?”
Tayla laughed. “Not a chance. Far too pedestrian for my parents. I was in all the kids’ classes at the yacht club though.”
“Ah, so you come from snobbery. I didn’t know that about you.”
“Yes, we had only the finest snobbery at the Bay City Yacht Club.”
He shook his head. “I’m trying to imagine you at a yacht club and failing miserably. When you said you grew up in San Francisco, I was thinking Haight-Ashbury.”
“Sadly, closer to the Marina. The Haight is my people though.”
“So how did the yacht club like the pink hair? Or were you dying it blue then? To fit in?”
