Page 50 of The Dating Dare

She proceeded to demolish her sandwich and didn’t come up for air until she’d finished the first half. Seth had already wolfed down his juicy bacon cheeseburger and sat munching on his fries. She picked up a steak fry and held it out to him. “Trade.”

He plucked a small handful of his shoestring fries and placed it on her plate. “Here you go.”

“Aww, Seth. You really know how to woo a girl.” She fluttered her eyelashes at him for his generosity. She should offer him more, but her steak fries were thicker than his skinny ones. Still, she placed two more fries on his plate.

“So french fries are what does it for you?”

“I’m a woman of many facets.” She stuck her nose up in the air. “Don’t try to figure me out.”

“I’ll take that as a challenge.” Seth grinned, all cocky confidence.

Tara hid her answering smile by starting on the second half of her sandwich. She tried to munch and swallow like she normally did, but Seth was staring at her with a quiet intensity that made her self-conscious.Should I take smaller bites so it doesn’t look like my cheeks are bursting? Nah. This was the gluttonous facet of Tara.Take it or leave it.

When they’d cleaned off their plates, they had a debate about whether or not he should carry her to the bathroom to wash her greasy hands. They came to a compromise. He brought her a hot wet towel to wipe her hands on. She felt like a pampered airline passenger in the first-class section.

“Please don’t tell me to lie down,” Tara said when Seth came to perch beside her on the bed. “I’m so full, I need the help of gravity to keep my food down.”

Chuckling softly, he piled two extra pillows underneath her foot. “Do you want to watch something?”

“Sure. What’s on?”

He handed her the remote. “You pick.”

She scrolled through the menu. Reruns, cartoons…ooh,Twilight.After all he’s done for me, I shouldn’t force that one on him.He would probably sit through it and pretend to enjoy it for her sake. He was just sweet like that. Oh, there was a Marvel Universe movie. Something they could both enjoy. Well, she really didn’t know what kind of movies Seth liked, but it was a safe bet.

“Does this one work?”

“Awesome.” He slid onto the other side of bed and rested his back against the headboard with his long legs stretched out.

It was surprisingly hard to concentrate on the blockbuster film. There was a good foot and a half of empty bed separating them, butTara could swear she felt his heat against her skin. She snuck a peek at him to find him absorbed in the movie, so she gave herself permission to stare at him, reveling in his hotness.

“See anything you like?” he asked casually with his eyes still glued to the TV.

Dammit. He must have excellent peripheral vision.She had to think fast, and a question she’d been meaning to ask him popped into her head. “Did you always know you wanted to pursue photography?”

“No.” For a moment, she didn’t think he would continue, but he sighed and glanced at her. “Not until my junior year in college.”

“Oh? What did you major in before then?”

Another longish pause. “Mixed-media art.”

He wasn’t being very forthcoming with his answers and she wondered if she should stop prying. But now she was dying to know what had caused him to change his path. She felt as if she was missing an essential part of his story, and this was it. What was making her confident, easygoing Seth falter?

“Why did you change majors?” she asked gently.

“I’m getting a beer. Do you want one?” Without waiting for her answer, he shot out of bed and strode to the minifridge. “I think they have a couple bottles from Mammoth Brewery.”

“Sure, I’ll have one of those. They make good beer.” Tara let him take his time with answering. But he acted as though the conversation was over and stood studying the fridge with great interest. It seemed hard for him to talk about. Maybe it wasn’t fair of her to expect him to open up to her without making herself vulnerable first.

“I changed my major in the middle of college, too,” she volunteered after taking a fortifying breath.

“You did?” That caught his interest and he hurried back to the bed with their beer. “What happened?”

She wasn’t sure if he was really that interested in her change of major or he was just happy he wouldn’t have to talk about himself. It was probably a bit of both. “When I went to college, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I just thought I wanted to get out of Weldon and I wasn’t the least bit interested in working at Weldon Brewery. I thought beer was gross in my teens.”

Seth laughed. “So what was your major initially?”

“My school had one of the best viticulture and enology programs, so I thought I’d give it a go.”

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