Page 130 of Huckleberry Hill
“My sister and friends are going to have a field day.” I laughed. “That’ll be a fun conversation.”
“Which part?” he asked. “When you tell them you’ve fallen in love with me, or that you’re not going back to New York?”
He looked at me, his gaze steady. As confident as Declan was, he still wanted to hear the words.
“Both,” I said quietly. “I think they’ll be more surprised about me falling in love with you so quickly. It goes against every bit of my cautious nature.”
He smiled and held up an apple slice to me. I bit off half, and he demolished what was left.
“That’s why you told me not to give the brand deal an answer right away,” he said suddenly.
I frowned and nodded. “I wasn’t sure how you would take my news. I didn’t want you to feel . . . trapped. I didn’t want you to miss out on something without having the whole picture.”
“You are the whole picture.” He pulled out the container of olives. “I know this is a lot.”
“The food? No, it’s the perfect amount. Let’s crack the cider open, while we’re at it.”
He handed me the olives and reached for the bottle of hard cider. “No, I didn’t mean the food.”
“Oh.” I paused. “Yes, it’s a lot for sure. My head is spinning. But I kind of wonder . . .”
“Yeah?”
“If I’ve been living in black and white . . . until you.”
Smiling, he popped the cork on the bottle of hard cider. “Cheers, bear snack. Here’s to living in full color.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The Hot Spring
* * *
We finished the food and split the cider. Then we blew out the oil lamp and snuggled down into the sleeping bag, our faces peering up at the sky.
Neither of us said anything, but our hands met underneath the bag and we linked our fingers.
I was a bit tipsy, giddy even; as light as the carbonation in the cider.
“Would you consider the brand deal?” I asked quietly. “Even if we weren’t together?”
He was quiet for a moment and then he replied, “When I was younger, it was all I wanted. Big brand deals, flashy clothes . . . a ton of money.”
“Buckle bunnies throwing themselves at you?” I teased. “Oh, wait, I’m pretty sure that part already happened.”
“I’m a gentleman, and a gentleman never kisses and tells,” he stated.
“Uh-huh, I’m so right.”
He pulled our linked fingers closer, forcing me toward him. He extracted his hand, but only so he could put his arm underneath me and cradle me close.
“As I was saying,” he drawled. “That was the dream for a long time.”
“And it stopped being a dream because of the injuries?”
“That was part of it,” he admitted. “But I think I was just tired, you know? Working toward those things. To what end? When I was in my twenties, my priorities were different and that was okay. But I don’t know. When I got to be about twenty-eight, I started thinking about how I could get out of that life. The endless cycle of injuries, and the potential that one would be the last . . . It all felt . . . meaningless, I guess. It used to be fun, and then one day it wasn’t fun anymore. I wanted something else. I just didn’t know what something else was.” He paused. “I envy you, Hadley.”
“Me? You envy me? Why?”
