“What is Bonanza?” Jackson asked.
“Bonanza is basically all the American foods that the original pioneers coming through here would have made.”
“I see. So…salted pork?”
She rolled her eyes. “The things the original pioneers would have had that would appeal to people in our century. How’s that?”
“That sounds a lot better.” He watched carefully as she drove to the restaurant, noting that she drove way out of her way to get there. He was already understanding the basics of the small town, and she was driving a very different way than made sense.
After they’d ordered, he asked what she wanted to do for the rest of their time off.
“Have you ever gone whitewater rafting? You can do that with or without a guide here, and I want to do it. Badly.” She’d been thinking about whitewater rafting since she’d first moved to Moab.
“You haven’t yet?” He was surprised because she seemed outdoorsy to him.
“Not yet. I haven’t really had someone to do a lot of things with in this area.”
“Well, then let’s do it. Can we set it up for tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow is the fourth of July, so it’s probably booked, but I’ll try.” She picked up her phone and found the website, making a quick call. “Noon tomorrow.” She grinned at Jackson. “They had a cancellation for noon tomorrow, so we’ll do it then.”
“Sounds good to me. Swimsuits or clothes?”
“We probably want swimsuits on under our clothes.”
“All right.” He smiled when the waitress brought their salads. “Thank you.”
As they ate, she asked another of her fun questions that were helping her to get to know him so much better. “If you could choose one daring outdoorsy activity to do that you’ve never done, what would it be?”
“Oh, good question. Skydiving, I think. It just sounds fun.”
“Oh my. I’m thinking ziplining. It looks cool, but before tomorrow, it’s whitewater rafting. I’m so excited!”
“We’re going to have fun.” He paused with his fork in the air. “Where are you coming up with all these questions?”
“Oh, I’m googling conversation-starters. It’s fun, and I’m finding lots of good questions. I figure if we can have deep, meaningful conversations, we’ll be in the sack together faster.” She acted casual as she said it, but truthfully, she was saying those things to be daring and shock him.
He threw back his head and laughed. “We’re in the sack together every single night.”
“This is true, but we’re not playing any of the fun games like hide the pickle.”
“‘Hide the pickle’?” He started laughing, his face turning red. “Did you really just call making love ‘hide the pickle’?”
“I did. But only because I knew it would make you laugh, and I love it when you laugh.”
“You do?”
“Well, yeah. Laughter makes the world go ’round.”
He shook his head. “You’re a special woman, Sydney. I hope you know that.”
She shrugged. “My friends always tell me that, but it’s hard to believe.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. I think it may have to do with knowing my mother is crazy. When I was a kid, I could never invite anyone over, because she’d say bizarre things. It always kind of freaked me out.”
“Like what?”
Sydney sighed. “I had a slumber party for my twelfth birthday, and my mother brought in the cupcakes, and invited all of my friends to tell her about their biggest fear about boys.”
“Well, that’s not so bad!”
“Then she told us all we should be practicing kissing with a mirror or a pillow so we would be able to use our tongues just right.” She shuddered. “It was downright creepy.”
“What’s your biggest fear about boys?” he asked softly.
“That my husband will never want to play hide the pickle with me,” she said with a wink.
He shook his head. “You make me smile, Sydney.”
“Good. That’s the goal. So…what’s your biggest fear?”
He frowned, tilting his head to one side to think about it. “Losing someone else I love with everything inside me. Like when I lost Paisley, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to keep going. It absolutely devastated me. So now I’m afraid to fall in love with you and have you die.”
“You’re afraid you’ll fall in love with me? Do you think that could happen?” For the moment, she had to ignore the fact that it was his biggest fear. If he thought it might happen, that was a good thing in her eyes.
He nodded. “I think it could. If I ever get up the courage to let it happen.”
“Are you really worried that you won’t let yourself fall in love with me? That worries me. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in a loveless marriage.”
“Well, yeah, I am a little worried about it. I spent so long thinking Paisley was the only woman I could ever love, and when she died…well, it messed me up inside.”
That’s when it hit Sydney exactly what her obstacles were. Alexis had to deal with Dirk’s obsessions with being proper, but now she had to deal with her husband being afraid to fall in love with her. She thought Alexis’s problems were easier than hers.
She sighed. How on earth am I going to deal with this?
“I hope you don’t think it has anything to do with you. I don’t want you to feel like you’re unlovable or anything.”
She shook her head. “I guess I know where you’re coming from…I’m just not sure how to compete with a ghost.”
He frowned. “You’re not competing with a ghost at all. It’s no longer how I feel about Paisley. It’s how I would feel if I fell in love again and lost you. It’s fear, not competition.”
She nodded, smiling as the waitress brought their food. She picked up her fork and started eating, not wanting to talk any more about the subject. She would eat and forget the man in front of her was never going to love her. Ever.
Building the desk together ended up being easier than either of them had thought. Jackson read the directions—which Sydney felt was against all male stereotypes—and Sydney brought him the pieces he needed. Together, it only took them a couple of hours to build both pieces of furniture.
She was pleased, because if her professor hadn’t been insane, then they might have a future together after all. Of course, her professor had never dealt with a man who was afraid to fall in love.
The whitewater rafting trip was more fun than she could express. Seeing his face when water came over the edge and dumped onto his head, sending cold water over him had her laughing hysterically. There was something special about seeing your significant other completely vulnerable that way.
As they left the raft and walked back toward her truck, he was still trying to shake the water off his body. “I feel disgusting.”
“I don’t blame you,” she said. “I feel like I have water in ever nook and cranny of my body, and maybe some sand. And some bugs and fish.”
“Fish? I sure hope not.” They had towels in the back seat, and they both grabbed one, drying off as well as they could with their clothes on. “That was fun!”
“It was! I want to take you on a long hike and picnic tomorrow. That was my favorite thing to do with my roommate in college. Hike. We went every chance we got. We went to Binghamton University, and there’s this amazing nature preserve. We would go there and walk around the area.”
“That’s really nice. I wish we’d had something like that.”
“Well, we’ll hike tomorrow then. I hope you have some good, comfortable shoes to walk in. I want to take you to the park and show you everything. All my favorite spots. Do you camp?”
He shrugged. “I’ll go, but it’s not my favorite.”
“That’s all right. I’m not a big camper. I’d rather sleep in my own soft bed at the end of the night, and not on the hard ground.”
“Well, that’s something we have in common.”
> She looked at him with sad eyes, still thinking about the fact that he’d never be able to fall in love with her. “I think you’ll find we have a lot more things in common than you realize.”
He frowned at her words, worried he’d made her sad. He never should have admitted that he was afraid of falling in love with her, but she’d asked. Maybe he should look up answers to her conversational questions. “What do you like to eat on a picnic?” he asked, determined to take the sad look out of her eyes.
“I don’t know. Maybe we could get some fried chicken and potato salad from the grocery store deli? I could make sandwiches, but I don’t know if I feel like it. This is my week off.”
“Oh, wow. Now I understand the level my new wife hates cooking. You won’t even make sandwiches on your time off?” He shook his head. They were going to be eating burnt toast for every meal.
“Well, I make so many while I’m working. I eat sandwiches for lunch every single day. I get so tired of them.”
“Maybe I could make up some empanadas for you to take.”
“You have no idea how happy that would make me. We’ll make some together.” She was constantly trying to think of things they could do together, because she was sure the more time they spent together, the faster he’d fall in love with her.
“Sounds good to me. I love making them.”
After breakfast the following day, they went to the local grocery store and hit up the deli for picnic foods. She took a big cooler and they packed the Styrofoam containers into it. Then she packed some paper plates and napkins on top of it. And then the drinks they’d grabbed from the store—Dr. Pepper for him and Sprite for her.
They put the cooler into the back of the truck and started toward the park. “You’re going to love my park,” she said, feeling a great deal of excitement as she thought about showing him her favorite hiking trails. “We’re on the Colorado River here, so I want to walk along it. This is my favorite place to be in the whole park. I end up down here making people pick up after their picnics a lot.”
“That’s got to be a fun task. Making people clean up after themselves like asking a toddler to pick up his toys.”
“Oh, making a toddler pick up would be so much easier. I spend a lot of time picking up after people too. It’s a pain in my butt, but no one wants to do anything.” She shook her head. “I hate having to play mom to so many people.”
He helped her spread their picnic out on a table. “How soon do you want to have children?” It was a strange thing to ask a brand-new wife, but he needed to know what her plan was.
“Within the next few years. I’m already twenty-six. I don’t want to be thirty having my first child.”
He nodded. “So…if we want two, and don’t want them a year apart…we want to start very soon.”
“Yes, we really do.” She shrugged. “I was kind of hoping for a honeymoon baby, but that’s not going to happen.”
He frowned. “I didn’t mean to mess up your plans.”
“Hey, I married a stranger. I knew he might not want to roll me over in the clover immediately.” She shrugged, laughter filling her eyes.
“You want me to roll you over in the clover and hide my pickle?”
“Well, yeah. We’re married, after all.” She grinned at him, grabbing a piece of the chicken. “We need to talk about cooking after we both go back to work. We could alternate days. You could make empanadas one day and burnt toast the next.”
He frowned. “Or you could cook. What do you cook?”
She shrugged. “I make a mean grilled-cheese sandwich.” Sighing, she shook her head. “Okay, the truth is I absolutely hate to cook. I can do a grilled cheese and a few other things, but my specialty is chili. I make a good chili.” There were a lot of other things she could make as well, but she didn’t want him to stick her with all the cooking just because she was the woman. Life really shouldn’t work that way.
“Chili? In the summer?”
“Well, you want me to cook, right?” she asked.
“I guess…maybe we could bond by taking a cooking class together.”
“In Moab? Do you really think they have cooking classes in Moab?” She looked at him as if he’d lost his mind.
“We could do some online cooking classes together. I’ll watch them first, and make sure we have the stuff, and then we’ll make whatever they make together!”
She laughed. “After I’ve worked all day, I barely have the energy to eat, let alone cook.”
“I can understand that. At least my job is sedentary. I don’t have to worry about getting sore from walking around all the time.”
“Does your hand ever cramp? Are you getting carpal tunnel?”
He sighed. “I am getting carpal tunnel in my right hand. I want to find a good chiropractor here who can help. I had one in New York that was keeping me from needing surgery.”
“I didn’t know that was even possible!”
“Oh, yeah. It is. It really does help.” He grinned. “I seriously thought I’d need surgery until I found this guy a year or two ago.”
“How old are you? How can I be married to a man whose age I don’t even know?”
“I’m thirty-two. I’ve been doing this for ten years.”
“Did you think to bring your camera today?”
“I did. I want to get some good shots. Wanna be my model?”
“As long as I can keep my clothes on. It is a public, family-friendly park after all.” She grinned at him, and he shook his head.
“You’re a mess, Sydney.”
“I know. That’s what you like about me.” And his reaction to her being a mess is what she loved about him. As soon as she thought it, she wanted to cry. She was already in love with him and he was afraid to love her. What was her life becoming?
“This is true.” As soon as they finished eating, they worked together to pick up the remains, dropping them into the trash. “Do you want me to put your bag into the car so we don’t have to carry it?”
“The truck? Yes, please. I drive a truck.”
“I see that you do. And I drive a little compact car. Maybe we should trade.”
“Not on your life!” Sydney pulled her water bottle from her pocket and took a big swig. “How long are you willing to hike? I usually do eight hours on my days off, but if you’re not used to hiking in this altitude, it probably won’t go well for you.”
“Probably not. Let’s say two hours?” He knew he’d be sore after that—and he was still sore from their move—but he needed to get used to doing the things she liked. He wanted them to spend a lot of time together.
Together, they started off up her favorite trail along the river. “I love this walk, watching the river rage beside us. If I were a creative person, I would find my muse right here. At the water.”
“Well, I think you seem pretty darn creative. You mean creative as in art or words?”
“I do. I love to read and I love to look at beautiful pictures, but I have no talent for creating either. I just enjoy others’ work and keep my park clean.”
As they walked, they ran into a man in a ranger uniform. “Hey, Syd. I heard you got married. Is this the guy?”
Sydney nodded. “Steve, this is my husband, Jackson. Jackson, this is Steve.” Sydney realized then she didn’t know her co-worker’s last name. They’d never been particularly close.
“It’s nice to meet you,” Steve said, offering his hand for him to shake.
“You too,” Jackson said with a smile.
“I don’t think you have any idea how many men you’ve made sad by taking our Sydney off the market. She’s an amazing lady.”
Jackson looked at Sydney. Why had she gone to a matchmaker when it seemed every man in all of Moab was already half in love with her? “I didn’t have any idea. But I can see why. She’s awfully special.”
“Just remember there are half a dozen of us waiting in the wings to steal her as soon as you screw up.” With those words, Steve wandered away, leaving
Sydney and Jackson staring at him in surprise.
Chapter 7
As Jackson and Sydney moved on down the trail, he looked at her out of the corner of his eye, wondering if she was going to address what Steve had said to him. When she stayed quiet, he asked, “Why didn’t you just close your eyes and choose one of the men who was already after you?”
“I don’t know what he was talking about. I don’t think he ever even asked me out…wait… yeah, he did, right after I started here.” She shrugged. “I wasn’t interested in him.”
“I’m just surprised that a woman who obviously had so many men after her went to Dr. Lachele, a woman who thinks she has the ability to grant wishes!”
“I don’t know why you think she thinks she has magical powers. I’ve never heard her talk about that.”
“I don’t think she runs around talking about it. She only told me because the girl she was speaking to disappeared.”
“What do you mean by ‘disappeared’?”
Jackson sighed. “My back was to them, but I heard them talking, like having a really weird conversation, and then I heard Dr. Lachele freaking out because she’d disappeared. So she told me about the whole Guild of Godmothers thing and gave me her Matchrimony card and told me she already had a woman in mind for me. That woman was you.”
“Well, she’s a little bit odd, but that seems far-fetched even for her.” She knew he’d told her the same thing before, but it still didn’t seem plausible to her.
“You should call her and ask her about it. I don’t think she’d hide it, she’s just not bragging about it.”
“Don’t think I won’t.” She made a mental note to call the matchmaker later in the day. She had to know what was going on with her favorite purple-haired friend.
She pointed out the different types of birds as they walked, and he kept his camera at the ready. He got several photos of birds, the landscape, and when she wasn’t looking, he took candid shots of her. He would send them to his mother when he told her they were married.
He found one spot, looking out over the river, and he backed up to it, holding out his phone for a selfie. “Get over here. We need a happily married picture.”
Maybe in Moab Page 6
