“Gibbs?”
“Yeah, how did you know?”
“He let me know the first night I met him.” Nick brushed an ant from the table. “He seemed pretty proprietary.”
Charlie Grace groaned. “Don’t even get me started.” She gave Nick a brief rundown on the demise of her marriage and the reasons behind the divorce. “Gibbs is a trademark wanderer.”
“His loss.” Nick gazed at her intently. “And, in my opinion—he’s a fool.”
Her breath caught. He was flirting. Flirting!
Admittedly, it felt good to have someone like Nick Thatcher interested. No one ever talked about how thrilling it was to be looked at in the way Nick was staring at her right now. It was a bit heady—this infatuation. The excitement of wondering what the other person would say next, the delight of knowing that person was looking at you and liking what they saw, the rush of it all. She felt like a schoolgirl.
A schoolgirl with a boyfriend. She had a lot to sort out.
She quickly reined in her giddy emotions. “Tell me more about you,” she urged, wanting to learn more about this stranger whom she found intriguing. “Where’d you grow up?”
“I was raised in Orange County, California—not far from Disneyland.”
“Ooh, I always wanted to go to Disneyland.”
He shook his head. “I’ve been dozens of times. You’re not missing anything.” He let his attention drift to the sky filled with stars. “You have everything, and more, right here. This place is magical.”
“It is,” she agreed.
“L.A. is nothing like Wyoming. It’s crowded and hurried. Everyone seems frantic to make their way to some unknown destination.” He rubbed at his chin. “My parents owned a florist shop. I worked there after school as a kid. When I was old enough to get my driver’s license, I drove the delivery truck.” His face grew reminiscent. “That’s how I paid for my first camera. A second-hand Nikon I found down at the pawn shop. I don’t know why, but I was drawn to photography from the time I was a small kid. I spent countless hours experimenting, taking pictures of everything from my pets to the trees in our backyard. The joy of capturing a moment in time and freezing it forever was a feeling unlike any other.”
“Yeah, I get that,” she said.
Nick leaned his arms on his knees. “I grew older, and my love for photography grew as well. I’d go to the library after school and study books on different techniques and the styles and works of famous photographers. Eventually, I realized that I wanted to take my passion to the next level, and I enrolled in UCLA and got into a program that focused on developing technical skills, but also the critical and theoretical aspects of the medium.” He paused and rubbed at the back of his neck. “Sorry, I’m boring you.”
“No, please. Go on,” she urged.
“Well, in addition, the program encouraged students to engage with the wider Los Angeles art community. That’s how I met the head of a small production company who was willing to take on an eager intern who wanted nothing more than to absorb everything he could.”
“Herb Nelson,” she murmured.
“How did you know…?”
She felt heat rise to her cheeks. “Your acceptance speech at the Oscars. I looked you up on the internet,” she confessed, a fact that seemed to please him.
In an attempt to divert attention from her blunder, she glanced around. “Where’d everyone go?”
“I think they all wandered inside the lodge,” he told her.
She looked at her watch, amazed at how much time had passed. Her full plate still sat on the table before her. She pushed her uneaten dinner aside and dared to meet his gaze. “I find myself a bit jealous of your life. Of all the traveling—new places, new people. It must be thrilling.”
“What about you?” he asked. “Did you always want to run a ranch?”
Charlie Grace shrugged. “I don’t know. There was never a plan, really.” She explained how her ancestors had made their way west on the Oregon Trail. She told him how her great-grandfather had homesteaded the ranch and how the property had been passed down several generations. “My dad was in an accident. I’ve always helped out, but that’s when I stepped up and took over.”
“What happened?” he asked. “To your dad, I mean.”
Charlie Grace’s throat thickened like it did every time she talked about that day. She fixed her eyes on the smoldering embers in the firepit. “It was a summer day four years ago. Dad was repairing one of the fences when he decided he needed to work the new rescue horse he’d taken in. A wounded horse is predictably hard to manage. It could very well take several men to load the horse safely.” She paused, searching for the fortitude to continue. “Dad is known for being an ornery cuss—and a stubborn one, at that. I told him to wait for Gibbs, who was due to arrive to pick up Jewel. He refused to follow my advice.”
“Ah…” was all Nick could find to say. “I think I can see where this is going.”
She nodded. “Yeah, the horse reared upon loading, and his hoof landed in a bad spot. Split Dad’s head open,” she said, placing her hands on the table in front of her. And then, lowering her voice, added, “I was frantic.”
