Curiosity lightens Tanner’s dark gaze. He leans forward on the bar, his shirt sleeves rolled back to reveal his inked skin, and his hand still covering my arm. “How so? You don’t strike me as the type of guy who gives bartenders a hard time.”
“Get a lot of those in here, do you?”
“What do you think?”
I think Burlington is too civilized for the blokes I remember from pub brawls back home, but I’m also fairly certain Tanner can handle any drunk idiot stupid enough to cross him. So I let that one go, and search for the words to explain what he really wants to know. “I didn’t make any decisions for myself for a long time, so I’m still really bad at it when I’m not prepared for it.”
It’s as good as I’ve got, and makes no sense on its own. I wait for Tanner to prod me more, but he just rubs his thumb over my wrist and walks away.
I sink onto the bar stool and go back to staring at the rich, textured wood. It’s my favorite aspect of the gorgeous wine bar. I like the smell. Merged with the leather scent that makes me think of Tanner, it grounds me enough to raise my head and search him out. And I don’t have to look far. He’s in front of me again with a box tucked under his arm.
“Come on,” he says. “Let’s go home.”
I like the sound of that more than I care to admit, but embarrassment still runs hot in my veins, and it’s hard to follow him without tracking the passage of my feet with every step. But I do follow him, and I force my gaze up in time to get a full view of his backside as he jogs upstairs in front of me.
Every cloud. Seriously. The dude fills a pair of jeans like a dream.
Safe in his apartment, I take my place on the couch while he moves around his place, turning on lamps, and opening and shutting the fridge. It’s not his normal routine. Most days he doesn’t come up with me, and I spend my evenings falling asleep over my laptop.
Tanner disappears into his bedroom. Bemused, I shed my borrowed flannel shirt and fish the memory cards I’ve taken from the static cameras out of my pocket. My laptop is protected by thick casing that makes it weigh a ton. I heave it out from my bag and set it on Tanner’s coffee table.
It’s a good machine, but it’s old and overworked, so it takes a while to boot up. Tanner comes back while I’m waiting and drops onto the couch beside me.
He’s never done that before, and it strikes me that he hasn’t taken a comfortable seat in his own living room since I’ve taken up residence in his life. He’s also no longer dressed for work. His dark jeans and shirt have gone, and he’s wearing sweatpants and thick wool socks that make me want to squeeze his feet, cos I’m a weirdo like that.
Tanner frowns at my laptop screen.
I move to close it. “Sorry, I can do this in the bar if you want some space.”
“I don’t.”
His tone gives me pause, but staring at him has become such a thing that I have to make myself not do it every time he’s close. I settle for watching my laptop come to life until he gets up and slopes into the kitchen.
Tanner is my newfound obsession, but my static cameras are my babies—my life’s work, especially as I have nothing else going on in my life. I forget about him rooting through his fridge and sparking his stovetop alight, and zero in on the footage from the first memory card. This one is at the very top of the trail and the one I hold out the most hope for in terms of rare sightings. It’scoldup there, and there’s already an icy carpet of the kind of snow I’ve never seen back home. Real snow, not the wet slush that brings England to a halt.
I sit back on Tanner’s couch and watch as the video software speeds through twenty-four hours of mountain life. For a good while, nothing happens that I haven’t seen already. The red foxes are the most curious. They come right up to the lens and nose at the camera, leaving a streak that freezes until it drops off sometime later.
But as amusing as the playful foxes are, they’re not what I’m looking for, and the first memory card lets me down. The second is corrupted, but I’m prepared for that—shit happens. I’m loading the third into the slot when Tanner comes back to the couch. He’s carrying two mismatched tumblers and has mini bottles of wine stuffed into his pockets. He sets them on the coffee table, then reaches across me to tap the track pad on my battered MacBook. “Marten. That’s a good spot. They don’t usually venture out of the trees at this time of year.”
I lean forward and squint at the screen. I’m unfamiliar with the American Marten, but they’re on my list of creatures Jerry wants me to capture. And Tanner is right—I wasn’t expecting to see one on open ground. “Wow. They’re smaller than I thought. Why would it be out in the open like that?”
I’m talking mostly to myself. But Tanner answers, reminding me that he knows my job better than I do. “It’s either a male who’s still horny after mating season, or it’s a female looking for a safe place to nest.”
“They don’t have their young till the spring, though, right? They have delayed implantation?”
Tanner nods. “They don’t carry the pregnancy if they’re too weak after the winter. But regardless of what sex that one is, you should document exactly where you saw it. They’re still on the endangered list.”
I had that list on the iPad that didn’t make it out of the hostel fire. I haven’t got round to researching it all over again, so I make a note in the crumpled pad that lives in my pocket while Tanner watches.
Then he returns to the kitchen, leaving me with his random bottles of wine, and a burning shoulder where his skin touched mine.
The next time he comes back he’s carrying two plates balanced on one inked arm and silverware in his fist. I focus, dazed from scowling at my laptop screen, to find him brandishing one of the plates in my face.
It smells like heaven and my stomach growls. I’m still a week away from my first paycheck, and most of my meals since I arrived in Burlington have been instant noodles and energy bars. The thick slices of ham and creamy potatoes Tanner offers me could’ve come from my nan’s Cornish kitchen, and I’m too hungry to turn it away.
Tanner settles beside me again, watching the screen. I’m hoping that means I don’t have to, as the dinner he’s brought me is awesome enough to require my full attention. I clear my plate while he peers over my shoulder. It takes me a while to notice he’s not looking at the screen anymore.
“Can I ask you something?” he says.
