Page 68 of The Cowboy's Second Chance Bride

“We just missed the crimson by a few weeks. It adds a lot of color here.” Cal pointed at the cloverlike ground covering.

“How do you not just want to stay here forever?”

Cal chuckled. “Mostly because I get hungry, and sometimes indoor plumbing is a perk. This is one of the best places to come and work out what’s on my mind.”

“If you duck under that swath of trees you’ll see some mini falls.” He held a hand up to his knees to tell me the height. “And there’s a hunting cabin about half a mile up the trail. If you sit quietly at the cabin, you can see all kinds of animals come to the falls. It’s magical.”

I swung my eyes to him. “Bears?” A few years back, Jace had been attacked by a sick bear.

Cal pointed to his pack, which was on the ground. “I have bear spray in there. And I have never seen a bear at the falls. Besides. any noise we make will scare off the ones that might be there.”

I did some rapid clapping to let the bears know we were here.

Cal laughed. “And now any animal within a half-mile radius has been scared off by that noise. Come on.” He snatched up his backpack and nodded for me to follow.

My phone vibrated in my vest pocket. “Weird. I’m getting a signal.” I took it out.

“Yeah, there are some parts that get service. Some cell towers hidden in the trees. You can never actually get away from civilization.”

Cricket texted.

His dad may have some media in his pocket, but the public opinion is on your side. Check out these comments.

She’d linked to an Instagram page. The page took much longer than normal to load, but when it did, the pictures were of the community center event. People were praising Cal and his work.

He stopped to look at me and the page, and I beamed at him.

“What?” he asked.

“You’re getting some love for what you do. People are finally coming out to defend you.” I tapped to access the Instagram notifications and saw there were already over a hundred comments. I scrolled through them. “Oh, hmm.”

“Okay, what does that mean?” He stepped closer.

“That picture we took earlier. Some haters have come out.”

“Haters?” He reached for the phone, but I pulled away and turned to keep him from getting it. “They’re sad that you’re dating me, they don’t think I’m good enough, and a lot of women have called you a snacc. With two cs.”

Cal’s brows knitted in question.

“Good enough to eat, you sweet morsel, you.” I slapped him on the shoulder. “It means they want to sex you up immediately, and, you know…” I gestured toward his boy parts.

“Considering the word is snacc, I’m guessing eating each other out is part of the sexing up.”

Instantly, my cheeks flared with heat. I slapped my palms to them to hide my blush.

Cal chuckled and then straightened like a peacock, spreading his shoulders wide, preening. “Good to know I’m such a hottie.”

His feigned arrogance quickly diffused my embarrassment.

I rolled my eyes. “Don’t let it go to your head, or I’ll have to drown you in the falls.”

“Well, they’re wrong.” He relaxed his chest and smiled big.

“No, you are very much a snacc.”

“I meant they are wrong about you not being good enough. It’s me who isn’t good enough.”

He held my gaze, and my body went warm from the sincerity I saw. But I caught a glimpse of something else before he winked, then ducked away to spread out a blanket he’d taken out of his pack. Was that guilt?

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