Page 96 of Beauty and the Bayou

Stella shrugged.“They’ll have to stop hunting and I think we need different hats.”

Juliet grinned at Gabe and he lifted a shoulder.“Girl knows what she likes.”

Juliet could respect that.

“So,youcan marry him,” Stella told her.“But he still has to do tours.He’s the best tour guide.”

You can marry him.She was nine.Those words should not have made Juliet feel like someone had sucked all of the oxygen out of the room.They meant nothing.Stella had been planning to marry him for his boats and the alligators after all.She didn’t even know how truly amazing Sawyer was.In every freaking way.But it was just an innocent, little girl thing to say.

Still, Juliet struggled for that deep breath for a long moment.

“Sawyer is the best tour guide?”Kennedy asked.“I think Owen’s pretty good.”

Stella gave her an unimpressed look.“Owen drives fast and he messes around with Wilma and Betty, but he didn’t even know that alligators can go twenty miles per hour in the water.”

Clearly true knowledge about alligators was the most important thing.“Who are Wilma and Betty?”Juliet asked.

“The female alligators who are in love with Owen,” Stella said with a little giggle.

“Alligators can be trained to recognize certain people by their voices and smells,” the little boy piped up.

“The alligatorsloveOwen?”Tori asked.“You’re sure?”

“Yes.All girls love Owen,” Stella said with a grin.“He’ssuper cute.”

Tori laughed.“Well, I think Josh is cuter.”

“Josh is cute, too,” Stella agreed.

“I think I might have my hands full when she gets to be a teenager,” Gabe muttered.

Juliet had the impression that his hands were already pretty full.She laughed.

Sawyer hadn’t said anything about any of these people and Juliet wondered why.Obviously, they all knew each other and the Boys of the Bayou well.They’d apparently been here a lot.Stella was, unapologetically, a huge Sawyer fan.How had he not mentioned them?

“Well, I think also Josh is the best tour guide,” Tori said.“He knowseverythingabout alligators.”

“Everything?”the little boy asked.

“That’s Cooper, by the way,” Kennedy said to Juliet.“He’s our human encyclopedia.Just watch.”

“Well,” Tori said, putting a hand on one hip.“I am a veterinarian and I’ve taught him lots of stuff.I even pulled a fishing hook out of an alligator’s foot about a week ago.The guys saw it and caught him, then held him down while I took it out.”

Cooper and Stella stared at her.

“No way,” Cooper said, clearly impressed.

“Way,” Tori said with a nod.“The guy wasmad, but I had to help him, right?”

“Do you have pictures?”Cooper asked her, looking fascinated and horrified at the same time.

“I do,” Tori said.“Even a video.”

Cooper’s eyes got wide.“Did you know that there are American alligators and Chinese alligators and the Chinese alligators are endangered?”

Tori nodded.“Did you know they have two kinds of walk?”

Cooper nodded.“A high walk with their belly off the ground and a low walk where it touches!Did you know that an American alligator can weight up toone thousandpounds?”

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