Page 14 of Roaring Fork Wrangler

“It’s yummy, right?” Juniper asked, pointing at the plate I’d nearly cleaned while she hadn’t eaten half of hers.

“If all the food in town is this good, I’m going to need to up my physical activity.” I nearly groaned. Despite my resolve to rein in my desire for Juniper, the first thing I thought of—again—was getting her under the sheets with me.

“It’s a mile walk from one end of town to the other. You could start there,” she said, smirking.

“Yeah? What else?”

“There are a couple of parks that maintain trails for Nordic skiing. Plus other areas where you can snowshoe. The town has an ice rink too, if you’re into that sort of thing.”

“All of the above. What about you?”

Her smile was broad. “I’m game if you are.”

While Juniper fussed, I insisted on paying for breakfast since she was showing me around the place.

We started out Nordic skiing on trails that were well groomed and pretty, like the woman I was with. Though, she was even more so. I continued to tamp down my attraction every minute we spent together when each new thing I learned made me like her more.

“Tell me your faults,” I said after we’d turned our skis in and were walking from the trails into town.

Her eyes scrunched. “You want to know my faults?”

“So far, I haven’t found any, so, yeah.”

She shook her head. “As my brother said last night and I confirmed this morning, I’m a nerd.” She shrugged. “Hand in hand with that is I spend too much time reading.”

“Yet you’re still athletic.”

“I’m competitive,” she confessed.

“Which is why you’re athletic?”

“Let’s just say I wasn’t about to let Grayson best me atanything.”

“What else?”

The smile left her face. “I’m twenty-three years old and still live at home.”

“I’ve got five years on you, girl, and I do too.” I waited, but she didn’t say anything else. “So far, I don’t see any of what you said as a fault.”

She nodded. “Sometimes, I think it’s easier for others to see our faults than it is to see our own. That’s true for our strengths too.”

“Insightful.”

She looked to her left, stopped walking, and motioned to a shop door. “You should see this.”

“What is it?”

“An original five-and-dime. There aren’t too many left in the world, and certainly not one like this.”

“That’s cool,” I said when I saw a mechanical pony that had to be from the fifties, maybe before.

“Everyone who’s ever lived in the village has taken a twenty-five-cent ride on Sandy. And we all have embarrassing photos to prove it.”

“Damn,” I muttered, pointing to a sign that said no one over the age of eight was allowed. “That hardly seems fair. I wanted a picture.”

Juniper glanced around the store. “Get on and give me your phone.”

I swiped the screen, and she took it. Since I was tall enough to straddle the thing without actually needing to sit on it, that’s what I did. Juniper giggled as she snapped shots of me, including one with me holding my hat in the air like I was on the back of a bronc.

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