from Seattle. She followed Arthur down the hill and into the trees, Barrett walking just a step behind and to the left of her.
"How much longer will you be here?" she asked as they walked, pitching her voice loud as they had before, to warn the animals away from their path.
"Another two weeks or so," Arthur answered, turning his head slightly so that she could see his profile. "Then we're headed south. Maybe to Yellowstone. Maybe somewhere else. You?"
"Just short of two weeks," Jenna said. "I got in last night. I wish I had longer, but I have to go to work, unfortunately, and my schedule isn't nearly as forgiving as a photographer's. Or a writer's."
"You know," Barrett said, "people think that, but unless you're writing the kind of stuff that pays thousands at a go, you're writing all the time. And it's not as forgiving as you might think."
Down on the flatland, they moved to walk a little nearer to each other, strolling through the trees more or less side by side, though Arthur still led.
"The tent isn't too much farther," Barrett said. "It's pretty roomy. Not very inconspicuous, we guess, but you can only fit two grown men in one of those little backpacker things for so long."
Jenna's tent—one of those little backpacker things—was barely large enough to fit a single person. She understood the sentiment.
"Well, you can fit two grown men and a grown woman into one of those little tents for even less time," she said. "So I promise not to report you to the ultralight outdoorsman police or anything. Anyway, I don't even think Arthur's shoulders would fit through the door of my tent."
"Arthur's shoulders barely fit through regular doorways," Barrett said, not quite managing a straight face.
Arthur shot a look back at both of them that said he'd quite clearly heard their conversation and didn't appreciate the direction it was going. Jenna looked expressionlessly back at him, but she only managed to hold the laughter until he looked away again, and then it spilled out, Barrett's following. It shouldn't have been that funny, really, she thought as she laughed, but there was a giddy sort of edge to the proceedings. She'd never just decided to have a one night stand with two hot guys before, after all. It was kind of an invigorating experience. And so maybe she was laughing a little more than she should, but she didn't think they would mind.
Barrett didn't seem to. He was smiling at her when the laughter died down and she turned to look at him, and the warmth in his expression made her cheeks heat a little. She looked down. His hand settled on her shoulder, drawing her in nearer, and they walked like that for a while, side by side with their hips bumping lightly against each other at each step. It was a pleasant way to walk, Jenna thought, that slight contact rekindling the anticipation that had settled a little as they left the hilltop.
The tent was not at all far, maybe even a little less than the mile they had initially suggested, though at their leisurely pace they did not reach it for nearly half an hour. As they walked, they talked, and Jenna learned that Barrett had grown up in Wyoming, which definitely explained the country boy thing he had going on. Arthur was from Alaska, near Juneau. They’d met a few years ago, in Katmai, when Barrett had visited for the first time.
“It’s actually kind of a funny story,” Barrett said, leaning in close so that Arthur wouldn’t hear him. His lips nearly brushed the curve of her ear, and a pleasant little shiver ran down her spine from the warmth of the whisper against her skin.
“If by funny story you mean he stumbled into the middle of a shot I’d been waiting to get for an hour and completely ruined it, then yes,” Arthur said from up ahead of them, “it is a funny story.”
Barrett dipped his head again, his grin a little amused behind its self-deprecation.
Through the trees, Jenna could see the curves of a tent, and she leaned a little closer against
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