Free See Jane Fall by Katy Regnery Page B

but
he’d be lying if he said it wasn’t affecting him, because it was. A
lot.
    He felt pathetically grateful that she was
finally letting her guard down again after such a cool, composed
morning. Suddenly he had a slight glimmer of hope that the rest of
the day might showcase the funny, surprising Jane from yesterday
instead of the cool, reserved one from this morning.
    Lars opened the front door quietly, stepping
down the two steps. He had no reason to keep holding Jane’s hand,
but he didn’t want to let go. She stepped down beside him and they
stood side by side.
    “They’re marvelous ,” she
breathed.
    He glanced down at her and felt his heart
speed up as he stared at her face. Her mouth was slightly open,
soft and surprised, and her eyes were wide and fascinated. He could
still smell that mango or passion fruit, or whatever it was, from
her lips, and wished he could lean down and kiss them. Instead, he
adjusted his hand again, lacing his fingers through hers, hoping
she wouldn’t notice and pull away.
    She turned to him and smiled. “ Aren’t
they wonderful ?”
    He nodded at her, smiling back. But, he
wasn’t smiling at the herd—honestly, a herd of bison wasn’t very
compelling for him anymore— he was smiling at her. From experience
he knew that tourists were generally blown away by their first
glimpse of a herd. He’d seen the look many, many times. But
not on Jane’s face, and it just about took his breath away
to see her so unreserved, no trace of the smart-ass from yesterday
or businesswoman from this morning. Just a guileless young woman,
enthralled by the sight of something pure and new in Lars’s world.
Watching her made Lars’s heart swell and thump, drawing him to her
in some otherworldly way he never saw coming. He squeezed her hand
instinctively and she glanced up at him, pink lips still tilted up
in delight, before she turned her gaze back to the grazing
herd.
    Finally she loosened her hand from his, and
took the lens cap off, clicking the camera on. Moving stealthily,
she approached them, then turned back to him, whispering, “How
close can I get?”
    He moved to stand next to her. “We can move
in a little. Just be really calm. No sudden movements. They’re used
to people, and they’re pretty gentle, but you don’t want to startle
them. The bulls can gore you if they get riled, but honestly
they’re more likely to run than charge. These are females, but with
a baby out there, don’t get too close. Squat down as we get
closer.”
    They moved calmly, quietly, until they were
about sixty yards away, and Lars put his hand on her arm, motioning
her to stop.
    She raised her camera and started to shoot
and he squatted down next to her, whispering in harmony to the low
whirring of her camera. “There used to be millions and millions of
buffalo out here. But, they were hunted, almost to the point of
extinction. By the late 1880s, there was only a handful left. A
couple hundred.”
    “Go humans.” She stopped clicking and turned
to him. “Way to almost wipe out a species. Then what?”
    “Well, they took a small herd of forty-one
captive and wild buffalo and moved them here to Yellowstone. Today
there are over four thousand wild buffalo here.”
    “Well, at least they tried to fix
things.”
    “I love to see the little ones,” Lars
whispered, smiling as he watched the calf trail along, bleating
after its mother.
    When he glanced at Jane, she was smiling at
him, but it was small, tenuous smile that wasn’t so sure. Her face
was soft, as it had been in the car yesterday while they were
talking about her father, and her green eyes were serious,
searching. Without thinking, Lars leaned forward, moving his lips
closer and closer to hers.
    She looked down suddenly, breaking their eye
contact, breaking the moment. “Thanks for showing me this. I got
some good shots. Time to finish unpacking.”
    He considered reaching for her as they stood
up, to connect with her, to assuage the growing