Alyssa Goodnight - Austentatious

“Has this bike been on a picnic before?” I asked.

He aimed a quizzical look in my direction, covered it with a smile, and lifted his hand to circle the back of my neck. No answer was forthcoming. I tried again.

“Where are the groceries going to ride?” I pressed.

“Between us, where else?” His reply was automatic and positively reeked of male ego. Evidently he’d forgotten how I’d had to peel myself off him, a regular pudding skin, after the first ride. I hadn’t a doubt that this second leg would be considerably more frazzling than the first, given the dips and curves in the roads that led up to Mount Bonnell, and I fully intended to reprise my role as pudding skin.

We would see who fared better: me or the picnic.

That is how we came to be zipping down West Thirty-fifth and bouncing along Mount Bonnell Road with an edible bazooka resting on my shoulder. The groceries had not fit between us, and I fully expected to have bruises on my butt where the water bottles had thumped in a steady beat all the way there. I’d have to keep that in mind while making my plans for the evening.

Pulling myself off the bike at the base of Mount Bonnell Park was another matter. I’d been coiled in a pseudo-fetal position for the last fifteen minutes, and my fingers had been curled, talonlike, into awkward clenching claws. Likely I was also deathly pale and ornamented with a curious array of kamikaze insects. It was entirely possible that the Juan in a Million moment, the gifting of the Weird shirt, was destined to be the day’s highlight.

I turned away slightly and made a show of stretching and surveying while surreptitiously pulling out my cell to check for messages. I was in luck—a text had come in while I’d been swooping along like a superhero with a grocery bag cape.

Mssg from Beck: Strip poker??

I was rolling my eyes in exasperation when Sean’s voice startled me back to the reality of right now. “Ready?”

This seemed to be the day’s recurring theme—Was I ready? Hard to say. Today was mapping out to be one of those “kill you or make you stronger” sort of days, and so far, for a squeamish little chicken, I thought I was kicking some serious ass. I did dread the thought of a final elimination round, though....

“Yep,” I answered with an enthusiastic nod, glancing at the trail of limestone steps leading up to the park.

Sean took over as pack mule, and I couldn’t help but notice that the top of the baguette was drooping, a little limp from the journey. I knew the feeling.

The rough-hewn limestone steps seemed to go on forever, and I lost count at a hundred. We reached the top together, Sean having tangled his fingers with mine at the bottom, maybe to keep me from looking up his skirt.

The steps led to an open expanse of patio laid with the expected limestone and covered with a partial wooden trellis held up by, surprise, surprise, limestone posts. Rather coincidentally, the spot put me in mind of an old-fashioned folly. I deliberately shook that thought from my head.

We drifted together toward the overlook of Lady Bird Lake snaking a beautiful, reflective blue through the surrounding hills dotted with scraggly cedar and scrunchy live oaks. Sean looked away first—I could feel the tug on my hand as he twisted his body around, scanning the area.

“Relatively secluded this morning.”

“Well, it is Wednesday,” I reminded him (and myself).

“Lover’s Leap,” he murmured, reading a mounted plaque and leaning his torso far forward and then whipping back with startling quickness. “Nothing romantic about death and disfigurement, in my opinion, but then I’ve been told I’m dreadfully dull.”

“Who told you that?” I demanded, shocked and rather appalled.

“My younger sister.” Judging by his grin, he’d been pleased with my reaction.

“Speaking as a younger sister, I’m sure it was justified,” I said sweetly.

“Brothers?” he asked.

“Just one.”

“He has my sympathies,” Sean parried with mock seriousness.

“He managed,” I countered, spearing him with a defensive glare.

“Against what was no doubt a carefully considered, meticulously organized, deviously clever assault. The man is a hero.”

“You seem to be managing just fine,” I retorted, scuffing my shoe through the pale powdery dirt.

“Ahhh, but we’ve already established that I’m a hero. And I’d wager you’ve mellowed slightly.”

“I’ll take that wager,” I countered, letting one eyebrow kink in challenge.

Sean’s grin flashed quick, the sun glinting sharply off his perfectly straight teeth. My eyebrow relaxed as he demanded, “Truce! Even now it’s clear I’m no match for a little sister.”

He held out his hand and I took it, for once not second-guessing anything. Filling my head with thoughts of Sean, careful not to leave room for anything else, I managed just fine. The effect was a floaty, serene sense of light-headedness. Perfect for a wandering hike along the limestone cliffs and a sunny picnic on a vast sloping slab of rock facing out over water and sky, both the same Easter egg blue.

I managed somehow to forget about everything—all of it but the two of us together. I might have fallen asleep on that flat, warm rock under the sun, but with nothing more than the tail end of a baguette for a pillow and a Texan’s fear of sunburn, I opted instead to wrap my arms around my knees and tip my head back for five blissful minutes of heat without the burn. It was a tricky balance, an art form really, much like the way a fugitive knows precisely how long to stay on the phone to beat the trace.

It was impossible to say when Sean switched his gaze from the glorious Texas Technicolor to me, but when my eyes finally blinked open, he was staring. Flustered, I took refuge in common sense, struggling to sit up despite my limbs feeling like warm wax. “We’re going to need to pick up some sunblock if we’re going out in a canoe,” I reminded him. “Otherwise we’ll crisp up and hurt like hell.”

“We don’t want that, do we?” he asked, sounding very James Bond and looking the part with his carefully banked smoldering gaze. He kept it trained on me as he pulled me to my feet.

“No-ooo,” I answered, suddenly obsessed with dusting off my bruised bottom.

“In Scotland we pack umbrellas, not sunblock. No sense in being overly optimistic.” We were climbing slowly back toward the limestone-paved patio, the sun beating warmly on our backs.

“You only have to burn once. After that you remember: getting aloe vera gel sticky-slathered all over you, cringing at every touch for days, peeling and itching until you resemble some sort of queer albino reptile. After that, you don’t leave home without it.” I looked at him quizzically. “You’ve never gotten burned?”

“Funnily enough, this is my first good opportunity. And now I’m wondering why you didn’t bring the sunblock,” he teased.

Something triggered in the back of my mind but got shuffled away in the face of unadulterated exasperation. “Possibly because I wasn’t privy to your plans, and I never expected to be flitting about, exposed to the elements, not to mention the pavement, on the back of your motorcycle.” I could hear the panicky edge to my voice and knew exactly what was causing it. Sean had touched my biggest nerve—today, I was flying blind.

“I’m teasing, luv. The sunblock was clearly my responsibility, and I bungled it. I’m just relieved you thought of it before we shoved off into the lake, pale and exposed as sitting ducks.”

“Well, we’d have had your umbrella, right? You did bring an umbrella. . . ?”

I was almost positive—you could say 100 percent certain—that the man wasn’t packin’ an umbrella.

“I’m afraid not,” he admitted, looking chagrined, the slightest bit of pink staining his cheeks. Quite possibly the onset of sunburn.

“I’m only teasing, luv.” I mimicked him, looking away quickly before he could see the onset of my pink.

“I deserve that,” he said, tangling his fingers with mine.

My jeans brushed against the velvety leaves of a Texas sage, and I let my fingers skim the lavender blooms. My breath was suddenly coming in pants, and not from exertion. If I was truly honest with myself, I had to admit that the hardest part of this whip-fast romance was stepping further and further outside my comfort zone with each baby step I took toward Sean. Made me wonder how I’d feel about the “new me” after the first blush of romance had paled.

Thinking to aim us down a scrub oak–lined hiking path and detour the century of steps, I shifted right. Sean shifted left simultaneously, and we collided on the uneven rock. He caught me, and for the space of a hundred rapid-fire heartbeats, we were only inches away from ... who knew what ... something good. But then the wind whipped up, high on our little outcropping of rock, fluttering Sean’s skirt.

I glanced down—I couldn’t help it—and Sean, glancing down too, moved his hand to that little pouch hanging over his ... hanging over the front of his kilt. Black leather trimmed with three jaunty tassels, it matched nicely against the colorful plaid of pine green, true blue, and black, shot through with streaks of yellow, pale blue, and red. But the colors all blurred together as I stared at that little pouch and Sean’s hand on it. I waited with bated breath (really!) and tried to ignore my heartbeat, building in silent crescendo. Unsnapping the pouch, Sean reached his hand down inside. I was blinking rapidly now, and my lips were twitching with the minor hilarity of the situation.