Tyler leaned against a bed and couldn’t help but grinning as more and more ideas kept popping from her imagination. Heck, he might need to build a few more cabins.
He loved each and every one of those ideas.
They spent an hour in the cabin before she finally stopped, then looked at him with a sheepish expression.
“I’m sorry. I’ve been going on for a while, haven’t I?” she said, tucking her notebook back into her purse.
“I could sit here all day and night and listen to you. I love that you want to participate in my vision.” Maybe it was time to drag her off to one of the counselors’ cabins. Was he changing this much? Maybe.
Just as he pulled her into his arms, the door swung open. With a grumble, Tyler released Elena and turned to find his two brothers in the doorway, stupid grins on their faces.
“We’re you planning on christening the place, Tyler?” Blake asked him.
“Sure looked that way to me,” Byron added.
“Shut up, both of you,” Tyler told them before addressing Elena. “Sorry about my brothers.” He could see the heat rising in her cheeks and the way she’d cast her eyes down, apparently in shame. “Don’t worry about them. They’re full of … words.”
“I’m fine, Tyler,” she said. “Why don’t you spend some time with your brothers while I look at the other cabins. Are they all the same?”
“No, a couple have special bathrooms for kids who have a harder time getting around, and some of the layouts are a bit different,” he told her.
“I’ll go and look at them while you do whatever it is that you do here.”
“I’d rather be with you,” Tyler told her.
Blake stepped forward quickly and held out his hand. “We don’t want to run you off, Elena. I’m sorry if we embarrassed you. We were just ribbing our little brother.”
“Oh, I’m not running off,” she said, looking up with a relieved smile.
Tyler realized that his brothers had simply intimidated her. And that Blake had made the gesture to speak to her had effected a world of difference in how she was feeling.
“It’s very nice to meet you,” Byron said. “Wait. We’ve met, at the bistro bar, right? Nascosto?”
“Yes,” Elena murmured but she couldn’t quite meet Byron’s eyes.
Tyler was thinking back to that meeting and remembered that Byron had been in a less than good mood.
“That’s right,” Byron said with a smile. He grabbed her and lifted her from her feet, causing a gasp to escape her shocked lips. “I remember that you like hugs,” he said before setting her back on the ground.
Should Tyler say something? He hadn’t the foggiest. But suddenly her cheeks colored delicately and a real answering smile appeared on her lips as she looked Byron in the eyes.
“I do like hugs,” she said with a soft laugh.
“Well, then,” Blake said before scooping her up and hugging her, too. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Why don’t you both go hug on your wives?” Tyler groused, and he slipped his arm possessively around Elena’s waist.
“Any time, day or night, brother,” Blake told him. “Nights are the best …”
“You boys, really, it’s okay, go and play. I’m going to look at the other cabins now.”
And with that, Elena slipped away.
Tyler turned to his brothers. “Now look what you did. You chased her off.”
“She seems capable of taking care of herself,” Byron said, and he gave his little brother a pat on the back.
“She’s pretty much perfect,” Tyler told them.
“That’s a big change from what you said a few months ago,” Byron retorted.
“Yeah, a lot can happen.”
Byron nodded. “I’ll agree with that.”
Yep, a lot was definitely happening here.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I don’t like to admit when I’m wrong,” Elena said as she sat back and enjoyed her s’more. “But I can do it. I’m finding that I might have judged you for past deeds.”
“What does that mean?” Tyler asked.
“It’s nothing.”
“Obviously it’s something or you wouldn’t have brought it up,” he responded.
“Why don’t you tell me what made you decide to build this camp.” She really wanted to get the focus off her and her slip in words.
Tyler was quiet as he gazed into the fire, the embers casting shadows on his cheeks, and making it impossible for her to read anything from his eyes.
“I just thought it would be a good project,” he finally answered.
“Come on, Tyler. I spoke to one of your managers while you were meeting with your brothers. He said this is a complete nonprofit project, that you’ve donated all the funds to build it, to get it started, and to ensure that it keeps going. That’s not just something a person does on a whim.”
Elena shifted in her seat. Tyler wasn’t turning out at all to be the person she had thought he was. She wasn’t too sure she was happy about that. Had she become too cynical over the years? Was she hoping he was rotten so she was justified in hating him? That didn’t say a hell of a lot for her.
“When I was a kid, life wasn’t always the easiest,” he finally told her.
Elena was taken aback by that response. It certainly hadn’t been what she’d expected to hear from him. He’d been wealthy. Sure, when she had met him, he’d lived with his guardians in a smaller home, but later she’d found out who he really was — what he was worth.