Adam draws back, his eyes full of fresh worry and a touch of amusement. “You think you’ve found new evidence of Bigfoot?” he asks skeptically, but growing more at ease. It’s easy to forgetthat we’re talking to a few thousand people when we’re alone at my dining room table.
“I don’t think. Iknow.” I swipe to open the recording, holding the speaker close to the microphone before I hit play. I can splice this in later if the mic doesn’t pick it up well. I mostly need Adam’s reaction. “I picked this up during my most recent tour in the preserve—”
“When you got lost,” Adam butts in.
I swat his shoulder. “Shh. Pay attention.” I restart the recording.
He listens quietly, nodding.
I press stop. “Well?”
“I have some bad news, beautiful.” He slides his hand around my neck, burying his fingers in my hair. “That ... was a red fox. What it’s doing is called a vixen scream.”
“No way.” I want to argue with him, but I can’t when he’s looking at me with those dark eyes.
“Way.” He winces apologetically.
“But—”
He turns to the microphone. “I’m going to kiss Stevie now,” he tells my listeners.
“You are?” I bite my lip.
He visibly swallows. “Mm-hmm.”
Then he does.
Epilogue
Stevie
One Year Later…
Is it possible for someone to be so perfect that they become imperfect? Because Adam has made this one-year-anniversary date borderline perfection, and I am worried.
No one is perfect. I’ve learned that.
But he planned every detail ... to perfection. It started with a gourmet picnic in our favorite spot in the preserve, right at sunset. Adam is wearing a T-shirt, which is my favorite. Simple. He braided a new daisy crown for me, something he does often when we have a quiet moment alone out here. And due to some heavenly miracle, there is an actual, full-arc rainbow in the sky behind us.
My eyes narrow at the meteorological phenomenon.Suspicious.
Adam drapes the flower crown over my red hair. “What’s wrong?” he asks, his mouth hitching into an amused smile.
“You’re too perfect.” I jut my chin. “I don’t trust it.”
“Well, well.” He gathers my hands in his, pulling them to his mouth. “How the tables have turned,” he murmurs against my fingertips.
“Would it kill you to have a flaw?” I ask, though I’m well aware of Adam’s habit of tracking mud into my house. He even got mud on my couch last week. “I’m tired of proving to our listeners why I’m worthy of you.”
After my confession episode, my podcast took off and quickly becameourpodcast, much to my boyfriend’s chagrin. At first, I lost a big chunk of my hardcore sasquatch listeners, but I quickly gained a rabid following of listeners who like a man with a rumbling voice and a passion for endangered New England cottontail rabbits. They come back every week to hear Adam and I flirt while we talk about nature preservation and debate the existence of various mythological creatures. Our female listeners are obsessed with Adam and his deep, sexy voice. I can’t blame them. I am, too.
But they need to cut me some slack. I’m a catch, dang it.
He chuckles—the deep, sexy kind that is the bread and butter of our podcast. “Stevie.”
“Yeah?”
He runs his thumb back and forth over the back of my hand. “We were supposed to talk until the sun goes down, then look at the stars. But I can’t wait.”