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women wouldn’t have
admitted to eating a piece of sugary, fattening candy, and if they
did? They would have been suggestive with that stupid lollipop,
rather than just sucking on it like a good ol’ piece of hard candy
from a penny store.
    Lars turned into a parking space in front of
the store front that read “Lindstrom & Sons: Yellowstone
Tours.” Now wait a second here. She didn’t flirt, she wasn’t
trying to impress him, she wasn’t putting on airs, and she wasn’t
trying to seduce him. Huh. It hit Lars like a ton of bricks
as he put the pieces together, and he sat back in his seat, a
little stunned, a little bemused, and maybe even a little
impressed.
    She must not want me.
    As he identified this reality, impressed
shifted quickly to bothered. Wait. She doesn’t want me ?
    But bothered was swiftly followed by the
compulsory reaction of any confident man in the face of such an
ego-bruising realization:
    Well, we’ll just see about that, Jane Mays.
We’ll just see.

 
    CHAPTER 2
    “Lars!” His father looked up from the desk
where he was sorting client files and grinned. “How’s the New
Yorker?”
    “Fine,” Lars grumbled, plopping down in the
loveseat across from his father’s desk. “Kind of a smart-ass.”
    The offices of Lindstrom & Sons were
simple and serviceable; in front of the left sidewalk window was a
small table with six chairs for client meetings, and in front of
the right window, there was a simple khaki loveseat and glass
coffee table on which a handsome leather album sat with the words Lindstrom & Sons: Adventures embossed on the cover. The
rear half of the office had two prominent desks and several file
cabinets lining the walls over which hung photos of Pop, Nils, Lars
and Erik leading various tours of Yellowstone. Two doors in the
back led to a washroom and a small kitchen that had a table for
two, a small refrigerator and a coffeemaker that made the worst
coffee in Gardiner.
    His brother Nils came from the back room
stirring a cup of coffee, and took a seat at the desk behind their
father. “Immune to Lars’s famous charm? Wonders never cease!”
    Nils plunked down at his desk and picked up
a Nerf football, throwing it over their father’s head in Lars’s
direction. Lars caught it easily and tossed it back. He didn’t have
his own desk, which grated on him most days. If he needed to handle
paperwork, he was left sitting at the conference table in the front
window which, more or less, broadcasted to the world: There’s
Lars Lindstrom, not important enough to have his own damn
desk.
    “She’s here for work, Nils, not pleasure,”
Pop said without looking up. “I’m sure she has more important
things to do than make eyes at Lars here.”
    He winked at Lars over his glasses then went
back to sorting the files. “Mess of work getting all these magazine
people sorted out.”
    “Can I help?” Lars asked, leaning
forward.
    “Nah, Midten . Me and Nils’ll handle
the business. You’re our face man. You handle the talent and the
locations.”
    Face man. Lars chose to ignore the
unintentional jibe. I can be more than that. “Yeah. I’ll
drive out with her tomorrow. They chose Sheepeaters, Old Faithful
and Yellowstone Lake. Had to convince ’em of that one. They
considered Hayden, but I told ’em I couldn’t guarantee sightings.”
Hayden Valley was home to a good number of Yellowstone wildlife,
but Lars didn’t like it for a photo shoot. Without animals grazing
it was unimpressive, and the animals were too unpredictable.
    “Have to go pick up Jane at five,” he said,
wondering if she’d wear her baseball cap at dinner. “Take her to a
restaurant for supper and then to the Best. She had fifteen bags to
unpack for the model. Can you imagine?”
    His father looked at him over his glasses
again. “Fifteen bags? For a week? I will never understand these
city people. All you need is a backpack and a duffel. Don’t even
need the duffel for less than a week.”
    Lars smiled