Read Online Surrender of a Tattooist: Obsessive Dark Romance Alpha Bad Boy (Tattooist Series Book 2) by Lexy Timms - Free Book Online

serious.” He laughed again. “They have all sorts of places up there where you can go. We would camp for a week in the parks and go digging for gems. My mom has so many quartz crystals all over the house, it’s crazy.”
    “You did that every year?”
    Cliff shook his head. “No, we went to Vancouver one year and up to Alaska another. We did eco-stuff. Like we’d go help build houses or we would do things where we could camp instead of staying in some fancy electricity-sucking resort.” He shrugged. “How about you? What were your family vacations like?”
    She flicked a few pieces of sand off the blanket. “We didn’t take vacations. My dad was a farmer first. He had another profession, too, but farming was in his blood. All his family were farmers. My mom was a beautician and a mortician; oddly enough, the two things are really compatible…”
    Cliff choked, “Run that by me again.”
    Pixie glanced at him from the corner of her eye, trying not to smile. “You heard me. When I was a kid, about eleven or twelve, I got into a lot of trouble because I put a lot of glitter into this one old lady’s hair because I thought it would make her prettier than my mom had made her. It took them hours to get it all off her, and boy was my mom angry.”
    Cliff did his best not to laugh but he couldn’t help it. When he was finally able to speak again, he said, “Don’t tell me how they got it off again.”
    Pixie felt the corners of her mouth rising. “I won’t. I will say I have a healthy respect for death, and I hate it. I have always hated it. Maybe that’s why I’m always trying to save lost or dumped animals. I hate death and I know I can’t stop it from happening to people, but maybe I can help it not to happen to innocent little dogs or cats that just need a chance to stay alive.”
    “I can see that. So, no vacations at all?”
    “You never know when someone might die or a sudden freeze or hail storm will happen. You never know when bugs are going to ride over your crops or when the animals might get sick, and trying to get somebody to look after a farm is pretty difficult.”
    “We should go on a cruise, the two of us, one day. Soon. It would be an adventure. We both need to blend in with the locals.”
    “We are locals.” She smiled. He was trying to be so sweet. “I’d love to. First I need to get my finances in order.”
    Cliff scowled at her. “You’re not paying, silly. I wouldn’t have offered if I wasn’t willing to pay for it. They aren’t terribly expensive, not like they used to be back in the day from what I hear.”
    “It’s very sweet of you.” She stared down at the blanket again, watching the sand glisten in the sun. “It just bothers me that I’m so…at my age I should be better with money.”
    “Then do something about it.”
    The words were a challenge. She knew it. It wasn’t something she was used to, feeling like she wasn’t doing exactly what she needed to be doing. She’d thought that once she left home, once she’d shed the weight of being who she’d been as a child and young teen, that all of that would change.
    She had been happy for a very long time, but now she wanted more than what she currently had, and she knew that; she just didn’t know what to do about it. She asked, “Do you think this is how normal people do things?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “I mean we’re getting to know each other, right? But we’re doing it by flying eagles and hanging out on the beach. Planning a cruise when we barely know each other. Is that normal?”
    Cliff rolled onto his back and tucked his hands behind his head. “I don’t know. I don’t think I care either. About being normal, anyway. I care very much about getting to know you, though. You fascinate me, Pixie.”
    “I’d like to get to know you too. I like you.” Had she just said that? She bit her lip and added, “Oh to hell with it. I like you a lot. I really do, and I want to get know more about you.