Hollywood Prince (Hollywood Royalty 3)

Now here I am, getting ready to take her hiking, and I’m so nervous I feel sick. I run my hands through my hair and grab my blue vest, shrugging it on over my thick knitted wool sweater. I had to wear a thermal shirt under it so it didn’t itch. My green khakis make the look. I grab my glasses and beanie, then open my door and am surprised when I see her door already open. I walk into living room and spot her looking at her watch, and I take her in. Fuck, I wasn’t lying before when I said she looked good in everything. I never thought Billy boots could be sexy, but fuck, if she would just wear those, it would be sexy as fuck.

Leaning against the couch with her head down, looking at her phone, she is wearing black leggings with her black Billy boots. A long thick gray long-sleeved hooded sweater, the black vest on, and a black baseball hat on her head holding her ponytail in the back. I clear my throat. “Twenty-four minutes.” She smiles and then puts on her glasses. “Did you put on froufrou?” It takes everything in me not to claim her mouth and kiss the sass right out of her. Instead, I shake my head almost like I’m erasing the image from my head. But nothing I’m doing is making it go away.

If only she knew I jerked off for a good five minutes before I could even think of getting dressed. I smirk at her. “Okay, let’s go.” I walk to the fridge and grab two bottles of water and chuck them into the black backpack that was dropped off with the boots this morning. Getting into the truck, I plug in the address and make my way there. Pulling into the parking lot, I see only two other cars in the parking lot. “Ready?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she says and then grabs some lip gloss from her pocket and puts it on. Now all I can think about is whether she tastes like strawberries or cherries. She gets out, and I follow suit, and we walk to a guy waiting at the entrance of the trail.

He is wearing all beige with a brown hat. “Welcome, welcome,” he says in a booming voice.

“Hi, I’m Erin,” she says with a smile on her face and her hand extended.

“I’m Jim.” He smiles at her, grabbing her hand, then looks at me, extending his hand to me. “Right on time.”

“Yes, sir,” I tell him, and he just nods his head.

“We are going to start at the bottom and work our way up,” he says, pointing with his finger. “Then work our way down.”

“That looks high,” she says quietly, leaning into me. I chuckle and grab her hand. She intertwines her fingers in mine, and we just walk. It’s natural, and she doesn’t make a big deal that we are holding hands. We start walking up the hill with Jim in front of us, the sound of water running to the right of us. I walk closer to the edge, and she stops, letting go of my hand. “No.”

“Don’t be scared with me,” I tell her softly, looking at her. I want to walk to her and grab her face in my hands, but instead, I just hold my hand out to her. “I promise to keep you safe.” She doesn’t look sure but walks to me and fits her hand again in mine. We stand and see that the water is coming down in a stream. The mountains on the other side are full of trees. Mostly pine trees.

She releases my hand. “Go walk ahead so I can take a picture.” I walk ahead of her and look back over my shoulder, giving her my smirk.

“Put the caption “ain’t no mountain high enough,”” I joke, and she looks at me. “What? Too cheesy?” I take my phone out of my pocket and do a selfie of the mountain in the back. “I’m posting mine,” I tell her, and she just shrugs and then takes another picture of the mountain. “Where are you posting that?”

She looks over and smiles. “I’m going to send it to my mom and then post it on my Instagram.” I walk to her.

“Why haven’t you accepted my follow request?” I ask her, and the wind blows her ponytail. When some hairs get stuck in her lip gloss, she gently pulls them out.

“Because my Instagram page is boring. It’s just travel pictures,” she tells me.

“And?” I ask her, cocking my hip. “Accept my follow request, Erin,” I tell her, grabbing her hand and continuing our walk up the trail. We get to a higher spot, and the water sounds like it’s raging. I walk to the edge and see that it goes down steep on both sides. It looks like a sand slope, but it’s rock all the way down to the swift blue-green stream. We continue walking, just looking around as we get higher and higher and the waterfall gets louder and louder.