“Fault,” he finished, his bitter expression a clear indication that he didn’t want to pursue the subject any longer.
Darcy didn’t push him, going quiet as they rode the elevator to the lobby and headed outside where Reed’s black Camaro waited at the curb. She slid into the passenger seat, breathing in the clean pine fragrance intermixed with the spicy masculine scent she was growing accustomed to. Or addicted to. Either one worked.
Reed started the car and merged into traffic. He drove toward the stop sign at the end of the street, stopped dutifully, then took a left turn and said, “We’re going to Haymarket, right? Or did you want to hit Copley Square?”
Darcy had to scrape her jaw off the car floor. “Haymarket. And how are you so knowledgeable about the city’s farmers markets?”
He shrugged, his foot easing up on the gas as they neared a red light. “My uncle used to date this woman who made her own cheese. She sold her stuff at a different market every weekend, all over the East Coast, and Uncle Colin always forced me to go with him.”
A hundred more questions bit at Darcy’s tongue. She suddenly realized she didn’t know a thing about Reed’s background. Who his parents were, where he’d gone to school, why he’d chosen to fight professionally.
She swallowed her curiosity, clinging to the swift reminder that she wasn’t allowed to get to know him outside the carnal sense. That would only land her in hot water. She would get attached like she always did, and then all her hopes for a harmless, no-heartbreak fling would go up in flames.
Still, her silence brought a rush of guilt. Darcy had never felt ruder in her life as she fixed her gaze out the window and pretended to admire the scenery she’d seen thousands of times before. The lack of interaction bothered her, but not as much as the one-word responses she offered when Reed tried to engage her in conversation.
For a woman whose middle name was chatty, keeping a conversational distance was excruciating. Reed didn’t comment on her sudden change of personality, but he did shoot several contemplative glances her way throughout the entire drive.
Twenty minutes later, they entered the enormous outdoor market and joined the crowd of people already filling the large space. It was mid-September, and the temperature was still in the high eighties, much to Darcy’s pleasure. She was hoping the good weather followed them all the way to October, the month she’d drawn for her recess chaperoning duties at school. But she already knew her October stint would be a gazillion times better than last year, when she’d shivered in the playground for the entire month of February during one of the worst winters to ever hit Boston.
“Where should we go first?” Reed asked.
Darcy’s gaze roamed the rows and rows of tables that made up the market. “Let’s start with veggies, then hit the fruit stands, and finish up with some jam tasting.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
With his fingers loosely hooked on his belt loops, he walked alongside her toward the tables of vegetables to their right. For the next half hour, they embarked on a health-conscious shopping spree, Reed carrying their overflowing bags without Darcy even having to ask. The whole time, he chatted easily about nothing in particular, while she did her damnedest to avoid any deep conversation. Despite the fact that she’d choked down so many potential questions her throat had run dry from the constant gulping, she was proud of herself for resisting temptation.
But the dark side finally called her over. They’d just stopped at a table piled high with Red Delicious apples when Reed broke out in laughter.
“Shit. I still can’t look at apples without thinking about this girl I knew in middle school.”
Darcy had to grin. “Why, was her name Apple?”
“Actually, it was,” he said smugly. “Apple Schulman, the product of a hippie mom and Jewish dad. She was skinny as a rail with big brown eyes and a mouthful of braces, and I was utterly and completely in love with her.”
“How old were you?”
“Twelve, I think? It was the sixth grade. She sat in front of me for every class, and I’d spend hours daydreaming about her and trying to work up the courage to ask her out. All the grades had their own annual dances, and I’d already chickened out about inviting her to the sixth grade one, but there was also this big school-wide dance at the end of the year.” Reed chuckled. “I was dying for Apple to go with me, but I was too terrified to ask. Every time I walked up to her locker, I’d freeze up like a Popsicle and then scurry away.”
Darcy laughed. She had trouble picturing the scene he was describing. The Reed she knew oozed confidence and sex appeal. She couldn’t imagine him ever being too nervous to talk to someone, or that any girl, old or young, would ever turn down an offer to date him.