“Don’t get here often.” He didn’t live there, for one thing, which she very well knew.
And the older he got, the more tired he grew of the nudge-nudge-wink-wink that followed him around this town. Sure, he’d sewn some wild oats. So had Hailey—hell, they’d sewn a few together—but everybody had accepted her growing up and becoming the librarian, and she wasn’t subjected to innuendo and suggestive looks everywhere she went.
That was one of the reasons he embraced traveling for work. He could sew oats to his heart’s content and then put it behind him. Nothing was ever behind him here.
“Rose said you had some DVDs for her.”
Hailey pulled a small pile of movies out of a drawer and, after doing something on her computer, swiped each one with a handheld scanner.
“I don’t have her library card with me,” he told her.
“I pulled up her name in the system. We got the new computer system a couple years back and there was a learning curve, but worth it.”
He nodded, waiting while she put the DVDs into a plastic bag, not sure what he was supposed to say to that.
She handed him the bag, but didn’t release it when his hand slipped through the loops, holding him there for a second. “I probably shouldn’t tell you this, but don’t give up on Paige. If you keep chasing her, she’ll let you catch her.”
He wanted to deny he was chasing Paige and then demand to know where she heard that, but that seemed a little junior high, so he simply smiled. “Good to know.”
“She’s worth catching.”
He thought so, too. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
His next stop was the Whitford General Store. There was probably an entire box of coffee filters in Rose’s kitchen, but they didn’t do him any good if he couldn’t find then.
“Rose didn’t call in a list,” Fran informed him from her perch behind the counter. She moved to the tall stool when she had customers, but behind her there was a plush office chair, a computer and her knitting basket.
“Don’t need a list, Fran. I’m a big boy.”
She snorted and then he wandered up and down the aisles, wishing he had a list. Coffee filters he knew, but he couldn’t remember what else was or wasn’t in the pantry. He grabbed bread and milk, since everybody always needed those, then added some junk food to the basket. Just because he could.
Good enough, he decided. Later he’d go through the kitchen and make a list. Then he and Josh could take a ride into the city and hit the grocery store. Josh could drive one of those motorized carts around, and it would do them both good to get out of town, even if it was only for a few hours.
The whole time she was ringing up his purchases, Fran looked as if she had something she wanted to tell him but wasn’t saying. Rose had probably called her, and the woman was holding back a lecture about loyalty or something along those lines. Or maybe Rose hadn’t called. Andy working at the lodge was everybody’s business by now, and it never had been a secret how Rose felt about Andy.
“I’ve known you your whole life, Mitchell Kowalski, and I probably know more about you than you think I do.”
That sounded serious. Though she probably didn’t know as much as she thought she did. If the Benoits had heard what he did with their daughter on prom night, Butch would have ripped him apart while Fran bagged up the parts to put out with the garbage.
“Wouldn’t surprise me,” was all he said.
“Don’t break Paige Sullivan’s heart.”
“You’re not the first person to warn me away from her.” And he was getting tired of it.
“Oh, I’m not warning you away from her. I think Paige could use a little…temporary romance in her life. You have a knack for leaving women satisfied and happy when you take off, rather than brokenhearted. Make sure Paige is no different.”
He wasn’t quite sure what to say to that. He wasn’t sure there was anything he could say to that. Having a woman old enough to be his mother—if not his grandmother—talking to him about his sex life was pretty high on the awkward list. And he didn’t even want to think about Paige’s reaction to hearing that Fran Benoit was trying to get her laid. By him.
Okay, that he had no objection to. But everybody being in everybody else’s business, especially their personal business, was just one of the things about the town that put his teeth on edge.
“I have no intention of breaking Paige’s heart, Fran.” He wasn’t going to address whether or not he had any intention of offering up some temporary romance, as Fran had so delicately put it.
“Good.” She took his money and gave him his change. “She’s a nice girl.”
“So I’ve heard.”