“And what’s your new project?”
She sighed, shaking her head. “My bathroom sink won’t drain. Well, it will, but if I put some tadpoles in the water, they’d be frogs by the time the water was gone.”
“Ah. You tried the chemicals?”
“Didn’t help much. The book says I need to clean out the trap, but I can’t get the connectors loose. Do you have any stuff that’ll loosen the PVC glue or something?”
Dozer shook his head. “The book says? You can’t do plumbing with a book.”
“I replaced the toilet last year by the book. Unfortunately, all the knowledge in the world won’t make me strong enough to break the pipes loose.”
“Sounds like you need a man.” She turned at the sound of Mitch’s voice just as he stepped out from behind a dividing wall covered with a variety of hand tools. Seeing him made that kiss flash through her head, and the temperature in the store seemed to spike suddenly.
Praying she was the only one who heard the innuendo lurking in Mitch’s voice, she shrugged. “Not really. Even if there’s nothing here that’ll help me loosen them, it’s just a matter of finding the right leverage.”
“It would only take me a few minutes to get your joints nice and loose.”
“So lame,” she said, as Dozer snorted. “Thanks, but I prefer to take care of it myself.”
“So you’ve said.”
She narrowed her eyes, but no response to that popped into her head. She wasn’t sure there was any response she could make. Luckily, the phone rang and Dozer excused himself to go behind the counter and answer it.
Mitch took that as an opportunity to move closer to her, and she folded her arms, as if she had any chance at all of warding him off. Nothing had worked so far. “You’re about as smooth as a horny teenager. I’m starting to think all the stories about you must be totally exaggerated.”
“You’re welcome to judge for yourself.”
“I bet,” she mumbled, feeling a little over her head in this conversation.
“In all seriousness, let me help you with the bathroom sink.”
“I don’t need your help.”
“No, you don’t.” That surprised her, but she tried not to show it. “If you don’t find anything to help here, I’m sure you’ll figure out how to get the right leverage. Or you’ll just take a saw to the pipes and put new ones in. But what will take you hours will take me a few minutes, so why not just let me help?”
Why not? Because she wasn’t stupid. She knew what he was up to—trying to prove to her that she needed a man in her life. Which she didn’t. He was developing a habit of being helpful, and Paige knew what came next. She’d get used to having him around and not doing things for herself. Then she’d start worrying she couldn’t do it alone, and then she’d start living her life around making sure she had a man to take care of her, including putting his happiness above her own.
On some level, she knew she was being ridiculous. So he’d changed a lightbulb. He was offering to fix her sink. That was a far cry from changing her entire life and everything about herself to keep a man from leaving her. But it was a slippery slope and, even though she’d seen her mother do it a thousand times growing up, Paige had found herself at the bottom of that slope more than once. The way Mitch tempted her to just slide a little bit was making her paranoid.
“I’m just trying to be neighborly,” Mitch said when her silence dragged on. “Isn’t that one of the things you love about Whitford? How we’re all neighborly and help each other?”
“Do you kiss all your neighbors?” she asked before she could stop herself. “Never mind. I already know the answer to that.”
“Just the pretty ones.” He winked, which made her roll her eyes. “I have to bring some primer back to the lodge, but I can come over early evening and take care of it. It’ll take me a half hour, tops, and I’ll behave.”
“Really?”
“Promise.”
She looked him in the eye. “You’ll behave how?”
“You’re supposed to leave a man some wiggle room.” Wiggle room was the last thing she wanted to give him. “Okay, fine. I’ll behave like a gentleman.”
Paige was torn. On the one hand, it really wasn’t a good idea to be alone with Mitch in her house. No matter where they were in the trailer, it was impossible to be more than a few steps from the bed, and if he kissed her again, she might be tempted to break her no-men streak. On the other hand, fixing the bathroom sink was becoming more of a job than she’d anticipated. She’d already done almost everything she could think of to get the trap free with no success. And cutting the old pipes out would not only add more time and mess, but money.
“There must be something more exciting you want to do on a Friday night,” she said.
“Not really. I was planning to come into town for supper anyway, so it’ll just be a little detour.”