But the joke was on him, because he realized the truth—he just wanted to be with her.
That wasn’t good news, either.
“What?” she asked.
More than a little unhappy with his epiphany, he shook his head. “Nothing.” And then he let go of her, gesturing for her to have at it. Whatever “it” was.
She slid out of the truck and headed to the back to pull out his shovel. Then, carrying the shovel, she walked up to the double-wide in her fancy dress and coat, as though she belonged there.
Mr. Wilford stood, eyes narrowed and nearly hidden behind his white, bushy brows. Ben rolled down his window, but he still couldn’t catch any words. He didn’t have any trouble at all catching Mr. Wilford’s bad attitude, though. Ben braced to get out of the truck, but the old man got up, limped to his front door, and vanished inside—but not before slamming the door, practically on Aubrey’s nose.
Damn it, that pissed Ben off. But Aubrey merely squared her shoulders and vanished around the back of the trailer.
Ben waited a minute and then followed. He couldn’t help it if he wanted to make sure she was okay. And that Mr. Wilford didn’t shoot her for trespassing. He risked Aubrey clobbering him over the head with the shovel for not staying in the truck, but he’d deal with that when he got closer. He wasn’t actually too worried, but he’d discovered something about his odd relationship with Aubrey. He preferred kissing her to arguing with her.
Not that he was exactly comfortable with that…
Chapter 14
Twenty-five minutes later, Aubrey slid back into Ben’s truck. The ground had been frozen and was almost impossible to break apart, forcing her to work her ass off. As a result, she was hot and sweaty, but she felt good about the morning’s progress. Very good. Lowering the truck’s sun visor, she studied her reflection in the small mirror there. Not too bad. She swiped at her slightly smudged mascara. Then she pulled out her notebook and, with great ceremony for the man seated next to her, she crossed off BEN. “There,” she said to Ben. “All taken care of.”
“Uh-huh,” he said.
“Yep. Ben’s off my list.” It wasn’t the right Ben, of course. The right Ben was seated next to her, but he didn’t need to know that.
Nor did he need to know how much it was killing her, how she was sleeping less and less at night, worried about exactly that.
His being on her list.
Not to mention his reaction when he found out. She couldn’t bring herself to tell him, not yet. He’d walk away, and even knowing that’s what she deserved, she wasn’t ready for it.
“Well, if you’re righting your wrongs,” he said—clearly fishing but coming so uncomfortably close to the truth that she held her breath—“then don’t forget Kristan. Remember how mean you were to her in high school when she took your spot in the school play?”
Kristan wasn’t on Aubrey’s list. Nor would she be. “She tripped me at rehearsal, and I sprained my ankle so that I couldn’t dance the lead. If I were making a list of wrongs to right, which I’m not”—she paused when he snorted, and she sent him a glare—“then I should be on her list.” She swiped her sweaty brow and sat back, arms still trembling from exertion.
He started the truck and took them back to the highway. “You want to talk about it?” he asked casually.
No. She didn’t want to talk about last night and the best sex she’d ever had. She was afraid she’d beg for more. “Talk about…?”
He glanced at her. “You were out there digging for something—or attempting to, anyway, since the ground was pretty frozen.”
Damn it, he’d sneaked a peek. “A pumpkin patch,” she admitted. She leaned back and sighed. “And if you were spying on me, the least you could have done was come help.”
He gave her a slow, lazy grin that did things to her girl parts. Each and every one. And thanks to him, there were more of those parts than she’d remembered. “You looked like you were doing all right,” he said.
Trying to ignore her annoying reaction to him, which she was helpless to prevent, she sighed. “Gee, thanks.”
“So why were you digging Mr. A*shole a pumpkin patch in the off-season?”
She looked at him. “It’s the off-season?”
He grinned. “Little bit, Sunshine.”
Damn. She’d not even thought of that, and she hadn’t looked at the seed packet when she’d bought it earlier at the grocery store. “How about I answer a question, and then you answer a question?” she suggested.
“Fine,” he said. “You first. What the hell was that back there?”
She slid on her sunglasses. “Mr. Wilford gave me an F in eighth-grade science because he didn’t like me.”
“He didn’t like anyone.”
“But I’m the only one he failed. He said I was cheating when in fact I wasn’t.” She paused. “Okay, so I was cheating, but only to help Lance.”
“The kid with cystic fibrosis? The one who runs the ice cream joint on the pier in the summer?”
“Yeah. He’d been going through a rough patch and had missed a week of school. He couldn’t catch up, so I was feeding him the answers to the test. Mr. Wilford caught me.” She’d never forget how he’d stood over her, those bushy brows—which were black then—bunched together. And how he’d said so harshly, You’re a selfish girl, Aubrey Wellington. No one likes a selfish girl.
She’d heard No one likes you, and she’d reacted with predictable bad behavior. “Lance tried to tell Mr. Wilford the truth,” she said, “but he wouldn’t listen. He thought I was a bad seed, and his mind was made up. So he failed me.”
She’d then been disqualified from two beauty contests that her mom had already paid for and bought gowns for, and it’d been a huge drama in the house. “I tried to talk to him about it after school,” she said. “I found him in the school garden, working on his pumpkin patch with the garden club.” She blew out a breath and a low laugh. “I can still see him standing there among his prize pupils and his equally prized pumpkins, pointing a dirty, bony finger in my direction. He said”—she adopted a low baritone—“You, Aubrey Wellington, will never amount to anything.”
“He thought we were all miscreants,” Ben said quietly. “But he shouldn’t have said that to you.”
“Actually, in hindsight I probably deserved it,” she said. “I was a total shit. But there was something in his tone that got me. And then he just walked away, like I wasn’t worth his time.”
“He spoke like Darth Vader,” Ben said, “and walked like he had a stick up his ass.”
She laughed. “Yes,” she finally said. “But at the time I didn’t think about that. I was embarrassed and humiliated.” She paused and then admitted the rest. “I kicked one of his pumpkins and broke it loose from the stem. I didn’t find out until the next day that it’d been one of his award-winning pumpkins, the one he’d planned on taking to the annual pumpkin contest—which had a thousand-dollar prize.”
“Ouch,” Ben said.
Aubrey sighed. “He cried. Mr. Wilford cried.” She was still staring out the side window, so she was surprised when she felt his warm fingers close over hers.