“Yeah, I know. Sometimes I wish you could lie.”
“I can lie, just not very well. Who knows? Maybe it won’t happen.” Amy turned back to the books. “What then?”
“Mad, erotic threesomes?” Jenna sashayed back to her table.
“Eww. You’re a pig.” Amy laughed.
“Ha!” She threw her head back with the laugh and turned back toward Amy. “I don’t know what then, but the next time he corners me, I’m not going to let my stupid body steal my ability to act like I would with anyone else. I’m going to climb his body like scaffolding”—she moved her hands and feet up and down as if she were scaling him—“wrap my legs around his waist, and kiss those amazing lips until he realizes that there is no woman on earth as incredibly smart and sexy as me!”
Amy’s eyes widened.
“Okay, as me, you, Leanna, and Bella, of course, but you know what I mean.”
Jenna closed her eyes and spun around. “That’s exactly what I’ll do.” She opened her eyes and found Charlie standing with his hands on his hips, straight off the construction site, his tank top drenched in sweat and black gunk, and a cocky grin on his face.
Uh-oh.
“Now, that’s what I’m talking about.” He closed in on Jenna, lifted her up, and sealed his lips over hers, stroking her tongue with deep, intense motions that should have sent her legs around his waist, only she was too wrapped up in thoughts of Pete.
Jenna opened her eyes wide, midkiss, then slammed them closed again. Kissing Charlie made her feel a little queasy—far from anything resembling a zing—and maybe relieved that he thought she was talking about him. She couldn’t even begin to imagine how to handle the explanation if he found out she was talking about someone else.
She heard the back door to the stockroom open, and Jenna’s eyes sprang open. She was still in Charlie’s arms, eye to eye with his hungry stare—and in clear view of Pete, standing just inside the door with daggers shooting from his eyes and steam practically streaming from his ears.
“Pete.” Jenna didn’t know if she’d actually said his name or not. She pushed from Charlie’s arms and landed with a thud on the floor as Amy spun around—and Pete stormed out of the building.
“Bummer,” Charlie said. “He must have been in a hurry.”
Yeah, a hurry to get away from me. Jenna’s heart sank at the look on Pete’s face.
“I just wanted to let you know that we’re out of town on another site for the next few days, but I’ll call you,” Charlie said. “I’m looking forward to the boat ride with you on Saturday.”
Jenna was still staring at the door, too shocked to move. She heard Amy join them, saw movement in her peripheral vision.
“You kissed her silly, Charlie.” Amy bumped Jenna with her elbow.
Jenna shook off her stupor and forced a smile for Charlie. The boat trip. “Great,” she lied.
“I’ve got to run.” He kissed Jenna’s cheek and whispered, “Maybe after the boat ride I’ll let you climb me like scaffolding.”
Shootshootshoot.
PETE DROVE DOWN to the pier, cursing a blue streak. What the devil was he thinking? He couldn’t get the image of Jenna lip-locked with that guy, her body pressed against him, out of his mind. He’d heard her and Amy talking about working at the library today, and he’d convinced himself that the only way to get past this mess was to lay his feelings on the line with Jenna. Let her know how much she meant to him, regardless of the obstacles in his life, and that he was interested in much more than just a sexual relationship. But she was most definitely with Doophus, and he was obviously wasting his time. He threw his truck into park and stared out over the water.
Joey pushed her chin onto Pete’s lap and huffed out a sigh.
Pete stroked her head. “What am I gonna do, girl? Stake my claim or walk away?” He was utterly incapable of walking away from Jenna. He took Joey for a walk along the beach, trying to work through his emotions. They sat on the beach and watched the sun set.
Pete’s cell phone rang, startling Joey. Pop. He marked sunsets by his father’s drinking, and it was that time again. He closed his eyes before answering the call and facing his father’s drunken ramblings.
“Hey, Pop.”
“Pete…Peter, Peter, listen, Pete.”
Pete pushed to his feet and headed back to the truck. “I’m here, Pop.”
“I can’t find her, Pete. She’s gone.”
His chest constricted. Alcohol brought his father’s longing for his mother to the forefront in the most painful of ways. “I know, Pop. I’m on my way.” He turned the truck around and headed toward his father’s house.
Like a child afraid of the boogeyman, Pete had come to fear the sight of his father’s dark house. He longed for days gone by, when his parents’ home was lit up with life, and visiting meant an evening of a home-cooked meal and laughter.
He mounted the stairs of his childhood Cape-style home. Joey’s nails tapped out a beat beside him on the porch decking. Pete had refinished the porch last summer in an effort to get his father to focus on something other than the loss of his wife. When he was just a boy, his father had taught him how to channel the ache and ire of his emotions into physical labor, but somehow his father had lost sense of that ability after his wife passed away.
He closed the door behind him, and the silence of the old house pressed in on him. There was no need for him to call out to his father or to wander the house looking for him. He knew he’d find him in the same upholstered chair, an empty bottle beside him, a glass on the end table, and a single reading light casting an eerie yellow glow over his mother’s sewing table.