I huffed, adjusting the cardigan that hung over my arms before crossing them over my stomach. “Look, I don’t want to bother you. I know you have a lot going on and the last thing you want is to talk to some girl passing through your town.” There, that was a little more real. “I just wanted to apologize. About last night—”
“It’s fine,” he clipped, tossing one tool into the old red box I’d seen him carrying the week before with a clunk before picking up another one.
“No, it’s not.”
He dipped back under the hood and my eyes flicked to where his fern green t-shirt edged up, revealing an inch of tanned skin just above his waistline.
I took one deep breath, closed my eyes, and started talking. “Rev is my cat’s name. Well, not really my cat, but the neighborhood cat who found me the first night I got here. He has this dreadfully loud and croaky purr, sounds like an old motor, so I named him Rev.” I shook my head. “Not that you need the whole backstory. What I’m trying to say is that I know now why that upset you, that it wasn’t my question but the name. And I don’t know everything,” I assured him, because his hands had stopped moving, and one of them gripped the new tool in his hand too tight for comfort. “I promise, I’m not trying to butt into your business.”
The muscle in his jaw popped, his breath loud as he started working again. He didn’t say anything, but he also didn’t tell me to go away, so naturally, I kept talking.
“I just really am sorry. I know it’s not an excuse, but I was so messed up. I’d never tried marijuana before and Tucker had this joint and—”
“You’re right,” Anderson snapped, standing straight and facing me for the first time. His chest was streaked with grease, and it heaved, his breath hard and steady. “It’s not an excuse. You think I don’t see girls like you come through here all the time? Trying to find themselves?” He scoffed, bright blue eyes as cold as the icy words he spewed. “You get wasted every night, try a few drugs, go naked in the hot tub like it’s the most original thing in the world. Well, I don’t care what you do, Wren, but whatever it is, for however long you’re here for, just leave me out of it.”
He growled, throwing the tool in his hand against the back of his toolbox. It rebounded and fell inside with a clank and I flinched, nose flaring, eyes on the ground. For a moment I just stood there, him staring at me, willing me to fight back. And when I lifted my eyes to his and saw the challenge in them, I almost did.
But I was done wasting my time fighting boys who wanted to be treated like men.
“You don’t know anything about me,” I whispered, sniffing back the tears that threatened to break and tucking my arms tighter around my middle. “And I take back my apology. You are an asshole.”
With that, I turned on my heels, held my head high, and took one step closer to the woman I wanted to be.
My blood boiled higher in temperature with every step she took away from Ron’s cabin. I watched, too—because apparently self-punishment is on my very short list of hobbies.
It was like her strappy sandals were tied to my heart beat. She stomped, my heart thumped—over and over. And every pump sent a fresh wave of heat through me, so when she rounded the trees at the edge of Ron’s drive and disappeared, I roared, slamming my fists on the old wooden table where my toolbox sat before grabbing the wrench I’d just thrown in there and getting back to work.
Every crank was exaggerated and I grunted, teeth clenched together so hard my jaw ached. It was stupid, because I wasn’t even mad at her—not at all, not anymore. Once she explained why she’d said my old nickname, I’d lost the reason to be angry—until she breathed Tucker’s name, that is.
I didn’t know why I let him get to me, or why the thought of him getting her high made me want to murder him. I’d been high plenty of times and I had absolutely nothing against her smoking a little weed, but I didn’t want him touching her, and the fact that she’d let him get her high pissed me off almost as much as the fact that he offered.
But why?
Nothing made sense, which only added to my frustration, so I took it out on the rusted old truck I’d been treating with nothing but TLC for months.
The garage door creaked and I glanced up to see Ron walk in. His long gray hair was tucked under his Navy hat and he lifted it off his head and readjusted it before nodding at me and climbing back under.
Usually working with my hands kept my mind busy, too—but not today. Not after I made a complete fool of myself. Wren didn’t deserve what I’d dumped on her, and I knew that even in the moment I did it. Nothing I said was anything I actually believed about her. If I did, I wouldn’t want to talk to her. I wouldn’t have gone to a bonfire for the first time in years just so I’d run into her. I wouldn’t be overanalyzing every word, wondering how to make it right, realizing I shouldn’t even try.
Because the truth had been buried under my newfound curiosity, but I’d been reminded of its existence last night. I had nothing to give a woman, least of all a woman like Wren, so I did what I do best.
I pushed her away.
She called me an asshole and she was right, so I proved it. I solidified her assumptions. And now she would live out the rest of her summer here without any regard for me and when she left, I’d still be here, and everything would go back to normal.
Every day would be the same.
A foreign feeling rolled through my stomach at that thought, but I didn’t have time to dissect it, because a high-pitched scream carried through the trees and into the garage.
Ron jumped and scrambled out from under the truck as I ripped around, eyes searching for the source of the noise. I knew that scream, and before I could talk myself out of it, my feet were moving, carrying me full speed ahead toward Wren’s cabin.
My heart thumped loud in my ear as I ran, boots crunching first on the gravel of Ron’s driveway before hitting the road. I didn’t stop to think about what I’d just said to her or that I’d probably be the last one she wanted helping her, not until I rounded the trees at the end of her drive and saw her standing there.
She was soaking wet.
I paused for just a second, chest heaving, and watched as she tried very unsuccessfully to stop the water spout on the side her house from spraying everywhere. It had split open under where the garden hose connected and was dousing everything—the firewood, the yard, her car.
Her.
“Shit,” I murmured, kicking back into action and sprinting toward her. She was fighting the water, cranking the knob that was connected to the piece now split off from the rest of the spout.
“It won’t stop!” she screamed when I was next to her, water spraying me as I shielded it with my hands and searched for the source.