“If you say so.” Gram lit a cigarette and turned back toward the kitchen. “I still wouldn’t tell your momma about helping with the bunnies. She worries too much as it is.”
“I know.” Because it had been ground into me before I’d even made it out of the womb. No coworkers. I wouldn’t be surprised if Mom tried to have it tattooed on my forehead one day. “I’m leaving now, and I am going to the lake.”
“Tell Paxton to get the hamburger out for dinner,” Gigi called as the screen door slapped shut behind me. Peg’s and Donna’s laughter chased me all the way down to the sidewalk.
I wouldn’t go see Paxton. The Bees would never leave me alone again. And Gigi, of all people, totally set me up. I would not go there. I’d go to the lake and dip my toes in the cool water, and … somehow my feet took me in the wrong direction. Through a break in the woods at the edge of our property. The way to Paxton’s house.
Twigs snapped under my feet as I walked, making my heart race. After the bloggers, I couldn’t underestimate how exposed I was out here alone. Lisbeth and Gigi had bought a two-bedroom house at the end of a dirt road, set way back near the trees. The earthy scent of the woods fought for dominance with the farm smell of the bunny hutches spread out along the back of the property line. I’d only been here twice before to run patterns and cucumbers over to Gigi for Gram. Paxton didn’t like people coming to his house, and after leaving the chattering Bees behind, I was inclined to agree with him about not wanting company. Lisbeth still worked at the nursing home two towns over, and was gone more often than not, so Gigi had mostly raised Paxton.
The gate clinked against the chain-link fence as I shut it behind me. I didn’t text before I came over, because then I would’ve had to admit I was coming over in the first place. According to Gigi, he needed to deal with the other bunnies while getting Matilda ready for the fair. I didn’t want to get in the way of that.
Gigi’s daffodils swayed in the gentle morning breeze. She loved to garden, but she was best known for her daffodils, which she often clipped and brought to people who were sick or mourning or heartbroken. Paxton got all his softness from Gigi, even if they weren’t related by blood. Maybe I’d ask him if I could bring some to my mom before I left. Browning grass crunched under my feet as I stepped around the side of the house, and stopped short.
Paxton held Matilda above his head, her fur gleaming from a recent brushing, and he kissed her wet nose while her little legs kicked the air. “Who’s my sweet baby? Who’s taking first place this year?” Matilda’s legs kicked faster. “That’s right. None of the other rabbits can compare. Not against the prettiest bunny in Shelby County.”
I put a hand to my chest, just to feel the place where my heart had melted clean away. I’d seen Paxton with his bunnies before, but usually at the fair, or other local competitions, when he was all business and focused on their posing for the judges. Never with this open and tender joy. Like Matilda held his world in her tiny, fast feet. I once asked him why he’d named her Matilda, and he said because she was magic. Seeing them together, I finally got it.
He caught sight of me and grinned. Not a hint of embarrassment over cooing at his rabbit like she was a toddler. He held Matilda against his chest, waving her front paw at me. “Looks like we have a visitor.”
“Sorry I didn’t text. Gigi sent me over here. She said you needed help with the bunnies before you went to work, and I didn’t have anything better to do.” Keep it cool. Easy. Like I just stopped over here and offered to help with his bunnies every day.
“Just finishing up.” He tucked Matilda back into her hutch, and brushed his hands off on his jeans. “Is that really why you came over?”
“Gigi also said you had to take the hamburger out of the fridge for dinner.” My voice got softer, nearly inaudible, as he walked closer and closer.
He stopped inches away from me, close enough for me to smell the soap on his skin. Closer than I’d been to him since the lake. “And you couldn’t have texted me that?”
I swallowed, keeping my gaze at his feet, afraid to look up. I didn’t have a lake behind me to flip into. “I wanted to make sure we were okay. Last night felt like a fight, but not.”
“I think you’re mistaking me for the hipsters you chased out of the store with a wrench.” The humor in his voice warmed me more than the sun peeking up over the tree line. His plain blue T-shirt hung right at the waist of his jeans, like it had shrunk or he had grown after he’d gotten dressed that morning. The button of his jeans was half undone. With one finger I’d be able to flick it open, and do what I definitely should not have been thinking about doing with my coworker. The material of his shirt stretched over his chest. Not because he was a secret Superman, but because his shirt really was too small. His lips parted slightly. Finally I met his eyes, and they looked the same as they did last night at work. No humor, just a burning intensity that made my pulse quicken.
“You didn’t answer my question.” My voice cracked and I wanted to kick myself for being so weird, but with him this close, my brain stopped functioning on normal cylinders.
“What question is that?” He’d angled his head so his words were like a kiss of air across my lips. I’d only have to push up onto my toes.
“When you said Midnight and Elise being together was worth the risk. Were you really talking about them?” I swallowed. My muscles gripped my spine so tight, it trembled. “Or someone else?”
“Someone else,” he whispered. The distance between our lips narrowed to the point where even a piece of paper wouldn’t have been able to slide in, but he waited.
He could’ve kissed me at any time, and my skin was warm and tingling enough that I would’ve let him. In fact, he probably could’ve taken me behind the rabbit hutches and I wouldn’t have objected. Everything inside me was screaming to grab his shirt, pull him against me, and kiss him until I forgot all about Jessica and Eric and Twitter.
Except for that small noise in the back of my mind. A clicking. Scarily similar to the sound of a rotten toenail on linoleum. I was sort of dating Eric. Not for real, but no one could know the truth, and I definitely shouldn’t be kissing another guy right now.
I put a hand on his chest, and he shuddered, his heart pounding hard against my palm. It matched the beat of my own. I took a step back. “I have to go.”
Without giving him a chance to respond, I turned and ran all the way back home.
After dinner, Mom, Gram, Peg, and I sat in the living room to watch Wheel of Fortune. I sat at Mom’s feet in front of the recliner, and tried to check Twitter again, but Gram yelled at me. It was family time, not phone time.
“That’s Vanna’s best dress since Beach Week,” Peg said. I looked up from spacing out. Vanna White wore a maroon gown with a beaded empire waist and one strap over the shoulder. “She looks good in chartreuse.”
“That’s not chartreuse,” I said. “Chartreuse is a yellow green.”
Had I been out on the lake with Paxton only a few days ago? I was a mess. Even though the Baseball Babe stuff had given me the kind of subscribers I’d dreamed about, I hadn’t been sleeping well, my anxiety levels had gone through the roof, and my emotions were all over the place. I was in no position to make sound decisions about relationships. I could barely manage my fake one, forget about adding a real one into the mix. Crossing that line with Paxton while I was still trying to figure myself out wouldn’t do either of us any favors.