That Kind Of Girl

“And she’s been gone, what—two years now?”

“Almost four,” Becca said quietly.

“Don’t you think it’s time you get a life of your own, instead of—”

“What are you doing, Colt?” She drew a deep breath in through her nose and blinked hard. “Who are you arguing with? Me, or yourself? What is so bad about my life that you feel the need to come in and show me all its flaws? Am I so pathetic that you have to save me from myself before I end up a shriveled old—”

“God, no.” He put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “Aw, I’m sorry, Becca. Of course I didn’t mean that. I didn’t mean—it’s just that, when you said…” He closed his mouth and frowned.

“When I said I was still a virgin—” Her voice cracked, and she swallowed hard and narrowed her eyes. “When I said I was still a virgin, you decided I had wasted my life and you were going to be the one to shove me into what you think my life should be.”

“I hate to see you end up—”

“An old maid schoolteacher?” She put her hands on her hips and bumped her chin up, taking a few steps back. “I’ve got news for you, Colt. I’m already an old maid schoolteacher. An old maid math teacher at that. Not even a class that anyone likes.”

“You’re not—”

“Oh, stop.” Becca hugged herself and turned away from him. “Just stop it. You said you don’t want my sympathy. Well, I don’t want yours. I’m not like you, Colt. I don’t go around railing over all the ways that life has treated me badly.” She was surprised by the anger in her voice but unable to stop it. From the look on Colt’s face, he was shocked, too. “I’ve found that my life is a lot easier when I quit wishing for what I don’t have and focus on what I do have. When I quit wondering why things turned out the way they have, and just accepted that they did, my life became a lot more peaceful. Things happen for a reason, Colt. I know they do. And who the hell are you to come here and point out all the ways you think my life should be different?”

“I’m your friend, that’s who.” He stepped away from the rail and made a movement toward her. “I want to see you get what you want out of life.”

She put her hands back on her hips and glared at him. It wasn’t his fault, she told herself, even as she wanted to slap him for making her feel this way. “I told you what I wanted,” she said quietly. “I told you twelve years ago. And you left.”

“You mean…” His voice tapered off and he stared at her. “You don’t mean Paris.”

She found she couldn’t answer, couldn’t even move her head in affirmation or denial.

“Becca, you don’t still want me to…” He took a step toward her. “You’re not seriously saying you still want me to make love to you, are you?”

Words stuck in her throat. Rather than speak them, she swallowed them down.

“Good God, Becca, what are you trying to do to me here? Do you have any idea how hard it was for me to walk away last time? It almost killed me.”

“You managed.”

“Just. Becca, I’m naked under here. You don’t want to say things like that to me.”

“I’m not drunk,” she said, quietly but with force. “If I made the offer again, and you said no, you wouldn’t have that as an excuse. Your only excuse would be that you just don’t want me.”

He took another step, stood in front of her now. She could see the stubble on his chin, the lines around his eyes from worry and lack of sleep. She could see where the shadow of his tan carved down to a V over his chest.

“Are you offering?” His voice was so gruff, he sounded like someone else, a stranger.

She lifted her eyes to his, and the moment stretched between them, heavy with the knowledge of what could be.

“Becca, are you offering?” He emphasized each word.

She swallowed and opened her mouth to answer.

The buzzer on the dryer went off.

She didn’t know he’d been holding his breath until he blew it out in a gust. She lowered her head, looked at his hands, the floor, the rain outside.

“Bit of a clichе, isn’t that? Except, it’s a buzzer that’s saved you and not a bell.”

She moved to step around him. He put a hand out to stop her. “Wait—”

She kept moving. “I’ll get your clothes, Colt.”

She could feel his eyes on her as she walked across the porch and opened the door. Could feel them, though she didn’t turn back to see.

Chapter 4

Colt scraped putty from the edge of the new window and rubbed a knuckle into his back. This was the last of the three windows he’d had to replace; he couldn’t for the life of him figure out how Doff had managed to break them all. Not that it mattered now.

He groaned, flexed his shoulders and looked at the sky. Judging both from the low sun in the west and his aching back, it was time to knock off for the day. His eyes drifted downward, and he saw Becca walking toward the quarry, a canvas and easel under one arm and a small tackle box in the other hand.

It irritated him, seeing how serene she looked walking across the field, when he’d felt like chewing nails all day. His eyes were gritty from lack of sleep. He’d lain awake, stiff as a rod all night because he couldn’t get her off his mind. And she was out for a stroll without a care.

He dropped the putty knife into his toolbox and closed the lid with a satisfying bang. Was she trying to drive him crazy? Was she trying to tease him until he was ready to pull his hair out? Because if she was, she was doing a damn fine job.

But he knew she wasn’t. Becca wasn’t a tease. She was naive, and so genuinely good that it was almost unbelievable. It wasn’t her fault he wanted to drag her to the ground.

He felt like an idiot, tagging after her. But he did it, anyway. He told himself he wanted to see what she was painting. And he actually did ask about the painting, when he joined her at the quarry.

She cast a quick glance at him over the edge of the canvas. “It’s the quarry, of course.”

Of course. She was as breezy as if the previous day hadn’t happened. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and fidgeted around behind the easel. She went back to painting.

“So…” He kicked a small stone into the quarry.

“Yes?”

“How’s school going?”

“It’s almost gone, thank goodness. The spring gets longer every year and the summer gets shorter.”

“Hmm.” Fascinating conversation. He bounced on his heels a few times and turned back to her.

“I was wondering…I mean, if you don’t want to talk about it, that’s okay. But I’m curious. How is it that you’re—”

“Still a virgin?”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe I was waiting for marriage.”

“Are you?”