Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Crane Cove, Oregon
“What are you doing here?”
The bat was heavy in her hand. The temptation to swing it at Peter’s head or drop it and run into his arms were equally strong. Which about summed up how she’d felt every other time she’d seen him over the last few years.
How the fuck did he look better since they’d gotten older? It shouldn’t have been possible since he’d been inhumanly gorgeous when they’d met, but the proof that life wasn’t fair and men got all the luck stood a measly fifteen feet in front of her.
“I, um…” Peter did the verbal equivalent of a drunk stumbling out of a bar and down the sidewalk, doing a succession of useless oral pauses until he finally said, “Work.”
The visceral disappointment caught her off guard, like putting salt instead of sugar into her coffee.
“We’re closed,” she told him, tapping the toe of her shoe with the bat.
“The door was unlocked and?—”
Her sweater slipped further off her shoulder and she adjusted it, and then she realized why Peter had stopped talking.
She was wearing the damn sweater.
His sweater.
Her sweater.
Their sweater.
The red cardigan he’d loaned to her and she’d kept borrowing until the actual ownership became questionable.
Why the hell had she kept it? Why had she kept any of the things that reminded her of him?
“The lights are off,” Sybil pointed out tersely. “Most people can take a hint.”
Peter had taken several slow steps toward her, and the closer he got, the harder it was for her to take a full breath.
“I need to talk to you, and historically you won’t talk to me on the phone.”
“I don’t like talking on the phone.”
In the golden glow of the streetlights, she saw the corner of his mouth twitch. “Should I have been sending letters? Carrier pigeons? Morse code with a flashlight?”
She bit her tongue to stop a smile. She refused to be charmed by him. Again.
“What do you need to talk to me about so badly that you needed to do some questionable breaking and entering?”
“The door was unlocked, so I think it was only entering,” Peter pointed out. “Is that a crime in Oregon?”
“Focus, Peter.”
When he was about three feet away, Sybil held out the bat to stop his progress, the end resting on his sternum. He sighed and gave her the good natured, boyish grin that made her heart flutter.
Used to make her heart flutter.
“I want to host a coffee cart for the movie,” he explained. “Is that something you do? Catering? ”
Disappointment reared its ugly head again. It really had been about work.
“I might be able to do that, but it won’t be cheap,” she said. “Why not open a tab here for a day?”
There was a brief flash of panic on his face. Peter had an expressive face; it was part of what made him such an excellent actor. He tried to keep his face carefully neutral, but when he slipped, his emotions projected on his face in CinemaScope.
“It’s hard for people to get away from the set. I wouldn’t want anyone to miss out.”
“So leave the tab open for a few days.”
“You’re making it very hard for me to give you money.”
Sybil held out her hand. Peter laughed, and she hated what the sound did to her insides. She was warm all over like a human cup of tea on a foggy morning, and it made her miss those naive palpitations of a simple crush. This kind of comfort could only happen after being in love.
She should have hit him with the bat while she had the chance.
Sybil dropped her hand, lowered the bat, turned, and started to walk back to her office. Standing near Peter for too long was dangerous. She’d fall into his gravitational field and want to orbit him like a small, insignificant moon around a brilliant sun.
The sound of Peter’s steps synced with hers.
“Depending on the cost, we could run the cart for more than one day,” he suggested, following her into the cramped office. Sybil gently prodded him back into the doorway with the tip of the bat.
“What’s this ‘we’? Are you going to be in there with me pulling shots?”
It was the wrong thing to say because under the bright office lights she could see the twinkle in his eyes.
“You could teach me,” he said, leaning against the doorframe. “I’m a fast learner.”
A different kind of warmth spread through her body, the kind that crackled like electricity. Her body remembered what a fast learner he was. It remembered what it was like to have him between her thighs diligently taking directions and putting all his hard studying to good use.
Sybil sat in her chair and stowed the bat in its hiding place before she was any more tempted to use it. The odds of “I had to hit him, he made me horny” working as a defense when Willis showed up to arrest her for battery were slim to none.
“My equipment is expensive, and you could burn water,” she said as she logged into her computer. “When did you want to do this?”
“Whenever it works for you.”
Sybil started to try and build a quote, but it was impossible with Peter lounging in her doorway looking at her while he looked like he’d stepped out of an ad for raincoats.
“You got my flowers.”
“I do. Every week.” She focused on her computer screen even though she wasn’t doing anything. “I think the local florist will be sending you a gift basket for Christmas.”
“Probably just a nice card. Do you like them?” he asked, the earnestness around the edges of the question making her heart twist.
She loved them, but she wasn’t going to tell him that. He’d get ideas, and he didn’t need any help in that department.
Sybil shrugged. “They’re pretty, I guess. But they’re such ephemeral things, and now I’ve got a bunch of vases I don’t know what to do with.”
Peter sighed. “You know what Scrabble words do to me.”
They got him all riled up.If she managed to use all her tiles in one go, he’d practically faint. It was one of the many quirks that had been so endearing all those years ago.
“Can I get this estimate to you tomorrow? I open in the morning, and I don’t think you can be quiet long enough for me to finish my closing duties.”
“I’d love to see you tomorrow,” he said. “When should I come back to go over everything?”
“I’ll take it to the hotel when it’s finished.” Maybe she could drop the estimate off at the front desk and run away before he knew she was there.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to stay? The front door is unlocked and anyone could walk in?—”
“Peter, I have a bat. And everyone in this town knows I’m not afraid to use it.”
“What about someone who isn’t from around here?”
“They’ll find out I’m not afraid to use it. Good night, Peter.”
There was an unusual amount of silence from the doorway, and finally curiosity bested her survival skills. She looked. Peter was still there and he looked like he wanted to say something, but he finally tapped his fist against the doorframe and gave her a tight smile.
“Good night, Sybil,” he said, and took a few steps back. “I missed you, by the way.”
Then he left, and the tinkle of the bell over the door ripped her heart out. How was she supposed to survive the next few weeks if he insisted on coming around and then leaving her hollow?
She should take her bat and go smash Graham’s car for bringing Peter back into her life. If Graham had never showed up, if he’d just given Eloise the money to fix up the hotel without ever coming to Crane Cove, Sybil could still feel only minorly off-kilter when she saw tabloid photos of Peter at the checkout stand at the grocery store.
Sybil clenched her jaw and refused to acknowledge the tightness in her throat. She finished her spreadsheets for the night and turned off her computer.
Tomorrow she’d drop off the estimate at the hotel and find someone else to cover the coffee cart if Peter was serious about coughing up the money. A guaranteed revenue stream wasn’t a bad thing. Her old cart from before she had the storefront was stored at the McMahon farm, so if she borrowed a truck she could set up almost anywhere.
Sybil had never been much of a silver-lining kind of person. Life was tough; she was tougher. But if she couldn’t find the good parts of this situation she was going to talk herself out of money that she could put towards her bookstore fund.
The bookstore. Books. Peter reading a book. The way his finger would slip between the pages to turn them. He had such great hands.
Sybil pushed back from her desk quickly and jumped to her feet. She needed to go home and get some sleep because she clearly wasn’t in her right mind if she was fantasizing about her ex-boyfriend turning the pages of a book.
Tomorrow she’d find a way to put some distance between herself and those hands.