Chapter 4
Chapter Four
As much as she didn’t want to keep harping on the subject, she knew Will deserved an answer—more than the one she gave him earlier.
She took it as a good sign that he was still holding her hand, but she wished they were still walking. So that’s where she started.
“Do you mind if we keep walking?”
He slowly nodded and they resumed their stroll toward the ski lift.
“Okay, so…I have a couple of close friends I grew up with. We did everything together. When we were in high school, we were a little goofy, and…I don’t know, pretty immature.” She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, but his expression was fairly neutral. “Anyway, it was my junior year, and my boyfriend had broken up with me. His name was Mike, and he dumped me so he could ask out the head cheerleader. A total cliché, right?” Shaking her head, she murmured, “The jerk.”
Beside her, Will chuckled.
“We were coming up on prom season and both my friends had dates, but my ego was shot and I told myself I couldn’t possibly go out with another guy. Hell, I couldn’t even think of kissing another guy. That’s when the dare happened.”
“The dare?”
She nodded. “Yup. The whole thing started out as a dare at a spring carnival. There was a kissing booth, and they dared me to get in line and kiss the guy in the booth.” Shrugging, she went on. “I wasn’t really shy, but that wasn’t something I would normally do—I normally don’t feel comfortable kissing someone who is a complete stranger. And I tend to…I don’t know…I tend to wait a little, even with the guys I date before things get physical.”
“So they were daring you to break out of your comfort zone,” he stated.
“Exactly. So, I figured, why not? What did I have to lose?” She gave a small laugh. “I was in the line, and I was second-guessing myself and my friend Audrey said to me, ‘Look at it like this—you’re going to kiss him and walk away. You’ll never see him again.’ And that made sense. Looking back, though, it really didn’t. That guy was a senior and I didn’t know him, but there was still a chance I’d see him in the hallways at school. But I told myself I wasn’t looking to get into a relationship. I was just getting a brief kiss and moving on. If you think about it, that’s what most normal people in line for a kissing booth are doing. They’re not looking at it as they’re meeting their soulmate or immediately going to ask out the person they kiss; it’s just for fun.”
“Did you see him around school?”
She shook her head. “Nope.”
“So you got your kiss and…”
“And…it was actually a lot of fun, and after that, it became a game we played—kiss a random guy and never look back.” Glancing at him, she smiled nervously. “Immature, right?”
“I don’t know if I’d say immature, but…high school was a long time ago, Sloane.”
“It was, but it wasn’t like we went to festivals and carnivals every weekend, and most don’t even have kissing booths anymore.”
“There was a lot of talk about letting them go at the festivals, but I was a little vocal about it,” he admitted. “I kept hoping you’d come back.”
They turned down the path to the right and she could see the platform for the ski lift. “Look! We’re almost there!”
He nodded absently. “Okay, but I’m still confused. You would go to random festivals, kiss random guys who you never saw again, but…you kept coming back here.”
Now it was her turn to nod.
“So what happened?”
“You happened,” Sloane said, chuckling again.
“I happened?”
“The first time I came to Sweetbriar Ridge for a festival, I was kind of blown away. Everything was just so much…more!” she said, smiling at the memory. “I’ve been to the state fair, and I’ve been to carnivals, but that festival was just amazing. All the people were so friendly, and it was all just so much fun! But…none of my friends were with me. I was here with my cousin. She knew the whole kissing booth story and…well… she dared me to get in line and buy a kiss.”
“Your cousin dared you? Who’s your cousin? Maybe I know her.”
There was no way she was telling him that, at least not yet. Instead, she deflected a bit. “That’s not important right now.” Sloane nodded. “Anyway, she dragged me away from the booth and back to her car and…I couldn’t stop talking about it. You. The kiss.”
“You did mention that I kiss like a dream…”
“I’m going to regret saying that, aren’t I?” she teased. “But yeah, you do. And after listening to me talk about it, and what I would have done if I had stayed at the festival, she said I needed to get over it and stop romanticizing it. That it was just a kiss.”
“But it wasn’t.”
Shaking her head, Sloane agreed. “No. It wasn’t. So we kept coming back for the festivals and we’d sort of watch the booth for you and I think she figured if I kissed you enough times without it leading to anything, that I’d get over it.”
“But you didn’t.”
Again, she agreed. “I didn’t. I wanted to get to know you. I do want to get to know you.” She paused, then shook her head. “I kind of feel like an idiot right now.”
“Why?”
“Seriously? That whole story does not flatter me or make me sound good in any way, shape, or form. And to know that you were looking for me too? That just makes it even worse!”
They reached the ski lift platform but didn’t step up. “Okay, I’m not gonna lie—I felt like an idiot too. I mean, it was mainly my own doing because I let everyone know about you kissing me and running off. I’m sort of like the village idiot where this whole thing is concerned because now the whole town’s watching.”
“I’m so sorry, Will. I…I guess I wasn’t…I mean, I know I wasn’t thinking about you. Only me. And I don’t know how I can make up for that.”
Silently, he looked up and watched the ski benches coming and going.
“Will?”
“Hmm?”
“Say something.”
Luckily, he didn’t go for humor this time as he faced her. “Sloane, you don’t have to make anything up to me. The truth of the matter is that I messed up too. Every time you walked away, I screwed up as I tried to go after you.” He paused. “And let’s be honest, I could have done more to convince you to hang out and give me a minute to come out of the booth. I’m not normally so clueless or such a klutz, but where you were concerned, I couldn’t seem to walk and chew gum at the same time.”
She laughed softly. “I think the tidal wave of candy hearts was my favorite.”
Beside her, Will laughed. “I think it was rather prophetic, myself. I don’t think the good people of Sweetbriar Ridge saw it that way, though. I got a lot of shit from people for knocking over that display. People paid good money to have those personalized candies made.” He chuckled again. “That was the only mishap that cost me money.”
“No!” she said, unable to hide her mirth.
Will nodded. “I felt bad and paid to replace them—obviously not in time for Valentine’s Day, but a week later, everyone had their candy.”
“You’re a good man,” Sloane said seriously. “I’m sorry I made you do that.”
“Two left feet made me do that,” he corrected and slid her a sexy grin. “That only seems to happen when you’re around. Why do you think that is?”
Sloane’s heart beat madly in her chest and it was pointless to be coy. This may be the first time they’d actually spoken to each other, but she felt that on so many other levels, they knew each other—like, genuinely knew each other. “I think because I make you just as nervous as you make me. And I don’t know how it’s possible.”
“I make you nervous too, huh?”
She nodded.
“Then I think we’re going to have to rectify that.”
A smile tugged at her lips. “I think so too.”
“Then how about we start by getting on this ski lift and continuing our conversation?” he suggested. “It’s kind of a long, slow ride that you literally can’t get off of. Are you sure you’re ready for that? There’s no way you can run away.”
It would be silly to take offense, so she simply shook her head. “I’m good if you are?”
There were a few people ahead of them, and she was watching how they got on the seats and hoped she could do it without being clumsy or making a fool out of herself.
“Do heights bother you? This goes pretty high and sometimes it stops for a minute and you’re just sort of…you know…dangling.”
Now there was a slightly terrifying visual. “I’ll be fine. I enjoy thrill rides—roller coasters, free-falling, that sort of thing. Besides, this looks like it goes fairly slow.”
“Do you ski?”
That made her laugh. “I’ve lived in Florida my entire life. I think I’ve only seen snow once, so…”
“So that’s a no,” he said as they stepped up for their turn. “Come on. This is going to be fun.”
And the thing was, she knew it would be. Hailey had told her about riding on it with Max right after she found out she was pregnant, so Sloane was fully prepared for the whole slow climb and dangling thing.
Although…once they started the steep climb, she remembered all too well everything her sister had warned her about—how the seat swung and creaked as if it wasn’t quite as sturdy as it should be. It took a minute for her to breathe normally and focus on the man beside her and not on how narrow the seat was or how she would need to sit almost perfectly still for the entire ride.
However long that happened to be.
Ugh…why did I think this was a good thing to do?
“Sloane?” Will said softly, as if he had said it more than once.
Slowly, she turned her head and forced a smile. “Hmm?”
“You okay? You got super tense and quiet.”
“I…I’m fine. It’s silly how this is making me nervous when I typically go on every roller coaster that goes upside down without any issue.” Even her laugh was nervous.
“Yeah, well…we can actually get off at the top if you want. There’s a set of steps that we can take down if we need to.”
And that made her relax. “Oh. Okay. Whew! I’m not saying we will, but it’s nice to have options.”
“I have to agree.” He took her hand in his again. “Tell me about some of the wildest roller coasters you’ve ever been on.”
After that, they talked about theme parks, rides, festival foods, and the scenery. Sloane had been so distracted that she didn’t even realize they had approached the top platform and were already heading back down to the bottom.
“Wow! That went faster than I thought it would! Thanks for distracting me.”
“All I was doing was keeping the conversation going. I feel like we have a lot of catching up to do, even though we just met. Does that make sense?”
Smiling, she nodded. “It does. But I feel like I’ve been doing most of the talking. I’d like to find out a little more about you.”
The confident grin on his face told her this man wasn’t afraid to talk about himself.
The only problem she had was…well…it seemed like they were talking about extremely superficial stuff—like neither of them was ready to take things deeper. So, she stuck to another safe topic.
“You’ve obviously lived in Sweetbriar Ridge for a long time.”
“Born and raised.”
“What’s it like living so close to a ski resort? This is kind of the equivalent to me living in Florida and having some of the greatest theme parks in the world right in my backyard.”
That made him laugh. “I don’t think little old Summit Ridge can compete with theme parks. Plus, it was closed for most of my life. It only reopened three years ago. I remember coming up here with my family when I was little, and it’s where I learned how to ski, but once it closed, we had to go other places. It became a bit of a drag to pack up the car with all our equipment and drive an hour or more away, but when I was in high school, it was a blast to do it.”
“So you enjoy skiing?”
“Absolutely! There’s actually an indoor ski school right here at Summit Ridge. We could check it out if you’d like.”
Did she?
“Um…not today.” Although it sounded like a lot of fun, she was going to have to reach out to Hailey soon and let her know what was going on. As much as she’d love to spend all day with Will, she was going to have to get back to her sister’s sooner rather than later.
Dammit.
“That’s fine,” he said, clearly unbothered by her response. “Maybe we can come back another time. Which begs the question—how long are you in town for?”
Good question.
“I’m flying back on Tuesday,” she told him. “And I do need to spend some time with my family.”
“Sure. I get it.” He paused for a moment. “You know, you never told me who they were. Maybe I know them, and we can all hang out together!”
Luckily, they were approaching the platform and she put all her focus on getting off without tripping. “That was fun! I’ll bet the scenery is gorgeous during the change of seasons, especially when the leaves change colors! Or during the winter! Do they ever put twinkly lights in the trees? That would look so pretty if you rode the lift at night! Do they let you ride the ski lift at night? Is that safe?”
She was rambling and she knew it, but if it bought her more time before she had to answer questions about who her family was, she’d gladly keep going.
“You know, they do put lights in the trees—I’m not sure they twinkle,” he teased, “But they sort of do a winter wonderland kind of thing. Again, if you’re here during that time, I’d love to bring you back to see it.”
“That’s very sweet of you, Will. Thanks.”
He took her hand again as they began to walk toward the resort building. “I know you’ve been up here for the festivals, but have you ever checked out the inside of the hotel?”
“Sadly, no. I usually came up here and played the games, rode the rides—although I never did the ski lift during any of the festivals because the lines were always so long—and once I did all that and kissed you, I’d leave.”
“Seriously?”
She nodded. “Seriously. Sometimes it would annoy my cousin, but…” She let her words trail off before glancing over at him. “Kissing you was more exciting than any attraction here.”
He stopped walking and gently tugged her a little closer. “Then you should have stuck around because we would have set off fireworks of our own that would put the actual show to shame.”
Was it Will’s imagination or did Sloane just make a sexy little sound at his statement? It was like a cross between a soft moan and a purr.
And he desperately wanted to hear it again.
Images of the two of them tangled up together raced through his head. They were already walking up to the hotel; would it be wrong to maybe suggest…
The sound of a phone ringing brought him out of naughty reverie. He glanced around and came to a stop as Sloane whispered an apology and pulled her phone out of her purse. “I need to take this,” she told him. “Why don’t you head up to the hotel and I’ll meet you there in a minute?”
“Um…yeah. Sure. No problem.”
She smiled as she swiped her screen before saying, “Hey! What’s up?”
Part of him wanted to linger and hear who she was talking to. Was it her cousin? The one who lived in Sweetbriar Ridge that she wouldn’t name? But when she glanced at him over her shoulder, he knew he needed to walk away or he’d look like a complete jerk.
So, he made his way up the path and sidewalk and casually walked into the lobby. It was a little crowded, but that wasn’t unusual for a Saturday. There were two restaurants inside—one casual and one formal—and he figured they’d eat at the casual one. Making his way over to the hostess station, he asked if there was a wait and she told him it would be about ten minutes.
“Can you put my name on the list? For two people?”
“No problem, Sir,” she assured him. “Can I get your name?”
“Sure. It’s Will. Will Campbell. Thanks.” Then it was back to strolling around and waiting for Sloane.
It took another five minutes before she walked into the lobby, looking around in wonder. Will couldn’t help but grin as he watched her, and when she spotted him, she practically skipped over to him. “Hey! Sorry about that. Was I gone a long time? I feel like I took a long time.”
“It’s fine, Sloane. Really. Is everything okay?”
“What? Oh, um…it was just my sister. She was curious when I was going to be back home, that’s all. No big deal. I promised I’d be back in time for dinner.”
“Your sister lives here too?”
He noticed how wide her eyes went as she seemed to stumble over something to say. And just when he was about to push her for an answer, the hostess called his name.
“Campbell, party of two! Campbell, party of two!”
Sighing, he looked at Sloane and gave her a half-hearted smile. “That’s us.”
“You know…maybe we should…”
Taking her hand, he forced himself to relax and stop being so suspicious. “We should go into the café and talk some more. Is that okay?”
She nibbled her bottom lip for a moment before nodding.
Relief washed over him again as he placed his hand on her lower back and gently nudged her to follow the hostess. They were led to a booth near the back and once they were seated with their menus and alone, he decided not to push about her family. There had to be a reason she didn’t want to talk about them, so it wouldn’t be right to make her. Instead, he focused on the menu.
“Are you hungry?”
“I know I shouldn’t be. I had a muffin and a cup of coffee at Books & Beans, but sometimes that’s just like hitting the launch button. Most days I don’t eat breakfast and I’m fine until lunch. But if I eat breakfast, it’s like I’m hungry all day. Crazy, right?”
“Nah, I get it. But I’m pretty much hungry all the time,” he said with a laugh. “It makes my coworkers crazy because I’m always asking who has a snack or who wants to go on a coffee and muffin run.” Another laugh. “And always to Books & Beans.”
“Well, they are the best place in town for that sort of thing. Billie’s amazing! Everything she makes is just fantastic.”
“You know Billie?”
And there were those wide eyes again.
“I…I’ve just been in there so many times, and her baking skills are kind of legendary.”
That was true, so he supposed it was possible.
Nodding, he picked up his menu and began scanning it. “So, what are you in the mood for?”
Their gazes met and held and from the fire in her eyes, he knew she was thinking all the same naughty things he’d been thinking earlier.
Swallowing hard, he fought not to mention how close they were to the registration desk and how they could realistically be up in a room in less than ten minutes. But instead, he averted his gaze and went back to looking at the menu.
“They have great sandwiches here, if that’s your thing, but I am going to have the bacon cheeseburger with fries and a Coke. What are you thinking?” He was certain she was going to order a salad. That’s what most of the women he went out with did. And then she’d pick at it and claim she wasn’t really hungry and blame the coffee and muffin she had earlier and…
“I think…hmm…after talking about them earlier, I have to get the nachos,” she announced with a smile. Then she glanced back at the menu. “Aaannddd…a milkshake. Chocolate.” She winked. “Go big or go home, right?”
He stared at her in wide-eyed wonder as she repeated her order to their server. And once she walked away, he still continued to stare.
“What?” she asked after a minute.
He shook his head and laughed. “You. I…I kind of like that you keep surprising me.”
“You mean other than not jumping out of your truck after we kissed earlier?”
Now he laughed even harder. “Well, there was that…”
“Or off the ski lift?”
“Well that would have been crazy.”
She smiled and laughed with him. “Okay, here’s something you need to know about me—I like food. All food. I suck at cooking, but I love to eat. I’m not a stick figure and I’m never going to be a bikini model, and I’m okay with it.”
Was she kidding? “I think you’d look spectacular in a bikini…”
He loved watching her blush. “Stop…”
“I’m serious! Sloane, I got serious neck-kink watching you walk away all those times and when I saw you this morning? Without a booth between us?” He paused and gave her a playfully lecherous grin. “Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it.”
She shook her head even as she giggled. “Okay, seriously. Just stop.”
“Uh-uh. No way. I’ll just have to prove you wrong.”
Her green eyes went a little wide. “Oh really? And how are you going to do that?”
“You’ll just have to put on a bikini for me. Then we’ll see if you know what you’re talking about.”
“Will, I’m not putting on a bikini for you. Besides the fact that I don’t wear them…”
“Skinny dipping?” he asked hopefully, imagining her naked, moonlit body in the river.
Her hearty laugh and smile were infectious. “You’re killing me,” she teased. “No, I was saying that I don’t normally wear a bikini—I normally wear a fairly conservative one-piece…”
“Spoilsport.”
“Hey, I’m usually swimming at my parents’ house with my family—including three older brothers,” she added quickly, “so…yeah. It would be weird to wear a bikini around them.” She shuddered dramatically.
He nodded. “That’s fair, but…we wouldn’t even have to go swimming! Just you and me—alone—and a bikini fashion show. You know, just to prove that you totally could model one.”
Sloane shook her head again. “I’m not discussing this with you anymore,” she said with a laugh. “Now, tell me something about you. I told you about how I’m not opposed to eating. Now it’s your turn.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to say that he had no aversions to eating either, but he figured she was looking for something a little more solid than that. “Well…I think I mentioned this earlier, I’m a mechanic. And even though I do it for a living, I tend to work on cars as a hobby too.”
Maybe he was imagining things, but he noticed that Sloane’s shoulders sagged just a bit. Rather than mention it, he went on. “Besides my truck, I have two other cars that I own that I’m restoring in my spare time.” Unable to help himself, he talked about all the ways he had restored some of his older cars and what he was hoping to do with the Chevy that was sitting in his garage. Just talking about it gave him a thrill.
“Oh,” she said, her voice slightly stilted. “That sounds interesting.” She wasn’t even really looking at him.
And then it hit him. “Not a car enthusiast, huh?”
Her nose wrinkled a bit as she shook her head. “Sorry.”
“For what? It’s something that I enjoy, but I don’t force it on others,” he said lightly. “Or at least I try not to. Being that it’s my job, sometimes whether I want to talk about it or not, people come to me and talk about it.” He shrugged. “Goes with the territory. But…I also enjoy going to classic car shows whenever one comes around.”
“My dad enjoys going to them too. He and my brothers go whenever one comes to town. I never saw the appeal, but…that’s just me.”
“What do you enjoy doing in your spare time? Like…what do you do on the weekends when you’re not here visiting your family?”
Sadly, she didn’t take the bait and mention them.
“Typical weekends lately have been boring. So many of my friends are married and have babies, and I’m still single. I tend to take those two days to do boring stuff like pay bills, do laundry, buy groceries…but every Sunday I have dinner at my parents’ house with everyone.” She sighed. “But occasionally, there’s a girls’ night and we go out to eat and either go dancing or to a movie or find something silly to do.”
“Like what?” he asked, totally curious.
“Hmm…last month we went to this wine and design kind of thing where you paint and…”
“Drink wine?”
“Exactly! It was awesome and my beach scene came out amazing and is hanging up in my living room!” she said proudly. “Then there was the time we all went to this float spa. We were all in separate rooms—which kind of sucked—but afterwards, we sat at the oxygen bar and then went out for Korean barbecue. I was so relaxed and I kind of wished we could have gotten takeout and eaten in our pajamas.”
“Wait…go back a minute. What is a float spa?”
“Oh, it’s a sensory deprivation sort of thing where you float in these pods that have, like, ten inches of water and a ton of Epsom salt, so you float.”
“Really? That’s a thing?”
She nodded. “It is, and it’s glorious! Oh my God…I have a membership and go float at least once a month. Sometimes twice.”
“That just sounds bizarre. How long do you float for?”
“An hour.”
“And what do you do while you float?”
“Nothing. You let your mind go blank and it’s just…I can’t explain it, but you just feel so refreshed when you leave. You should totally try it!”
“Um…I don’t think so,” he admitted. “That doesn’t even sound a little bit appealing.”
They were saved from making any more conversation as their food arrived. They each thanked the server and dug in wordlessly. While Will enjoyed his food—the burger was one of the best he’d ever tasted—he could tell that things had taken a turn toward the negative after he talked about cars and she talked about floating.
There was a definite physical attraction, but now that they were talking more about themselves, it seemed like they didn’t have a lot in common.
Actually, they both seemed to have strong feelings about each other’s hobbies.
Strong negative feelings.
There was no way he’d force Sloane to share his hobby—that would just be crazy—just like she couldn’t force him. But he wanted her to see that there was more to him than just that one interest—a lot more, probably more than he let most people see. He’d just never found anyone that he felt comfortable enough with to be more than just Will the mechanic.
Until now.
“I think I have a solution,” he said finally.
“A solution?”
“To that whole being nervous and rectifying thing we mentioned earlier.”
Sloane looked at him warily. “O-kay…”
“Spend the weekend with me.”