24. Mac
We should have stopped at the Inn. I should have called Nate and told him he could order pizza and rot his brains on video games while I stayed with Shelby in her room and did everything my suddenly unleashed imagination wants to.
But my conscience can’t do it, and I know Shelby’s can’t either, because she sneaks up to Nate in the living room and presses her hands over his eyes.
He gasps. “Shelby?” His smile is so wide, his expression almost emotional when I tell him Shelby’s staying with us after all, that I know this was the right decision.
It’s also the right decision to call into the Dinghy to tell them I won’t be in today because I can’t stand to spend a second away from Shelby now that I’ve got her back.
Still, when I watch her laughing at something Nate says after I hang up the phone, I know the day’s going to be an even mix of elation and torture. All I want to do is get her alone, but the last thing I want to do is make Nate uncomfortable. I especially don’t want to bring something into his life that looks like it’s going to be permanent when it can’t be. But I listen to my own advice and try not to think about that.
I’m moderately successful, mostly because I can’t stop staring at Shelby as she gets resettled in my house—dropping her bags in her room and then joining us in the living room to watch Nate reenact his victory over the scary-ass-looking monster in his game for her.
Once she’s next to me, though, all I want to do is touch her.
I have to sit on my hands as I kick back oh-so-casually on the easy chair so I don’t act on it in front of Nate. But that means the littlest touch is scintillating. The soft brush of her foot against mine as she settles on the couch next to my chair is so exquisitely painful I have to bite my cheek hard just to draw my attention elsewhere.
I don’t know how strongly Shelby feels about me, but I know it’s something, because she lowers her lashes every time she looks over and catches me staring at her. Not coquettishly, but almost shyly. It’s suddenly my new favorite activity to try to make this happen.
She gets up to play with Nate a moment later, and once again, my heart fucking explodes watching them. When she opens a door in one of the rooms to find a desert scene, with a camel sitting there waiting for her character, she actually shrieks “A camel!” I should be laughing. It’s adorable how excited she gets when she sees camel stuff.
But I’m also acutely aware that if I thought I was falling for Shelby before, right in this moment, I know it’s more than that. I’ve already fallen. I’m lying prone on the ground, at her fucking mercy.
The thought sends spasms of something through me I can’t quite call joy. More like terror. How can I possibly feel that way in only a few short weeks?
But I feel, absurdly, like I’ve always felt this way. From the moment I saw her with Nate that morning, dripping wet and so lost, something inside me came undone. Maybe it’s because that was the only way we could have met. I never talk to women at the bar beyond polite service-related conversations. I politely excuse myself from meet-cutes at the grocery store. I straight-up refused to let Chris or Lana even talk about setting me up with anyone.
But I don’t think that’s it. I think Shelby slipped into my life like a torrent of rain pouring into all my parched, broken cracks. What kind of person jumps into the water when life’s not suiting them? And what kind of person fights like hell to find a life that does?
I have to excuse myself. I grab a glass of water and head out onto the deck to calm the fuck down. The rain has stopped, and I inhale the soft spring air.
But when I walk over the new grating, all I think about is Shelby. When I peer over the railing and see the fire pit, I think of Shelby. The waves crash with her name, and when I turn around and she’s in the doorway, smiling in the golden spring sun, all I see is my Shelby, brighter than that star in the sky.
“Nate and I were thinking we should all take Tink for a walk,” she says. “Since it’s so beautiful outside now.”
“Yes!” I bark. “Good.”
I spend the first few minutes running around with Tink, chucking her a stick as hard as I can, then half sprinting after it with her. The physical activity helps a little. Sneaking glances at Shelby every other second doesn’t.
Not wanting to turn into a too-sweaty mess, I finally slow down, coming back to walk next to the two pieces of my heart. Three, if you include my damn dog.
“We were just talking about how you haven’t gone scuba diving this week,” Nate says.
“Nope.” I can’t help meeting Shelby’s eyes.
Big mistake.
My son looks at me suspiciously, and for a moment, I’m sure he’s going to ask us if something’s going on. But Tink barks, and he laughs, and a moment later, the two of them run down to the water together.
“Hey,” Shelby says. “You okay?”
Of course she asks me this. It’s classic Shelby.
“Yes,” I say, falling into step beside her. “Are you okay, Ponytail?”
She laughs. “Yes.”
Nate’s a hundred feet away now, down by the water, his back to us, so I risk leaning in and pecking her on the temple.
“Hey!” she laughs. “Nate’s going to see!”
“He’s busy.”
She looks up at me, then hooks her fingertips around mine, just for a moment. It’s the softest brush of my skin against hers, but it sends an almost painful spike of energy through me.
I look down at the sand as we walk. “I lied, though.”
“About what?”
I glance over at her. “Me being okay. This is torture.”
“Aren’t you having fun?”
“It’s the best day of my life,” I say. “But all I want to do is to get you alone.”
Shelby’s quiet, and I worry I’ve scared her. Maybe she wants to take it slow. Maybe she doesn’t want to take it anywhere and this is just a fever dream.
But when she speaks, her voice is kind of strained. “Is that right?”
Heat floods my lower half. “That’s right.”
“What exactly do you want to do?” There’s a mischievous glint in her eyes. Way down the beach, Nate throws the stick far into the ocean, and Tink dives into the frothy water after it.
I dare to press my hand against the small of her back, to run my thumb across her spine. “I’m worried I’m going to scandalize you.”
“What? I’m not that innocent.”
“Isn’t that a Britney Spears song?”
She shoves me aside, and I wrap my arm around her shoulder, just for a moment, like we’re playing around. But when it comes to how badly I want her, I’m dead serious. “Shelby, you don’t want to know all the things I want to do to you.”
She looks up.
I know I have to let her go. Nate’s going to see. Stu’s probably lurking somewhere, and he’s going to see too. But I don’t want to let go. So I reach up and wrap her hair around my hand.
I tug, tipping her head back so her lips are only a breath away from mine. “Well, for starters, I’d like to use this ponytail for a handle.”
I let her go then, shoving my hands into my back pockets.
“Mac,” she says, the word a little strangled.
“Yeah?” I rasp.
A beat passes, where I’m sure I’m going to need to fling myself into the sea.
Then she says, “I’m going to hold you to that.”