Chapter 1 #3
“What do you think about your song?” he asks as he sings the lyrics, looking into my eyes. He offers his fist to me. “Here, hold my microphone.”
“Stop it.” I laugh and wave his hand away.
He continues to sing softly, tapping his boot on the bar stool to the song.
“It’s a good song, a classic. I’ll have to think up an even better one for your song tomorrow,” I add, sipping my beer.
When it’s time to head out, we slide off our stools, and the entire bar seems to tilt an ear as we head for the door, and it’s not even subtle.
Wisteria Cove never is. It’s full of meddlers and nosy neighbors.
On our way out, Marilyn says something snarky that I can’t make out.
Vanessa pretends not to look at us, but I see her side eyeing us.
I give them both my brightest smile and pat Finn’s chest like he’s my trophy.
He’s busy talking to a buddy of his and doesn’t seem to notice.
Then his hand slides over my lower back and he guides me out of the bar.
I almost trip because I can barely focus with him touching me.
Outside, we head down Main Street. His hands slide into his pockets.
He walks me to the door of Wisteria Books & Brews, where I’m living above my sister’s bookstore in her loft apartment for now.
I have a small cottage I rent where I grow all my plants and have a greenhouse, but I like to be closer to the shop.
When the cottage kept getting mold and everything broke down inside, I turned it into a little micro farm instead of living out there.
The heat was sketchy last winter and when Willa moved out to the tree farm with Tate, I took her up on her offer of staying above the bookstore.
Finn leans in and says, “Have fun on your date tomorrow night.”
“You, too. Maybe you’ll make it to a second date with this one,” I tease.
“That a challenge, Maren?” he asks.
“Maybe. Let’s see if we can both make it to a second date.” Highly unlikely on my end, but he doesn’t need to know that.
He steps closer, near enough that I feel the heat of him before I even register the movement.
His chest brushes mine for just a second, light enough to pretend it did not happen, heavy enough that my breath stutters anyway.
I can smell cedar and soap on his shirt. It wraps around me before I can blink.
He reaches past me to open the door, his hand near my shoulder, his arm practically caging me in. His face is close, and his voice drops just a little, warm and sure. “I’ll see you at lunch on Saturday.”
His words move across my cheek like a touch. I swear the air changes. I nod, but my fingers curl around the strap of my bag to steady myself. My pulse races.
He holds the door there, waiting, watching me with this soft, unreadable expression that sinks right into the center of my chest. For a heartbeat, I wonder if he feels it too. This spark, this pull, this thing we have spent our entire lives pretending we do not notice.
“Sounds good.” I smile. “Hopefully, my date won’t turn out like the last one.”
That guy was super creepy. He asked me how big my toes were and kept staring at my feet.
That was when I excused myself to the ladies’ room and called Finn who somehow made it there in record time and pulled me out the window by my ass.
We still laugh about that story. That night he played Getaway Car for me on repeat, and we laughed the whole way home singing at the top of our lungs.
“You won’t win the worst date wager,” I say. “I still hold that title.”
“That’s for sure.” He nods and flashes a grin, the easy kind he uses when he wants everything to seem fine. “You never know. Maybe tomorrow night you’ll find the one.”
There is something in his tone that doesn’t match the grin.
It’s light and teasing but edged with something I can’t quite place.
His eyes hold mine for a second too long, like he’s waiting for an answer I don’t know how to give.
The words sound like a joke, but the look…
the look feels like worry or something close to it.
Something warm and complicated that tightens the air between us for a breath before he clears his throat and turns away.
And I tell myself I imagined it, even though I feel it settling under my skin.
“I challenge you to find someone worse than Toe Guy,” I say, trying to ease some lightheartedness into the conversation.
We shake on it. His hand’s big, calloused, and comforting.
The second our palms meet, a spark races up my arm like a live current.
My breath catches before I can stop it. His touch feels grounded, steady, but there’s something electric underneath, something that makes my pulse trip over itself.
I tell myself it’s just the magic reacting, but deep down, I know it’s him.
“Night, Carpenter Ken,” I call as he walks away.
He half turns, that grin catching the glow of the streetlamp. “Night, Hexy Barbie.”
The sound of his voice hangs in the air long after he’s gone. I stand there, pretending the chill crawling over my skin is from the breeze and not the way he said it.
But as his silhouette disappears down the street, the lie settles heavy in my chest.
Because no amount of small talk or first-date smiles could ever make me feel the way his goodbye just did.
And I already know that I’m in trouble.