Chapter 24
Chapter
Twenty-Four
Phin watched Rhaz out of the corner of one eye as he ate his sandwich. He wolfed down the first half and, as if catching himself, slowed down while eating the second.
“Hungry?” she teased.
He gave her a sheepish grin as he chewed. When he swallowed, he smiled. “I am. Maybe I should have gotten two.”
“You eat like I do,” Richard said from across the table. He popped a potato chip into his mouth.
Rhaz hadn’t tried his yet but kept eyeing the bag.
Phin opened hers and offered him one. “They do have potato chips where you come from, don’t they?”
He looked at it. “No.”
“They don’t?” Jessica said with raised eyebrows. “Wow. I can’t believe a place without potato chips, but I suppose there are some.”
“There’s actually a lot, honey,” Richard said. He took a sip of his soda. “All sorts of countries when you think about it. Third world and all that.”
“Oh yes, I suppose you’re right.”
Phin studied Rhaz a moment as he took another bite of his sandwich, his eyes still on the chip she was holding up. “You really have never had a potato chip?”
He shook his head as he chewed.
“Wow.”
He plucked it from her fingers, surprising her and making her jump.
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to frighten you.
“You just surprised, that’s all.” She reached into the bag and took out another chip. “On the count of three.”
He grinned. “All right. You count.”
“One,” she began with a grin.
“Two.” She waggled her eyebrows at him.
“Three.” They popped the chips into their mouths at the same time.
His eyes widened. “Salty,” he said. “Very salty.”
He chewed and swallowed. “I’m not sure I like it.”
“You don’t have to like it,” Jessica said from across the table. “And if you don’t, it’s more for us.”
“Leave his chips alone,” Phin scolded. “She’s a potato chip fiend. You have to watch her.”
“I’ll remember that.” Rhaz opened his own bag of chips and took one. “It’s not as salty the second time, but it’s still very salty.” He shoved the bag toward Jessica and Richard.
“Thank you.” Jessica grinned. “I do love my chips.” She shoved her empty bag to one side and started eating from the one he gave her.
Phin sometimes, well, okay, make that a lot of times, didn’t know what to make of Rhaz. And right now she wasn’t trying to make anything of him. Instead, she was taking it all in. Having lunch with Jessica, Richard, and Rhaz like they were two couples out for an afternoon picnic.
And it made Phin realize that she wanted this. Maybe not with Rhaz, but a relationship. She’d always told herself that once she figured out what she was going to do with her life, she’d look for a relationship.
But maybe she could enjoy one and then figure things out. It’s not like she had to make up her mind in the next month. She’d just had her own timetable she was trying to stick to, and she’d only recently gotten out of college. Didn’t most people take a year to figure things out?
Maybe she’d do that.
The problem was she might decide what she wanted and discover the only place to do it was Portland or Seattle, or even one of the bigger cities in California. Phin knew she wanted to stay on the West Coast so she’d be closer to family.
She sighed and reached for her drink.
“Are you okay?” Rhaz asked, his voice low.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just the same old ‘what am I going to do with my life’ thoughts.”
“You need to seriously give that a rest,” Jessica said. “Maybe make out a list and we can help you eliminate choices one by one over the next few months. Two heads are better than one. Or in our case, four.”
“Make that five,” Richard said. “Counting him.”
Everyone looked at Rhaz. He caught the looks and shrugged.
“See?” Jessica chortled. “I told you he was staying.”
Phin’s jaw dropped. “There is no guarantee that Rhaz is staying,” she stuttered. She looked at him. “Are you?” Her heart fluttered.
Rhaz hesitated. “I am still working things out.”
Richard studied him a moment but didn’t say anything.
Thank goodness. Phin had never met him before. Jessica said he was a curious sort, and once he glommed onto something, he didn’t let go until he figured it out.
Rhaz was a mystery and everybody knew it.
There were a lot of things about him she had yet to uncover, and that was just in conjunction with the fire department. She’d leave all that to Chief Morrison, which meant she was going to have to get Rhaz back down to the station so the two men could talk.
She smiled at him. “Have you talked to Chief Morrison again?”
“No, I haven’t. Probably because he doesn’t know how to get hold of me.” He gave her a light shrug. “No phone.”
“You don’t have a phone?” Richard said in surprise. “Who doesn’t have a phone?”
Jessica and Phin both pointed at Rhaz.
Richard shook his head. “You really ought to get a phone. You could even get a cheap one while you’re here in the States. Did you leave yours at home?”
“I’ve just never owned one,” Rhaz said.
“That is unbelievable.” Richard shook his head again. “Wow.”
“There are people who don’t own phones,” Phin said in his defense. “Rhaz just happens to be one of them.”
“I don’t know what I’d do without my phone,” Richard said. “I don’t know how our parents did it.”
“When did they start getting cell phones?” Rhaz asked.
“The early two-thousands. Actually, a little before that if you wanted the good ones,” Phin said.
“Such a small device.” Rhaz pondered a moment, looked at Jessica’s phone on the table, and shook his head. “And it can do so many things.”
“It’s the greatest invention ever,” Richard said and pulled his out of his pocket. “I can do all sorts of things on this baby. But not today. Today I’m off work, and I am picnicking with my girl, her sister, and her boyfriend.”
Phin sucked in some air. “Rhaz isn’t—he’s not?—”
Jessica grinned. “Are you sure? I notice he’s not saying anything.”
Rhaz glanced between them. “Boyfriend?”
Phin’s cheeks heated, and she wanted to slide under the table and hide. She remembered her conversation with Rhaz about this. They called boyfriend and girlfriend something else where he was from.
“You remember what it means, don’t you?” she asked him.
He thought a moment. “Oh yes.”
They chuckled but said nothing after that. Her heart fluttered and her belly did a flip. He didn’t mind Richard saying that? Did he want to be?—
Oh. Oh my.
Phin didn’t know what to do with this. She could ignore it, of course, but then she didn’t want to. She kind of liked how it made her feel.
They finished their lunch, threw away their trash, then headed for the beach. Would it hurt to imagine that he was her boyfriend? To walk along the beach hand in hand, even though they wouldn’t?
But still, a girl could dream. At least he was gorgeous, and people would think he was her boyfriend. There was that.
She’d have to ask Jessica later if they looked good together. But then that might set Jessica off on a tangent of, “Oh, you should just go for it. Flirt with the man.”
And on it would go. Eventually she’d say something in front of Rhaz that would embarrass her beyond belief and he’d probably never want to see her again. And what a blow that would be.
Rhaz watched Jessica and Richard joke with each other, laugh, and give one another a friendly shove as they headed down to the sandy beach.
This beach was rockier than the one he’d been to in Moon Creek Falls, but it was pretty in its ruggedness. He’d be sure to visit the Azurale Dragons when he returned. The water there was said to be crystal blue, clear, and have medicinal properties.
He would enjoy visiting it and, for a fleeting moment, thought of taking Phin, as if it were a natural thing to do.
Then he remembered she would never set foot in the dragon realm. For one, he still didn’t know how to return to it.
He watched Jessica and Richard walk ahead of them, their hands joined together, and his accidentally brushed against Phin’s.
She gasped at the contact and looked at him with wide eyes.
“I am sorry,” he said. “Did I startle you?”
“No, not at all. I... I stepped on a stick.”
He arched an eyebrow at her and looked behind them. There wasn’t a stick. What was she doing? Had his touch shocked her that much? It was a simple brush of skin against skin.
He stopped and looked at her hands.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
Without asking, he reached for her hand and examined it. “This is lovely. I would say these are the hands of an artist.”
“No, just a communications major with a concentration in public relations,” she said with a grimace.
“Does it bother you that much? Not knowing what to do?”
“Being equipped is no problem. I’m plenty equipped. It’s just that I have so much equipment I don’t know what to do with it.”
“And that’s a bad thing?”
“In my case, yes. I just can’t make up my mind.”
He nodded, took her by the hand, and escorted her down the steep sand dune. This one was much bigger and steeper than the one in Moon Creek Falls as well.
He liked Moon Creek Falls’ beach better, he decided. “Think of it as training with one weapon. A sword perhaps. You perfect it, then move on to a spear. Perfect that, then move on to the bow and arrow.”
“That’s a weird analogy. What made you think of that?”
“Just a book I read. They were fighting.” It wasn’t a lie. One of the last things he’d read before getting pulled through the door was the training log of one of his captains in charge of cadets.
Rhaz let go of her hand when they reached the bottom of the dune. He had to admit he liked holding it.
It was soft, small, and warm.
Ezriel liked it too. His dragon was content today, spending all this time with Phin.
“They seem happy,” he commented as he nodded toward Jessica and Richard.
“Yeah. Richard may be a boring accountant, but she sure likes him.”
“Why does everyone assume he is boring? Or is it just his job? I know accountants who are not boring. They’re fine warriors.”
His breath hitched. He shouldn’t have said that.
Thankfully, Phin just giggled and they kept walking.