Chapter Six
HUNTER COULD HAVE SMACKED himself.
He should have known Emma was going to notice the way Granny had been shoving them together, but somehow, he hadn’t been prepared for her to ask him about it point-blank.
So he’d gone ahead and vomited the whole nonsense myth about strangers meeting at the Crossing at her, and in the process basically outed himself as a commitment-phobe who would do literally anything to avoid getting matched up with a potential soulmate by the fickle hand of fate.
Now she had this pinched expression on her face, and he had this itchy feeling like it was his responsibility to get her smiling again. Which was ridiculous.
Honestly, it was for the best that everything was out in the open. She should know what she was getting into, hanging out with him. Yes, they had chemistry, and yes, he was attracted to her. But he was who he was. A reclusive loner.
That said, they were out here together now, and as much as he appreciated silence, he couldn’t stand letting this awkwardness go on for the next two hours.
He cleared his throat. “So anyway, that’s the story of my messed-up family.” He scratched his beard. “Well, except my sister, Kyra, but she’s annoyingly well-adjusted, so we don’t talk about her much.”
There was that flicker of a smile, and it eased the anxious tightness in his chest. “Well-adjusted, huh?”
“Yeah, it’s really embarrassing. Lives in Boston with her perfect husband and two perfect kids.”
“Did she and this husband happen to meet at the Crossing?”
Hunter let out a rough chuckle. “Yeah, the Crossing of MIT and Harvard.”
“Oh, so your sister’s not just well-adjusted—she’s also a smartie.”
“Total genius.” He smiled to himself, thinking about how she’d smoked him at school. “Though she can’t light a fire to save her life.”
“Literally.”
“That’s what happens when you spend your whole day with your nose in a book,” he teased. “Plenty of brains, but survival skills?”
Emma laughed, taking his ribbing of bookworms in stride. “Just you wait. Next zombie apocalypse, us eggheads are going to have all kinds of knowledge that you outdoorsy types are going to need.”
“Guess we’ll have to team up, then, huh? If we’re all going to make it?”
“I can think of worse ideas.”
He glanced down, and their gazes met, and yeah. He liked the idea, too.
Other than the whole zombie apocalypse part, of course.
They were really in the thick of the forest now, and he breathed in the deep pine scent, mingled with the earthy smell of the woods.
The first leaves of autumn littered their path, but not thickly enough yet that they crunched underfoot.
One corner of his mouth twitched up. Maybe the next time they did this, the place would be in full fall colors.
Not that he was expecting to do this again or anything.
“So what about you?” he asked, automatically offering her his hand as they hit an uneven set of stone steps. “What’s your family’s deal? Brilliant siblings? Tragic dead moms?”
Oh hell, he really hoped she didn’t have a tragic dead mom.
She slipped her fingers into his palm. They were soft and small and warm, and she gripped onto him as she hauled herself up the tallest of the steps. “No and no. I’m an only child, and my parents are still both alive.”
Thank God. He’d nearly stuck his foot so far into his mouth he could have swallowed it.
“Are they in the city still?”
She shook her head, letting go of his hand. “They never were, actually. I grew up in Westchester, though they don’t live there anymore, either.”
“No?”
“My dad finally retired, and they sold the house to buy an RV. My mom actually just called me from the Upper Peninsula this morning.”
“Good for them.”
Hunter tried to imagine his own father off touring the country, and it made a stone lodge in his throat. His mom hated road trips, but she’d loved to travel. What adventures would they be having if she were still around?
“Yeah, they’re having fun, I think.”
“You just think?”
She cast her gaze skyward before refocusing it on the ground in front of them.
“My dad definitely is. But most of the time, my mom just kind of goes along with whatever my dad wants to do. Not that he takes advantage of it or anything, and she set the agenda for a bunch of the time back when my grandma was sick and living with us when I was a kid. But sometimes, I worry she’s so busy making sure he’s happy that she doesn’t really stop to think about what she really wants.
” She paused, glancing up at him. “Does any of that make sense?”
“Sort of.”
“Not that I’m much better.” She picked up a branch and moved it to the side of the trail, the way he’d done earlier, but a lot more delicately. “I just went along with everything, too, when I was…”
When she didn’t continue, he prodded her with what he hoped was an encouraging “Hmm?”
“Um, before I moved here, I was sort of engaged.”
“Oh.” Somehow, he hadn’t seen that one coming—and he sure as hell hadn’t seen the spike of hot jealousy that rose in his chest. He flexed his jaw, choosing his words. “Do you mind me asking what happened?”
He could hear Granny and the rest of the town gossips in the back of his head. Everybody had been wondering about what had brought Emma here, but no one had gotten up the gumption to ask yet, and here he was, getting the scoop with absolutely no intention of sharing it with any of them.
She laughed, but it wasn’t funny. “It’s a whole long story, but basically, he stole a bunch of money from the company where we both worked, and then he disappeared.” She exploded her hands in the air. “Poof.”
Okay, now that he really, really, really hadn’t seen coming. “Wow. Not exactly your typical breakup story.”
“Right?” She grinned, and her eyes were less sad. “What I wouldn’t give for some normal cheating or growing apart or something.”
“Much easier to explain on a Christmas card.”
“Ugh.” She groaned. “Or on social media. I basically shared his wanted poster, changed my relationship status to ‘it’s complicated,’ and logged off.
On my personal accounts, in any case. I have a work account, too, where I just post bookish stuff,” she clarified.
“I’ve been avoiding the subject altogether over there, though it feels like ignoring a pink elephant in the room, considering how many of my professional contacts know that the company I worked for imploded because of him.
” She cringed. “Honestly, since I moved, I’ve been too afraid to even check in and see what people have commented or DM’ed. ”
“See, there’s your problem—being on social media at all.”
“Wait.” Her brows drawing together, she slowed her pace. “Are you trying to say you’re not?”
He kept walking. “Why would I be?”
“Uh…” She scurried to catch back up. “Because it’s how people connect these days?”
“Exactly.” And yes, he sounded like an antisocial grump, but why pretend to be anything else?
“So you don’t, like, keep in touch with high school people or anything?”
“I have a beer with Lucas every couple of weeks.” Lucas’s tenacity in dragging him out to be social every now and then was one of his best—and most annoying—traits.
“As for the rest of them”—he shrugged—“three quarters of them still live in town. I see them around from time to time. And if I want to know what they’re up to, the Heart’s Hope Crossing gossip line keeps everybody up to date. ”
“Wow.”
“What?”
“Nothing. I’m just having a hard time deciding whether to be horrified or impressed.”
“I’m biased, but I’d say go with impressed.” He shook his head. “To backtrack, though, your fiancé”—again, that unwanted spike of jealousy—“really just up and disappeared?”
“Yup.”
“I’m sorry.” Sorry she’d had that happen to her; no one deserved to be abandoned like that.
But not entirely sorry that it had landed her here.
“Thanks. It’s okay, honestly. I mean, it was just a few weeks ago, so I’m still kind of messed up about it. But I… don’t miss him? At least not as much as I think you’re supposed to when a seven-year-long relationship just ends.”
That didn’t cheer him. Not at all.
He mulled his words for a moment, trying to focus on her and not on his irrational reactions. Finally, he offered, “I don’t know if ‘supposed to’ really has anything to do with it. After something like that, you have the right to feel whatever you feel.”
“Yeah.” She hummed in thought before shrugging and moving on. “Anyway, it sucked, but I’m dealing, and hey, I landed on my feet.”
“Damn right you did,” he agreed.
“And now that I’m not just going along with him, I get to try new things.” She gestured around, and the smile on her face was real this time. “Like hiking.”
He didn’t miss the way she’d just skipped over all the crappy stuff in a mad rush to get to the silver lining. But considering the silver lining seemed pretty great to him, he didn’t dwell on it.
Before long, they came up to the first boardwalk the Eagle Scouts had installed that summer.
It was made up of a series of planks crisscrossing a bit of the trail that tended to turn into a mud pit in the rainy seasons.
The build had been inspected when it had gone in, but part of his job was making sure the paths remained in good condition.
He took out his phone—blessedly free of service—and shot a few pictures, documenting that everything was in order.
While he worked, Emma pulled a paperback out of her bag, and he snickered. She really was a bookworm. Should he find that as endearing as he did?
Should she look so sexy, sitting on a log in the middle of the forest, utterly lost in her own world?
He blinked, shaking off the intrusive thought before it could burrow too deeply into his subconscious. They’d just finished having an entire conversation about his unavailability. He’d be a real jerk if he started anything between them now.