Chapter Fifteen
It turned out being platonic friends with someone who you were also attracted to, and had kissed once and therefore knew what it was like to kiss them, was hard.
Will hadn’t expected that. He’d been down this road before. It wasn’t like he hadn’t realized Tori was a woman back in the day. But he hadn’t known what she’d tasted like. Or what it was like to have her look up at him with a mixture of fear and nervousness in her eyes.
Tori had always been a force. Confident and sure as she blazed through everything and he’d known underneath all of that were some insecurities and some uncertainty. He’d also known she’d never deign to show it.
He supposed that was one of the things he’d liked about her. She never made him feel bad. She never made him feel uncomfortable. She never expected too much, and she never pushed. Not until that night.
Wasn’t that why it had been such a shock? That she’d never done anything like that before. Never asked anything of him. Then she’d shoved it all at him like he was supposed to know what to do with it. Love and care.
Now they were here in this place, and she wasn’t asking a damn thing of him. But he wanted . . .
He wanted. It was getting harder and harder to ignore.
Weeks in each other’s company and working together had solidified a certain foundation. Here they were. Friends again. Comfortable with each other. Well, a kind of comfortable. There was still something that lurked in the shadows, that buzzed underneath the interaction, but it didn’t bubble over.
Every time he looked at her, he thought about that kiss from weeks ago now. Thought about what it would be like without the anger fueling it. Thought about what it would be like . . .
He pushed the thought out of his head and focused on what was in front of him. One of the last kayaking trips they’d give this year since the cooler temps would start to make it too dangerous.
He’d move into taking the extra hiking and backpacking excursions that would crop up for the crowded fall season. Winter would be leaner, but he’d stay busy with more administrative tasks. Brandon was making noise about a business co-op or chamber of commerce for Gracely, to keep the businesses that existed here and bring in new ones.
Plans were being made. Plans for the future. Brandon and Lilly were getting ready for the twins. Sam and Hayley were all moved in together and though Will didn’t want to think about it too deeply, he wouldn’t be shocked if they ended up getting married eventually. It seemed like a foregone conclusion.
Time was marching on. He wasn’t getting any younger.
And he couldn’t stop thinking about having the one woman he probably shouldn’t want to have. She’d made it abundantly clear that she did not want him to want her.
“Hey.”
Speak of the devil. “Hey, what’s up?” He lined up the waterproof packs he’d carry down to the beach for the kayaking trip.
“Lilly got a meeting with the pizza place guy, and Brandon wanted to attend. Which means I’ll be your second this afternoon.”
“Sounds good. Do we know any more about the pizza guy? Any connections to Gracely?”
“They didn’t seem to think so.” She moved to his line of supplies and started packing the second bag.
“Gracely isn’t known for its deep and abiding love for Evanses, so maybe it’s best if he’s just a random outsider,” Will mused.
“It’s strange how people hold a grudge. Never quite understood it.”
“I can’t understand it myself,” Will agreed, zipping up his pack. “But I’ve only been on the other end.”
“Everyone I knew growing up just blamed God for their troubles. Or Democrats. Or both.”
He gave her a sideways glance, because though it was no actual piece of information, she didn’t often talk about growing up. Period. “What things were the people you knew growing up blaming God for?”
She shrugged, focusing hard on her supplies and packing them a little too carefully. “My family lost our farm when I was six.”
“I’m sorry. What? You grew up on a farm?”
“We left it when I was six, that’s hardly growing up on it. But it’s Kansas, what did you expect? CEO daddy?”
“You were a little farm girl. Now I’m imagining pigtails and Daisy Dukes and—”
She gave him a shove, but a smile curled her mouth. “I was six, you pervert.”
It was hard not to acknowledge moments like this. When it was easy. When it was nice. He always wanted to tell her what it meant, to be friends again. Because it hit him every time. But if he stopped and said he liked it every time he felt that, well, he’d probably drive her away for good.
“Tell me more about the farm.”
“I’m not telling you anything about anything. We’re going kayaking, and it’s sort of my least favorite excursion, so you’re going to have to give me some leeway.”
“Sam could probably do it. I forgot you hated water.”
“Sam’s out with Hayley’s hike. And it’s not water I hate, it’s that I can’t control it.”
“You can’t control the rocks you climb either,” he pointed out.
“That’s where you’re wrong. The rock doesn’t move. It doesn’t do shit. I am the master of it.”
He studied her as she shouldered the backpack. She wouldn’t like it, but . . . “Tell me about the farm.”
It was her turn to send him a sideways glance. “Why?” she asked skeptically.
“I’m intrigued. You don’t talk about your childhood much. Or at all.”
“You don’t talk about yours,” she returned.
“You know all about mine. Silver spoon, prince of the town. Even better than the heir apparent because I didn’t have to do anything like Brandon did. It was great.”
“Funny, you sound awfully bitter when you say it was great.”
He didn’t know what to say to that. Parts of it had been great. No one had ever called him on his bitterness before. He said things in a joking enough way. People didn’t pick up on the undercurrents.
Of course Tori did.
“I loved it, the farm,” she said on a sigh. “I loved walking out my door and seeing nothing but sky and fields. My dad used to let me ride in his lap on whatever he was riding. Tractor, combine, whatever. I had chores and even though I was six, I had to do them on my own and right.”
“Like what?”
“Collect the eggs. We had a whole coop full of chickens.”
“You’re shitting me,” he said, pulling his own pack onto his back. He couldn’t quite picture Tori, such a bundle of intense energy, sweetly collecting eggs as a six-year-old.
“Nope. Collect eggs. Fight off jackass chickens. But that was a kid’s perspective. As I got older, I realized it was a lot more than tractor rides and fun with the animals.”
“Like what?”
“Bills. Death. Uncertainty. Everything you do dependent on the weather, on prices that you have no control over. How much fertilizer you can buy from month to month. Credit. Creditors. It’s funny, we moved to a trailer and Dad would wax poetic about the farm like it was the best thing we’d ever had and we’d never be happy if we didn’t get it back. Mom would remind him of the stress and the pain and suffering.”
“Doesn’t sound very happy,” Will offered softly.
“You’d be surprised.”
He wanted to push on that. With every fiber of his being did he want to understand that statement. But he could tell by the way she started marching toward the office she regretted saying it. He’d need a lot more than charm to get her to say the rest.
So he followed her, mulling all that over. Though it made his heart beat a little too hard, he felt like he needed to share something back. He needed to prove to her that when she gave him pieces of herself, it wasn’t unnoticed. It meant something to him. As a friend.
As a friend. “You know, I was pretty happy when my dad decided to move the mine away.”
She stopped for a minute and looked back at him. They were only a few steps from the door. He could just go in and leave it at that, but that wouldn’t get him what he wanted.
“I always hated it. Maybe for a while I hated it because Brandon loved it, or because it was going to be his and not mine. There was a jealousy for a while, but I was over it then. When I wanted it gone. I hated that place, that company, because it didn’t . . .”
Shit, why was he laying all this at her feet? What did it really prove?
“Didn’t what?” she asked, and it was that soft note to her voice that reminded him it proved something. What he didn’t know, but something.
“It didn’t have a heart. It was this soulless center. We have this beautiful town and all of this natural beauty around us and they just pumped things out of the ground. I know that I wasn’t supposed to feel that way, and I know that it’s not . . . It just never spoke to me. It always bothered me.”
She was looking at him as though he were some strange creature she’d never seen before. Which seemed about right as it was certainly a feeling he’d never ever in his entire life told anyone. Not Brandon. Not his father. No one had ever heard those words uttered from his mouth.
And he’d given them to her.
“Well, you and Bran built something beautiful. Something with a heart and with a soul. So I guess you win.”
He smiled wryly. “At the cost of Gracely?”
“Gracely’s not dead yet.”
With that, she stepped inside and those words twined with all the other words she’d given him over the years. Her words were always shifting things inside of him. Changing things.
It was only now he was beginning to realize it.
* * *
“There you are!”
Tori looked around the hood of her car where she’d been pouring oil into the tank. The damn thing was on its last legs, and she basically had to put oil in when she left home, then again when she went back home at night.
Now there was Lilly, looking pretty as a picture pregnant with twins and Tori was sure she was sweaty and covered in oily filth.
“Here I am. Did you need something?”
“Yes. I need a favor. Do you have dinner plans?”
“Um . . .”
Lilly smiled and Tori realized it wasn’t an unkind smile. Lilly could be intimidating and it stemmed from a sort of certainty, Tori supposed. It wasn’t an unkind certainty either, or a predatory one. It was just . . . Lilly. Certain and sure and Tori was going to have to learn to relax around that.
“No ambush, I promise,” Lilly said, holding up her hands. “We had that meeting with Shane Malone—the pizza guy—and we want to prove Gracely will bring in some revenue. So we’re getting as many of us as possible to go to dinner tonight. If you can’t come, it’s not a big deal, but we’d certainly love you to.”
“Oh well, sure, I can come.” What excuse was there not to go?
Lilly gave Tori’s arm a squeeze. “Perfect. Everything with your car all right? I’m sure someone could give you a ride.”
“It’ll get me there and back. What time?”
“I think we’ll all meet down at the restaurant around six-thirty. That’ll give Sam and Hayley enough time to clean up after their excursions.”
“Sounds good.”
Lilly nodded and marched back to Mile High like the general she was. Tori couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like to be so in charge of your life. She couldn’t begin to imagine what it would be like to march around on heels while pregnant with twins, but that probably wasn’t something she’d ever need to worry about.
She ignored the little pang as she always did at the thought of kids. But seriously, what would she do with a baby? She could barely take care of Sarge and herself.
She closed the hood of the car and then whistled for Sarge, who bounded around the corner of the office cabin.
She opened the driver’s-side door and Sarge hopped right in, moving over into the passenger seat with ease. Tori slid inside. It was five, so she had a little time to clean herself up.
She hadn’t had pizza from the new place since that night at Cora’s, and her stomach rumbled at the thought. It was damn good pizza.
She stuck her key in the ignition and turned it. Her stomach sank at the click click click sound. No engine noises, no signs of life. Just click, click, click.
Oh, ugh, she needed this car to last just a little bit longer. She’d somewhat foolishly sent her entire last check to Mom. Will had made her all nostalgic about the farm the other day and she’d just needed to make a connection, even if it was only money.
Damn that man.
She sighed and got back out of the car. More oil wasn’t going to fix click click click. Tori didn’t know a whole lot about cars, but she knew that much.
“Doesn’t sound so good.”
She looked back over at Will, who had come out onto the porch at some point.
“No, it doesn’t. Learned anything about cars in the past seven years?”
“Not a thing.”
“Know any mechanics?”
He shook his head. “Not in Gracely.”
“Fantastic,” she muttered. She popped the hood—if she looked hard enough maybe it’d whisper the fix to her.
“I’ll get Sam,” Will called. “Car engines aren’t his specialty, but considering what he’s rigged up at that cabin, maybe he’ll be able to figure something out.”
“Thanks.”
Will disappeared and then reappeared with Sam. They both clucked over the car engine as though they knew a damn thing when she was quite certain they didn’t. But she played fetch with Sarge while they pretended like they were doing something important. That was friendship, right? Letting the other person think they were lending a hand.
She smiled wryly at herself as Brandon and Lilly exited the office.
“No luck?” Lilly asked.
“No luck,” Sam said. “I think we’re going to need to find a mechanic who’ll come up here. Paying for a tow truck to brave these mountain roads gets costly.”
“As long as it’s okay with Tori, why don’t we table the situation for today. We’ll go eat pizza, someone will drive you and then pick you up for work in the morning. Tomorrow we can work on finding a mechanic who’ll make a car call. Sound good?”
Tori wanted to argue. She wasn’t used to someone swooping in and telling her what to do or how to do it, but Lilly gave her a little arm squeeze as though they were the best of friends who just touched each other. “You can say no. I won’t be offended. I just thought it might be the most reasonable course of action. But I tend to overstep.”
“But you do it so thoughtfully,” Will said, smiling at Lilly.
Which made Tori feel like a jerk for being irritated. “No, that’s fine. It’s no big deal. Hate to put someone out with the extra driving, but—”
“You can’t ‘put out’ a friend. It’s a favor, not a deficit.”
“Right.” Tori tried to smile even though she felt extraordinarily uncomfortable. Even when she’d been friends with the guys back in college she’d always been the one who did the favors. She was the one who swept in with the plans. She was the one who handled things.
The boys drank and partied and occasionally bought her a meal against her will. But she wasn’t used to being . . .
“It’s okay to let friends take care of you,” Will’s voice said far too close to her ear. So close she doubted anyone else heard the murmured words. She glanced up at him. He was too close, bending his neck, his beard all but brushing her temple.
“Well, favor or friendship or whatever, thank you for offering. I’ll . . . take the help,” Tori said with as much cheer as she could muster. Because it was hard to muster cheer when you were panicking about your loss of control.
And perhaps that was her issue and not anyone else’s. Yeah, perhaps.
“Well then, we better get going. Brandon and I want to get a little talk in with Shane before dinner, but Will or Hayley can take you by your place to drop off Sarge and so forth.”
“We’ll take my Jeep,” Will said, awfully high-handedly in Tori’s opinion.
But she gritted her teeth and didn’t say anything as people dispersed. It made sense. She didn’t want Sarge to mess up Hayley’s car, and Will was offering and they were friends.
“You’re vibrating like, well, something inappropriate,” he offered as the other two couples drove away.
“If you’re trying to ease my frustration with a vibrator joke, you fail,” she muttered, forcing herself to unclench and move.
He grinned and fell into step next to her. “I don’t know if I’d say I failed. You did recognize it as a vibrator joke.”
She glared at him, but damn it, a smile was tugging at her lips. “I don’t like people planning things for me.”
“I know you don’t. But that doesn’t mean you can’t occasionally let somebody.”
It was even more irritating that he was right. “I just . . . I’ve been taking care of myself for a long damn time, you know.”
“Yeah, I know. And everyone else who came into your orbit too.”
She thought of Toby. “Not exactly,” she muttered.
She’d been happy to let Toby take care of her and because she hadn’t been in love with him, she’d figured it’d be fine. As long as she wasn’t trying to love someone, things were fine. But somehow relying on him, even without love, had ended up blowing up in her face.
Will tapped a fingertip to her forehead, then the bastard followed the line she knew must have been dug in there from her frowning.
It was a friendly touch. It was. It didn’t shudder through her. It didn’t remind her of kisses or yearning. It was just a touch.
“We’re helping you out because we care about you.”
As if that would make the fear and anger go away. That just made everything worse. “Care doesn’t always help,” she said, and she shouldn’t have. He was going to push that, but she needed some space first, so she whistled for Sarge and got into the Jeep without saying another word, or letting him.