CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
TEAGUE DIDN’T KNOW WHAT to do with himself now that he’d lost his best friend. Work was there, of course, but when he wasn’t at the station, he felt rootless. He’d inherited a small, craftsman-style house built in the 1930s from his paternal grandparents. The garage had been converted into a woodshop of sorts, and he’d put his grandfather’s tools to good use from the day he’d moved in.
Teague was handy.
Efficient, too, because after a year of occupancy, the paint was tight inside and out, the woodwork refinished, the kitchen and baths updated. The yards, front and back, were also well tended. Lawns had been mowed, shrubbery trimmed, even the birdbath was clean and held fresh water.
That left him with nothing to do but brood.
There’s all your big talk about wanting kids, wanting a family, but then you go and fall for someone who’s already taken...because it means you risk nothing.
On the second morning of life without Polly, he was driven to seek company. Not until he knocked on a familiar door did he realize he’d chosen to visit the only man he knew more miserable than himself.
Without a word, Gary White pushed open the screen door.
“Dad,” Teague acknowledged, then followed his silent and stiff-spined father into the kitchen.
The newspaper was open on the table, and a thick, utilitarian mug sat beside it, filled with black coffee. The older man poured a second one for his son, and Teague took it, even though he knew the caffeinated stuff his father made was caustic. “Thanks,” he said, cupping his palms around the heated white ceramic as he leaned against the countertop.
Gary returned to his chair and continued perusing the sports section of the paper.
Teague ran his gaze around the room that hadn’t changed since the day his mother had walked out when he was fifteen years old. The curtains over the sink had been a jaunty yellow when his mother had run them up on her sewing machine, but they’d gone grayish now, and hung with the limpness of surrender flags.
An old rotary phone, installed on the wall beside the refrigerator, still had a sticker with lines printed on it for emergency numbers. In his mother’s handwriting there was the listing for the pediatrician’s office, the poison control center, her parents’ home phone—that hadn’t been relevant in the decade since their deaths.
“Whatcha been doing to keep busy, Dad?” Teague ventured. His father had retired from the fire department with a full pension. Still in good health, he could have sought a second career or traveled or taken up square dancing.
His father turned the page of his paper. “I’m in the middle of replacing the valves and floats in all the toilets.”
The house had two and a half baths. The man would probably stretch out the task for the entire week. Teague sipped at the terrible coffee and wondered why the hell he’d hied himself here.
“Did you look at that brochure I left the last time I visited?” It was for an Alaskan fishing excursion company. Teague had suggested the two of them might take a week and do one together.
Getting out of town sounded even more attractive now. “Silver salmon and rainbow trout in September and October.” They might be a little late on booking, but hell, he was willing to pay a premium price for the vacation. Arranging time off work was less of a problem. Firefighters were always willing to switch shifts.
And God knew his dad never had anything pressing on his schedule.
He cast a glance at the older man. “I’m serious. If you had a computer, right now we could—”
“I don’t need a computer.”
Teague sighed. His father didn’t need or want anything that hadn’t been in this house fifteen years ago—except the one person who’d packed her bags and walked away from it.
Janet White had never explained to Teague why she’d left her marriage. About abandoning him—well, that had come with the justification that a son belonged with his father. Truthfully, nothing much had changed upon her absence. He and his father had learned to do laundry and put together meals, but the silence around the dinner table had been the same.
His father had forever been of the mind that what happened on the job stayed on the job. Naturally taciturn, he hadn’t sought other topics of conversation that might engage his wife and son. Teague had moved outward, seeking friends and activities to fill the void, but he supposed his mother could only crave the companionship her emotionally unavailable husband was powerless to provide.
Teague swigged down more of the dark brew, his gaze resting on his father. There were threads of silver in his hair, but he’d lost none of the brawn in his shoulders and arms. His belly was as flat as ever. At fifty-seven, he could pass for years younger.
“You know, Dad, you look pretty good for an old geezer.” He said it with a smile, hoping to tease one out of his father. “Have you thought about sending out some feelers to friends or looking into a dating service? Bet you could find a lady to share your golden years.”
Gary White’s brown eyes shot up to his, their shocked expression telling everything the man wouldn’t—he was still hung up on his ex-wife.
Shit. “Never mind,” Teague muttered. “Let’s start with salmon. What do you say to a week away next month?”
His father immediately shook his head. “I could never be gone that long.”
“Why?”
“You never know if...” The older man made a vague gesture.
Exasperated, Teague set his coffee on the counter. “Dad, she’s never coming home,” he said, and heard the echo of other, similar-sounding words. “Teague, you’re never going to have her.”
His father’s gaze dropped back to the baseball box scores. “That’s private,” he mumbled.
As everything was private, Teague thought, his jaw hardening. Work, worry, stress, feelings. It had become a habit in this house. A habit of the two men in this kitchen.
Everything uncomfortable, everything honest, every raw, stripped-to-the bone emotion put up on a high shelf. Out of reach. Unattainable, like the women he and his father had set their sights on.
“Because it means you risk nothing.”
Jesus.
What’s wrong with me? Teague thought, now as frustrated with himself as with his dad. Why the fuck did I come here?
Because you’re in danger of becoming just like the man at the table, his common sense answered. A stunted, closed-off human being.
That truth was only darker and more bitter than the coffee he dashed into the sink before striding out of the house and into the too-bright sunshine. It struck the top of his head like a smite from God.
Only one person, one relationship, Teague realized, could save him. And getting her back would mean reaching high and then laying everything he had at her feet.
* * *
BEHIND THE WHEEL OF HIS truck, traveling the narrow road that ran along the bluffs above Crescent Cove, Teague finally found Polly. Seated on a fat-tired, single-speed cruiser bicycle, she pedaled along the crumbling edge of asphalt, as yet unaware of the vehicle tracking her progress.
Her hair gleamed bright in the sunlight. He frowned a little, thinking she should be wearing a helmet. One was available; it sat in the wire basket mounted above the rear tire. There was a sheaf of daisies resting there, too, white-and-yellow heads nodding with each bump in the road.
She’d probably run the roses he’d brought her through the garbage disposal.
The thought made him grind his back teeth for a moment, but then he forced his jaw to relax. The situation was dicey enough without getting overwrought. He and Polly needed to have a quiet, rational conversation.
They could manage that, he was sure of it. Before everything started going wonky this month, they’d always been of an easygoing, like-minded temperament.
Taking a deep breath, he goosed the gas. The truck eased forward, and he kept it at a slow pace. When he came abreast of her, he rolled down the passenger window.
She glanced over; then her eyes went wide. The bike’s front tire wobbled.
“Watch out!” he cautioned. To the right of the road, the earth fell away to brush-covered hillside and she was dangerously close to going over it. He braked, watching her wrangle the handlebars.
The bicycle straightened out. Polly continued pedaling. Riding faster away from him.
Frowning, he gave a little more gas. “Hey!” he called through the open window as he caught up to her again. “I’ve been looking for you. I thought we could talk.”
“You thought wrong. I told you to stay away.” Then she lifted her cute fanny off the bicycle seat and started pumping, moving with surprising speed.
A burst of irritation heated his blood. His fingers tightened on the steering wheel, even as he told himself to chill. Calm down. Keep your cool. We’re going to have a quiet, rational conversation.
Surely two people who had been friends as long as they could manage that.
Keeping hold of his patience, he pushed down on the gas pedal again. She was really moving now, the muscles in her slim legs flexing below a pair of blue jean cutoffs. Their golden length distracted him a little, and he didn’t realize that the road had narrowed. As he approached her again, his side-view mirror came too close to her shoulder, and he jerked the wheel to avoid it brushing her.
The truck jolted left, her startled blue gaze followed suit and in that moment when her attention wandered from the road, she dropped off it.
Between one blink and the next, Polly had disappeared.
Teague’s heart slammed into his tonsils. He was out of the truck before his brain even engaged. “Polly!” he yelled, panicking. “Polly!”
At the edge of the road, he looked down, scanning the dirt and scrubby chaparral bushes. At the sight of a scrap of bright color, he launched himself in its direction, sliding on the silty orange dirt. It was a running shoe.
Polly’s shoe.
He squeezed it between his fingers, mimicking the painful clutch of his heart. God, oh, God. “Polly!”
A dozen feet to his left, something started rustling in a dense-leaved, dusty-green shrub. Either it was a maddened animal or his woman was alive.
“Are you hurt?” he yelled, scrambling and slipping across the uneven terrain.
A blond head poked out between two prickly branches. “I’m pissed,” said the wild-haired, angry-eyed creature glaring his way. “What were you thinking?”
Relief tasted like cool water to his parched throat. She was alive, thank God. Alive and unhurt enough to hiss and spit. “Is anything broken?” he asked.
She ignored the hand he held out and managed to step free of the chaparral. Other than a few scratches on her legs and arms, she looked okay.
But the thin red lines spiked his temper. “Where’s your helmet, damn it?”
Pausing in brushing the dust off her backside, she glanced over at him. “With the bike, about six feet farther down the hill.”
He pretended he wasn’t seeing red. His point was to woo her, after all. “I mean, why aren’t you wearing it?”
“I didn’t know I was going to encounter the trucker from hell. Now go down there and get Skye’s bicycle, would you? If it’s damaged, it’s all your fault.”
Muttering under his breath, Teague handed over her missing shoe, then slipped and slid around more bushes until he came across a metal frame and fat tires. All looked intact, with the exception of the bunch of daisies, their stems now mangled. With vicious satisfaction, he threw them farther down the hill, then shouldered the bike and trudged back toward the road.
Polly was standing beside his truck. The instant he set the bike down, she tried to wrest it from his grasp. He held on. “What are you doing?”
“I’m getting on my way,” she said, still tugging.
Without another word, he swung it from her hands, lifting it over her head to set it in the bed of his truck. Then, letting his temper get the better of him, he crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at her with Take that in his gaze.
She stared back, her blue eyes glinting fire like the sunlight catching in the Pacific Ocean over her shoulder. A breeze blew across them, ruffling their hair, but doing nothing to cool the mood that shimmered in the air.
Another tense moment passed, and then she turned smartly on the heel of the shoe that he’d found in the dirt—that goddamn shoe, it still had the power to turn his pulse erratic—and took off down the road. Stunned that she’d walk away from him, he watched her in silence a moment, then leaped forward to grab her by the elbow.
She whirled around, glaring again. “What’s gotten into you?”
“I...I...” Teague tried to slow the swirling tangle of feelings that were spinning, Tasmanian Devil–style, in his gut. He reminded himself of the relaxed conversation he wanted. He recalled she’d been his best friend for years. They’d always been levelheaded, even-keeled companions.
But then he thought of her hot tears, her confession—“I’ve loved you for years”—her command for him to go away and leave her alone. And words just burst from his mouth.
“I’m fucking furious with you,” he said.
Yelled maybe, because they both staggered back. Teague struggled to restrain his revving heartbeat and gain control again. God, he’d never been this mad at a woman in his life. He charmed; he didn’t shout.
For a moment, he reconsidered what he was doing. The desperate man he’d become in the past few days without Polly wasn’t a comfortable fit. His skin and bones didn’t seem big enough to hold all that he was feeling inside. All that he was feeling for her.
But if he succumbed to the habits of a lifetime, by diminishing those feelings or by putting them at a distance, then he’d turn into his father. Drying up, one long, lonely day at a time. Never getting what he truly wanted. Who he wanted, despite the risk.
He gave himself another moment to level out his breathing, then met her gaze, willing himself to sound sane. “You accuse me of not seeing you when that’s just a crock, Polly. You didn’t let me see.”
“I—”
“No.” He pointed a finger at her pretty, cheerleader nose. “It’s my turn to tell some truths. I might have my high shelf, but you, you have your impervious, perky shell and your glued-to-the-soul secrets.”
Her mouth opened.
“Don’t even start complaining about the perky. I happen to adore the perky in you. But God, couldn’t you at least drop a hint or two before blindsiding a guy with the truth?”
Her arms lifted, fell again to her sides. “I threw my dress on the ground! You don’t call standing naked in front of you a hint?”
She had a point. And the fact was, he knew why she’d taken so long to be truthful with him, one of the consequences of being such close friends. A little of his anger evaporated. Men, starting with her father, had taken advantage of her. His gender hadn’t given her much reason to trust, and that she’d allowed herself feelings for him—even confessed them—was probably the biggest compliment Teague had ever been paid in his life.
“Oh, Polly,” he said, reaching for her.
She stepped back, her eyes wary.
Oh, Polly. “I love you,” he said softly, his chest aching like hell. “I know I’m an idiot for taking so long to acknowledge it, but I’m in love with you. I suspect it’s been that way for a long time.”
If he’d expected her to fall into his arms—but he didn’t; he knew her that well. When she took another step back, he sighed. His temper was still on edge, but he couldn’t be angry in the face of those big, scared blue eyes that fixed on his face with patent disbelief. “You don’t believe me,” he said.
“Of course I don’t.” She tapped her forefinger against her chest. “Unattainable. Now you care about me.”
“I—” His breath sighed out. Damn. He should have seen that coming. It was just that what he felt for Polly, his best-friend-who-was-a-girl, who was no longer his best friend but was something so much bigger, was not at all like the stupid crushes he’d had on Tess or on Amethyst Lake or the Belgian exchange student. This was so much more...vital.
Urgent.
Risky.
His father had loved his mother, and yet she’d still packed her bags. But his father hadn’t been willing to share his life or his heart. Teague was going to have to do both.
“C’mon, Pol,” he said, opening the passenger door. “Get in.”
“Why?”
He squeezed the chrome door handle as if it were her neck. “I want to show you something.” When she didn’t move, he decided throwing her bodily into the seat wasn’t his greatest idea. So he gave her another chance. “Please, Gator. For old times’ sake.”
The suspicious look on her face didn’t waver, causing his ire to rise once again. Damn, he wasn’t used to this...this passion. She’d always mattered so much to him, but now...now they mattered infinitely more. He hoped like hell he could convince her of his love before he killed her out of frustration.
* * *
POLLY FELT BATTERED all over, inside and out, as Teague drove northward. It was mostly silent between them, though every once in a while she saw his grip go white-knuckled on the steering wheel. Then he’d mutter, “You should give me the benefit of the doubt” or “At least you could credit me with the ability to take my head out of my ass.”
She just had to stay strong for a while longer, she consoled herself. He’d drop this harebrained notion of his—love! now, after all this time?—soon. They wouldn’t be friends like before; that relationship had been buried between the sheets of her bed, but they’d both be in a place to move on.
Except he’d moved into her workplace, she realized, trailing him from the parking lot of her elementary school to the classroom she’d occupy in just a few days. He hesitated outside the locked door. “Do you have your keys?” he asked. “Or I could track down Ted.”
She glanced up at him. “Ted? You know our janitor?”
Teague ran a hand through his hair. “We’re recent acquaintances. He let me in yesterday and this morning.”
“You’ve been in my room?” Polly dug into the pocket of her cutoffs. “Ted opened the door for a stranger?”
“Don’t blame him. I can be pretty persuasive,” he admitted. “And the firefighter thing is sort of like a free pass.”
“Don’t I know it?” Polly grumbled. She inserted the key in the lock and then pulled open the heavy metal door, latching it on the doorstop set in the outside wall. The scent of new paint and raw wood reached her nose.
“What—?” She made to step inside.
Teague caught her arm. She winced and he instantly turned it up, inspecting the scrape he’d brushed with his thumb. “Oh, sweetheart,” he said, so sympathetic she wanted to weep. “I should have looked you over before now. Let’s find your first-aid kit and I’ll take care of everywhere you hurt.”
“No,” she said, pulling away. He couldn’t reach the place she was really wounded.
“Pol—”
She stepped across the threshold. “Tell me why we’re...” Her voice trailed off as her gaze fell upon the structure built into one corner of her room.
“I planned for it to be done before I showed it to you,” he said. “But wuss that I am, I missed you too much to wait that long.”
Surrounding the room’s bookcases was a floor-to-ceiling edifice made of plywood. “A castle?” On the outside, someone had inked in the suggestion of bricks on the turret and vines climbing the walls.
“The artwork is thanks to my buddy Vin at the station. It’s just a suggestion for now. He’ll come back and do the details after I get the thing finished and painted.”
Her imagination could picture it. A whimsical and appealing palace for the kindergarten princes and princesses, knights and warrior maidens who would pass through her door for years to come. “They won’t be able to resist reading time.”
“That’s the plan,” Teague said.
Her heart was swelling in her chest, no longer tucked into itself for protection. Still, there was pain. “It’s the kind of thing a...a friend would do,” she murmured.
“It’s the kind of thing a person who loves you would do,” Teague corrected.
“No,” she whispered, feeling the sting of tears.
“Yes.” Teague pulled her around, then lifted her chin so her watery gaze met his. “I might have been saying the wrong words to you, Polly, but I’ve been doing the right things all this time.”
“What do you mean?”
He slipped his free hand into his back pocket and pulled out a printed receipt. “Construction materials. Check the date. I ordered them the day you mentioned wanting a reading nook in your new classroom.”
She had to take his word for it, because the tears made the numbers waver. “I don’t understand.”
“It was a way of showing you how I feel—and it showed me how I feel, too. I’ve always enjoyed doing things for you. Bringing you muffins. Finding your keys. I’ve always enjoyed spending time with you, too.” He ran a hand over the back of her hair. “For over four years, you have been in the woman in my life, because you are the woman I love.”
“But...but...”
“I know what you’re going to say. Yes, it took me long enough to figure out. But we both had some trust issues to overcome.”
His mother. Her father.
Teague stared into her eyes. “But we did overcome them, didn’t we, sweetheart? I’ve never let anyone get closer to me than you.”
Polly’s face went hot as she thought of him coming inside her, skin to skin, the ultimate, physical trust. But to give him a chance at her heart...?
His voice softened, and his gaze turned tender. “You’ve trusted me so often and for so long. Please, take another leap of faith. Believe me when I say I’ll never give up on us.”
A shiver worked its way down her back. “It’s so risky.”
“You’re the one who pointed that out to me,” Teague said. “But I’m taking a real chance now, aren’t I?”
When she looked away again, he brought her face back toward his. “I love you, Gator. I love you so very much.”
She sniffed. “Are you...are you sure it’s not because I’m the unattainable one now?”
“Of course I’m sure.” He laughed, sexy and low. “Because that’s exactly how I’ll disprove your theory.” Then he bent his head and took her mouth, kissing her with heat and passion and masculine intent. There was nothing friendly about it, and she melted against him. “See?” he said against her lips. “You’re perfectly attainable. Not to mention mine.”
And because she’d once read that best friends made the best lovers—and now knew that to be true—Polly pulled him as close as she’d always dreamed she could. “And you’re mine right back.”