CHAPTER SEVEN
KATY
Katy scrambled out of the hotel, his words reverberating in her head.
Get out, get out, get out…
Into the twilight, she fled a little ways away from the hotel façade, away from the vendors selling their street foods and strawberries that made new American arrivals ill.
Katy stopped when she reached the corner of the street. Just a couple of streets over, she’d find refuge at the Paredes’s house.
She’d never felt so wretchedly vilified in her life.
Yet peace washed over her. She’d been doing the right thing, serving her fellow human being in the Savior’s stead, and she could turn the other cheek.
“Katy!”
A man’s voice, shouting after her.
Marcus.
Her first instinct was to hide. She didn’t want him to inflict any more hurt on her. First, his rejection of her bus ride idea, and then his anger. At her nosiness, she supposed.
“Katy!”
She saw him shuffling on the sidewalk, haggard, chasing after her. Tuk-tuks and cars illuminated him with their headlights. He was going to collapse if he wasn’t careful.
He spotted her and stopped, his eyes wild and his brows relaxing.
“I am so sorry,” he called out for all of that Antigua street to hear.
Katy wasn’t going to cry. She wasn’t.
And she didn’t.
She came over and stood a few feet from him. “It’s okay,” she said. ““Let’s…get you inside. You probably feel horrible.”
He turned, and they walked side by side, back to his hotel. In his white shirt and pajama bottoms, he looked like a college kid.
With a manly beard.
“I feel tons better.” His voice lowered. “Thanks to you.”
She didn’t need the credit. Wouldn’t someone else in her position do what she did? “You’’re welcome.”
“And then I had to yell at you. I am such a jerk.”
She bit her lip. No, he had no excuse. “Was it so very bad for me to mention…”
He closed his eyes and pointed at the bench outside the hotel. “Sit here for a minute?”
They sat facing the street. Tuk-tuks zipped up and down happily, like little bumper cars. Or tiny clown cars transporting regular people. Pedestrians chattered under the deepening darkness. Someone was roasting something that smelled good.
His stomach grumbled loudly, and Katy laughed.
“Want more Guatemalan food?” she teased.
“Eventually.” He grinned and then turned serious. “I need to explain my outburst. My inexcusable rudeness. I…I guess I felt like you were prying off layers of privacy from my life.”
“That wasn’t my intention,” she said. “I remember now why I wanted to find you. I was going to write you a letter of apology, so I needed your address.”
“Ah.” He winced. “I’ll accept your apology if you accept mine.”
“An equal trade? Hardly.”
His head swiveled her direction.
“Just kidding,” she said, smirking.
He smiled, his features softening. In the flickering light at the hotel entrance, he looked almost approachable. Rumpled and cuddly.
Did she just think cuddly?
Marcus James was no teddy bear; that was for sure. He could be a gruff bear. She knew that now, with a heart still tender from his loss.
How could someone survive that tragedy? In all her life, Katy had only lost a grandmother, and she had been of an age where her passing was a blessing. But to have lost your wife and baby?
“Apology accepted,” she said.
He studied her. “You’re something else.”
She squirmed under his gaze. “Just doing what the Savior would want me to.”
“I’ve given up trying to figure out what He wants me to do,” he murmured.
“Sometimes, we need to be ready to hear.”
He sighed. “Anyway. Thanks for not running off on me. I wouldn’t have blamed you had you gone off and never returned.”
She took a deep breath, willing herself to be brave. “Dare I ask if Conchilla is still in the running for your prize, then?”
“Conchilla?” he echoed. “Oh, right.” A ridge formed between his brows. “Is that why you did…all this?”
She took in a quick intake of breath. “Why I took care of you? Of course not.”
His forehead relaxed. “Sorry. I’m sure you can see why I might think…” He shook his head. “Never mind.”
“That hadn’t even occurred to me.”
He gazed deep into her eyes. Her chest tightened with an unfamiliar, warm feeling.
“I believe you,” he murmured. “Anyway, you asked about Conchilla.”
Her breath stilled. “Yes?”
“The answer is, it’s still in the running.” He smiled, and her heart skipped a beat. He was so handsome with his sexy scruff and his mouth lifted to one side.
She smiled back. “So, is a bus ride okay?”