Getting Lucky (The Portland Pioneers Book 2) (20 page)

Maggie laughed. “No. He’s not. It’s all some stupid clinical logical
thinking
thing.”

“What about him and Tabitha?”

“What
about him and Tabitha?” Maggie shot back. “I wasn’t really aware there was anything there.”

“Him being pissed off would make more sense if he was hung up on her. So they never. . .ever?”

Maggie just laughed again. “It’s getting old to say it, but geez
,
you really must not have known her as well as I thought you did.”

“So that’s a no, then,” Noah said with a bit of a flush on his cheekbones. “Remind me never to try matchmaking again.”

“Tabitha makes Cal
crazy
,” Maggie confided. “Like. . .she drives him absolutely mad. He’s a little self-righteous normally, but she literally brings out the worst in him. They’re like oil and water. Or maybe like oil and a blowtorch.”

“Not like us, then,” Noah teased, nudging her gently with his knee.

“Definitely not,” Maggie grinned, aware of just how sappily she was staring up at his face.

Cal drove up a few minutes later, and Maggie refused to lift her head from the place she’d rested it, right in the crook of Noah’s arm. She knew how coupley they looked, and now that she knew exactly how much an ass Cal had been about the whole thing, she was a little less inclined to protect his feelings.

Noah got to his feet and extended a hand to help Maggie up. She gave him a pointed smile and didn’t let go of his hand, even after she was upright. If Cal noticed, he didn’t say anything, and after a quick greeting, started talking business with Noah. Maggie reluctantly let go of his hand and drifted through the garden and through the broken fence to the backyard.

Maggie was sitting on the broken concrete patio, staring out at the ocean when Noah came up and with a heavy sigh, plopped down next to her.

“Sorry this day has been shit,” he said, with an embarrassed smile. “I was actually really looking forward to spending time with you.”

“It’s okay,” Maggie said. “I was too. Well, not exactly the manual labor part, but it was still a good excuse to see you.”

“Cal says he doesn’t think it’s black mold either, but it needs to be tested and then the house needs to be fumigated.” Noah’s face scrunched up. “And then he’s got to locate the source of the mold. Probably water leakage, he thinks. Roof or plumbing, he’s not certain yet.” He pulled out his phone from his pocket. “It’s nearly five. I guess I should call the hotel and make sure Hannah hasn’t given away my room in a fit of pique.”

Maggie had been sitting out there thinking about this for a while. She’d had at least an hour to think, and she’d come to the same conclusion that Noah just had. Or rather, she’d understood the predicament he was in, and had come up with a solution of her own.

She put her hand on his, over his phone. “You don’t have to do that,” she said quietly.

Noah gave her a confused look. “I have a guest room,” she said slowly, feeling her heartbeat accelerate rapidly under her sweatshirt. She hoped he couldn’t tell. “I know we’re still figuring all this,” she gestured between them, “out. But you need a place to stay that isn’t that awful hotel. I don’t think it would be weird. Would it be weird for you?”

He looked shocked, plain and simple, and Maggie wondered if she’d just totally misinterpreted his “you’re important” statement earlier. She also wasn’t the kind of girl who randomly invited men to her bed. She had a feeling they would end up there, eventually, but she didn’t think either of them were quite ready yet.

“It wouldn’t be weird for me, no,” he said softly, dropping his head down next to hers. “But I don’t want to make you feel obligated, Maggie. I can stay at the hotel again. It honestly wasn’t awful.”

“I’m really not home much,” Maggie admitted, glancing up at him. “It might be about the same for you as staying in the hotel.”

“I don’t care,” he said, and the look of affection in his eyes was so stark she couldn’t help but see it.

“Okay, then. It’s settled,” she said.

“Jack is going to lose his mind when I tell him.” Noah laughed, breaking the nearly solemn moment between them.

“Jack?”

“My best friend. Jack Bennett. He’s. . .well. . .he’s a character. And that’s the least of it.”

“Would you not normally stay with me?” The question popped out of her mouth before she could stop it.

“That’s a hard question to answer,” he admitted, standing and helping her to her feet. “I know I’ve changed. Or maybe it’s more like this was always me, I just stopped caring about the image so much. Pretty much nothing about Sand Point would have fit my image.”

She gave him a sly look. “I like the image quite a bit, thank you very much.”

He just laughed. “Likewise, Miss Maggie. Likewise.”

“The mold guy will be here soon,” he continued, shoving his hands in his pockets. “I’ve got to stick around for him. And there are some other details I want to discuss with Cal. I’m sure you’ve got stuff to do at home.”

“Yeah, some,” she said, though she would have rather stayed with him, even if she was annoyingly underfoot. “I could swing by the Café and make sure we’re set to resume service tomorrow. I need to set up the week’s produce order.”

“Then I’ll see you later tonight, at your house,” he said, leaning in and apparently taking a clue from her earlier behavior, gave her a brief but still very thorough kiss.

Maggie glanced up and thought she saw Cal staring at them from the kitchen window, but when she peered in for a closer look, there was nobody there.

“Later, then,” she said. “Have fun with the mold guy.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me,” Noah groaned and Maggie left him chuckling, so much lighter and happier than she’d felt this morning, driving over to his house worrying about Tabitha.

He did make a girl feel like she was the only one in the world, but Maggie decided that was more a comment on him
than it was on the women he saw. She and Tabitha just happened to be sisters, that was all.

Maggie unlocked her car door and got in, glancing up in the rear-view mirror, seeing the same blue eyes stare out at her.
That was all
, she reminded herself.

Maggie tried really hard to play it off casually. Making Noah dinner—it was really no big deal. After all, that was the one thing they’d done more than anything else: she’d cook and he’d eat.

She’d been to the Café after leaving Noah’s house and had taken inventory, quickly penciling in her produce order and then driving back to the house, but not before she grabbed a few things from the walk-in fridge. Considering it was the day after Thanksgiving, there should have been enough turkey for an army, along with a metric ton of other miscellaneous leftovers at her house, but Maggie had pushed them all on her guests. After all, she almost never ate at home. What was she going to do with all that food?

Now she regretted her impulsive decision a little, but a refrigerator bare except for a few bottles of wine, a handful of beers, several exotic mustards (mostly for Cal, who liked to throw some bratwurst on the grill on a hot summer evening), and a sad looking jar of pickles wasn’t the end of the world.

Dinner was easy; she could do dinner in her sleep. Peeling a handful of leftover potatoes, she cubed them as she sautéed celery and onion she had extra from the stuffing the day before, with the leeks she’d nicked from the Café. Adding in a quart of homemade chicken stock she’d also grabbed from the Café freezer, she dumped in the potatoes.

Potato leek soup, Maggie thought with satisfaction, and as she stirred, the savory scent filling the air, it felt like the right thing to do. Kind of like how inviting Noah to stay here felt right. He didn’t belong at the hotel; he belonged here. With her.

While the soup simmered, she changed the sheets on the guest bed and hoped it wasn’t too
weird that she’d made it clear he’d be staying here and not in her room. No doubt he was very used to affairs and one night stands and all that, but Maggie knew she was the opposite. She’d tried dating around, and the game hadn’t turned out to be for her. She wasn’t going to ask Noah to share her bed until she was sure of him, no matter how tempting that particular proposition might be.

She’d flipped on her portable iPod speaker in the kitchen and was swaying to the music as she stirred the soup when she heard his knock on the door.

“It’s open,” she yelled and popped her head around the edge of the counter. To her surprise, it was dark outside. She hadn’t even noticed—but then that was pretty normal. Maggie could spend twelve hours in the kitchen and other than the ache at the small of her back and the balls of her feet, she’d never notice the time passing. Cooking relaxed and centered her and she’d focus until there was nothing around her except the stove and the knife in her hand and the dish in front of her.

Noah walked into the living room carrying a suitcase and a laptop bag, a jacket hanging over his arm. “Hey, you cooked,” he grinned at her. “I was going to take you out and spoil you for a change.”

This was the downside of coming back to Sand Point; there was so little opportunity for dating even if she’d had the time to spend. So now she was hopelessly out of practice with the whole mating dance.

“Oh,” she said, feeling the flush of embarrassment creep up her cheeks. “Sorry. It’s kind of a habit.”

“I’m not complaining, Maggie,” Noah said steadily. “Trust me, I love your cooking. And it smells amazing.
”

“Just a little soup I cooked up.”

“It still smells amazing,” he said, and she definitely caught the bashful glance he gave her. She’d suspected it for a while, but was pretty sure now: he wasn’t used to being taken care of. He was used to being the one who did the taking care. Maggie resolved to do a whole lot more of the same.

“Here, I’ll show you your room,” she said, bustling through the kitchen and down the hallway before he could see how red her face was. Okay, it was definitely weirder than she’d anticipated it being—and she’d spent a lot of time in the last few hours worrying it was going to be strange.

The room was small, with a double bed covered with one of her mother’s quilts, a jumbled combination of a hundred shades of blue. The curtains were navy and the walls a very pale baby blue. Maggie had run through with a duster when she’d changed the sheets and had made sure the simple wood furniture was at least dust-free. She wasn’t the greatest housekeeper in the world, which surprised some people. Just because she loved to cook, Maggie thought wryly, did not
make her a domestic goddess. Far from it, in fact. She’d even more hastily cleaned up the clutter in her own room, though she’d refused to look too closely at her own motives for bothering.

“I hope it’s okay,” Maggie said, far too aware of how tightly she was gripping her hands together and how hard it was for her to meet his eyes.

“It’s wonderful.” He set his bags down, and tossed his jacket on the bed, turning to look her directly in the eye. “I know we haven’t talked about this, really,” he began to say and Maggie wanted to put up a desperate hand and stop him right there. She was not ready to have this conversation. Instead of twenty seven, she suddenly felt about twelve and so horribly awkward again.

“No, seriously,” she stuttered out, and he gave her a look, shutting her right up. She hadn’t figured out how to finish that sentence anyway.

“We like each other. But I don’t want you to feel any pressure to take
anything
to the next level, even if I’m staying here. Okay?”