Veer (Clayton Falls) (11 page)

“I don’t really know my
dad
.”

“Oh, sorry.”

“It’s all right. He just decided having a kid wasn’t for him and took off when I was pretty young.”

“That sucks.”

“Yeah, but my mom was awesome, so she made up for it.”

“Was?”

She bit her lip. “She died a few months ago.”

Damn i
t
. I needed to stop asking questions that upset her. “
I’m sorry to hear that. It must have been really tough
.”

“Yeah, it’s life. What’s your family like?”

I wasn’t prepared for her question about my family.
I was still trying to process how hard losing he
r mom must have been. “I’m the second youngest
of
four
, and my parents are still alive and together.
My older brother and sister both live within twenty minutes of my parents
.”

“Wow,
four
? That’s cool. I’m an only child, so I can’t imagine
what it’s like
.”

Wow
. No parents, and no siblings. “It was busy, but always fun.”

“That’s cool. I always swore that if I had a family
,
I’d have a large one so my kids had each other.”

“If you had a family? You don’t know if you will?”

“You never know. I’m single right now, so it’s not really on my radar, you know?”
She shrugged.

“Yeah. I get that.”

“Do you want a big family? Since you come from one?” She looked at me
as if
daring me to answer. It didn’t bother me at all.

“Definitely.
My brother and sister were
both
married with kids by my age, so I’m
kind of the black sheep of the family.”
What I didn’t tell her is that I was just as surprised as my family about how long it was taking me to settle down. I was beginning to think it just wasn’t in the cards.

“It’s not like you
’
r
e
old. You’re a guy
. Y
ou have so much time.”

“Yeah, I know, but tell my mom that if you meet her.”

She laughed.
“All right
. W
ill do.”

The sun had just about disappeared
,
and I noticed her
glancing
around apprehensively.

“You okay?”

“Yeah… but, would you mind
…?”
She stopped and looked down. “Never mind.”

“No, what is it?” I had to know
.
I needed her to ask me a favor—I had been such a jerk to this sweet and sensitive girl
who
obviously had been through a lot.

“Would you mind walking me back to my car? I know it’s safe here, but I’m used to the city and—”

“Absolutely
,
” I agreed immediately, but I wasn’t ready to say goodbye yet.
We’d managed to have a conversation that didn’t involve arguing
,
and I enjoyed it more than I
’d
expected.
“But would you maybe want to come over and hang out for a bit? I live right over there.” I pointed to my balcony.

“Well— ” I could
tell she was searching
for an excuse. I couldn’t let her find one.

“You did promise Max you’d continue petting him.
”

She smiled. “All right, for a little while. But then you’ll walk me to my car afterward?”

S
he really
was
worried. “Of course.”

“Okay.”

“Great.” I tried
to play it down
.

We walked aroun
d and up the front steps of my condo
. I unlocked the
door and let her go in first
.
I held
Max back.

“You live in a loft?
That’s so cool
.
I didn’t think they had places like this here.”

“I take it you
’re a fan of
lofts
?
”

“Love them. I want one really badly. Maybe when I’m done with school and can afford one in a safe neighborhood.”
She continued her perusal.

There she went again with safety—either she’d been through something traumatic
,
or she was paranoid. I sensed it was the former.

“
May
I look around?”

“Absolutely, make yourself at home.”
I unleashed Max and walked into the kitchen.

Becca
gazed
out
the floor to ceiling windows. “This view is insane.
I could just stare out forever. It must be amazing during the day.”

“You think this is good. I have
these windows
in my room too.”

“You get to go to sleep and wake up to the ocean every day? I
’m
jealous.”

I laughed. “Glad to know you like it. From what I understand
,
people fought them putting these
condos
in. I just figured if I was living in a beach town, I was going to really do it.”

“Yeah, where did you say you were from?”

“What’s the problem, can’t place the accent?” I teased.

She turned away from the windows and glared at me. “I really upset you with that, huh?”

“Nah, I just wanted to give you a hard time.”

“Wonderful.”

Okay, I couldn’t let things go down that path again. “
W
ould you like something to drink?” I was already pulling out some glasses and looking through my wine
collection
. She struck me as a girl who liked wine.

She hesitated, and I repeated
“
please stay
”
over and over in my head. I had an irrational need to spend time with her. I wasn’t ready to let her go yet.

She walked over to me and saw the wine. “Maybe one glass.”

“Cool.” I poured us each a glass and walked over to the couch.

She took her glass from me
and sat down. “A drink with a view
, nice.”

I sat down next to her
but left
plenty
of space between us
. “Shall we toast?”

“To what?”

“A fresh start.”

“You mean for us?”

“Yeah. I know we started off on the wrong foot, but if it’s okay with you
,
I’d like to be friends.”

She smiled. “Friends
. Yeah
, I think I can handle that.”

“Okay good.” I lifted my glass. “To a fresh start and new friends.”

She took a small sip, and I liked the way she closed her eyes afterward, savoring it.

“
Mmm, a pinot noir. Velvety.”

“
Y
ou know wine.” I was right.

“Yeah, wine is one of the few luxuries I allow myself. You know
,
other than my state of the art car.”
She swirled the wine around in her glass.

“That is a nice car.”

She leaned back against the couch. I liked that she was getting comfortable. I liked that she was comfortable at my place.

Chapter Eleven

Becca

How I allowed myself to end up drunk at Gavin’s that night, I’ll never know.
When he asked me, I knew I should say no. I just didn’t want to go home to the
empty
pool house
—or at least that’s what I told myself
. In the one week I’d been in town
,
I’d already watched all of my movies. I was going to have to ask Jake if I could borrow some of his.
When
Gavin
pointed out his condo, I had to see it. I was dying to know if there was anythi
ng even remotely modern in town.

The inside of his place was even cooler than I expected. I had to give him credit
. H
e had good taste. I loved the concrete counter tops, the exposed brick and beams, and that view
. I
t was breathtaking.

We settled into a comfortable conversation
,
and I let myself relax. He
seemed
different. Instead of arguing
,
he
appeared
legitimately interested in learning more about me, and I found I actually cared about his story as well.

“
T
ell me about your job
,
” I asked after Gavin popped open our second bottle of wine. I wasn’t sure where the first one went, but it was good
,
and I wasn’t complaining.

“My
job
?” He poured more into
his empty glass
.

“Yeah. Is being a cop like it is on TV?”

He laughed. “Not exactly. Well
,
unless you watch cop shows that involve ticketing farmers for
tractor
violations or making sure teens don’t get too crazy with their parties.”

“Come on, there has to be more.”

He took a long sip of wine. “No, really there isn’t. Crime isn’t
much of
a problem here.”

“You say it like it’s a bad thing.” I guess there were some benefits of l
iving in the middle of nowhere.

“Not bad, just boring.”
He stared pensively down into his wine.

“
I get that.”

“
W
hat do you plan to do after you
graduate?”
His hazel eyes had more green in them than usual, probably because he was wearing a green t-shirt.

I relaxed back into the arm of the couch, enjoying my wine before answering. “I want to work for the District Attorney in Boston. I’d love to be an assistant D.A. one day.
”

“A prosecutor? I can see that. I’d bet you’d be pretty intimidating in the court room.”

“Intimidating?” I laughed. “Not exactly, but I think I’d be good at it. I’m on the trial team at school
,
and I’ve done pretty well.”

“Well, I definitely wouldn’t want to be a criminal you were
trying to put behind bars
.”

“I’m not that scary.”

“No, you’re not.” He looked at me for a m
inute, finishing off his glass
. “Are you ready for more?”

“I probably shouldn’t
,
but why not
?”
An idle thought about how in the world I was going to
get
home hit me, but I was already tipsy
,
and I easily brushed it off.

“Well I know you said you don’t see much action as a cop here, but at least you’d be ready for it if you did.”

He poured a little more wine in my glass.
“What
do you mean
?”

“I just mean you’re in good shape—you could handle whatever.” I was fighting the urge
to run my hand down his chest
. H
is t-shirt clung to it
tightly, and I remembered what his chest
had looked like that day on the beach.

To distract myself, I pulled out my hair tie and let my hair fall down.

A small smile spread across his lips as he reached over to take a lock
of my hair between his fingers. “I like when you wear your hair down.”

“Yeah? It’s pretty long. I’m growing it out for
Locks
for
Love
.”

“Oh,
the wigs for cancer
patients
? That’s really cool.”

“Yeah. I think it’s almost long enough now.” I didn’t go into all of the reasons it was important to me
. M
ost
revolved around
my mom.

“I’m sure it’ll still look good short, but I like it now.”

“Thanks.”

Watching him play with my hair undid me. I lost my battle and reached out to touch him, tentatively at first. “
Let me rephrase my previous comment
. Y
ou’re
in amazing shape.”
I could feel the blood
rushing
to my face and knew I was blushing, but
I got a little braver, moving my hand more.