Читать книгу Falling for the New Guy - Nicole Helm - Страница 14

CHAPTER FIVE

TESS SCOOTED FARTHER down into the cooling bathwater. It was her day off and she didn’t want to face it. So much so, she’d taken a bath, something she almost never did. Infrequently enough she didn’t even have bubbles. She’d squirted some shower gel in there and now she was lounging in tepid, bubbleless water.

It seemed terribly appropriate.

At least she didn’t have to face Marc. Small mercies. Her embarrassment wasn’t likely to fade anytime soon, but maybe she could get a better handle on it with a day in between sitting in a car with him for eight hours.

Eight long hours knowing he’d seen through her so easily. All the bravado, all the work she’d done to create this persona, and it’d only taken her father threatening someone with a butter knife and her asking Marc to keep people from pressing charges.

Marc saw her for what she was. A scared little girl with daddy issues so wide no submarine could cross.

She thought about the way she’d cried all over his shoulder then commented on the broadness of said shoulders. It was so out of character. At the very least when she flirted with a guy she didn’t do it in the middle of a good cry.

And she did not flirt with cops. Attraction didn’t matter. She’d seen enough to know if she got together with one cop, all the hard work she’d put into building her reputation would be for nothing. It was rare these days someone rolled their eyes at her simply for her gender.

She wasn’t undoing all that work for an impressive chest. Except she’d already done it with tears and Dad.

It was an impressive chest. What was the harm in a little fantasy when he wasn’t here, and she was in the bath, and—

Nope. Whole lotta harm. Because she had to share a damn patrol car with the guy for weeks upon unending weeks, and she did not need actual fantasies in her head.

Which was enough impetus to get her out of the bathtub. The only problem was—now what? She should go see Dad, check his place for signs of drugs, figure out what was going on.

She should. She should. What else might he do if she didn’t?

I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t care.

She was over the crying and the hurting. So she’d do the only thing that ever helped that—run her ass off.

She pulled on her running gear and slipped her apartment key in her shoe. She purposefully left her phone on the kitchen counter, strapped her MP3 player to her arm and stepped into the hallway.

There was Marc.

Well, hell.

She mustered her best I-did-not-wipe-snot-on-your-shirt-last-night smile.

“Morning.”

“Um, morning.” He cleared his throat, looking around the hallway at everything but her. “I was, um, going for a run.”

She could see that. Despite the cool March temperatures, he was in shorts. Showing off legs. Long, muscular, powerful, strong legs. A whole lotta adjectives for legs.

She had to stop looking at his legs. “I was, too.” Run till her brain exploded. Hopefully her libido, as well. But not in the fun way.

“Ah.” He nodded, looking at some point behind her on the wall.

“Yeah.” She scratched her head, pointed awkwardly at the stairs. “Um, after you.”

He gave one of those little Marc nods. She could not think of anyone else who could pull off that terse, distanced demeanor and still be something of a marshmallow on the inside.

Marc Santino had hugged her while she’d cried last night even after she’d given him a total out. No getting around that marshmallow move. Which was not something she had a lot of experience with. Which meant she should be wary, not interested.

“I should...get to it.”

Tess nodded. Not interested. Not interested. Not interested. Her eyeballs weren’t getting the message, because they were homed in on his butt as he walked down the stairs in front of her. Granted, in the loose athletic shorts she couldn’t get a good butt vantage point, but she’d seen it plenty in his uniform pants.

And had apparently unwittingly committed to brain space that it seemed very tight and firm and—yikes.

He paused at the bottom of the stairs. “Do you know any good...running routes?” He was so stiff and uncomfortable, not making any eye contact.

Tess gave up. “Pretending last night didn’t happen is way more awkward than acknowledging it.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it,” he muttered.

“Well, maybe it’s just as awkward, but you’re being too weird. I can’t take it.”

“How am I being weird?”

“You’re staring at a light fixture.”

His frown deepened and he purposefully moved his gaze to her. And, zowie, she needed to stop dwelling in Attraction Land. But his eyes were all light brown and mesmerizing and...

Briefly, his gaze dropped, not to the floor, but more like boobs, floor, then quickly back to her face. Wait. Had he just checked her out?

Oh, they were in some trouble.

Focus on the running thing. Now. “I usually run down the waterfront then up the bluff. There’s a path, pretty secluded without being creepy and a nice view.”

“That’s got to be at least four miles.”

“Run until your legs fall off.” She forced a sassy smirk. “Surely you can handle it?” Because there was no doubt about Marc being in fantastic shape. His T-shirt was loose enough in the stomach area, but around those arms? And the shoulders, perfect for snot crying?

Yeah, she had ample view of his shapes.

She seriously, seriously needed to cool the heck off. “You’re welcome to follow along if you want. Unless four miles is too many for you.”

Again he did the little boob-floor-back-to-face look, and if she wasn’t totally warped, she could swear his cheeks were a pinch pink. As if he was blushing.

Anyone else, she might adjust her sports bra right there and give him something to really blush about. But no cops. Especially not ones with marshmallow centers.

“All right,” he finally said, gesturing toward the door. “After you.”

She forced a sunny smile and sauntered out the door. No, she wasn’t sauntering. She was walking. Like a normal human being.

Swaying those hips like you want him to stare at your ass.

Okay, that, too. She kicked her leg out behind her, pulled her toes up to her butt. “Do you stretch beforehand?”

When she glanced over her shoulder, she saw him still standing in the doorway. Until the door smacked him because he hadn’t been paying attention. You will not bend over and touch your toes. You. Will. Not.

But, oh, it was tempting. A hell of a lot more fun than trying to run her conflicted thoughts about Dad away.

But also way more dangerous. She wasn’t into danger. She was into finding a way to build some kind of stability in her life.

Ha. Ha.

Marc stood to her side, where she couldn’t really watch him stretch. Which was probably by design.

They stretched in silence, and it was hard work to maintain the silence. Just like she couldn’t stand his weird awkwardness, she was no good with his distancing silence.

She was no good with all of it. Maybe you’re just no good.

“Ready?” she asked, eager to run that asshole voice in her head to the ground.

* * *

TESS’S PONYTAIL BOUNCED. She bounced. Every spandex-clad inch of her. This was some circle of hell. Run with the hot woman in spandex who is your FTO and also going through emotional shit you want nothing to do with. Circle five? Had to be higher than that.

Once he’d tried to get ahead of her, but she’d taken it as a challenge and never let him pass.

So he had to run behind her on the narrow path and try to focus on trees and shit. They’d run down the waterfront and up the bluff, and Marc slowed as a familiar house came into view.

“Don’t tell me you’re running out of steam.”

He looked at the big fancy house along the bluff. He’d only been here once, and it had been a weird visit. Christmastime. Mom harassing Leah and him stepping in. One of those rare moments with Leah when he couldn’t hold on to his usual detachment. “That’s where my sister works.”

“Oh, yeah?” She stopped her running, bending to one side and then the other. Spandex. Ass. Breasts. Spandex. Fucking damn it.

“Are you going to stop by and say hi?” she asked, completely unfazed that he was dying.

Saying hi to Leah was the absolute last thing he wanted to do. Scratch that, the last thing he wanted to do was keep jogging with an erection because Tess’s ass in those spandex running pants was not fair.

Life was not fair.

“Yeah, um...” How did he phrase this so he made it clear that even if he did go say hi to Leah, he didn’t want Tess tagging along? Doing it alone was bad enough—adding this woman to the mix had disaster written all over it.

“I’ll go up to the top of the street, turn around. If you’re not done by then, I’m sure you’ll catch up or I’ll just see you later.”

“Yeah. Great.”

She bent backward, fingertips splayed across her back, then bent farther, giving him an ample look down her shirt.

Abruptly, he turned toward MC Restoration’s office. He wouldn’t go to the big house—not all sweaty and...other things he was denying.

He’d knock on Leah’s little workshop door, hope to God she wasn’t there, and be on his merry way. Far away from the sight of Tess in spandex.

He refused to look back at Tess as he strode through the backyard of MC. He was focused on his destination. On safety. He knocked, held his breath and hoped no one answered.

“Marc?” Leah’s eyes were wide as she opened the door. “Hey, is everything o—”

“Yeah, yeah, good. I was just out...running.” He gestured toward the ring of sweat around his shirt collar. “Passed by and thought I should say hi, I guess.”

Leah blinked at him, but then she smiled.

Which was conflicting. A part of him felt as though he should be making bigger strides in the big brother department. Trying to figure out some relationship they could have or maneuver that wouldn’t be all heavy with what came before.

But Leah had spent too long as the driving factor of his life. Spending days on end in hospital waiting rooms, scrimping so Mom and Dad could pay off her medical bills, listening to bickering and arguments, trying to tread the waters of his parents’ separation.

Then, when they got back together, doing everything in his power to be whatever they needed.

Most of that wasn’t Leah’s fault. Her health had been beyond her control, though her rebellious streak had landed her in the hospital more than necessary after her heart transplant. Which had also been the source of Mom and Dad’s discontent and...

This, this was why he didn’t seek out Leah. Even if she was the most wonderful person in the world, she made him think about things he’d much rather not think about.

“You sure everything is okay?”

“Yeah, sorry. I was kind of trying to avoid a weird situation.”

“Weirder than this?”

“Ha. Maybe. I don’t know.” This was pretty weird, after all. He didn’t know much about how to start conversations with Leah. Conversations that wouldn’t irritate him or make him feel like crap, anyway.

“Well, come on in.” Leah moved out of the doorway and into her little shed of a work area. It was a mess. Tools and light fixtures and wires everywhere. Not much room to move around, either.

“What exactly were you avoiding?” she asked, picking up a few wires and studying them.

“Just avoiding someone, and there your place was. So I said I needed to come say hi to you.”

“Wow, you must have really wanted to avoid them. They trying to sell you something?”

“Oh, no, we live in the same apartment complex and were going for a run at the same time and she’s nice, really, I just...it was...I’m not good with small talk.”

Leah put the wires down, eyebrows raised. “She?”

Shit. “Well, yes. I work with her, actually. She’s my field training officer.” He didn’t like the way Leah was looking at him, all considering, and he really didn’t like the way he was fidgeting and the way his face was getting hot.

“What does field training officer mean?”

“Basically she’s observing while I learn the ropes of a new department.” Marc backed toward the door. Hopefully Tess would be out of sight by now and he could slip out and—

“Ah.”

He scowled. “What does that ah mean?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“Good.”

But then Leah grinned. “Must be a Santino trait.”

“What?”

“Lusting after the boss.”

“She’s not my boss.” Shit. “And I’m not lusting. Also, please don’t ever use that word in my presence again.”

Leah chuckled. “Fair enough.” She studied him for a second before returning to a workbench scattered with tools and debris and a bunch of things he wouldn’t even begin to know how to make sense of. “You can hide out here as long as you want.”

“Thanks.”

“And, you know, that’s an open invitation sort of thing. Not just for hiding out, either.”

“Thanks.” Even though he didn’t feel thankful. He felt guilty. Guilty for not being the kind of brother he should be. Guilty for moving here but not making any overtures toward Leah.

Guilty because even knowing he should make an effort—he didn’t want to. His hand grasped the doorknob. “I should head back.”

Leah’s smile was small, not much of a smile at all, really. “Sure thing.”

“I’ll, uh, see you soon.”

“Sure.” She focused on her wires and, well, he was a dick. Plain and simple.

“Um, you know, I work all weekend, but maybe we could go out to lunch...or something sometime next week.”

She stopped fiddling with her wires, surprise written all over her face as she looked at him. “Well, sure.”

“Great. I’ll call you.”

The corner of her mouth quirked up. “That’s a brush-off in dating code, but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt in sibling code.”

“I will call you.”

“Yeah, you’re a stand-up kind of guy, Officer Santino. That field training lady doesn’t stand a chance.”

He scowled. “Not happening.”

She made a considering noise and stood, crossing over to him before hesitating. “I was going to go for a hug but...not my forte.”

“Yeah, not mine, either.” Though hadn’t he done an admirable impression of it last night? With a woman not related to him. A woman he barely knew.

A woman who was an adult and basically still abused by her father.

“We should try,” he said, his voice uncomfortably rough. His family had its issues, deep uncomfortable ones, but they certainly didn’t physically or purposefully hurt each other.

“Really? Because—”

It was awkward, and ridiculous, but it felt necessary. He reached around Leah and gave her an uncomfortable one-armed squeeze. “There.”

“Please. I’m begging you. Never again.”

“No promises.”

She groaned. “Ah, so this is the brother torture everyone else complains about.”

Thirty years, and she was just now experiencing some stupid little thing normal brothers and sisters did all the time. It wasn’t anything near as bad as Tess’s father’s treatment of her, but he felt guilty all the same. As if he’d failed.

“Don’t get all...whatever. You can’t exactly torture the little sister when she spends all her time in the hospital or running away. It is what it is.”

“No, I know.” But Leah had been healthy for a lot of years now, and she’d been talking to the family regularly for the past year and a half. He had been the one to not make any overtures.

Changing that filled him with dread, but ignoring the fact it was his duty wasn’t an option. “I should get back, but I will call you about lunch next week.”

“All right, but if there’s hugging involved, I won’t be held responsible for my actions.”

“Noted.” Marc turned the knob. He’d save the dread and discomfort for later. For right now. Right now he was just doing the right thing, and that was all that mattered.

He stepped outside, grimacing when he saw Tess’s form jogging up on the path. Not quite long enough.

“That her?”

“Yeah.”

Leah laughed and gave him a shove. “Go get ’em, tiger.”

“I’m not—”

But Leah shut the door before he could argue. He wasn’t going to go get Tess. He wasn’t.

He wasn’t.