“Concerning which part?” She didn’t even look at him. “The fact that you can’t be trusted to spend time alone without doing damage to public property? Or for believing my friends when they said they were setting me up with a nice guy?”
He clenched his jaw. “Moving past the property damage bullshit for a second, what makes you think I’m not a nice guy?”
“Would you like a list?” She shook her head. “You couldn’t be clearer about your distaste for Wellingford. That’s hardly nice.”
“My disliking this place has nothing to do with being nice. This town is small and cloying and everyone here has been stuck in a rut since the lumber mill opened up a few hundred years ago.” Too late, he realized he had just included Bri in the insult.
She finally turned in her seat to face him. “Is that so? And what’s so wrong with working a legitimate job and making a living? Or the people who want a life where they know their neighbors? Or that some of us like not having to worry about locking our doors at night?”
He winced. Yep. She’d caught the unintended insult. “I—”
She spoke right over him. “Yes, people like to gossip and keep tabs on each other, but that’s what family does. At least you have one, even if you ran away from it.”
Setting aside the implication that she didn’t have a family for now, he growled. “I didn’t run away.”
“To hear Drew tell of it, you barely waited a week after graduation to up and leave.”
Yeah, because he couldn’t stand one more day of being known as Drunk Billy’s youngest boy, always causing trouble, never quite doing a damn thing right no matter how hard he tried. Burning down the high school—accidentally or not—had just been the straw that broke the camel’s back.
That didn’t mean that this little spitfire could look down her adorable nose at everything he’d accomplished since. “There’s nothing wrong with joining the military and doing something useful with my life.”
“You’re right. There isn’t. It’s admirable.” She didn’t give him time to deal with the shock of her actually agreeing with him. “How many times have you been home in the last ten years?”
From her tone, she already knew the answer. Twice. Once for his old man’s funeral, and once for Drew’s graduation from the police academy. Needing to get the topic off himself—and away from her goddamn judgment—he turned the tables. “You know, from the way Drew described you, I didn’t expect an interrogation.”
She huffed again as he pulled into the restaurant parking lot. He’d picked the Italian place on the outskirts of town, hoping to minimize the chance of running into anyone he knew. If he thought he could have gotten away with driving all the way into Williamsport, he would. But it was nearly forty minutes away, and he didn’t think he could handle being closeted in this SUV with Bri that long. He kept catching the faintest strain of her perfume, something light and floral, and it was distracting as hell. Annoyed that he’d even noticed, he spoke without thinking. “That said, for a mousy librarian, you sure have a mouth on you.”
…
Mousy librarian. He really wasn’t pulling any punches. Bri gripped her purse as she started for the restaurant, and she nearly gasped when he pressed a hand to the small of her back and guided her through the door. She glanced at him, half expecting to see… She wasn’t sure what. But there was just tight anger on his face.
What had she expected? That he was so overcome by her mousiness that he couldn’t help but touch her? She might enjoy living in the fictional worlds of her books, but she wasn’t delusional.
Knowing that didn’t help the way the heat from his hand seemed to seep through her coat and blouse and imprint itself on her skin. His thumb stroked down her spine in what must have been an accident, but it didn’t stop her from catching her breath. Was he playing with her? Look at the poor, dowdy librarian, and how she responds to the slightest touch like an overeager puppy. Pathetic.
She swatted his hand off her back, hating that she immediately missed the feel of him touching her. “Stop that.”
His mild look only made her want to spit nails. “I’m being polite.”
“Your version leaves a few things to be desired.” Mainly the “polite” part.
They followed the perky redheaded hostess back to a corner of the restaurant. Bri couldn’t help wondering if he’d purposely picked the restaurant on the farthest edge of town and called ahead and requested a spot where they were guaranteed to melt into the background and avoid every other customer in the place. He must really not want anyone to see them together.
Ryan held her chair out for her, and the suspicion that he was having one over on her only solidified. He’d spent their short time together insulting both her looks and her profession, and now he was being courteous?
It didn’t help that her body responded to him in a way she hadn’t anticipated. She wanted to blame it on the candlelight glinting off his strong jaw and those wonderful shoulders, wanted to believe the lie of intimacy created by the shadows and the way he rested his perfectly muscled forearms on the small table between them.
Because she wanted to believe it so desperately, she clung to the only ammo she had against him. “I might be a mousy librarian, but we can’t all be juvenile delinquents with firebug tendencies.”
His jaw hardened, sending a ripple of something through her lower stomach. “Too much excitement for you? Playing it safe is just another way of hiding.”
The barb struck too close to home. So what if she liked to play it safe? There was nothing wrong with wanting her adult life to have the security and roots her childhood had lacked. Maybe she’d missed a few opportunities for excitement as a result, but she regretted nothing. For him to sit there and judge her for that… “Better that than running away the first opportunity you had. Frankly, I’m surprised you didn’t up and join the circus and cement the cliché.”
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“I’ve heard enough.” As soon as she’d moved to Wellingford, she’d been entertained with stories of past events, many of which Ryan starred in. Most of those came from Drew himself, but there always seemed to be someone nearby to chip in with more when he got going.
“You and every other person in town. You’re all old maids, sitting around and telling tales of the glory days.”
Bri flinched. She’d grown up dreaming about a town like Wellingford, a place where family meant more than blood and it was finally safe to let down her guard. To have him so blatantly dismissing it—and dismissing her—stuck in her throat. “Just because you’ve seen a bit more of the world doesn’t mean you can look down on the people who live here.”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “I’m not the only one looking down on someone here.”
“Yes, well, your opinion is pretty clear, don’t you think?”
Ryan glared. “No, I don’t think. You’ve been here about a year, am I right?”
“Fourteen months.” Not very long in the grand scheme of things, but she’d managed to put down small roots, to instate a successful children’s program in her library, and to finally start to feel like she’d found somewhere to belong.
“Exactly.” Then he lifted his menu, obviously done with the conversation.
Well, that was too damn bad. She wasn’t. “Explain, please.”
“It means Wellingford is still a novelty for you. It’s new and cute and you’ve got stars in your eyes. I don’t. I see a place where everyone is in their neighbors’ business, and you can’t make a stop at Chilly’s without everyone in town knowing about it and speculating if you have an alcohol problem.”
What? Bri made a conscious effort to close her mouth before she spoke without thinking. Why would anyone assume that he’d have an alcohol problem? She knew for a fact Drew stopped by the local bar most days after work to have a beer, and there had never been a whisper of anything like that.