He smothered a yawn. “How long do you think they’ll stay?”
“Hard to say. Until they feel the wind change. Going on their past record, it could be a few weeks, or we could get home tomorrow and they’ll have moved on to my brother’s house.” They were nomads at heart. When we’d been in school, they’d tried to stay put during the term, and were mostly successful, but as soon as we’d graduated, all bets were off.
“Well, I don’t mind how long it is.” He stretched his legs out in front of him and crossed them at the ankles. Finn had great legs, probably from riding his bike so much—it was something other girls commented on all the time. My gaze drifted over them now, wondering…
I squeezed my eyes shut. This was a dangerous path to take. I’d already decided I was keeping him as a friend. Only a friend.
The whole time we’d been helping my parents set up outside, in the back of my mind I’d been thinking about what Finn had been about to say when the knock on the door happened. From his expression, it had been serious, so I was wary about prodding. But if we were going to get back into the friends groove, we couldn’t leave obstacles in our way. We had to be brave.
I picked up a cushion and plucked at the corner. “Before they arrived, you were going to say something.”
His eyes shifted to the left. “I was?”
“We were talking about”—when your mouth took me to heaven—“last night.”
“It was nothing,” he said quickly. “We should go to bed.” His eyes widened. “I mean—”
For one long moment, the blood in my veins stilled, then I noticed that he was flustered, which was rare—and adorable—and I grinned. “It’s okay, Finn. I know what you meant. And you’re right. Tomorrow’s a workday, so I’m going to turn in.”
He nodded once, without meeting my eyes, and I left the room, not sure if I was glad we’d avoided the conversation, or relieved.
Chapter Four
Scarlett
The next morning, eyes barely open, I headed down the hallway toward my second favorite kitchen appliance—the coffeemaker. I sent up a prayer that Finn was already up and had it going.
“Good morning, baby girl,” my mother singsonged a bit too loudly as I made it to the kitchen.
I peered around the room and found my parents bustling away, pulling fruits and vegetables from a large box on the counter and shoving them into their ancient juicer.
Finn sat on a stool at the breakfast bar with a grimacy smile and a huge glass of something thick and green. He held it up. “Your parents are making us smoothies,” he said with fake enthusiasm.
“To say thank you for letting us stay¸” my father added, passing me a glass. “Here you go.”
“Er, thanks.” I thought about asking if I could squeeze past to make some coffee, but ironically, I wasn’t caffeinated enough to face the disappointment on their faces. It seemed from Finn’s expression he was in the same boat. So I settled on, “Where did you get all this produce?” and slid onto the stool beside Finn.
My father chuckled. “We’ve been up since dawn, walking around the neighborhood, and we found a great organic fruit shop a few blocks over.”
“Don’t worry,” my mother added, “we’ll be out of your hair in a few minutes. We have a big day planned, starting with climbing the Harbour Bridge.”
I had tingles in my toes just thinking about being that high up, but I knew my parents would love the feel of the wind in their hair from that height.
They packed their assorted purchases into the fridge and wiped down the counters. “We bought some produce for ourselves, and it’s all out in the icebox in the tent, so this is for you. But we’ll pop in and make the smoothies for you each morning while we’re here.”
“As a thank you,” I said faintly, still not daring to taste mine.
“Exactly,” my mother said, and beamed. “We’ll see you both later.”
With a kiss on the top of my head from each of them, my parents left the kitchen. Finn and I sat frozen to our stools as we listened to them going through the door, then the footsteps down the path, then their car starting. As soon as it had cleared the gate, Finn and I both leaped up and raced for the coffeemaker. Neither of us said a word until we were back on our stools, steaming mugs of goodness in our hands.
“I’m sorry about that.” I tilted my head to his empty smoothie glass.
“No problem. My liver is probably exceedingly happy about it, even if it was awful. Are you going to have yours?”
“Yeah. After coffee. When I can face it.”
He nodded and took another sip from his mug. He looked sleepier than usual. His almost-black hair was getting a bit long and stuck out in all directions. The worn, pale blue T-shirt he slept in was paired with the shorts he’d dragged over his sleeping boxers like he did every morning. But today there were also dark circles under his eyes.
I nudged him with my elbow. “Hey, are you okay?”
“I just didn’t sleep well,” he said dismissively.
“Is it my parents staying?” They were sometimes hard for me to cope with, and they were my family, so I knew it was hard for Finn having to deal with them when he didn’t have to.
“No, it’s—” He swallowed and something in his eyes changed. Heated. My pulse picked up speed and my gaze dropped to his mouth.
“You’re doing it again,” he practically growled.
He’d done it first, I wanted to point out, by thinking whatever it was that had made his eyes change. But that wouldn’t get us anywhere. “Sorry,” I said instead and took another sip of my coffee.
“Look, Scarlett, about what happened.” He rubbed a hand down his face and was silent for a few beats as he studied the counter in front of him. “What happened between us. I have to check. You’re not interested in anything happening between—”
“No!” I said, a little bit too fast and too loud. “I don’t want to lose this friendship. It’s way too important to me.”
He gave me an awkward smile. “Agreed. I feel the same way.”
I looked at him over the curls of steam coming from my mug. “And we would lose it, wouldn’t we, Finn?”
“Yeah,” he said softly. “I think there’s a good chance we would.”
A tight band formed around my chest, making it difficult to breathe. “So we’ll go back to being just friends, and I’ll go out with the guy Cathy knows. And you’ll date someone new, and you’ll bring her back here, and she’ll be jealous of me like always, and you’ll—”
“Tell her that you’re non-negotiable in my life, as always,” he said, the corners of his mouth twitching.
“—and everything will be like normal.”
Yep, normal. That was exactly what I wanted. No more kissing Finn or thoughts of kissing Finn. Just everything back to the way it had been. Oh, yes, I was ninety-nine percent sure that was how my life should be.
“And to really make things normal again,” he said, in the teasing tone he only used with me, “you’ll go back to finish your degree?”
“I’m not quite ready. I haven’t saved up enough money yet.” Though even I could hear how feeble that sounded.
“Scarlett, if you can’t bring yourself to finish your degree, then something’s wrong. If you were really committed to a career in accounting, you’d have finished it by now and be working as an accountant.”
This was better. We were acting like the old Finn and Scarlett again. “At least my chosen career—as well as my temporary career—will actually earn me money. Tell me again how many jobs are waiting for people with PhDs in obscure ancient reed flutes?”
He grinned. “Almost as many jobs as there are for professional artists. Which is what you should be doing with your life.”
“Painting isn’t my only skill. I can take my pick of jobs to earn my crust because I’m a woman of many, many talents.”
This time it was his gaze that dropped to my mouth, and I immediately regretted my choice of words. Even so, my pulse spiked at the memory, but I dragged in a deep breath and pretended we were both only thinking about our careers.