Page 74 of Catch Me When I Fall

The woman pocketed her phone once more and headed towards the salon a few doors down.

“She’s just a local,” I muttered, almost embarrassed. I’d been worrying about nothing. I turned back and headed where I needed to go.

Five minutes later, I was standing on the docks, bundled up in front of Leo’s boats, watching him work. His back was to me as he bent over, grabbing some netting. When he rose to his full height, he began working the net as he twisted his head to look at me over his shoulder.

“What do you need, Carrie?”

I took a step closer to his boat, watching it gently rock back and forth in the water. “Leo,” I called, shoving my gloved hands into my light-yellow puffer jacket. It was freezing out here—and he was just in a thick sweater and jeans, no gloves.

Where the heck were his gloves?

He turned to me and my breath caught.

For the last few weeks, he’d been out at sea, and I could tell the trip took a toll on him. His sandy hair was in disarray as the freezing cold breeze blew it in different directions, his face was covered in scruff, and those once soft green eyes were now hard—guarded.

“What do you need?” he repeated, his voice hard. Leo’s voice was never hard. Not with me—never with me.

My mouth opened and closed as the wind died down.

His jaw tensed. “Carrie, I’m busy. What do you need?”

“I just—” I looked away, gathering the right words. I heard him move, and when I looked back, he was on the dock, coming for me.

“It’s too cold out here for you,” he said.

“Leo, I—”

“It was a bad trip, Carrie. I have to get this boat ready to go back out, okay?” he pressed, growing impatient.

I nodded. It was a hard season for him—for all the fishermen on the docks. The whole town was buzzing about it.

Leo gestured to me. “Again, I ask: what do you need?”

“I need you to come to dinner tonight,” I blurted.

“Dinner?”

“At my place.”

He stared at me.

I took this chance to clarify. “I want to make you dinner tonight—at my place.”

I’d never made him a meal and he’d never made me one. If we ate together, it was always take-out from Margie’s.

But tonight was different.

“Carrie,” he sighed, shaking his head.

“Do you—do you not want to have dinner with me?”

“I don’t want to be jacked around,” he answered simply.

Now, it was my turn to blink. “I’m not…What?”

He took a step towards me. “I’m into you. You know that, right?”

I nodded slowly.

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