Page 29 of Years in the Making

The next morning I wake up to a text from Teddy with a timestamp of two a.m.

I didn’t even ask how your day was, I’m a terrible person.

Did you wake up to ask me that?

His response is a guilty-looking emoji.

I hope you at least slept well. Wouldn’t want you falling asleep on the job and being crushed by a tree.

Are you working at the library today?

I am. I start at 9.

By the time I leave for work, he hasn’t responded, and again I try not to let that bother me. He’s at work, work that requires his full attention and both hands. But when I pull up to the library, there is a large truck with a tree logo, and the sound of chainsaws fills the air. Even with the hardhat and his back to me, I can pick Teddy out of the crew as they cut and haul a dead tree to the chipper. I back myself through the doors so I can watch him for as long as possible before clocking in and getting to work. The library isn’t busy at this time in the morning, and it’s easy to hear Teddy’s team working away. Around 10:30, the door opens and a few of the guys walk in. An older man asks me to point them to the washroom, and two of the three walk in the direction I gesture. The third guy stops in front of me, and when I look up I’m greeted by a face I have come to really appreciate.

“Surprise.” He smiles at me, those canines pressing into his lower lip. Teeth that have done zero damage to me but still hold my attention.

I want to pretend to be cross that he hadn’t told me, but my desire to do that is no match for the one that wants me to leap across the counter and plaster myself to him.

“Hi,” I say shyly. “Are you all done?”

He shakes his head. “Nah, still a couple more trees to fell. We’re just taking a break because our schedule allows it today.”

I quickly look around. I’m the only one working until eleven so I slip around the counter, grab his hand, and drag him to a random aisle, hidden from anyone else who may be inside.

“Is this a small-town version of the stacks?” he whispers, his hands moving to my hips and pulling me into him.

“You seem taller,” I observe, moving my hands to his neck.

He nods as he brings his lips to mine. “Boots,” he says against me, that cinnamon breath brushing lightly across my skin.

If one day someone told me I’d be making out in my workplace with the hot tree guy, I would have laughed. But I’m not laughing now as we play “how hard can someone be pushed against these shelves before they topple over?” Turns out, pretty hard, because they’re all bolted to the ground. It feels like flames are going to burst out of my body, and I wonder if Teddy can feel how hot my skin is as his lips trail down my throat.

“Goddamn, I’ve missed you,” he groans just before his lips are back on mine.

I want to say I missed him too, but the desire to kiss him harder wins out as his hands graze the sensitive skin at the base of my shirt. Chills race through me, and I pull on his neck so his lips fuse with mine.

The sound of his coworkers leaving the washroom has us jumping apart so fast we may have broken the sound barrier. As I fix my shirt I watch him casually lean against the shelf across from me, looking down at his feet, eyes closed, and doing deep breathing exercises. Those pants he’s got on may hide a lot now, but while we were plastered together everything was pretty obvious.

“Sorry about that,” he says when we hear the main door shut. “That was the definition of not slow.”

“I’m pretty sure I started it.” I smirk back at him.

“That’s true. You should be the one apologizing, I guess.” I don’t know if it’s the one eyebrow he has quirked, his grin, or simply the inexplicable need to touch him but whatever it is has me erasing the distance between us. Ithread my fingers through the loops in his pants, and look up at him with the most demure expression I can manage.

“Teddy…” I coo.

“Mm-hmm?”

“I’m very sorry.”

He removes his hands from where they’d been holding him up on the shelf and runs them up both my arms until his fingers card through in my hair. Eyes locked on mine he lowers his face, and just when he’s about to kiss me he moves to my ear and whispers. “I’m not.” Then he drops his hands, straightens up, and walks away.

When he reaches the door, he looks back and smiles at me. “Thanks for making reading fun, LG.”

After he’s gone, I go back to the task he distracted me from and replay every second of today’s encounter. My mind keeps reminding me that this is new, take it slow. But my body is telling me the opposite, and right now it may be winning.

TWELVE

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