Page 7 of Tourist Season
“Okay.” His focus lingers on me for a moment as though he needs to be sure I’ll stay, and then he lifts his hand away, turning to face Maddison. “I’ll take a turkey sandwich to go, please, and an Earl Grey tea with two tea bags.”
A grin sneaks onto my lips and I shake my head. When I look up at my companion, his expression is a mirror of mine.
There’s something addictive about holding his attention. I forgot how fun it was to let my guard down a little. Suddenly, I find myself wanting to say something witty, or cute. Poke fun at him maybe. Like, “Turkey and tea? You sound like trouble.” No, my God, that’s fucking awful. At this rate, I probably can’t trust that anything worthwhile will come out of my mouth.
So what if I just smile a certain way instead? Hold on to those green eyes of his that break away from mine to watch my fingersfold a lock of hair behind my ear? I thought I’d forgotten how to do this. How to flirt with a man. I thought I’d shut all that away years ago. I might be only a few months shy of twenty-nine, but I thought I’d buried those skills a long time ago. I thought they’d died the day I did.
The next patron in line steps between us to order, shattering the hum in the air that crackles like a spell. My new friend moves to the pickup counter as Maddison puts his order together, and though I leave his side to put cream and sugar in my coffee at the little stand along the wall, I can feel him watching me. But I don’t return to his side when I’m done.
Instead, I pretend to observe the people around me who chat about potholes and shipwrecks and gossip from town, or museums and ghost tours and plays at the Carnage theater. But really, I’m stealing glances at him. I notice details, because that’s what I’ve trained myself to do. Like the wear on his hiking boots, the leather scuffed, the soles caked with a thin layer of dried mud as though he spends most of his time on his feet. I catalog the lighter streaks in his hair. The tattoo that wraps around one forearm, an ouroboros. The scar that follows the curve of his elbow, disappearing beneath his rolled-up sleeve. I notice the way he tilts his head from side to side, loosening some hidden tension lodged between his bones. I especially notice the way he scans the other patrons with a cold and clinical detachment, but his focus always returns to me. And every time it does, he smiles. He seems observant, but remote. It’s as though his charm is a well he can draw from when he chooses. But the rest of the time? He’s stoic, like that well is hidden in a faraway landscape. A place he keeps carefully guarded.
Maybe that should scare me. But it only adds to the gravitational force that beckons me closer.
When he has his sandwich and drink in hand, he joins me to add a splash of milk to his tea. With a sweep of his gaze around the small café, he looks at me with a crease between his brows. “Busy place. There’s nowhere to sit.”
I shrug, though my nonchalance feels forced. “Typical for the Bean, even early in the tourist season. But we can walk, if you like?”
I’m not sure why those words just exited my mouth. I barely manage to stop short of offering to show this guy around downtown. I’m not that kind of person anymore, one who puts herself out there to strangers so easily. I used to be. And then, one beautiful, innocuous August day, it cost me more than I ever thought possible.
But there’s something about this man that seems so different from the other tourists who pass through Carnage, people I only pay attention to long enough to assess as a threat to my town. Something about him is almost familiar. Maybe it’s in the way he seems removed from the rest of the busy café as he gives the room one last assessing look. Maybe it’s the way he appraises the coffee shop as though searching for threats that gives me reassurance. Or maybe it’s in the way his expression clears when his attention returns to me and he smiles. “I’d like that,” he says, and for a blink of time, a single heartbeat, the world around us disappears.
I clear my throat. Give a faint nod. Then I turn and lead the way to the door, but he reaches past me before I can touch it, pushing it open for me to pass through. And I can’t stop the flutter of excitement that dances behind my ribs.
“So, how does a person wind up in a town with a name like Cape Carnage? Is it a ‘come for the name, stay for the ballmeat’ kind of situation?” the man asks, taking a bite of his sandwich aswe amble down the street toward the quaint downtown, filled with independent shops and quirky restaurants. I chance a glance up at him and I’m met with his teasing grin, and even though I expected its pull, I still feel unprepared for the magnetic force of it.
“The ballmeat is a big draw, for sure. Premium ballmeat in Carnage.” I smirk into the lid of my coffee before taking a sip.
“Not eating?”
“No, saving it for later,” I say as I pat my bag where the foil-wrapped bone is hidden. I meet his eyes only briefly, hoping my smile comes off less forced than it feels in my skin. “Is that what brought you here? The premium ballmeat?”
“Honestly, no. It was the tea bagging.” I huff a laugh and I can feel the warmth of his amusement next to me. “I’m here on vacation.”
“I never would have guessed.”
“What gave me away?”
I shrug. “I know every face in town. And I don’t know yours.”
“How many people live in Carnage?”
“Four thousand, two hundred and ten.”
“And you know every person here.”
I look up to find him scrutinizing me with narrowed eyes, the warmth in them still there, though it’s veiled by a thin layer of suspicion. “Yeah. I do.”
“Born and raised here?”
“No,” I say, flicking a wave to Diane Montgomery, the owner of the Starlight Boutique across the street. She waves back before entering the clothing store. “Just had time and motivation, I guess.” I lift a shoulder and look up at my companion, and though the suspicion still lingers in the crease between his brows, it softens. “What about you? Why are you here, of all places?”
“Bird-watching.”
I pause, staring him down with a furrowed brow. “Bird-watching.”
His eyes dance in a way that makes me think he enjoys my disbelief. “You heard me, Meatball.”
“Don’t you dare. You’ll be wearing this coffee,” I say on the heels of a groan. He smiles at my threat, taking a sip of his tea.
