Page 24 of The Harborer
He corralled his blooming frustration. “Has it occurred to you I’ve picked up on thosesignalsand don’t want anything to do with them? And why is it people assume that when a good-looking woman comes on to a single guy he automatically hops on board with the idea? Like he’s so desperate he couldn’t possibly turn her down?”
In his peripheral vision, Amy’s mouth curved into a smile. “So youdothink she’s attractive.”
He groaned, and Amy busted into laughter. “I’m sorry, Shane. I couldn’t resist teasing you, although Iamcurious why you’re not interested in hanging out with her—not that it’s any of my business—but you’re handsome and single, and we’ve already established she’s also attractive and single.”
The question gave Shane pause, and it had nothing to do with why he wasn’t attracted to Estelle. Instead, he was floored by what Amy had said. She thought he was … handsome? Really? In aheartbeat, his exasperation dissolved, replaced by a cozy warmth oozing behind his chest wall.
“So?” she teased. “Are you going to tell me?”
He puffed his cheeks. “Joy set us up on a blind date last year, and that was enough to discover Estelle’s not my type. I’m pretty sure I’m not hers either.” Their pheromones, if there was such a thing, had clashed. More like rammed each other and detonated, and not in a good way.
Estellewaseasy on the eyes, but she just didn’t do it forhim… like so many of the women he met lately. Nothing clicked; there was no connection. One- or two-nighters with strangers held zero appeal these days. They had a way of leaving him hollowed out.
Besides, Estelle was a uniform chaser. Put an ordinary guy into a firefighter’s bunker gear, and her interest—which might have been on life support—suddenly spiked. Same with EMTs or anyone in a pilot’s flight suit. She wasn’t looking to connect—just collect.
He’d been a little brutal tonight, and he hated doing that, but the woman was insistent. More so than last time. He’d been mildly interested the first time he’d been out with her, but as their date had dragged on, it had become painfully clear they had nothing in common but hormones. Any physical urges had faded right along with the evening.
Amy shrugged and leaned against the door with a tired sigh.
Damn, he wished Micky had been there to take her home. Not because Shanedidn’twant to take her home—he liked having her nearby. She was like a warm ray of sun, even in the pitch dark, and her pleasant floral fragrance filled the cab of his truck. He had no idea what perfume she wore, or if it was her shampoo or lotion, but she smelled really, really good.
Considering she belonged to someone else, he probably liked it a littletoomuch.
Amy’s forehead crinkled. “So generally speaking, she’sattractive, but not in a Shane O’Brien kind of way.”
“I’m not even sure what a ‘Shane O’Brien kind of way’ is, but I guess that sums it up.” He guided the truck slowly around a corner, heading away from Bowen Street. If he rolled along at a two-mile-an-hour clip, he could stretch a very short drive into a slightly less short one.
“The other thing to consider is she’s big-city-sophisticated, and I’m small-town-provincial. It worked out for Charlie and Joy, but they’re the exception.”
Bottom line, he wasn’t interested in starting anything with Estelle. But saying that outright might make him look bad in Amy’s eyes—and he did not want Amy having negative thoughts about him. Why that mattered, he couldn’t say. Only that it did.
“If you don’t know, then why not go out with her while she’s here? You might be surprised by what you discover.”
He chuckled. “You sound exactly like my mom.”
“I do?”
“She’s always trying to set my brothers and me up. ‘Shane, did you see where Debbie so-and-so is visiting for the weekend?’” he said in a falsetto that drew a giggle from his passenger. “Then she hints around about me stopping over and paying my respects to Debbie so-and-so’s family. When I ask her why, she changes the subject.”
Amy turned so she partially faced him in her seat. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say much about your family. You’re a local boy, right?”
He nodded. “Born and raised in Fall River.”
“Do your parents live close by? And your brothers?”
“Dad … left when I was in my early twenties. Mom’s in Pagosa Springs.”
Pagosa was a little over two hours away, which was perfect. Close enough if she needed him in an emergency, but far enough that her meddling was limited to phone calls.
“One of my brothers lives on the East Coast, and my other brother treks all over the world, so he doesn’t really live anywhere.”
“Wow. That sounds so different. Do you see him much?”
“Nope. He’s too busy doing his nomad thing.”
The emotional distance between Shane and his family probably explained why the Hunnicutt brothers felt more like family to him than his own brothers did. People often referred to him as the fourth Hunnicutt, which made sense. They’d had each other’s backs since preschool. And while he figured he and his siblings would rally in a crisis, their lives were so separate that one call every six or eight months was enough to catch up.
She cocked her head to the side. “Your dad left? Where did he go?”
