As the words spilled out of his mouth, he frowned.
What on earth had prompted that?
She came to an abrupt halt at the steps to her front porch, looking as surprised as he felt. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I know, but . . .” He scrambled to come up with a logical reason for his impromptu offer. “There, uh, will be some blood.”
Some of the color leached from her face. “How much?”
“Not a lot. How much does it take to make you queasy?”
“Not a lot.”
That’s what he’d assumed.
“It’s up to you . . . but in light of what happened today, you might want to let me handle wound care tomorrow. After that, there should be minimal, if any, blood on the dressing.”
Grimacing, she fingered her key ring. “At this rate, you’re going to be sorry you ever crossed paths with me. I’m becoming a pest.”
“I wouldn’t use that term.”
“Thanks for being diplomatic.”
More like honest—but better to leave that unsaid.
“What time would work best for you?”
“Are you going to services in the morning?”
Good question.
He hadn’t attended any yet, other than the one for Skip—but he ought to get back into the habit. Now that he was stateside again, with a more reasonable schedule, there was no excuse to skip a weekly visit with God.
“Yes.”
“Which one?”
“I haven’t decided.”
“I’ll be at the eight-thirty. We have donuts afterward, and I always help serve. I should be home by ten-thirty.”
“Why don’t I meet you here about noon?”
“Would you rather I come to Ned’s house?”
“No.” He flashed her a grin. “And you wouldn’t offer if you could see the place. All the rooms are piled with boxes, and the dust bunnies have taken up permanent residence. I was planning to swing by the lighthouse tomorrow anyway. Skip and I used to do that every Sunday after church.”
Another wave of mist swept in, and she moved up under the porch roof. “I’ll let you go before you get soaked . . . but I do want to thank you for asking your buyer to wait four weeks for an answer to his offer. I’ve formed a committee to work on ideas. Our first meeting is tomorrow afternoon.”
“I heard about that from Greg. And for the record, I hope you succeed. You may not believe this after our last discussion at the lighthouse, but I’d like to save it too, if possible.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” More damp air coiled around them. “You’d better get going or you’ll be socked in. I’ll thank you properly tomorrow for the lighthouse reprieve.” She stuck a key in the knob and turned it. Fitted a second one into the dead bolt that was inches from a security system sticker.
As she pushed open her door, the alarm began to beep.
His cue to exit. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Thanks again.”
She closed the door, and as he stepped off the porch, a slider lock was pushed into place with a muffled snick.
Marci had a serious hang-up about security.
Perhaps tomorrow he could find out what was up with all her defensive measures.
Curious as he was about her private Fort Knox, however, it was her parting comment that kept replaying in his mind while he jogged toward the truck.
“I’ll thank you properly tomorrow for the lighthouse reprieve.”
Of course she hadn’t meant anything personal with that remark.
But the image running through his mind of what a proper thank-you from her could entail was very personal.
And inappropriate.
Ben slid behind the wheel and clamped his jaw together as the irony of his situation registered.
Since the day they’d met, he’d been skittish about Marci’s volatile temperament. Out-of-control emotions were very, very scary.
Yet he’d begun succumbing to the same affliction in her presence.
Fingers gripping the wheel, he ticked off the evidence as he backed out of her driveway and accelerated toward town.
The night she’d called the police on him, he’d been rude and terse. At the headland on Monday, he’d lost his usual cool. Earlier today, after she’d fallen off the ladder and tumbled into his arms, his emotions had been as tangled as their arms and legs.
While he might hide his roiling feelings better than she did, they were there, no more than a microscopic layer below the surface.
As for the electricity sparking between them—that, too, appeared to be short-circuiting the left side of his brain . . . and his common sense.
It was almost as if Marci had infected his emotions with jumble-itis.
Ben slowed to negotiate one of the trickier curves in the road, and the small, rustic wooden cross that had hung from Skip’s rearview mirror for as long as he could remember began to swing.
Too bad his grandfather wasn’t around to offer some of the folksy, sage counsel he’d spouted each summer, some of it on this very road . . . and one particular piece on a misty day like this, not long after his parents separated during his tenth year.
From the depths of his consciousness, the memory of that exchange surfaced.
He and Skip had been driving through the fog, and during a lull in their conversation, he’d begun to think about the pending divorce. Tears had welled in his eyes—and much to his chagrin, one had spilled out.
Naturally, Skip had noticed—and he’d reacted in his usual address-the-problem-rather-than-let-it-fester style.
“It’s okay to have feelings, son. Good and bad. Never be ashamed to let them out.”
“Grown-ups don’t c-cry.”
“Who says?”
“D-dad never cries.”
Skip gave a dismissive wave. “He cried plenty growing up—and I expect he’s crying this summer too. It’s rough when two people who stand before God and vow to love each other forever decide they can’t keep that promise anymore.”
Funny how Skip always seemed to know what was on his mind.
“Maybe they didn’t try hard enough.”
“Maybe. Or it could be they should never have made the promise in the first place.”
“I wish they hadn’t.” He kicked at a piece of gravel on the floorboard. “I wish they’d never gotten married!”
“No, you don’t.” Skip’s voice was calm and measured. “You wouldn’t be here if they hadn’t—and I wouldn’t have the finest grandson in
