Page 77 of Let Me Be the One
Blinking out of her fog, she repeated, “What?”
He half laughed. “You said Sutter was handsome, then you just trailed off and started staring at me again.”
Heat slid up her neck and slowly filled her face. Thank God for low lighting. “You said he was slick, but slick isn’t all that great, especially on a pretentious jerk like Sutter. You’re genuine and he is not. And besides, he’s not a specimen like you.”
“So why does it feel like you just censored that? What were you really going to say?”
“I don’t know.”
He cocked a brow. “Oh, I think you do.”
“Fine.” Deciding he could just deal with the truth, she said, “Everyone I know says Sutter is gorgeous, but his eyes don’t make me forget myself. He doesn’t smell good enough to eat.”
Tanner abruptly sat back in his seat, a fire starting to smolder in his eyes.
On a roll, Callie continued. “He doesn’t openly love his mother and brother the way you do. He doesn’t want to help people—that is, anyone but himself. He doesn’t growl in a way that amuses me, or argue in a way I enjoy. Never, not in a million years, would he know what to do if he found me in a tree during a rainstorm. And I can guarantee he wouldn’t give two flips for a dog, or a goat, or this mysterious horse you keep claiming is mine.”
As she spoke, she breathed faster. Tanner breathed deeper.
Gripping the edge of the table, she leaned in, unable to stop the flow of words. They’d been building the entire week that he’d stayed away. “I never missed sleep thinking about Sutter when I was already exhausted. He would hate having a meal here, in this house, this setting, without power.” The more she said, the more clarity she had. “I could never, not for any reason, suffer through marriage with him.”
The wordmarriageput Tanner on alert. She couldn’t tell if she’d intrigued him or made him want to escape into the storm.
“Relax,” she snapped, peeved by his attitude given the wealth of emotion imploding inside her. “I don’t know you well enough to propose, but I like you enough that I can imagine it.” That sounded absurd so she tacked on, “Not that I have been.” She could say thatwith complete honesty. “I’ve had my hands full just getting through every damned day.” Standing, she picked up her empty plate and went to the sink. Heavy shadows lurked in the corners, shifting with the candle flames, but she knew her way around her own kitchen.
Disposing of the scraps, she scraped her plate and then put it and her fork in the sink before returning to the table. “Snakes,” she muttered, feeling very put out. “Bugs and new locks and weird noises and things that don’t work when they should. Animals that I don’t yet entirely understand.” She snapped up the dishes Addie had sent and sealed the lids over them, before carrying them all to the counter.
“Don’t open the fridge yet,” Tanner warned, his voice calm and even. “Wait until you have everything ready to go inside. That way you’ll only open it once and it’ll stay colder longer.”
“See, you knoweverythingand I know almost nothing, but you don’t rub it in. Sutter would. That is, he’d be all condescending and superior and I’d want to punch him in the throat.”
Seeing Tanner’s grin only amped up her frustration. Especially when he stood and pitched in.
Stepping back, Callie gestured. “And that! Doing kitchen chores like it’s nothing. Big, bad Tanner can work a full day, save a loony neighbor out of a tree, stick with her because she’s falling apart, then smile and help clean up.”
“I didn’t—”
Whatever he was going to say, she didn’t care.
She threw up her hands. “It’s freaking unnatural! What man does that?”
“The good ones?”
Oh, sure—with the insinuation being that she’dpicked nothing but thebad onesfor her entire life? “And then be all jokey-jokey about it?” Even knowing she was being unreasonable, she still wanted to tackle him to the floor and devour him.
She wasn’t sure if he’d let her though, so instead she filled her lungs, clenched her hands, and tried to bring all the excessive feelings under control. Not an easy task in her current frazzled state. “Before coming here, before you and Addie, goats and chickens, Liam and the Garmets, I was a sensible, even-tempered person. People liked me because I was easy and fun, not ranting and irrational.” She jabbed a finger at the table and her voice pitched higher.“In candlelight!”
Tanner watched her like she might start screaming any moment. Or maybe she was already screaming. God, what a day it had been.
“I need a shower,” he said, still in that casual, even tone.
Every muscle in Callie’s body seemed to lock up. Did he mean to shower at her house, or had she just driven him away? If he decided to go, she would not ask him to stay. Absolutely not.
After swiping a cloth over the table and then giving a glance at the dirty dishes in the sink, he faced her. “So.”
Sowhat? She stiffened her spine, belatedly trying to find her pride.
As if nothing much had happened, like he’d had a normal day with a normal woman who hadn’t just gone off on a tirade, Tanner gently rested his heavy hands on her shoulders.
