Feels like Trouble (Lake Fisher 4)

Her cheeks get even more pink. “Then what is it?”

“I…I don’t know yet.” My tone of voice hints at my frustration. “What do you think it is?”

“Well, seeing as how for the past twenty-five years we haven’t been able to be within ten feet without threatening to murder one another, I’d say what we’re doing is brand new.” She gives a little shiver as if she’s cold. “It’s weird, right? It feels weird.” She shivers again and grins at me. “So, no girlfriend?” She waggles her eyebrows at me, which makes me laugh.

“No girlfriend,” I confirm.

“What was your last relationship?” she asks. “Was it Penny-Rae Peterson? I heard a rumor you were dating her.”

I shake my head. “I took her out for a movie after her husband left her. But we were never a thing.”

“Oh.” She looks kind of disappointed.

“What about you?” I ask. I hold my breath.

“What about me?” she says.

“Do you have a boyfriend?” I ask, adding a comical lilt to my tone along with a whimsical eyebrow waggle.

She shakes her head. “No.”

“That’s all I get?”

She grins. “Yes.”

“Come on,” I tease. “You have to tell me something.”

“Who was your last girlfriend?” she counters instead. “Somebody from here?”

I shake my head. “No, she lived in the next town over.”

“Why’d you break up?”

I shrug. “It just wasn’t right.”

“For you or for her?” She stares at me.

I shrug again. “Both of us, I guess. It was mutual. I could see her toda

y and still be nice to her.”

“Well, that’s important.”

I twirl my fork in the air. “And you?” I ask again, not wanting to let her off the hook so easily. I keep eating as I listen to her talk.

“I dated a few men, but none of them ever stuck. I always ended up bored.” She looks everywhere but at me. “Did you always end up bored too?”

I take a moment to think, and realize she might be on to something. “Yeah, I guess you could say that. Nothing wrong with them. Just…lost interest.”

A grin tugs at her mouth. “These pancakes are amazing.” She spears a dripping stack and holds it out close to my mouth. “Want a bite?”

I open my mouth warily, afraid it’s a set-up and she’s waiting to smear syrup all over my face. Or worse. But she doesn’t. She just slides the fork back out of my mouth, and I chew. “I think she did spit on your pancakes,” I say after a moment. I lick my lips. “And she was chewing spearmint gum when she did it. Gross.”

“You’re disgusting,” she says and tosses my napkin back at me.

I let out a laugh. “And you’re a pushover. Your pancakes are fine.”

“Just for that…” She leans over the table and scoops up some of my sausage gravy, sticks it in her mouth, and sighs. “So good.”