“Then I’ll take it to go,” I suggest. “I’m perfectly happy eating at home.”
“Just, um, really quick—you would be at home alone, right?” Penn asks. “I mean, there’s no one there waiting on you?”
I try to ignore the way his lips twist to hide a grin. “How smart would it be for me to tell you if I’ll be at home alone?”
“It wouldn’t,” Matt says quickly. “Trust me. Bad idea.”
Penn glares at him before turning his attention back to me. “It would be super smart. What if something happened to you and you didn’t know who to call? Come to think of it, I should totally give you my number too.”
“Nine-one-one is pretty convenient. I think I’ll be okay.”
“Ooh, she doesn’t want your number,” Matt jokes. “Let’s write this one down in the record books, boys.”
“Will you shut the hell up?” Penn sighs. “Give the girl some time. It’s probably pretty overwhelming to meet me.” He turns slowly, his eyes full of salaciousness. “I’ll give you some time. No worries.”
I roll my eyes to distract him from the goose bumps breaking out across my skin.
“You can give me all the time you want,” I say. “It won’t make a difference.”
Instead of being dissuaded, his position solidifies. The look on his face threatens to dissolve me where I’m standing. It’s heady, a mixture of alpha and beta. A combination of sweet and sexy that’s so intoxicating that I feel like I’ve already had a drink. But I’m not going to entertain that reaction.
I need to find out who I am, not who wants to sleep with me, and I have little faith that giving in to Penn will somehow become an epiphany about my life.
Epiphanies over orgasms. I need that on a shirt.
“Do you really believe that?” He raises a brow.
“Absolutely.” I rip my gaze away from him and flip it to Matt. “Where’s the bathroom around here?”
He points across the patio to a door behind the makeshift tiki bar. There’s no hiding his amusement with Penn and me. “Want me to show you?”
“I can find it. Thanks.” I start to step that way but stop. “If the waitress comes back, will you tell her I’ll just have a bacon cheeseburger, no onion? And to take it to Harper’s table?”
Matt grins smugly. “Will do.”
My eyes drag over Penn as I focus once again on the bathroom.
The jerk is smirking.
I flash him my sassiest smile and walk away.
CHAPTER EIGHT
AVERY
The bathroom is clearly marked and also thankfully unoccupied. I dart inside, my mind racing, and fiddle with the lock. A screw is missing, and it takes forever to get it latched. Once I do, I collapse against the wall and breathe.
There’s a little sink with a mirror hanging above it that looks like it was put there before I was born. The toilet is obscured from view by a wall. The room definitely leaves a bit to be desired but is somehow still charming.
I close my eyes and inhale a deep lungful of air.
“Look at me, walking away,” I say out loud.
A dose of pride washes over me because that wasn’t easy. But I did it. I didn’t cave.
Laughter drifts through the crack between the door and the floor, and I find myself listening for Penn’s voice. It doesn’t take long until the friendly timbre makes its way to me.
Even if I could actually avoid him in this town of nine-hundred-or-so people, I don’t know that I’d want to. He’s funny and friendly, and everyone who knows him seems to like him, even Harper. And the way he talked to Lorene today at the salon was downright adorable.
“But that’s the problem. He’s everything I like. He’s just everything I don’t trust too,” I whisper to myself.
My mind projects the next six months like a home movie. There are two potential end results if I give in to Penn.
The first is that we hook up and then move on. That wouldn’t be terrible if it weren’t a complete waste of time. Also, it has me repeating the same behavior I’ve had my whole life: giving in to what other people want when it’s not what I want.
Not that I don’t want to sleep with Penn. I do. So much. So, so much. But it’s a one-night stand—a week at most—and I’m not in the market for that. I don’t want to be.
The second potential outcome is that we somehow finagle things into a semblance of a relationship. But would it even be a relationship I wanted to be in? Or just a relationship that has an expiration date on it from the get-go?
I sigh. “You are not even thinking about this,” I tell myself. “You promised yourself you’d find someone that truly wants you. That’s probably not Penn. No, that’s definitely not Penn.”
This is true, regardless of what Harper says. Case in point: he doesn’t even remember me. While he’s not to blame, it is a red flag for future interactions.