Tangle (Dogwood Lane 2)

She looks at me out of the corner of her eye. I can’t help but wonder what she sees when she looks at me.

“What kind of guy am I?” I ask finally.

She shrugs. “I don’t know. Depends on the day.”

“Today, then.”

“I’d say today you’re . . . charismatic. Cute.”

“I hate that word,” I grumble.

“Okay. How’s ‘unavailable’ sound?”

“Fair enough.” I stretch out my legs, my body tight. “For the record, you’re the epitome of the women whose hearts I keep breaking.”

“I’ll play. What kind of girl am I?”

Every word that pops in my mind is one I can’t say—one I shouldn’t say. Words like “captivating” and “sexy” aren’t going to help.

I twist my lips as she watches me and awaits my answer.

“Charming,” I say, landing on the word closest to “charismatic” I can find. “Adorable.”

“You make me sound like a little boy,” she whines.

“Okay. How’s ‘available’ sound?”

“Ugh,” she groans. “See? Right there. That’s the problem.”

“What? That I go for the available ones? I’m sorry. I thought that was the right thing to do.”

“No. That you say ‘available’ like it’s a curse word. Like it makes us needy.” Her eyes burn with an intensity that I can’t look away from. “Yes, I want to be in a relationship. Yes, I want to be loved and needed, and that’s not a bad thing.”

“No, it’s not, theoretically. But it is when the proverbial ‘you’ thinks they’re going to get those things from me when I’m crystal clear it’s not going to happen.” I sigh. “I don’t like hurting people’s feelings, Haley. I go into relationships with all my cards on the table, and I still walk out of it feeling like a prick.”

She takes a napkin out of the container. Folding it over and over, her chest rises and falls faster. “For the record,” she says, “I don’t like wanting guys who don’t want me in the same way. If I could figure out how to do that, I wouldn’t do it either.”

I turn away from her for both our sakes. “Seems pretty easy to me. Stay away from guys like me.”

“Well, guys like you could not let girls like me in your bed.”

“There go my plans for tonight,” I joke.

We chuckle together. I barely hear the sound over the clatter of the kitchen, but somehow, it almost drowns it out too.

Although I’ve been clear and up front, I feel . . . disappointment. It’s like the lines have been drawn, and I feel bereft because of it. But she’s right. Guys like me should not let girls like Haley in my bed.

She gets to her feet slowly. Claire comes by and asks if she wants her lunch put on her tab. They have a quiet conversation as I busy myself with checking my nonexistent new text messages. I look up when Haley stands next to me.

“Here’s your coat.” She extends a hand, my jacket dangling from her fist. “Thanks again.”

“No problem.” I take it from her, watching the browns and golds in her eyes swirl together.

There’s something I want to say, but I can’t articulate it. When I don’t say anything more, the light in her eyes dims, and she turns toward the door.

I could stop her if I tried. But I don’t. What good would that do?

CHAPTER TEN

HALEY

The clock on the wall at Mucker’s is shaped like a pizza. Each hour is marked with another topping. The seven is a pepperoni and the time Claire was supposed to meet me here for dinner twenty minutes ago.

I don’t text her, because it’s futile. She never texts me back.

The book in front of me, the one I borrowed from the library this afternoon, promises to make résumé writing easy. It lies—that, or I just have nothing to put on a list of qualifications.

I look up to see Claire’s car pulling in front of the restaurant. She gets out, puts her purse on her shoulder, and starts toward the door. Then stops. She waves before talking with an animation I know means she won’t make it inside for another twenty minutes.

My stomach rumbles. I turn to flag down Alexis to place an order, but when my gaze lands on Claire again, my hand falls to my side.

Trevor is standing next to my friend. He looks freshly showered and shaved. A green pullover hides some of the ridges of his body, and if I could stop looking at his face, I might be annoyed by that.

It’s really disappointing that I didn’t meet him six months ago. Back then, I didn’t care whether I could get on the same page with a guy. I jumped in and hoped for the best. I just had to go and start making sense a bit too soon.

Trevor points toward the building as Claire laughs. She shakes her head and shrugs.

My pulse strums through my veins as I watch them talk like old friends and wish I were out there too. I grip the edges of the table, not sure whether to push back and stand or keep myself in place. The decision is made for me when Claire’s eyes shift from Trevor through the window to me.