Something in the Way (Something in the Way #1)(62)

She checked her makeup in her compact. “Last night?”

“Your date.”

“Oh.” She snapped the mirror shut. “So good. So so good.”

The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. “Really?”

“Not even in a sexual way. Manning just made me realize I’ve been dating boys all this time when there are men out there.”

“How?” It came out as a whisper, so I cleared my throat. “What did he do?”

“He arranged this dinner just for me. We had a great talk, where he opened up so much.”

“About what?”

“Our relationship and stuff.” She shook her head. “His sister died.”

It came out fast, like an afterthought or an unwarranted slap across the face. I couldn’t believe he’d shared that with her after I’d asked about his family and he’d said he didn’t talk about it. With anyone. Not even me. He’d given Tiffany this intimate piece of himself and me nothing.

When the shock wore off, it hit me. He’d had a little sister. And she was gone. His gentleness with me, at times, could be almost brotherly, the way he didn’t smoke or curse in my presence. I couldn’t deny the attraction between us, but it made more sense, his sadness, his intensity, if he was a big brother without a little sister.

“Then he walked me back to my cabin,” Tiffany continued. “He never acts like I owe him anything. He was a gentleman, you know?”

That sounded like Manning to me. A gentleman, someone who’d never push me to do anything I wasn’t comfortable with. I wanted that for Tiffany, to be treated well, but not enough to give her Manning.

“Can you be more specific?” I asked.

“He was trying to be polite at first . . .”

At first. At first? “Then what?”

“Here’s a lesson you’re going to learn sooner or later, Lake, so it might as well be sooner. Men’s brains turn to mush with a little physical contact.”

My chest rattled with each breath, caving in on itself. I didn’t even know enough about men to understand if getting physical could mean just a kiss or if it was always more. What I wouldn’t give for a dinner date with Manning. And then to be alone with him afterward, to have our first kiss in the quiet dark under pine trees.

“I’m starting to like this place,” she said. “It’s romantic.”

I didn’t get a chance to ask for details. The boy who’d been pacing around like a predator finally pounced. “Tiffany, right?” he asked. “We went—”

“High school?” she asked.

His face lit up as he wrung his hands. He was definitely more prey than predator. “Yeah! You remember. Armando Diaz.”

If Manning wasn’t coming, I didn’t want to be here. “You can sit here, Armando,” I said, standing.

He took my spot without a glance in my direction. “Thanks.”

After saying goodnight to Hannah, I left the hall. My tennis shoes barely made a sound on the forest floor on the way to my cabin. Bushes I couldn’t even see rustled. There were no lights, just the sliver of a crescent moon, but even it was blocked by trees. Frogs burped a chorus by the lake.

I heard footsteps before I saw anyone. It unnerved me, not being able to see who was there, which direction they were coming from. I turned around. “Hello . . .?”

“You’re not making a very good case for walking alone in the woods,” Manning said.

It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to his big frame a few feet in front of me, shadowed, but undeniably his.

“Haven’t you ever seen Friday the 13th?” he asked.

“No.”

“Is everyone in your family this stubborn?”

I wanted to make some remark about his family and how he’d betrayed me by telling Tiffany something it would’ve made more sense to tell me, someone who cared. But if it was true about his sister, a snarky comment didn’t seem right. “I’m not trying to be,” I said. “I didn’t want to stay in there by myself.”

“You have your sister. Your friends are in there. You have Hannah.”

I don’t have you. Before him, I would’ve loved having Tiffany treat me like a friend instead of a pest. Now, I didn’t care to be anywhere Manning wasn’t. I glanced at the ground. “Why didn’t you come tonight?”

“I’m on patrol. Supposed to be walking the site, checking on cabins.”

I exhaled softly, quietly relieved. He hadn’t purposely been avoiding me. “Can I walk with you?”

He hesitated. “It’s not really a two-person job.”

“I’m not ready to go to sleep. Please?”

Silhouetted against the trees, he ran a hand through his hair. “I’ll walk you back to your bunk, but we can take the long way.”

He passed me, and I turned to follow him in the opposite direction of my cabin. “Did you have a good day?”

“We have to be quiet. Don’t want to wake up the kids.”

“Did you have a good day?” I whispered.

His sigh ended in a light laugh. “It was hectic. Yours?”

“I got a bullseye during archery.”

“Yeah?” He sounded impressed. “None of my boys managed that. Me, neither.”