Misadventures of a Curvy Girl (Misadventures #18)(28)

Oh.

Oh.

My heart sinks, even as I cling to any reason I can stay. “I still have work to do here,” I protest faintly. “Pictures to take.”

Ben makes a dangerous noise. “Look around you, sweetheart. You think this is the kind of picture your boss wants?”

I glance around the storm-wrecked bar and outside the door to Main Street, which looks just as broken, just as bad.

Caleb lets go of me, although I can feel the reluctance in him, and that gives me the courage to try one last time.

“I could stay…?” I offer. “And help?”

There’s that cold curl to Ben’s mouth now, something almost like a sneer, and I wonder how can this be the man who just crushed me against his chest, the man who just frantically kissed my hair as if to reassure himself I was alive? How?

How can he just change? Close off like this?

“Just get out of here, Ireland,” Ben says, and his entire body is tensed with something that’s either panic or fury. “Don’t make this awkward.”

And those are the words.

Those are the words that slap me across the face—more than go home, more than it’s time for you to leave.

Don’t make this awkward.

Don’t be that fat girl. Don’t be the girl so desperate for affection that she abandons all pretense of dignity and begs for it. Don’t be eager, and don’t be clingy.

Don’t draw attention to yourself.

Don’t ask for more than what people want to give you, because they won’t want to give you much.

I know these don’ts. They’ve been my rulebook since high school, my guiding principles, and every decision I’ve made since turning down that photography scholarship has been because of the don’ts. How could I have fooled myself into thinking last night was something special? I know better—I know better—and I still let myself hope the adventure could last.

“Ireland,” Caleb says, something pained in his voice. But I’m already turning away, I’m already leaving. Crunching over the bricks and glass outside to…to where, exactly?

To the farm, I decide. I’ll walk to the farm. It’s only a couple of miles, and there are only two turns. I can find my way, get my things. Then I’ll walk to my car and leave for home.

They want me to go? Fine. I know the don’ts inside and out. I have them tattooed on the beating flesh of my heart. I know them even better than they do.

I won’t make anything awkward.

I’ll go.





“Ireland, wait!” Caleb calls, jogging up next to me. I’m already to the edge of town, past the place where he’d parked his truck. I’m guessing he stayed behind to talk to Ben, and I’m also guessing that whatever that conversation consisted of would piss me off, so I’m not going to ask about it. Instead, I turn and say, “Yes?” like he’s a complete stranger to me.

Hurt flickers through those green eyes, and for a moment, I feel bad. Then I remember Ben’s cruel words, and I regret nothing.

“Please, Ireland, I—” He squints down at the ground and scratches at his head, as if he’s so lost for words he can’t even remember how to speak them aloud. “I’m—I’m sorry, I guess. I mean, I don’t guess that I’m sorry, I know I am, but sorry isn’t all I want to say. I just don’t know how to say the rest.”

Just go. Just keep walking.

But it’s like I unbottled part of myself last night, and I can’t remember how to bottle it again. “Sorry isn’t an even exchange for being treated like that,” I say, hoping my voice flays him open. Hoping each word is a penknife under his fingernails. And he does flinch and opens his mouth to say something, but I stop him. “If you and Ben don’t want to fuck me again, that’s fine, but I don’t deserve to be shooed away like a dog.”

Caleb slumps his broad shoulders at this. “You’re right. Of course not.”

I start walking again, and he follows me.

I sigh and stop again. “Is this your way of offering me a ride to the farm?” I ask. And even as I ask it, there’s a part of me that hopes he’ll say no, that he’s coming after me to tell me to stay, to tell me that Ben didn’t mean it.

To tell me they both want me to stay.

But he doesn’t tell me that.

“Yes,” he replies. “I’m not letting you walk all the way back to the farm. Or to your car. And I’ve already talked to them on the phone, but I’d like to check on Mrs. Parry and Mrs. Harthcock, so I’m headed that direction anyway.”

Ah, how gentlemanly, I think bitterly. A real gentleman should always give last night’s trollop a ride back to her car, especially if it’s on his way to do other things.

Caleb trots off to fetch his truck, and within a few minutes, I’m inside the cab as the ancient air conditioning roars hot air in our faces and as I try to wipe as much of the sheetrock dust off my face as I can. My hair is a lost cause—I look like I took a shower with grit instead of water—but I still pick out the bigger pieces of gypsum and flick them out the window. I’m examining the scrape on my thigh as we pull onto the gravel driveway of the farm.

Caleb parks the truck and then looks over at me for a minute.

“Get on the porch,” he says gruffly. “I’ll get something for that scrape.”