Page 17 of The Long Way Home
“I’m right, aren’t I?” I ask, trying to keep my tone casual, but my eyes won’t leave her.
“I’m not confirming or denying.” She shrugs one shoulder and tips her bottle back. “Maybe your read is all wrong, and I just hate football.”
A breeze kicks up, ruffling the edge of her tank top, and it forces my eyes to trace down her body. Thankfully, her laugh breaks me from where my thoughts were headed.
“You’re not what I expected.”
“Yeah?” I respond, unsure of which way this could go. I’m pretty sure the last five minutes I went full creeper.
“I thought Josh’s best friend would be—I don’t know. Dumber.”
“Wow.” I bring my hand up, placing it over my heart as if she stabbed me there. “You wound me, Rach.”
“I said what I said,” she smirks into her bottle.
“Well, if we’re being honest,” I start as I dig into the cooler to replace her almost-empty beer. “I thoughtyou’dbe more annoying.”
“Rude.”
“And taller.”
Her jaw drops slightly. “Excuse me? What do you mean, Rhett? I’m like 5’8”, that is tall for a woman.”
“Well, compared to 6’3”, anything between 5’4” and 5’9” feels the same to me.”
She crosses her arms, fighting a smile. “There is such a huge difference between 5’4” and 5’9”. You’re being ridiculous.”
“And yet you’re still talking to me.”
“I’m not sure that is really up to me.” She swaps one leg over the other, pretending to look unimpressed, but the smirk tugging at her mouth gives her away. “Even if I wanted to leave, I’d have to be able to rip Margo away from Josh. And I know you’d think that would be relatively easy, seeing Margo is smaller than me, but she is feisty. Plus, I’m too polite to walk away mid-conversation.”
“Right,” I say, nodding solemnly. “Classic Southern manners. It clearly has nothing to do with my devastating charm.”
“Oh, definitely not that. I could come up with ten more reasons why I’m still here, and you wouldn’t find the word ‘charm’ on the list,” she deadpans. “For example, I’m mostly here for an anthropological study.”
Oh, this outta be good.
“Of what, exactly?”
She gives me a slow once-over. “Of what happens when an overconfident man is left unsupervised near a tailgate cooler and a stranger.”
I bark a laugh. “So this is research for your thesis, then?”
“Exactly. I think I’m going to publish a paper,” She brings her hands up and flashes them as she continues. “‘The Delusions of Males with a Height Advantage: A Case Study.’”
“Clever title,” I say, nudging her knee with mine. “Let me know if you need a quote for your abstract. I’m happy to contribute.”
She nudges me back. “Oh, I’m documenting everything. You’re already test subject A. I think this is going to be a real medical study breakthrough. But don’t worry, your contribution to science won’t go unnoticed,” she replies while giving me a wink at the end. Heat rushes through me, as if she’d leaned in and kissed me full on the mouth instead. Which is ridiculous, because she didn’t kiss me. But it’s good to know something so small can land with that kind of impact. What the hell is happening to me?
“You think you’ve got me all figured out, don’t you?”
Rachel shrugs one shoulder. “Maybe not all. But I’m pretty good at reading people, too. You’re not the only one with that skill, Rhett.”
“Yeah? Care to share? What’s your read on me?”
She pauses, and at first I think she might dodge the question. Then she looks right at me, and I’m suddenly nervous to hear what she thinks of me.
“You come off all laid-back and ‘charming.’” She uses air quotes as she says it. “But underneath that? I think you’re anxious. I think you have this need, or maybe I should say a want, to be the one people count on. The one who steps in when it matters, ie, the Public Health route.”
