Page 55 of A Brambleberry Summer

“Have you had dinner?” he asked instead. “We were about to order takeout from the Thai place in town. Buying you dinner is the least I can do for your help last night.”

She looked shocked by the invitation. For a moment, he thought she was about to say yes. She looked at Logan, who was now digging in the dirt nearby, with a softness in her eyes that touched him deeply.

After a moment, she looked back at Wyatt, her expression shielded again.

“No, thank you.”

He wasn’t expecting the outright rejection and didn’t know what to say for a few seconds. “If you don’t like Thai food, there’s a good Indian place with fabulous curry that just opened on the other side of town. I’ve heard they deliver, too. Or we can hit up the trusty taco truck down the beach.”

“I like Thai food,” she said, her voice low.

He gazed at her, confused. Was ithimshe didn’t like? “Have you already eaten, then?”

She shook her head. “No. I’m not really hungry and I have much work to do tonight.”

“We can help you after we grab dinner,” he suggested.

After a moment, she sighed, looking distressed again. “I...think it is best if we do not spend a great deal of time together.”

“Why not?” He was either being particularly dense or she was being obtuse. “I thought we were friends. That’s what you said last night.”

“Yes. And then you kissed me and I forgot about being friends and...wanted more.”

He felt his face heat up. He could be such an idiot sometimes. Did he really think they could go back to a casual friendship after he had basically had a breakdown in her arms the night before, and then kissed her with all the pent-up loneliness and need inside him?

“Neither of us is looking for romance right now,” Rosa went on, deliberately looking away from him. “I know this. But when you kiss me, I forget.”

He did, too. When he kissed her, when he felt her arms around him and her soft mouth under his and the curves he longed to explore, Wyatt wanted to forget everything and get lost in the wonder and magic of holding her.

Rosa was right. Neither of them was looking for romance. The more time they spent together, the harder it was becoming for him to remember that.

It would be better to keep their distance until his house was fixed, when he and Logan would move out. Once things were back to normal and he didn’t run the risk of bumping into her every time he came home, they would be able to go back to their regular lives.

No more moonlit kisses on the stairway, no more quiet talks on the front porch of Brambleberry House.

Just him and his son and his work.

The future seemed to stretch out ahead of him, gray as a January day.

What if he was beginning to want more?

Chapter Twelve

Aweek later, he stood at his sister’s kitchen sink, helping Carrie thread vegetables onto skewers for the grill.

“Thanks for having us for dinner. I’ve been so busy, I haven’t had much time to cook and I think Logan is getting a little tired of the taco truck for dinner.”

Carrie laughed. “Surely not. Who could be tired of that?”

He impaled a yellow squash on the metal skewer, followed by a mushroom and then a slice of onion. “I feel like I haven’t seen you since the Fourth. Tell me all about your trip.”

After taking Bella to the concert in Portland a week earlier, Joe and Carrie had driven down to San Francisco for a few days with her.

“It was fun. We did all the touristy things. Alcatraz, riding a cable car, going to Fisherman’s Wharf. And, of course, shopping. You can’t visit San Francisco without spending too much money. We bought some cute school clothes for the new year.”

He needed to start thinking about the new school year. Logan would be starting second grade. Wyatt still had a hard time believing he was that old.

He was finishing the last of the skewers while Carrie did some shrimp and some chicken when the doorbell rang.

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