Page 12 of Get Lost with You
“If you do it right, it feels really good,” another woman said, nodding along.
“Kill me now,” he whispered under his breath.
Jillian ducked her head, avoided his gaze. The women slowly dispersed back to their mats while Anderson went back to their lawn chair next to the cooler.
“What are you doing, Anderson?” he asked, tucking his AirPods in their case before shoving them in his pocket.
“I like to make sure the ladies stay hydrated.”
Of course. That made perfect sense. In Smile.
“Are you going to clean that all up?” Jillian asked softly from beside him.
Levi looked down at her, resisted the urge to touch her in any way even though he really wanted to reach out, maybe take her hand. “Yeah. I guess I’d better.”
She hooked a thumb over her shoulder. “I have a first aid kit in my car.” She gestured with a tilt of her head and started walking toward the far parking lot.
So much for avoiding her; Levi fell into step beside her.
“You realize you have to embarrass yourself in front of me now, right? To even the score?”
Jillian sucked in a breath, stopped in her tracks, and turned to face him. His heart beat faster as she stared up at him, hands on her hips.
Sounds rumbled out of her mouth but nothing coherent as her eyes widened. She shook her head, mumbled something he didn’t catch.
His fingers went to his chin without meaning to and he rubbed the scar there, that long-ago night flashing through his head with startling clarity. He hadn’t thought about her being embarrassed. Really, all he’d thought about other than the fact that his chin wasgushing blood was that Jillian Keller almost kissed him. And he’d been really disappointed that she hadn’t.
The way she’d acted the other day, he wondered not only if she’d forgotten about it but if he’d imagined her feelings. Clearly, she remembered, but obviously it wasn’t the smile-provoking memory for her that, to this day, it was for him.
Six
At well over six feet with wide, muscular shoulders, Levi barely fit in the passenger-side opening of her yellow Beetle. If he was uncomfortable with the lack of space, he didn’t show it. If he thought she was staring too hard or her breathing was oddly erratic, he gave no signs. Other than the slightest of flinches when she cleaned his cuts and scrapes, it almost felt like he was holding his breath. Jillian was doing her very best to not think about his legs or his calves or what it would be like to crawl right onto his lap and—
“Is this the same car you had when you were younger?”
She startled. “It is.”
He pursed his lips, nodded like he didn’t know what to say about that. But it was better than talking about who had embarrassed themselves more. She won that battle hands down.
“When I came home after…” She stopped, glanced up to see him watching her intently. “When my marriage ended, I moved back in with my parents. Right after I got home, my dad asked me to come out to the garage one night.” She smiled, returned to the spot on his calf that she was bandaging up, as she thought about how a little piece of her resurfaced when her dad gave her the car. “I’d sold it before moving away but he got a chance to buy it back, so he did, as a surprise.”
She swallowed past the thickness in her throat. She hadn’t wanted to be a failure at marriage, but God, she’d wanted to come home. She was so happy to be back in Smile, and getting her teenage car back made her feel lighter. Hopeful. It was step one in a pretty long healing journey.
Levi was still looking at her as she crumpled the Band-Aid packages. She tried to breathe through her nose as she reminded herself he was just a man and she was no longer an innocent young girl who plucked petals off flowers as she chanted “he loves me, he loves me not.” She hadn’t been that girl in a very long time.
The memory of getting her car back, along with his proximity, was doing strange things to her nervous system. She let out a sharp breath, exhaling the rough pieces of the past, then stood up. Before she could move back, he unfolded his long body, rose slowly, like he was allowing her time to adjust to his nearness. Smart would have been stepping away;stayingaway. Jillian was smart. Just not in this particular instance. Not when it came to Levi.
“Thanks for taking care of me,” he said.
Her pulse wobbled. “You should watch out for coolers.”
When he laughed, she felt it along her skin, and for one split second, she ached to close the distance and take the kiss she’d craved all those years ago.
She frowned up at him, remembering that night and what he’d just said about evening the score. Shewasn’ta kid anymore. They could address the long-buried mortification head-on. He might not even remember.
“Back to the whole embarrassment tally. Pretty sure I have you beat for the rest of our lives.”
He didn’t follow her when she walked over to a garbage can, got rid of the wrappers, then wandered back.
