Page 319 of The Parkers' Handsome Holiday
Still, there was a nagging feeling inside of me that I hadn’t heard the whole story. I shrugged to myself. I had wanted to talk to Adam anyway. It shouldn’t be too hard to track him down. I wasn’t sure it was right for me to talk to him about our relationship while we were there at the mountain. After all, we were going to need to set certain boundaries. But as his boss, I should probably know if something was bothering him, shouldn’t I?
I headed out of my office, pausing when I saw Kayla. “Hey,” I said. “Any idea where Adam headed off to?”
“Think I saw him going over towards the condos with his toolbox,” she said. “Everything all right?”
“Just one of those mornings,” I said, rolling my eyes. And it really was: I was already starting to feel emotionally exhausted, and it wasn’t even ten-thirty yet. But things would be better once I talked to Adam, I was sure. I shook my head. “Thanks, Kayla,” I told her. “Full recount later.”
“I’m counting on it,” she said, grinning at me.
It wasn’t too hard to find Adam over at the condos, up on a ladder as he fiddled with the heat coils meant to melt the snow off one section of the roof so that icicles and dangerous icy patches didn’t form as the sun hit it.
“Adam?” I called from the bottom of the ladder, shading my eyes as I looked up towards the sun.
I couldn’t see his face very well from that angle, but he was definitely looking down at me, and he sounded normal as he said, “What’s up?”
“Just wanted to make sure that you’re okay,” I said, feeling foolish for asking. Maybe I had been too hard on Ian before, when he just wanted to help, and maybe now I was blowing things out of proportion with Adam too. Maybe he was feeling totally fine, and fine about us, he just didn’t want to be too friendly with me while we were at work. That was for the best anyway, I was sure.
“Yeah, fine,” Adam said shortly. “Just working away. Did you need something?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “I just…” I trailed off before I repeated that I just wanted to make sure that he was okay. Clearly, he was. “It’s good to see you back at work, that’s all,” I told him, even though I wasn’t sure that that was something that I was allowed to say out here, where anyone could overhear it.
Adam merely grunted in response, and I took that as my cue. “Well, if you need anything from me, let me know,” I told him.
“I will,” he said, turning back to his work.
I walked back inside, trying to shake the feeling that he was being distant to me. He was just trying not to be too obvious about us while we were at work. That was probably a good thing. That was the responsible thing, really.
Still, I found myself thinking about him all day, wondering if he was taking on too much work given the time that he’d been gone earlier in the week. I went skiing with Ian for the afternoon, and I couldn’t stop thinking about skiing with Adam and Ethan and how much I really wanted to do that at some point. I wanted to spend more time with Adam, that was it.
I couldn’t remember ever feeling this interested in someone before, but instead of scaring me or otherwise bothering me, I honestly felt excited by it. So I caught Adam as he was on his way out that night. “Hey,” I said, grinning at him.
He paused, staring at me for a moment. I blushed, patting my hair. It was probably going wild from being under my helmet for the afternoon. “Did you go skiing?” Adam finally asked.
I nodded. “Yeah, Ian and I went,” I admitted. “It was a good afternoon.”
Adam nodded slowly back at me, shifting back and forth from foot to foot. He glanced around like he was worried one of the other employees would see us and put two and two together. But nearly everyone had gone home by then.
“I was wondering if you wanted to come over for dinner before you go home for the night,” I said, wondering if he would calm down a little once we were in private. I knew that he had told me I would need to be patient with him, and I sort of wondered if I was the first person that he had dated since Ethan’s mom. His nervousness was honestly kind of cute, actually.
But for now, he shook his head. “I have to get back to Ethan,” he said.
“Oh, of course,” I said, trying not to feel disappointed. I knew exactly what I was getting into with him, after all. I wanted to spend more time with him, but I had to respect the fact that he had a life as well. I smiled at him. “Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”
Adam nodded at me. “See you tomorrow,” he agreed. For a moment, he hesitated, almost like he wanted to say something else. Or kiss me goodbye, maybe? But then, he glanced around again, gave an aborted wave, and left.
I grinned after him, unable to help it. If he was this nervous around me, it meant that he cared about me, didn’t it? And even though I knew that I needed to stay focused on my job, even though I knew that Ian hadn’t quite come around to my relationship with Adam just yet, things felt good between us, and it was nice to think that he cared.
CHAPTER 34
ADAM
I managed not to run into Bailey on Friday. Not that I was avoiding her. But I still couldn’t stop thinking about what Ian had said to me about her deserving someone better. I was busy anyway. Maybe if I just gave it a little time, she would come to her senses, or get interested in something or someone else, and we would never have to have the awkward conversation about how she didn’t really want to be with me.
I sure hoped so, anyway.
I mean, I didn’t. If I had my way, I would have taken Bailey up on that dinner on Thursday, and maybe something more. Oh, I had to get back to Ethan, that was true. I couldn’t stay the night there. But he and his grandfather had been playing video games when I got back. They would have been fine for another hour or so. Longer, maybe. I knew that Dad was, in his silent way, happy to think that I might have found someone again.
Sometimes, I wondered why he was so okay with being alone but didn’t seem to support the same thing for me. But then again, I was a lot younger than he had been when he and Mom split up. And although I took after him in a lot of ways, he was a lot more of a loner than I could ever be.
