“That was very brave of you,” she said.
“People do it all the time—go to jail for what they believe in. Journalists do it. Protesters do it. I bet you a hundred dollars Mary Jacob has been arrested.” Then he grinned. “Tell me about the boys. Tell me about your brother. Tell me again why you don’t have a boyfriend.”
So she told him about her nephews and her brother, just brief sketches, but he was very interested. He reciprocated by telling her things she didn’t already know about Cal and Sierra. But then she asked the question he knew would come eventually. “Will your parents be at the wedding?”
“I don’t think Sierra will invite them. My father suffers from dementia of sorts. Not Alzheimer’s, but he’s easily confused and travel with him would be a nightmare. It’s supposed to be a happy occasion, after all.”
“Why are they having the wedding now?” she asked.
“I think it’s a time thing—as in they don’t have that much of it. And gathering what there is of our family isn’t easy. Maggie has her practice in Denver, Cal has a practice here, when the Crossing is full of campers it’s hard for Sully to close up shop and in summer Connie has both the fire department and search and rescue duty. And they’ve decided to become foster parents.”
Sid’s eyes popped up from her plate. They were round and startled. “Huh?”
“Yeah, some of their couple friends do that and I guess Connie has been through the certification program. Friends they sometimes hang out with have had foster kids and Sierra thinks it’s a good idea. I’ve seen her with Cal’s little girl—they’re both great with kids.”
“Wow,” she said. “You make it seem like the whole family is virtuous.”
“It’s a trick, Sid,” he said. “You’ll fall in love with me because I gave Sister Mary Jacob a hundred bucks.”
She made a pffftt sound with her lips. “Not for a hundred bucks I won’t.”
When he walked her to her car, he grabbed her hand and she allowed it. When they were beside her car he swung her around and pulled her against him. Closely against him. She looked up at him.
“You said I would always be safe with you,” Sid said quietly.
“Try to get away,” he said.
She pulled back and was instantly free.
“I’m not taking hostages, Sid.”
Without warning she flung herself against him, into his arms, dug her fingers into the thick hair at the back of his head and smothered him in a kiss so sweet he was breathless. For a second, shock kept him from reacting. Then he circled her waist with his arms and held her, moving over her mouth with passion and urgency. The taste of her, more chocolate than anything, turned him on and blew his mind. If there had been a private room nearby, maybe she wouldn’t have been all that safe. And neither would he.
“Whoa,” he said, tightening his arms. “You are definitely worth waiting for.”
“I think you’re manipulating me,” she whispered against his lips.
“I wouldn’t even know how,” he said, kissing her again. And again, that kiss was hot and crazy. He really wanted her. And yet this was not the time or place. “We’re in a parking lot,” he said. “We have three choices. We can climb in my truck and make out, we can go somewhere and be alone or we can table this for a while.”
She relaxed in his arms. “I’m taking door number three. Under the circumstances.”
“I have my own place.”
“My brother is probably expecting me.”
“I still have my own place,” he said.
“It’ll keep.” She gave his cheek a pat. “I’ll go to the wedding with you, but only so you don’t have to be embarrassed by having a nun for a date.”
“Okay,” he said hoarsely. “Can I at least have your phone number now?”
* * *
Sid was a little dreamy while driving home. She was having a conversation with herself. Aloud. She’d been doing this since grade school. Eventually she was overheard, especially in the computer lab, and learned she wasn’t the only person who did that. She’d ask and answer the questions as they came. Usually mathematical or theoretical, but ultimately questions in every category. It was how she worked things out.
What do you think you’re doing, Sidney?
She was hooking up.
But she wasn’t good at hookups. She hadn’t had very many. And the one she did have turned into a husband! A very bad husband. She wasn’t about to let that happen again. She wasn’t crazy.
That looked a little crazy out there in the parking lot, spread on him like butter on bread. But she couldn’t help herself. She liked him.
Did she ever like David in that way? She couldn’t remember. She’d asked herself a hundred times—was her heart broken because she loved him so much or because he’d betrayed her in so many ways?
In the beginning, before they married, she was very taken with him. He was sweet and attentive. There was her father’s death, and David really hung in there.
Uh, he went to the funeral and then didn’t he have finals? Or midterms? Or whatever it was, it was so critical.
Everything was so critical...
But she had signed on for it.
She thought that’s what people did for each other.
He kept saying, “I’m not doing this for me, Sidney. I’m doing this for us.”
There was never any “us.”
She gave him seven years!
She supported him for seven years but she was doing exactly what she wanted to be doing.
Was that the problem? The weak link? That she was so involved in her work?
I hate to break it to you but he could have started being unfaithful before you were married and how would you know? her inner voice asked. Did you ever once check?
Oh God, I can never be in a relationship again because I can’t be one of those women who reads his texts in the dark of night or follows him to see if he’s really going back to work!
Then the idea of a garbage collector makes perfect sense...
But he’s not really a garbage collector. Well, he really is, but that doesn’t mean anything at all—it’s his job, not his identity.
Was that where she’d gone wrong with David? Putting too much importance on the importance he put on himself? Didn’t her degrees take as much dedication and time and intelligence? She was a scholar! A scientist!
He said she was dull. Boring.
That was name-calling.
It was true.
Sid took a deep, calming breath. There were three things that decimated her about her failed marriage. That David had lied to her for so long and she’d been clueless, that she suddenly realized that not only was she completely alone, she’d been completely alone all along, and third, there wasn’t much about her to be attracted to—she was boring. A completely boring computer nerd. That she was a computer nerd on the cutting edge of cyberscience, information technology and artificial intelligence didn’t make her a more interesting person. If she and David went out with his friends, doctors who could accomplish complex surgeries and save lives, doctors who would cure diseases, they would invariably ask her, “Listen, I’m having this problem with my operating system...” or, “I don’t think I have a good cloud coverage setup...”
Yes, it had all been quite painful, to never feel a part of his life or even of her own life.
But things weren’t exactly like that now. Right now she was connected. It had been like training for a race—she came out of her quiet, preoccupied, serious place and learned to be more outgoing. She liked people, after all. Anyone who had engaged in a long and complex course of study could tell you about how easy it is to become hyperfocused. She’d had to learn the first way in order to excel in math and then computers, so she had to likewise learn the more extroverted way, getting out of her head a little and appreciating her enhanced social skills.
A few months with Rob and she hadn’t been lonely anymore. A few months behind the bar as a bartender and server and it brought such a relief to feel that people actually liked her. Of course, she felt they didn’t know the real her—the boring, fixated, dorky person she had left resting inside.
But there was no denying she still grieved the loss of her science. When she was making great strides in the lab, experiencing breakthroughs and making discoveries that could change the world, she felt huge. Inside, of course. But huge and important and confident. With her meltdown, she lost that. She wished she had not let it happen, but she wouldn’t know how to stop all the side effects of her personal crisis. Yes, even the most pragmatic scientist is vulnerable to emotional calamity.
She fled to Rob to rebuild herself from the ground up. Then Dakota came along and she felt an instant zing of energy. Well, she must have been ready. She was a woman, after all. She hadn’t stopped producing hormones. There was a certain biological science to it, wasn’t there? There were lots of theories about why a certain man appealed to a certain woman. About what made all manner of creatures desire the opposite sex. With whales, the males wanted the strongest, fittest females because reproduction was difficult and many cows died giving birth, which made perfect sense to Sid, considering the calf weighed about six hundred pounds. But the whales didn’t just mate with the most available female.
And so it was with men and women, she assumed. The right one at the right time with all the right biological configurations from looks to scent to prowess. Whatever the magic was, Sidney went to bed thinking she’d grow old in her brother’s house playing Auntie Sid and woke up one morning finding herself wickedly attracted to Dakota Jones.
It was going to be complicated.
* * *
Ever since the night his tire had been slashed, Dakota had been parking in a more public place on the street when he went to the bar for dinner. He risked running into Alyssa but he wasn’t about to sacrifice any more of his Jeep SUV to the manic charms of Miss Neely. And sure enough, Alyssa was sweeping the sidewalk in front of the beauty shop as he walked up. She stopped and leaned on her broom. He thought briefly of crossing the street, but that would be just plain cruel. He walked right up to her, smiling.