at him, sometimes her heart pounded so hard against her breastbone it made her feel dizzy.
She understood the term lovesick now. Because she definitely felt a little bit sick when he was near.
She’d never felt this way about any of the guys at school. They were all too narrow and awkward, and she was awkward enough for all involved and didn’t need anyone else contributing to it, thanks.
But Luke...
Luke wasn’t awkward at all.
She wished that she could be like Catherine, who didn’t seem to get all that bothered about boys, even when she liked one. If they didn’t like her, she just sort of shrugged and moved on.
Emma did not feel like she was in a shrug-and-move-on place.
She walked into the front office of the mechanic shop and saw that it was empty. She moved cautiously toward the side door that led to the actual garage and peered inside. She could see legs sticking out from under a car, legs that she was sure were Luke’s and didn’t belong to the owner of the garage, Dusty, who was round in the middle and had stick-thin legs that pointed outward, in opposite directions from each other.
She cracked the door open slowly. “I—I brought food.”
The legs moved, and then his whole body emerged as he pushed forward on the roller board he was lying on and maneuvered himself out from under the car. He had streaks of oil or some other car-related something on his face.
And she had never seen anyone more handsome.
“You didn’t have to do that,” he said.
“I did. My boss...asked me to. Not that I wouldn’t have done it just because. But in this instance... I work for him. And he told me to. So. I did have to.”
That was too many words.
“Well,” he said. “Thank you.”
“Busy today?”
“Dusty is laid up at home with a broken leg. So it’s going to be a hell of a couple weeks.”
“Oh.” She frowned. “Does no one else work here?” She was a little embarrassed that she had to ask that, but her awareness of this place boiled down to Luke.
“No,” he said.”
She handed the bag to him, and he took it. “That’s...too bad.”
“No kidding. But gotta keep overhead down.”
He opened up the bag and set it down on a workbench, then sat down on a stool. There was a cheeseburger and he took it out, biting into it.
She grimaced.
“What?”
“You didn’t even wash you hands,” she said.
He huffed a laugh and took another bite. “What’s your name?”
“Me? Emma.”
He swallowed. “Luke,” he said.
As if she didn’t know. But she wasn’t going to say that she knew.
“I know.”
What was wrong with her?
A smile quirked the corners of his mouth. “I would offer you a French fry. But I didn’t wash my hands.”
“That’s okay. I kind of have...limitless French-fry access.”
He shook his head. “What a life.”
“Are you going to come for dinner tonight, too?” she asked.
“Probably,” he said. “I’m never going to get all this done if I don’t put in some late hours.”
“You always eat dinner at J’s.”
“Mostly.”
“No one’s waiting for you to come home for dinner?”
“Nope,” he said, stuffing another fry into his mouth.
She wanted to ask more questions. Why he lived by himself. Why he didn’t have a girlfriend. If he didn’t have a girlfriend. Where his family was. Why he was here all the time, and why, if there was no one here to wait for him for dinner, did he live in Sunset Bay at all, when he could have gone anywhere else.
Cars broke everywhere, after all.
But she didn’t have an excuse for staying and chatting with him, and she had to get back to work.
“Maybe I’ll see you later,” she said. “I have to go.”
“I’ve been working late all week,” he said. “Do you work Friday night?”
She was supposed to go home Friday night and help with dinner at the inn. Their inaugural dinner, which was fully booked.
“Yeah,” she said. “I’ll be here.”
“Maybe you can bring my food over after your shift ends? If that’s not too much to ask. And bring something for yourself?”
She froze. Was he...asking her out in a very strange way? Or was he just asking her to be a food-delivery person who lingered?
She didn’t have any idea. So the only thing to do was ask, since she’d already revealed that she knew him and scolded him for not washing his hands. It wasn’t like she was knocking it out of the park here.
“You...want to have dinner with me?” she asked.
“Yeah. It gets kind of old