She polishes off the tub of ice cream and places it down beside her with a teasing smile gracing her lips. “And what makes you think it was your job to fix it? How do you know that I don’t already have some guy lined up to do it?”
“Angel, I don’t doubt that you have an endless line of guys begging to do shit for you, but I don’t care. There’s no ring on your finger, you invited me in late at night, and when I got here, that railing was still broken. So, as far as I’m concerned, there’s no man in your life … unless you’re about to tell me otherwise.”
Amelia watches me for a prolonged second, and I see taunts and teasing on the tip of her tongue, but she must swallow them as she gently shakes her head. “No,” she murmurs with a smile playing on her lips. “There’s no man.”
Fuck, that’s like music to my ears. “That’s what I thought,” I tell her. “Hence why I couldn’t resist coming around here in the middle of the night to fix it. Besides, my boys were the ones who broke it, so I have to fix it.”
Her brows pull down as confusion plagues her. “What do you mean? Is it some kind of rule with the fire department? You break it, you fix it?”
“No,” I chuckle at the absurdity of it. If we had to fix everything we broke in order to save lives, we’d be broke. “I just wanted to. I didn’t like the way you were looking at it this afternoon, and when you told me about the sentiment, I couldn’t help myself. I had to make it right.”
She purses her lips, looking away while very clearly deep in thought. “Well, thank you anyway. It would have killed me walking past it every day and seeing it like that.”
I walk across the kitchen and pluck the spoon out of her fingers, letting my hand trail over her skin for the briefest moment. “Anytime,” I murmur lowly, loving how my proximity has her cheeks flushing a beautiful shade of red.
She looks up at me, still coming off a little bit shy. “You’re trouble.”
“Only the good kind,” I promise, stepping back to give her a little space to get under control.
I wash up the spoon, feeling on cloud fucking nine. I’ve got her hook, line, and sinker. I affect her, and she doesn’t know what to do with that. She wants me, but I see in her eyes that she's terrified of taking what’s already hers. Why, though? I’ve never quite met a woman like this before. Her walls are so thick that she can’t even allow herself a glimpse of happiness.
My phone dings in my pocket, and it momentarily distracts me from what I’m doing. I pause a moment and double-check that it’s not the tone I use for the boys, though if it was them calling me in for an emergency, they would have used my pager. Realizing it’s just a text, I ignore it and get back to cleaning up.
“Was that your phone?” Amelia gasps, making me turn her way in confusion.
“Um, yeah,” I say, a little slowly, wondering where the hell she’s going with this.
“Well, welcome to the twenty-first century,” she teases with a bright, beaming smile. “You know, I kind of owe you an apology.”
That draws my full attention. I place the spoon up to dry and turn off the tap before drying my hands and leaning against the counter. I look her straight in the eye. “Go on,” I prompt, crossing my arms over my chest as I fight a smile, knowing that whatever she’s about to come out with is going to be good.
Amelia cringes but plucks up the courage to tell me what’s on her mind. “In the hardware store the other day, when your pager went off,” she starts. “Well, I kind of laughed at you,” she grins, not sorry at all. “I mean, who the hell uses a pager anymore?”
“I do,” I cut in, loving how she teases me.
“I know, I know,” she says. “It made sense when I figured out what you do for a living, but for the past few days I assumed you were either one of those self-important, arrogant assholes who think they need a pager or just a loser.”
I shake my head, wondering what to do with her. I can’t resist but to walk forward and place my hands down