best. She was innately cautious when it came to relationships, and even though being with Ben was something she wanted with all her heart, she needed to mentally prepare for being intimate with a man again after so long. Basically, she would fret. Half of her was so filled with longing and excitement she wasn’t certain she could contain herself, but the other half of her was uncertain. What if he didn’t like her body? She had all the basic female parts, but not a single one was extraordinary. Maybe he liked adventurous sex. Maybe he was into some kink. She didn’t think she could do adventurous or kink, which meant that if he did, in short order he’d be bored with her just like Adam had been.
On the other hand, just kissing him had carried her higher than making love with Adam ever had, so she could be short-selling herself as to what she could or couldn’t do. With Ben, she didn’t know if she had any boundaries.
“You look funny,” Olivia said, staring at her.
Sela jerked herself back to the present and managed to say, “Like I’m crazy? Because that’s how I feel, as if I have twenty balls in the air but only know how to juggle one.”
“One ball isn’t juggling. It’s tossing a ball back and forth.”
“My point exactly. I don’t know how to juggle.” She blew out a breath. “I’m going home, and going to sleep.”
She did exactly that, not even bothering with bed and instead wrapping herself in a blanket and curling up on the couch where she could watch the fire. Funny how she had seldom had a fire going before, and now it was one of the most comforting things she could imagine . . .
She slept so soundly that she woke feeling as if she’d slept for hours, but the fire still had small flames licking upward so she knew she hadn’t. Sleepily she got up and replenished the fire, checked the battery-operated clock—10:24—and went back to the couch. Instead of going back to sleep, though, she lay there staring at the fire while she mentally ran through everything that had happened during the long, eventful day. She wanted to think about Ben, relive those intense, exciting kisses and the promise of more; instead she mentally worried over everything else.
A sense of unease gnawed at her, but she couldn’t isolate the reason for it. There were a lot of things about the day to worry about, things that had already happened and couldn’t be changed. Upcoming was dispensing the gasoline, but she’d have plenty of help for that, and Ben had promised to come down and get them better organized as far as security.
But . . . what if there was trouble over the gasoline? If demand outstripped supply, those left out were going to be angry. She couldn’t think of any way to avoid that; she couldn’t manufacture gasoline and put more in the tanks. They could dole it out in five-gallon increments—after the community patrol had filled their tanks—and there would either be enough for everyone to get some, or not. She also had to find out about the kiln that Mona Clausen might or might not have, preferably before they pumped the tanks dry.
Those were things to do, not things to be uneasy about. Short term, life in the valley was going to be easier, because of the gasoline supply she’d protected.
Liquid gold.
The supply of gasoline was priceless, the way things were now. People would do everything they could to get it, for use or trade. It was better than money, because you couldn’t eat money, or stay warm with it.
In her mind’s eye she suddenly saw Ted talking to Lawrence Dietrich—Dietrich, who, according to Carol, was involved in meth. Making it, selling it, or taking it, she didn’t know, but meth was death. A meth addict would steal anything to feed the habit—
And she had gasoline.
If not Lawrence Dietrich then others like him—and meth was an ongoing problem in the area—would know that come morning she’d be emptying the tanks. People had been deliberately spreading the news, just as she’d asked them to do. If anyone intended to steal the gas for themselves, they had to get it tonight, before people started lining up tomorrow. She expected people would start showing up well before dawn, and once they did, the opportunity for theft was gone. The best time to steal the gasoline was . . . now.
She threw