No one else in town shared her view, especially when she walked around downtown wearing a thin white T-shirt, while braless, in the rain. The show she gave was apparently more than anyone cared to see, though I suppose it wouldn’t have mattered if she’d had one or both mammary glands in that instance.” He straightened up and put an arm behind his back like the ancient butlers in a place like England. “Should you decide to reduce yourself to a Dick’s level, there are condoms in the drawer of your never-used night table, the one on the guest’s side. Let him put it on—you’re clearly unused to the practice and would probably do it incorrectly. There are more in the bathroom. You have plenty to be getting on with, but if you need more, I can go—”
“Oh my God, I’ll be fine.” I hastened to the door. “I’m good, Mr. Tom. We don’t need to be so much in each other’s lives.”
“As your protector, miss, I must—”
I shut the door. Edging into middle-aged dating was uncomfortable enough; I didn’t need help from my ancient, wacky butler. I had to draw the line somewhere.
As I started walking, nervousness coiled within me. Wow, it had been a long time since I’d gone on a first date. A long, long time. I had no idea what to expect. The guy I was meeting was a few years older than me, with a couple of teenagers and a steady job as a winemaker, and lived one town over. We had similar interests, and though he was apparently big into crime shows, he also enjoyed comedy. If we went to a movie or something, we’d probably be able to find some common ground.
That was about the extent of what I knew, though. I supposed I could’ve exchanged a bunch more emails with him before taking the plunge, but I didn’t much like getting to know someone via electronic communication. Inflection was missing, as was tone. I had a large propensity for sarcasm—I couldn’t have someone mistaking that for genuine concern, because then where would we be?
The windows of Austin’s bar shone up ahead, the honeyed glow spilling out onto the sidewalk and highlighting a couple of Harleys parked out in front. A flicker of light caught my attention to the right. A man leaned against a thin tree trunk in front of the closed candy shop, his head bowed over his phone, the light not reaching his face. He glanced up as I passed, his face concealed in the shadow of a flat-billed baseball cap.
A familiar warning sensation crawled down my scalp and over my skin—something I felt whenever I encountered a male stranger lurking in the shadows. I pulled my gaze away, lest he took that as a challenge or as interest, watching instead for movement out of the corner of my eye. I held my breath as I increased the distance between us, speeding up just enough that I’d get out of there faster, but not enough that he saw I was scared and decided he liked chasing prey. I might not technically be prey to people anymore, but old habits died hard.
In a moment, though, he dropped his head back to his phone, uninterested. I let out a relieved breath. He was probably waiting for something, bored, and had decided to check out the chick in the dress as she walked by.
My relief was short-lived.
Up ahead, hanging out outside the bar, sucking on a cigarette and checking out the Harleys, stood my nemesis. He kept trying to annoy and antagonize me in subtle little ways, something he did despite knowing Austin would punch him off his barstool (literally) if he talked trash to me. It had happened on my very first night in town, plus another handful of times in the two or so months since. The guy’s name was Ryan, but he didn’t deserve the respect of being called his real name, so I’d dubbed him Sasquatch for his shaggy hair and bushy beard, which probably held crumbs and fleas alike. He was clearly as dumb as rocks, and if his vendetta weren’t so tragically annoying, it would be hilarious.
He grunted as I neared, the amber of his cigarette glowing across his bushy unibrow. “What are you doing here? You don’t come in on Thursdays,” he said.
“Funny, I’d hoped the same thing about you.”
“I come in every day.”
“Maybe if you had a friend, you wouldn’t have to.”
“Well, maybe if you