Page 17 of Down Shift (Driven 8)
“That’s what they all say.” He chuckles as I take a seat beside him on a boardwalk bench.
“And then what? They’re wooed into telling you all of their deep, dark secrets and fall madly in love with you?”
“Something like that.” He nods his head and turns on the charm by flashing me a cocky grin.
“But I thought you were grumpy all the time. Do you get a lot of girls with your moody self?”
“And we’re back to that again,” he counters, pushing his knee over so that it knocks against mine.
I open my beer and take a timid sip of the bitter ale, trying to hide my innate dislike of it. And I think I’ve done a pretty good job of masking the look of disgust on my face, but when I glance over, Zander’s head is angled and his eyes are on me.
“You work in a bar but don’t like beer? How’s that working for you?”
Ladies don’t drink beer, Gertrude. It’s classless and tacky. My father’s and Ethan’s admonishments ghost through my mind unexpectedly. The chills that blanket my body have nothing to do with the spring storm moving in.
The memory, the constant refrain running through my mind, makes me want to chug this entire beer and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand in defiance. To reaffirm I’m no longer that woman.
“Fine. Good.” I take another sip for good measure to try to prove I’m unfazed by the taste I never was allowed the chance to acquire.
“So I take it you were a bartender elsewhere? Before you came to the island?”
“Yes. Yeah.” Old habits of grammar die hard, but I try to forget them as I focus on t
he fib at hand.
“And here come the bullshit lies I warned you about,” he says with a chuckle.
“Seriously, I was—”
“No need to explain or lie, Socks. I watched you work for a few hours. You did a fine job. Filled orders quickly. Know how to pull a draft without foam. It’s sad to say that I may have spent a bit of time in bars and can tell a greenhorn from a pro, but I can.”
“Oh, so now you’re a bartending expert?” It’s a stupid comeback, but it’s my only defense.
“I’m an expert at a lot of things, I assure you that. Most of which are ones I’m not proud of lately.” There’s a tinge of discord in his voice that makes me want to be the one asking questions, but before I can get them out, he shifts the topic of conversation. “What was so bad in your life that you ran here to escape from it?”
Hello, curveball. We went from bartending to invasion of my privacy. His question puts every part of me on edge. And it’s not just his question but also the impenetrable stare through the darkness that unnerves me. The one that tells me he knows I am in fact hiding something.
My mind runs a million miles an hour. Did Smitty tell him the details? Did Zander search through my stuff in the house while I was at work and find something? Did my dad or Ethan send him to track me down and bring me back, even though there is nothing left to go back to?
“I’m not running from anything,” I state with as much certainty as I can. His expression tells me he’s not buying it, so I try to explain without going into detail. “I’m starting a new chapter in my life. It’s so different here from where I used to live, and I needed that. A change of pace, I guess. But running, no.” I nod my head to put the emphasis on my statement and yet he doesn’t look away.
I’m the first to avert my eyes. I need to in order to prevent him from seeing things I don’t want him to see. But even when I do, I can still feel the weight of his stare as I look out to the darkness beyond where we sit. To the ocean I can hear but not see.
The crack of a new beer can opening startles me, but I keep my gaze straight ahead, hope that by focusing there, the sting of tears on the backs of my eyelids will abate.
“I’ll accept that answer for now, but I’ve gotta tell you something, Getty—I don’t buy it. Sure, all of that might be true in a loose sense, but there’s more there.”
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“True. I don’t. But I’ve seen a lot of shit in my life . . . more than you could probably imagine. So phrase it any way you want to, deny it every which way from Sunday, but until you face whatever it is, nothing’s going to get fixed.”
“You’re overstepping boundaries for someone I’ve known only twenty-four hours.” I try to play off the comment like I’m not irritated but can’t quite pull it off.
“You’re right. I am.” His admission is quiet, contrite, and so very unexpected after his dogged assumptions.
Silence descends on us as he lets it go, leaving me to dwell on the truth to his words that I’d like to pretend I didn’t hear. Lightning flashes far off the coast, a subtle reminder that I’m actually on an island in the ocean, completely vulnerable.
Kind of like I was before I came here. No wonder when I first stepped foot on the wharf, I felt like I belonged instantly. And maybe, possibly hoped that the small-town atmosphere would mean that I’d be the outsider whom everyone left alone until I figured out if I wanted to stay or move on.
