Page 33 of Porter's Angel
He smirked—there it was. She was putting limits on herself. “How old do you think you are? A hundred?”
“Well, I’m not fifteen,” she snapped.
Ouch. Though it wasn’t the first time that he’d been accused of being immature for knowing how to have fun, and he tried to make her see the error of her ways. “Hmm, I don’t know any hundred-year-olds,” he said, “but I do have a few sixty-year-old friends I can introduce you to.” Maybe seventy? How old was Funches anyway? That guy sure liked to party. “I’m sure then we can find some age-appropriate activities for you to do.”
Her jaw clenched. He noticed her fingers clamping against that poor rose. “I think I can manage to keep myself busy.”
“With what?” he asked abruptly. “What do you like to do?”
Her fingers fidgeted. “Work. I like to work, but… that’s not happening anytime soon.”
Why not? She couldn’t work; she didn’t like to play? She might want to trick him into believing that there was nothing below the surface of that appealing face, but he’d already seen that raw, passionate side of her. He knew exactly how to draw it out, though it killed him that Nash had discovered it first. “Sounds boring,” he said. “Have you checked your pulse lately? Are you sure you’re still alive?”
She snorted. “What’s your deal anyway, Porter? Other than helping out your mother, I’m not here to make friends…”
His heart stirred. Angel probably meant to do the opposite with her speech, but the fact that she was going out of her way to help his mother warmed him to the core. “Who said anything about friends?” he asked. “I don’t know what you’re suggesting, but scout’s honor, I’m not looking to befriends.”
“That sounds even worse,” she said. A dimple played near those luscious lips. She really didn’t think he was serious—at all. “So, we’re to be enemies then?”
“How about something in between? Cohorts? Partners in crime? Bonnie and Clyde?”
“Sorry, I don’t have the time.”
“Bock bock bock.” He made chicken noises. That was always his last resort with his brothers when they didn’t want to join him and Nash. It worked about just as well on her.
She huffed and leaned back against her seat, though he noticed that she seemed more relaxed as she stared out through the window as they closed in on the town. The historic buildings loomed through the murky twilight and he still hadn’t gotten a date out of her. He wasn’t worried. He could work on her fraying nerves when she came back to work on the garden. She’d need another ride to her car, at the very least.
He drove her down the familiar roads to the bright yellow door that led to Hems and Threads and the sweet-smelling Sudz Shoppe. “You know,” he said. “My sister-in-law owns Sudz.”
“She does?”
“Yeah, the redhead—she’s married to Hudson. You might’ve seen her at church. She’s always loved soaps…” his voice faded as he noticed how sinister the brick building looked under the cloak of night. Under the darkening shadows, the deserted sidewalk didn’t seem very safe either.
Porter was surprised by the protective instinct that surged over him at the thought of her being out here all alone. Harvest Ranch was safer than most towns, but they were only an hour away from Charleston and occasionally drifters came this way to cause trouble.
No wonder she’d been terrified when he’d surprised her that morning, and in a rush, her predicament hit him like a fist to the gut—her unreliable car, her need to get away from Nashville, her closing off from everyone around her, and yet, she took the time to help out his mother? Who was this woman?
Angel wouldn’t let him in to find out. She scooted forward in her seat as he parked. Her hand flipped off the buckle of her seatbelt and found the handle for a quick escape like she was in training to be Houdini. She pushed the door open and then jerked it closed again without getting out, swinging around to face him so fast that he had to swallow. Twice.
“Hey, uh…” She seemed to be weighing her words, and for once, she dropped her fierce attitude and appeared almost vulnerable. “I know we talked about this before, but please… don’t tell anyone about me.”
There it was again.
“Sure.” He tried his best to reassure her that her most embarrassing moment was safe with him, mostly because he couldn’t make heads or tails of it, but he guessed it was good. Then, on a whim, he decided to play with this—all without his brother here to goad him on. “But you have to do something for me,” he said.
She stiffened.
He didn’t mean it that way. “It’s notthatbad. Look, I’ll keep quiet, that’s not even a question. I just want to show you that even twenty-year-olds—” he took a guess at her age and quickly modified it at her wrinkled nose, “thirty-year-olds can have fun. Come with me to the waterfall?”
Her eyes widened like he was asking her to walk the plank. “What’s the waterfall?”
She was killing him. He shot his best “Porter” grin at her to get her to calm down. “I’ll show you. C’mon, unwind a little. You in or not?”
She leveled a glare at him. “Then you’ll keep quiet?”
“Of course! I already said that I would!” They were way past that.
She sighed and shrugged. “I’m in.”