They slid into a booth, and ordered some beer and hot wings to start. After the waiter moved away, Miguel leaned back and opened conversation. “It looked like business is doing well at the shop.”
“It is. Although the town has grown, it still has that small town mentality. Even after they built the auto mall and the dealerships moved in, most of the residents trust us more. And they send a lot of referrals our way.”
“I’m not surprised. You’re the best mechanic there is.”
Her eyes sparkled in that way that made him feel like a king. He wanted to give her everything, spoil her to excess, just so he could see her look at him like that every day.
“Thank you.”
“Are Russell and Jason still there?”
“Of course. They love it, too. It’s in our blood.” She thanked the barback who brought their drinks and the young man’s appreciation of her beauty was evident in his returning grin. His expression sobered, however, when he looked at Miguel.
Faith laughed. Even over the blaring music he heard it and the sound tightened his chest. “I see you’re still possessive.”
“Only with you.”
Her smile faded slowly. “Don’t waste the energy on me.”
One brow arched. “Why not?”
“Because when I’m with you, you’re the only man I see.” Her words were accompanied by a Mona Lisa smile that left him wondering if there was any truth at all to her words, or if she was teasing him.
“Then maybe I should stick around.”
She took a long pull on her beer, choosing to drink from the bottle rather than use the frosted glass next to it. He found that erotic. Of course, everything about her was erotic to his mind.
“You’d go stir crazy around here,” she said.
“Probably,” he agreed, knowing he was addicted to the adrenaline rush inherent in his line of work. The closest he came to relaxing while conscious was when he was with Faith. “Are either of your brothers married?”
“Jason came close once, but the gal joined the Coast Guard and he wasn’t willing to leave Rio Penasquitos. Russell has never come close. I’m beginning to doubt he ever will. He’s got commitment avoidance syndrome.”
Miguel picked at the label on his bottle. “He just hasn’t found the right woman yet.”
“That’s what my mother says.”
“I’ve been told I have commitment issues.” He held her gaze. “But I was prepared to marry you. Was desperate to, actually. So everyone would know you belonged to me.”
She paled.
He pushed forward. As always, he was playing to win. “You didn’t ask me why I’m here. Aren’t you curious?”
The hot wings arrived at the table. The large round plate was set between them, but neither of them moved to eat.
“Yes,” Faith said, so quietly that he read her answer on her lips rather than heard it. “I’m curious.”
“I recently broke up with someone I’d been seeing for several months. She was pressing for… more. And I couldn’t give it to her. Our last night together wasn’t pretty. She was upset and said some things that weren’t pleasant. But the only thing that stuck with me was her assertion that she was perfect for me. That we were compatible in every way and I was just too fucked up to see it.”
“Ouch.” But her eyes were hard, her mouth pursed with jealousy. She may tease him about his possessiveness, but she was equally so. Always had been. It had taken her months to believe he was really interested in her and several more months beyond that to convince her that while he wanted into her pants in the worst way, that wasn’t why he was dating her. Once she’d come to believe that the rich boy with the good looks, Aston Martin, and deftness with a football was really interested in a poor girl who worked a dirty job and was never part of the “in” crowd, she’d become a tigress. He was her man and anyone who forgot that was swiftly reminded.
He couldn’t wait to see her at a company party, her lithe legs in heels and a champagne flute in her hand. She’d have her arm around his and a look in her eyes that said, Yes, he’s my arm candy. Only I get to taste.
“She was right,” he said with a dismissive shrug. “There wasn’t anything wrong with her—aside from the fact she wasn’t you.”
Faith’s eyes were so dilated; the blue of her irises was a mere sliver around the black center. “Miguel, I…” Her voice trailed off, as if she didn’t know what to say.
“I came back to prove to myself that being with you couldn’t possibly be the way I remembered.” Lifting his beer bottle, he dipped the neck toward her in a toast. “And I was right. It’s better.”
He cursed his inability to read her thoughts. She looked shaken, but not overly pleased about his confession. He reminded himself that she’d dumped him—callously. Maybe being with him long term was something she still didn’t want. Maybe he was just a hot fuck.
“It was always good between us,” she said finally, pulling herself together and arranging wings on a plate before handing it to him.
“So what happened?” he asked, detesting the gruffness of his voice that gave too much away. It was time to be honest, but ripping himself open wasn’t how he wanted to manage this.
Wiping her hands with a napkin, she looked at him, her features soft and her eyes impossibly sad. “You were going to Princeton; I wasn’t. I knew a clean break was the only way you would go without me holding you back.”
Miguel froze from the inside out. His hand tightened with white-knuckled force on the bottle. With his gut churning with anger and confusion, he seized the one thing out of the mess of his emotions that mattered to him. “Did you love me?”
Her hands stilled. She looked at him with luminous eyes. “More than anything.”
“Bullshit.” He rubbed at his chest, trying to ease the ache that made it hard to breathe. “If that was true, you would’ve come with me. The fact is, you loved your family more. And this town, the shop—”
“I would have held you back even if I’d g-gone with you!” she cried, her voice breaking. “Your parents thought I was after your money. Hanging on to you would only have proven them right.”
“As if I gave a shit what they thought. They would have come around eventually, and it wouldn’t have mattered to me if they didn’t.”
“It mattered to me. You had years of college ahead of you—fraternities, sports, late night-studying… There was no place for me in that.”
He pushed the beer away, feeling sick. “I would have made a place for you. Or we could have agreed to a long-distance relationship. Phone calls, visits, holiday breaks.”
“All of which would have interrupted time with your father and curbed your freedom to network. You needed to create the contacts you could use in the future.”