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She tried to use the walk back to her apartment to clear her head, but she couldn’t stop fixating on the cruel unfairness of it all. The heart-stoppingly gorgeous guy she’d been crushing on for months had been crushing on her right back. How often did that even happen? Never. Not to her, anyway.
But it didn’t matter, because he was moving away. They’d missed their window. If only she’d known. If he’d given some indication—any indication—of how he’d felt. They could have shared so many kisses by now. They could have shared so much more than kisses. She could have seen him naked. Run her fingers over the washboard abs she just knew were hiding under his clothes.
Darn it.
By the time she got home, Penny wasn’t just frustrated, she was angry. Caleb had wasted so much time by making her think he wasn’t interested. If only he’d said something sooner…
She couldn’t dwell on it anymore. She had too much work to do to catch up from yesterday. And she’d promised to visit George today.
She sat down at her computer, opened up the application she was working on, and tried to push Caleb and the abs she’d never get to touch out of her mind.
Penny hesitated outside the door of George’s hospital room, clutching a bouquet of balloons in her fist. Maybe she should have brought flowers instead? She’d thought balloons might be more cheerful, but now she worried they were too juvenile.
When she peeked her head in, she saw that the curtain was drawn alongside the bed, but Mike was sitting in a chair by the window working on a laptop. He looked up and waved her into the room.
“Dad? Someone’s here to see you.”
Penny stepped around the curtain to the foot of the bed. George looked small and shriveled under the pale blue blanket, with all kinds of tubes hooked up to him. A machine beside the bed regulated his IV drip and displayed his blood pressure and heart rate.
His mouth stretched into a thin smile and he wiggled his fingers in greeting, too weak even to lift his hand. “Hey, kid.” His voice was as weak as the rest of him.
Penny handed Mike the balloons she’d brought and went to take George’s hand. It was cold and fragile in hers. Like blown glass. “How are you feeling?” she asked.
George grunted. “Like someone opened up my chest and moved everything around. I guess I’ll live though. That’s what they tell me anyways.” At least he still sounded like his old grumbly self.
“You’ll be back on your feet in no time,” Penny said. “You’re too stubborn to let a silly thing like a heart attack slow you down.”
“Sure,” he said. “That’s me.”
Talking clearly took a lot out of him, so Penny only stayed a few minutes and did most of the talking herself.
“I’ll come back when you’re feeling stronger,” she promised, leaning over to kiss his cheek.
He squeezed her hand. “Sorry I gave you and everyone else a scare.”
“You can make it up to us by getting better.”
He nodded, his eyes already fluttering closed as Mike walked her to the door.
Penny took the elevator downstairs and got into her car, feeling shaken. Sure, George was old, but not that old. He’d always seemed so healthy and energetic. One minute he’d been full of life, and the next he’d nearly died.
It was easy to forget just how tenuous and unpredictable life was. You never knew when something would be taken away from you.
As she sat in her car thinking about George and life and missed opportunities, Penny made a decision. A scary decision.
She wasn’t giving up on Caleb without a fight. She refused to spend the rest of her life wondering what could have been. So he was leaving in a month. So what? That still left them thirty days together, give or take. They could do a lot in thirty days.
So much.
Just because there was an expiration date hanging over their heads didn’t mean they couldn’t enjoy each other’s company in the meantime. She was new Fun Penny! She didn’t need commitment. She didn’t even want it.
This was exactly what she’d been looking for: adventure, spontaneity, risk. Living in the moment with no strings or expectations. This was her chance.
Penelope Popplestone was taking the steep path—rockslides be darned.
Penny’s nerves were a jangling mess when she walked into Antidote the next morning. It was one thing to decide to go after Caleb, and quite another to actually do it. She wasn’t used to doing the pursuing. This was new territory for her.
But that was good. That was what she wanted. Unexplored vistas. Why should she always sit back and wait for a man to make the first move? Hadn’t she just been thinking that she needed to get better at asking for what she wanted?
