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“Deep thoughts, bunny.”
“Don’t call me ‘bunny.’ I’m not an infant.”
Amber did a mental stutter step. She never would have said that to him in the light. She never would have said it to anyone.
But Tony didn’t seem to recognize the audacity of her remark. He just said, “Sorry.” Then he exhaled, considering her question. “No. Not really.”
“So who are you, really?”
“Who do you think I am?”
She felt her face heating, but she ignored it. “You’re strong. I mean, your body, of course, but that’s not the main thing. You walk around like you know where you’re going, and like that’s all you’re thinking about. You don’t care who sees you or what they think about you. You’re … centered in yourself, I guess. And everyone else is irrelevant.”
“You’re seeing the job.”
“No, it’s you. I mean, it’s what you look like. To me.”
“And you have a thing for that guy.”
He didn’t say it like a question. It was just that obvious. She didn’t try to perk up whenever he was around, but she felt it happening—the way her spine straightened and her chin lifted and her eyes went all wide and excited.
He must have seen her staring at him. Must have read her mind when she followed him out to the parking lot each night, hoping that tonight would be the night she’d get something other than Have a good one as a goodbye.
Amber closed her eyes against the sick discomfort of her embarrassment, but eyes open or closed, it was the same. The blackness didn’t change. She could shrink away from it or expand into it.
She decided she would rather expand.
There was nothing wrong with having a thing for him. It wasn’t illegal. It wasn’t even pathetic, though it felt that way. It was human. She was human.
And she was tired of shrinking.
She looked straight at the spot where she knew he was and said, “Yes. I do have a thing for that guy.”
“He’s not me. I’m a lot more fucked-up than he is.”
“I think everybody is. I mean, everybody is more complicated than they look, when you actually get to know them.”
“Yeah, maybe so. You want me to tell you what you look like? From the outside, I mean?”
“I think you already did,” she said.
“You tell me, then.”
Amber considered how to put it. “Sweet. Nice. Ordinary nice, and ordinary pretty, all the way through. Like a Girl Scout, or Maria in The Sound of Music.”
A huff of laughter. “There’s some of that, I’ll be honest. But you got the whistle, too.”
“What about the whistle?”
“You round up those kids with the whistle. When you’ve got your clipboard and you’re barking orders at them out on the soccer field you look tough as nails.”
Tough as nails. She liked that.
“You look sexy.”
Something dark and dangerous in his voice made her nipples prickle.
“Don’t.”
