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“Hi.” She smiled, shadowing her eyes with her hand to look up at him.
“Nice day, huh?” he said, glancing at Bass, then back at Penny. Bass just nodded. He hadn’t realized until right then that Finn Billings was the one guy in town he might dislike the most. Not because he wasn’t a good guy. Ryder was right, he was solid. The man volunteered at the old folk’s home for God sake’s.
So why did he feel threatened? Sure, Finn was in shape, but Bass outweighed and outstood the guy. And it had nothing to do with size or success.
It had to do with Penny and how right a guy Finn was for her.
“Yes, very nice,” she agreed.
“Well, I was just talking with your brother and friends,” he said to her and pointed toward the lake where, yep, their crew was hanging out. “Would you come join us? Both of you, of course.”
“Oh! Um…” She glanced at Bass. She saw the same thing he did. Ryder was yelling at her to come over, and Jenna was waving her arm and beckoning. Seemed all their friends liked this idea.
“I’m going to sit here for a bit,” Bass said and looked at Penny. “You go on.”
Jenna then yelled for Penny, and it seemed this mission of getting her a date to the rehearsal was turning into shoving her and Finn together. Bass couldn’t blame his friends. They didn’t know how he felt about her.
Even if they did, there were things he couldn’t change. Finn could give Penny everything she wanted. More, he could give her those things for longer than two weeks.
She stared at him a moment.
“Go on,” he said again.
“Here.” Finn held out his hand to Penny and helped her up.
“I’ll be right there,” she said.
Once Finn was out of earshot, Bass said, “Maybe it’s best to keep a distance.”
She looked hurt, stunned, betrayed. And he wanted to instantly call back his words.
She bent, pretending to straighten her towel, and whispered, “I wish it was you I was walking toward…not away from.”
And despite what he’d said, part of him wished she would walk toward him. Stay with him. But maybe she knew what he did, that she would eventually have to walk away from him, because she turned from him and did just that. And he had pushed her to do so.
Chapter Eleven
Sebastian hit the steering wheel of his car. Yesterday at the lake, there’d been so many things he should have said to Penny. She thought he was incredible? Would she feel that way knowing he intended on ending this? That he was knowingly shoving her in the direction of another man?
“I’m an asshole.”
He had to say it out loud or else he would forget. Forget that for a moment they could steal a piece of time together where they could be a couple. Do normal things, like go to the lake and hold hands, catch a movie, maybe dinner, then he’d take her back to his place and sink inside her until sunrise.
He closed his eyes. That was a fairytale, and he knew better. Maybe he was a bigger masochist than he realized. The punishment and pain of being with her was getting to him.
Finn was the kind of man she wanted. But the way she looked at him made him think maybe he could be the kind of man she deserved.
His grand plan had been to push her limits and send her running from him. He combed a hand through his hair. He couldn’t think about her with someone else without wanting to punch something. But every time he saw Finn talking to her, they looked…right.
Like a normal couple.
And she deserved to spend time with a man who could offer her a future. That wasn’t Sebastian. But that didn’t stop him from tasting her, needing her.
Which begged the question: what would it take to actually pursue Penny? In the open? With long term intentions?
That would have to start with the truth and end with some kind of open acknowledgment. Not something he’d ever done.
And there was one person who wouldn’t take kindly to him setting his sights on the innocent Miss Diamond, especially for a short term romp.
