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“No, of course not. He wouldn’t. It’s not that, it’s…”
Although taking some satisfaction that her opinion of her brother was accurate, Mikayla felt more confused now than ever. “It’s what?”
Leah shrugged self-consciously. “He’s just very good looking.”
“Right. And that makes you uncomfortable?” Mikayla asked, bewildered.
Leah sighed. “He’s never been anything but polite to me, but I find him very intimidating. I get all tongue tied when I’m around him and I feel…like I can’t get my breath. It’s embarrassing.”
Mikayla grinned at her. “You like him.”
“Yeah, he’s nice.”
Mikayla barely restrained herself from rolling her eyes. “No, I meanlikelike him.”
Leah’s brows knit into a pensive frown. She looked down at her coffee cup for a long moment. “Maybe.” She took a sip of coffee and then shrugged. “Not that it matters. Someone like Callum Sinclair is never going to look at someone like me.”
There was an edge of heartbreak to the words that was unmistakable. Mikayla wasn’t sure Leah was right about Callum not looking at someone like her, though. From what she could see, Callum was doing quite a lot of looking in Leah’s direction—usually when she was looking the other way. Mikayla sighed, gauging that now would not be a good time to flag Callum’s interest in Leah. The situation required very delicate handling, and all she could do was trust that Callum would be careful with Leah and that he wouldn’t deliberately hurt her.
* * *
Maybe he should have changed her shift, rostered her with Bluey, Rafe thought to himself. He sat in the office at Ambulance HQ, inputting the roster for the next four weeks, looking at how many times he’d rostered himself and Mikayla on together. All the damn time. They worked well together, so it made sense, but now he had a problem. He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the kiss, about the feel of her mouth on his. The bigger problem, though, was how she hadn’t so much as looked at him as she’d dashed inside. She also hadn’t contacted him since, which was very unusual for them. He’d considered texting her about taking the dogs for a run on the beach but hesitated. He wanted to leave the ball in her court. When Sunday passed without a word from her, he was starting to fear the worst. He felt like a rat for moving on her the way he had. He hoped desperately that she’d accept his apology.
He heard her car pull up out front just as Len’s pulled away. He was going to be all on his own with her, for hours. As he heard her bootsteps in the entryway, he hustled to the kitchen and started unpacking the dishwasher, feeling it was best if he at least looked busy.
“Hey,” she said brightly from behind him.
“Hey,” he glanced over his shoulder, willfully ignoring the tightening in his gut at the sight of her.
“Stopped at Coco’s for coffee. Man, it was packed in there. Here you go.” She placed his coffee cup on the bench next to the sink.
“Mik—”
“I saw Len leaving. Looked like he was in a rush. Everything okay with him?”
“Ah, yeah, he’s okay. Had a breakfast date with his wife, asked to go early.”
“Oh, nice!”
He cleared his throat, desperately searching for the right words to apologize to her.
“I was gonna text you yesterday but I dropped in on Leah, just to see how she was doing after the wedding.” She paused, took a sip of coffee before continuing hurriedly. “I ended up hanging out there for most of the day. She’s somehow got her hands on this massive four poster bed, from some buy swap and sell site. I think she’s got a real knack for that sort of thing. You should see the outdoor bench seat she got. So, anyway, it took us all day to put the bed frame together. I didn’t get away until really late. That’s why I didn’t call you.”
“Oh, right, no worries.”
She beamed at him. “Great. I’ll just go and chuck my stuff in my locker. We should probably clean the vehicles today. They haven’t been done in a while.”
“Sure. Great idea.”
And then she was gone, zipping into the changeroom, where he could hear her clattering about. She had barely given him a chance to speak at all. It was clear that she would rather not talk about it, rather not hear his apology. She obviously wasn’t pissed off with him, so maybe if she didn’t want to talk about it, he had to respect that and just let it lie. Just not think about it. Just not imagine pulling her into his arms and pressing hot kisses all over her gorgeous face. He blew out a breath and closed the dishwasher door with more force than was necessary.
They got through the next few shifts in a very similar manner. Although he felt bad for thinking it, Rafe could have wished for busier shifts. Not a terrible road accident, or a heart attack victim or anything of that nature. A broken leg that needed to be transported to Orbost would be good, or how about a mystery case that had to be driven all the way to Bairnsdale. That could take up pretty much the whole shift. But there were no broken legs or mysteries to be driven anywhere, and so the shifts passed with excruciating politeness from both of them.
“Need to restock the gloves.” Mikayla moved around the back of the ambulance, opening draws and cupboards at random.
“Alright.”
“’Blankets are all good, but we could use some fresh towels.”
