by Jeannie Watt
“Okay.” Molly started tapping away, felt the metal give beneath the hammer.
“Move it in this direction...”
Molly followed Finn’s instructions, hammering from the center out until her flat circle was now a lovely, relatively smooth dome.
“I made a hubcap.” She laid down the hammer and picked up her handiwork.
“Kind of.” Finn smiled at her. “I’ll show you how to do some different textures...”
Half an hour later, Molly had used a variety of hammers for a variety of different techniques. Finn was a patient teacher and she could see now why he wanted to make it his career. He made her feel confident, even though she’d been patently uncertain when she’d walked into his shop.
“You’re different here,” she said without really thinking.
“You are, too.”
Molly wanted to ask, “How so?” but didn’t. This was not a real place for her. She was visiting Finn’s world, which was far different from her own.
“Have you made any other artwork?” she asked.
“Artwork?”
“Frankie?”
Finn gave a scoffing laugh. “That’s not art. That’s recycling.”
Molly disagreed, but wasn’t there to argue. “Do you have any other recycling?”
“A few pieces in my backyard. Smaller.”
“Can I see them before I go?”
“You’re leaving?”
Molly bit her lip. So very tempting to say, No. I’m not leaving, and then see what unfolded. “I think I’d better.”
He didn’t argue. Molly took off her glasses and her gloves, set them side by side on the bench. “This has been fun.”
“You’ll have to come back.” He said it in a way that told Molly that he didn’t believe she would. He was right. Being here...she saw too much potential for trouble. For getting in over her head. as she’d gotten in over her head with Blake.
They left the shop and walked by the light of the full moon up the short path to his house. He veered to the right and opened the gate of the chain-link fence. His back porch light was on, illuminating the metal pieces in his backyard. Molly went from piece to piece. A funky glass table supported by what looked like a twisted tree, a chair made entirely of old rusty bolts, a swan with raised wings supporting a rustic wooden planter.
“That’s it. These three pieces.”
“You’re talented. Ever thought of making this your career?”
“I was thinking that I wanted something more stable.” He shot her a sideways look. “Surely you understand that.”
“I do.” She smiled a little. “You are a good teacher.”
“I know.”
“Can you handle the Jonases of the world?”
“Do those guys take automotives?”
“The Dennys do.”
Finn let out a breath. “You had to say that.”
“Reality bites.” She reached out to touch him, to lay her hand on his upper arm. His gaze jerked toward her as his muscles tensed beneath her fingers. “I don’t want you to give up the idea of teaching. Not for a second. But it’s important to go into it with eyes wide open. It’s not what it looks like from the outside. Many students are not empty vessels waiting to be filled. They’re there for a credit and to cause trouble.”
“Rosy picture.” He started back out the gate and Molly followed as they headed down the driveway toward her small car. “Sometimes I envy Dylan. He may have taken some side trips, but he always knew what he wanted. And now he’s accomplished it.” He stopped next to her car. “I imagine you always knew what you wanted to do, too.”
“Guilty.”
Finn lifted his chin, looked over the top of the car off into the distance, then back at her, making an obvious effort to push unsettling thoughts aside. “Did hammering help with your frustrations?”
“Yeah. It did.” The mental ones, anyway. The physical ones...not so much. “Thanks for inviting me.”
Molly opened her car door and Finn stepped back. “Hey,” she said softly. “Since I’m here—” and since they were not at odds with each other “—tell me about Chase. What did you mean about him going nowhere but up?”
One corner of Finn’s mouth tightened briefly. “His dad died in prison.”
Molly’s mouth fell open. “I...uh—”
“Chase is not his dad. He’s a good kid.”
“But still.”
“We can’t all come from Ozzie and Harriet backgrounds.”
“I realize that. I just feel protective of my sister. I don’t want her involved with anyone who would—” she made a helpless gesture “—I don’t know, screw up her life?”
“I get that. I’m sure Chase doesn’t want to be involved with anyone who would screw up his life, either. He’s working hard, Molly.”
“What’s his mother like?”
“Not dangerous, if that’s what you’re asking. She’s a sweet woman who got hooked up with the wrong guy.”
And that was exactly what Molly was hoping her sister wouldn’t do. She suddenly had more questions. Lots of them.
“He’s never been in trouble.”
“Not like I was.”
She gave him a dark look over the top of her glasses. “That’s not reassuring.”
“He thinks Georgina is perfect.”
“Well, I’ll give him a couple points for that.” She let out a sigh. “I don’t want to come off as a snob.” A lift of his eyebrows told her that was exactly what she was coming off as, which ticked her off. “I’m just being protective, okay? There’s a difference. If I was a snob, I would look down on Chase because of his background. I don’t. I think he’s a nice kid.”
“But not nice enough for your sister?”
Molly crossed her arms. “Positions reversed...how would you feel?”
Finn considered. “I’d be okay with it. His dad is dead.”
Molly pressed her lips together, then unfolded her arms. “I don’t want to ruin what’s been a nice evening.”
“Then trust me when I say that Chase is a nice kid who won’t do your sister wrong.”
Molly bit her lip, and then opened her car door. “I wish I could, Finn...but I just don’t know.”
“Here’s the thing, Molly...”
His tone stopped her as much as his words. She glanced over at him and he said, “Like it or not, you judge people. Chase is not good enough for your sister, and I’m not good enough for you.”
“I never said you weren’t good enough.”
“It was heavily implied.”
“What I said has nothing to do with your worth as a person. It has to do with what I can and cannot deal with in my life.”
“How am I so lacking?” He reached out to put his hand on the top of her open car door, essentially caging her in.
She dropped her chin, tried to find words before looking back up at him. He was watching her closely, as if her answer honestly mattered—whether he wanted it to, or not. “It’s not a lack. It’s incompatibility.”
“So you say without really knowing me.” She didn’t answer, even though she thought he was wrong. She did know a lot about him. She knew he was compassionate and took care of small orphan animals. He was there for his grandfather. But he was also a guy meandering through life. He had a goal, but he may not be able to achieve it. What then?
Finn shifted his weight and then said with a touch of impatience, “Not every guy you go out with has to be husband material, Molly—for you or your sister. Have you ever thought about just having fun and not worrying about compatibility?”
“I don’t think I’m wired that way.”
His hand dropped away from the top of the car door. “Your life, Molly. You’ve got to live it the way you see
fit.”
“Thank you. I will,” Molly said, not missing the censure in his words. Who was judging whom now? “And for your information, it isn’t about me not wanting to have fun...it’s about me trying to make the best choices possible. There’s nothing wrong with having a plan and sticking to it.”
Especially when the objective of that plan was peace of mind and security.
“Tell me about this damned plan of yours.”
“What?”
“I’m also trying to make a plan. Maybe I can use yours as a prototype.”
She gave a short laugh. “I don’t think so.”
“Guys like me can’t use a plan like yours?”
“You have different objectives.”
“Tell me about your objectives.”
For a moment, they faced off, then Molly slowly stepped out from behind the safety of the car door and swung it shut. Now there was nothing between them except for a couple feet of gravel and a healthy dose of animosity. She walked around him to the front of her car, put a foot on the bumper and hoisted herself up to sit on the hood. If she was going to have an uncomfortable discussion, she was damned well going to be physically comfortable while she did it—or pretend to be comfortable.
“You’ll scratch your paint doing that.”
“So?”
He folded his arms over his chest again and waited while Molly massaged the tense muscles at the back of her neck with one hand. So much for feeling better after metal hammering.
“I hooked up with a guy who looked really good on paper,” she finally said. “A semi-professional athlete.” Finn’s eyebrows lifted and she glared at him. “Don’t be so surprised.”
He took a couple steps closer. “I didn’t think you were into athletics.”
“I can watch quite nicely.” And she had once enjoyed hiking and skiing. “Anyway, eventually it became...very clear...that we had different expectations in life and that being together wasn’t going to work. For me, anyway.” She ran her fingertips over the smooth, cool metal of the hood. “I wasted a few years of my life on a guy who blindsided me. I’d been... I don’t know...amazed that he and I had hit it off so well. I totally bought into the opposites-attract thing.”
“How’d he blindside you, Molly?”
She shook her head. He didn’t need to know all of her humiliations. “Let’s just say he did. And to keep it from happening again, I did a lot of soul searching. I wrote down what made me feel most comfortable and secure in life. Made a long list. Then I pared it down to a short list of nonnegotiables.”
“What’s your number one objective, Molly?”
“Security.” She wanted to feel as if her world was safe and predictable. And she wanted the people in her world to play by her rules.
“Not love?”
“Not if it interferes with security.”
Finn gave a slow nod. “This guy must have taken you for quite a ride.”
“Yes. And I’m not about to get on board again.
He considered her words for a moment, then said, “What if a guy didn’t want anything from you that would interfere with your security?”
“What are you getting at, Finn?”
“What if a guy just wanted to have some fun? Would you be on board for fun?”
Her stomach did a small freefall. Fun with Finn conjured up all kinds of unsettling images.
“I...uh...would have to believe that I wasn’t heading toward another big mistake.” She stretched her legs out then dropped them again, the heels of her shoes bouncing on the bumper. “This guy you’re talking about wouldn’t happen to be you, would it?”
“Well, you could see where I would be a lot of fun.”
The wry note in his voice helped ease some of the tension in her neck and shoulders.
“That’s what Sheena said.”
“Shayna. And that doesn’t have to be the kind of fun I’m talking about.”
She cocked an eyebrow. “Doesn’t have to be?”
“Well... I’m open to a lot of stuff.”
“I bet you are.” Banter she could handle. Serious Finn telling her she was judgmental, not so much. “But as you know, I have strict rules and parameters.” She made it sound as if she were exaggerating, but the sad truth was that she really wasn’t. She did have strict rules and parameters, that helped keep her safe from nasty surprises in life—as safe as one could be anyway.
So why did safe suddenly seem...lame?
Finn.
His lips tilted into a careless half smile, but his gaze was serious as he said, “Afraid you’d fall for me?”
“Well...you are Finn Culver.”
He laughed, genuine amusement lighting his eyes.
“You’d better go home, Molly Adamson, before I provide you with too much temptation.”
“Yeah. Right.” She spoke lightly, but the truth was that he was tempting. There was never a time she didn’t find him tempting—even in the heat of an argument.
He was right—it was time to go home.
Molly slid off the hood of the car, ignoring his pained expression as her jeans made a light scratching noise. She dusted off her behind, then once again met Finn’s dark gaze. “Thanks for an interesting evening.”
“Anytime.” One corner of his mouth tightened as his gaze slid down to her lips and Molly felt a tingle go through her. In another time and place he might have kissed her...but not after this conversation. Besides, he’d promised no kissing.
You could change that...
She wasn’t going to. She opened the car door and slid into her seat. “I’ll think about what you said, Finn.” Because she wanted to be openminded, and open to change. She just didn’t want to get hurt again.
“Do that, Molly. I’ll talk to you later.”
* * *
MOLLY UNLOCKED THE front door and walked into her silent house. Georgina’s books were stacked on the coffee table and her laptop was open, but her purse was not hanging on coat hooks as usual. Molly wandered into the kitchen where she found a note propped against the sugar bowl. Out with Chase. Big surprise.
Finn approved of Chase.
She still wasn’t convinced that a guy who came from a wildly dysfunctional background was the guy for her sister, but she’d hold off saying anything for a while. It was totally possible that nature would run its course and that her sister and Chase would break up. No sense creating a sisterly rift when it wasn’t necessary.
Besides, Finn had given her other things to think about.
She almost went to the cupboard for chips, then decided she was woman enough to tackle this business without a crutch. Her notebook was now neatly filed with the cookbooks and she pulled it out, laid it on the table and flipped the cover open.
When her life had been in shambles, not all that long ago, this book had helped her put things back together. It contained goals, insights and, most importantly, promises she’d made to herself. The act of writing those promises down in the form of a life plan was the closest she could get to carving them in stone. She’d stepped outside of her comfort zone with Blake, reaped some benefits, but, in the end, had lost more than she’d gained. Confidence was good, but losing trust was brutal.
But...she rifled through the pages, recalling how lost she’d been when she first started the life plan book...maybe trust didn’t only involve another person. Maybe she needed to trust herself—trust that she could have fun, as Finn had suggested, and not lose herself, or her heart, in the process. It didn’t need to be an all-or-nothing deal. She could cut loose. Date a little.
Trust herself not to slip into a Blake situation.
Her strict parameters had been utterly necessary when she’d first started healing her life, but now that she’d moved forward and gained her confidence back, maybe they were
a little too strict.
Surely there had to be a way to address her very natural needs without losing herself in the process.
Molly reached for the pen lying next to the grocery list and turned to the page where she’d listed her goals. She hesitated, then put the pen to the paper and wrote Have a little fun.
* * *
MOLLY SEEMED PREOCCUPIED during class, teaching with a brisker style than usual, but a couple of times she caught Finn’s eye and it seemed as if she relaxed a little. Then Denny or Mr. Reed would ask a question and she fell back into all-business mode. The result was that Finn had no idea what the aftermath of their last conversation was. Whether she was going to give him a wide berth, and whether she was going to loosen up a little. He was shoving his notebook and folders into his old backpack after class had ended when Molly approached his desk.
“Can I speak to you before you go?” she asked in her cool teacher voice.
“Sure.” He had to admit that he loved her cool teacher voice.
She glanced around to see if anyone was close enough to hear, but the class was emptying rapidly, with the exception of Denny, Mr. Reed and Martha, who always took their time. “I’ve given your suggestion some serious thought—the one about having some fun.”
“And...?”
Her mouth tightened again and she shot a glance over at Denny who was eyeing them as if he was looking for some kind of infraction to report. “Maybe I should talk to you later.”
She was worried about Denny? Really?
An idea hit him. “Hey... Dylan and Jolie are coming back earlier than expected and we’re going out on Thursday night. Why don’t you join us?”
This time Finn glanced at Denny, who seemed to be taking a longer time than usual to pack up. In fact, the guy was barely moving.
“Are you waiting to talk to Molly?” Finn asked.
Denny gave him a dark look. “No. I understand the assignment.”
“Well, I don’t,” Finn said easily, before turning back to Molly. Actually it was a lie, because for once the stuff she presented made perfect sense. “Thursday at McElroy’s.”
“Just a casual thing, right?”
“No. An orgy.” Her lips twitched at the corners, as if she were fighting a smile. “Yes, casual. All you have to do is relax and enjoy my pretty face.”
