On the outskirts. Helping, but not acknowledged. But still there.
Until Wyatt.
He’d been ten when he moved to the neighborhood, the weird, scrawny boy with glasses who seemed, at first, just as much on the outskirts of the group as she was, until the day he was fully accepted into the fold and she was left behind.
Except worse.
Because Wyatt had been on the outskirts with her. He should’ve known how she felt.
Instead, when he reached out and included her, he’d challenge her to a game of pool, and then he’d wipe the table with her. He’d offer to give her some pointers on shooting a basketball, and then he’d spend the whole time hogging the ball and saying, “Like this, Skye. See how I’m holding it. No, not like that. Here. Like this.” He’d pick her for his team in baseball, and then go out of his way to dive in front of her any time a grounder came her way.
The scrawny boy who wasn’t really any better at anything than she was, telling her how to be better.
Every time.
And don’t get her started on what he’d done the last time she’d gone fishing with the guys.
Beck and his buddies had all eventually graduated high school over the course of three years or so, and she hadn’t seen them much after that. Wyatt and several others left, either for four-year universities or to join the military. Beck and the rest stayed behind for community college. Then the crazy years happened—Beck and four of his buddies had formed a boy band. By the time Skye started college, they’d been on their first tour of the States. By the time she graduated, they’d been internationally famous.
A few years ago, the band broke up. The guys had moved on to different paths, some back home, some out all around the world, but they’d still stayed close. They hadn’t forgotten their roots. Whenever they were all back home in Copper Valley, they still got together to play baseball or basketball, eat hamburgers and hot dogs, and talk about the good old days.
And Skye still tried to keep up.
It wasn’t like she was really part of the group, but she still liked hearing who was where, who had a girlfriend, who’d switched jobs, and who’d realized he wasn’t as young as he used to be while playing one of their pick-up games.
Wyatt was rarely there. He was one of the few who had permanently moved away. His sister had gotten married and moved across the country, and his mom had passed away a few years ago. She’d gone to the funeral with her parents.
Every once in a while, though, he still showed up in Copper Valley. Usually at the request of Beck or one of the other neighborhood guys.
Like three years ago.
When Wyatt had come back to town for a weekend house party, and Beck insisted on a pool tournament.
Poor Beck.
Skye had mopped the table with him.
And then with six of the other guys.
And then, she’d found herself up against Wyatt in the final round.
You’re holding your cue wrong, Wyatt had said. Here. Let me show you.
She’d spun that pool cue around and pointed it at him. I think I know how to handle my own stick.
Just trying to help, he’d said. And he’d seemed genuinely injured.
As though he truly had no idea how obnoxious his help was. As though he truly didn’t understand that while she might not have held her pool cue the way he thought she should, what she did worked for her.
But he’d done what he needed to do.
That injured look of his had ruffled her feathers, because suddenly, she’d suspected he actually didn’t know how obnoxious he was.
And then he’d beaten her.
By a single shot.
Now can I show you how to hold your cue? he’d said.
She’d offered to shove it up his nether regions and invented a date with her girlfriends that she was late for.
And she wished that was the last time she’d given Wyatt Owens any thought, but every once in a while, that unexpected hurt in his expression had flashed through her memories.
And she’d spent more time than she wanted to admit wondering if she’d misjudged him.
Last night, when she’d opened her eyes and found Wyatt’s attention glued to her, his blue eyes raw, unguarded, and interested, a mix of conflicting reactions and emotions had overwhelmed her.
It was Wyatt, for heavens’ sake.
But he was…different. Still arrogant, still know-it-all, still one of the many guys she’d grown up with, but also more. More human. Also, oddly more untouchable.
Maybe it was life experience. His years in the military seemed to have tempered his arrogance and molded it into assured competence instead. The subtle crinkles around his eyes, the deliberate way he moved, the way his shoulders were broader, his muscles holy wow harder, his jaw stronger, his focus more intense—sometime in the last decade, Wyatt Owens had grown into a man.
A man with six-pack abs and a restrained energy who was entertaining his nephew for a week.
And she’d been painfully aware of him every last second of lunch, and every last second they’d been in the house together.
The man hadn’t been able to breathe without Skye feeling it. He’d been a part of the background of her life forever, always as a friend of Beck’s first, a pain in her neck second, but today—today, and last night, he’d been different.
Not that she needed to give him any more thought.
She still hadn’t gotten back to normal after her last real relationship. There was no need to muddy her life by tangling with her brother’s friend.
Men weren’t in her plans right now. Didn’t want one, didn’t need one. Period.
She snapped the lid shut on her luggage. She didn’t want to drive in the dark, but she was on the verge of having to.
The clink of pool balls in the next room set her teeth on edge.
If Wyatt was teaching Nicholas to shoot pool the way he liked to teach Skye how to shoot pool, the kid would probably be faking the flu before tomorrow was over.
And he probably had no idea his help wasn’t actually helpful.
She thunked her luggage on the floor and rolled it out of the bedroom.
“Miss Skye! Come play with us.”
She glanced in the game room. Nicholas’s wide, hopeful smile hit her in the heart, like a candle flickering to life in her chest. Wyatt angled around the table and glanced at her too. “Bad idea, Nicholas,” he said. “She’ll wipe the table with both of us.”
Skye started.
Had he just said she was good?
She squinted.
Yep, his self-deprecating smile suggested he had complimented her pool skills.
And that he didn’t expect her to appreciate it.
She bristled at the same time a shot of guilt surged through her veins. Had she been overly tough on him? She liked to think she was a nice person, but with Wyatt…
She simply didn’t understand him.
“We can all play,” Nicholas said. “Miss Skye, you can have the girl colors, and I’ll have the boy colors, and Uncle Wyatt can have the yellow and black.”
It was impossible to not smile at Nicholas. “So Uncle Wyatt’s a bumblebee?”
Nicholas’s ears went pink. “No, he just…gets black and yellow.”
She’d already missed the best window to leave the mountains while it was still light since she’d been out hiking with her camera, getting reacquainted with one of her favorite hobbies. And there was nowhere she had to be tonight. “Okay. One game. But how about you and me are on a team against your Uncle Wyatt?”
Nicholas shoved his glasses up his nose, and this time, the pink came out in his cheeks. “Okay.”
Skye picked her cue from the wall beside the Dogs Playing Poker framed print. “Go on, Uncle Wyatt. Rack ’em up.”
He was barefoot in a plain gray T-shirt and jeans that molded to his thighs and hips. His biceps flexed and bunched while he set the pool balls in the triangle, and she did her best to not notice.
Inste
ad, she turned her focus to Nicholas. “Do you have any pets at home?”
He shook his head.
“No? Hm. Who’s your best friend?”
He launched into a story about Nina from the playground, whom he hadn’t seen since school let out for the summer a month ago.
And Skye noticed that peculiar sensation again that told her Wyatt was watching.
Her scalp tingled like she had sand in her hair and her nipples tightened.
Just as they had last night in the bathtub.
He gestured to the green felt tabletop. “Ladies and children first.”
Her nose scrunched. If Beck—or any of his other friends—had said the same, she would’ve assumed they were being gentlemen.
But when Wyatt offered her the chance to go first, because she was a lady, she somehow felt insulted.
What was wrong with her?
“Here, Miss Skye. Do you need help holding your pool cue?”
Wyatt coughed, and a dry grin flickered to life on his chiseled features. “I think she’s got it, Nicholas.”
Nicholas blinked at Skye. “Ladies first, Miss Skye.”
See?
That was adorable.
And realizing she couldn’t appreciate a simple gentlemanly gesture from Wyatt made her squirm.
She liked people.
She liked being nice to people.
So why couldn’t she be nice to Wyatt? It wasn’t his fault, exactly, that she’d always found his personality somewhat lacking.
“Thank you, Nicholas.”
She set the cue ball on the table, lined up, and shot. The balls scattered around the table, and the seven ball dropped into the corner pocket. “Hope you like solids, Nicholas.” She arched her arm in invitation. “Your turn.”
Nicholas was tall enough to get a decent angle on his cue, but he gripped it at the very bottom end, and the cue swung wildly on the edge of the table while he tried to line up his shot.
Wyatt took two steps toward him, but Skye jumped between them. “Hey, bud. Can I help you get set up?”
He gave her a shy smile. “Sure, Miss Skye.”
She bent over him, adjusting his grip on the cue, the positioning, and she quickly reiterated the basics of the game—which balls they wanted to shoot in the pockets, and to not sink the eight ball.
When Nicholas was in position, she stepped back. “Go ahead,” she said. “Take your shot.”
He pulled the stick back. He rammed it forward, and the cue ball jumped. It thump-thump-thumped across the table, half-heartedly knocking into the fourteen and six balls before teetering to a stop at the far side of the table.
Wyatt winced.
“He’s learning,” Skye said through a clenched-jaw smile.
“And we don’t want to damage Beck’s table,” Wyatt said, eyeing the mark where Nicholas’s pool cue had left a streak of chalk on the felt.
“Please. Like Beck never did far worse to pool tables when he was growing up.”
Wyatt’s jaw opened, then shut.
Skye felt a real smile blossom. “Or you too, for that matter. Go on. You’re up.”
She and Nicholas stepped away from the pool table while Wyatt circled it. He slid a glance at her, and that warm, crinkly-eyed smile of his made her breath catch.
“But we weren’t the ones who popped a basketball,” he said.
Oh, wow. She’d forgotten about that incident with the lawn darts at Miss Helene’s garden party. Her own lips spread in a smile. “Far more innocent than y’all dog-piling on the air hockey table and fighting over Magnolia Feeney’s diary.”
“Still have a scar from that.”
“Lucky none of you broke anything when the legs collapsed.”
He bent over the table, lining up his shot while he chuckled. “Seems to me you weren’t completely innocent in that little accident.”
“You need to get your memory checked, old man. I was stuck at home with the babysitter.”
“Then how do you know so much about it?”
“You made the Ledger. I clipped the article and framed it for Beck for Christmas.”
“Never did understand why he called you a pain in the ass.”
“Language, Uncle Wyatt,” she sang.
He darted a glance at Nicholas, then back to her.
And his self-deprecating grin had to be the sexiest thing she’d seen in weeks.
She sucked a breath in.
Wyatt Owens wasn’t supposed to be sexy.
“Sorry, Nicholas,” he said. “Don’t tell your mom I said ass, okay?”
“I’d totally bargain for some pancakes at Sue Ann’s tomorrow if I were you,” she murmured to the gangly boy.
“We men have to stick together, Miss Skye,” he said gravely.
Wyatt flashed another one of those grins. “Atta boy, Nicholas.”
When had he grown into a man? And why was she suddenly noticing?
Nicholas sat straighter and flashed a pure, happy smile at Skye.
And she took a hit right to the heart.
This kid liked her.
So why didn’t Steven’s kid like her?
What was wrong with her?
Wyatt took his shot, neatly landing the fifteen in the side pocket and setting himself up with a clear shot of the eleven ball as well.
She gave herself a mental shake. “Watch closely, Nicholas,” she said, “because I don’t think either of us will be getting another chance to hit the balls.”
“Why not?”
Wyatt’s grin had disappeared when he shifted a glance over his shoulder at her.
“Because your Uncle Wyatt has had a lot more practice than we have,” she said.
Wyatt kept his gaze trained on hers. As though he were trying to decide if she were complimenting him, insulting him, or merely making an informed statement.
She’d never noticed how unique his eyes were. The deep blue was ringed in navy, with flecks of the sky between. And he had remarkably long lashes. They were lighter than the dark brown of his hair, but thick and full. They should’ve been feminine, but on him, they simply accentuated his eyes and completed the rugged, subtle expressiveness of his face.
He’d be a fascinating subject to photograph up close.
Those eyes.
The dark stubble on his cheeks.
The intensity radiating out of his pores.
She cried a mental uncle and looked away. Being friends with Wyatt? Yes, she could make an effort to be friends. But this weird attraction? To one of her brother’s oldest friends?
Bad idea.
“Maybe we can play foosball while your uncle finishes off the pool table,” she said to Nicholas.
The distinct crack of a pool cue hitting a ball was followed by the equally distinctive crack of balls clashing on the table.
“Your turn,” Wyatt said.
She gaped at the table.
Had he just missed?
On purpose?
Again?
Who was this man, and what had he done with Wyatt Owens?
“You go, Miss Skye,” Nicholas said.
Wyatt settled onto a stool in the corner, the raised eyebrow and the hitch in his lips challenging her. Go on, he seemed to be saying. Tell me I missed on purpose.
“I’m leaving in the morning,” she said. “No matter what the pool table says. Not playing for that.”
He shrugged. “Not my business.”
He was doing it again.
He was trying to fluster her so he could win—or lose—without appearing to have an agenda.
But with Nicholas there, winning wasn’t what she cared about.
She just wanted the boy to have fun.
And she couldn’t help herself, but she wanted to bask in his affection, deserved or not.
* * *
Wyatt had never appreciated being ganged up on until Skye and Nicholas took up a halfhearted rivalry against him.
Her being here took the edge off those memories that snuck up whenever he though
t about how small Nicholas was. And their laughter eased any remaining aches.
From the moment he’d found out Amelia was having a little boy, he’d wanted to be there to protect his nephew from every perceived threat, be they physical, mental, or emotional.
His military lifestyle didn’t lend itself to that kind of presence in his nephew’s life though. Until this week, the most time they’d spent alone together had been a few hours here and there so Amelia and Vince could go out to dinner by themselves when Wyatt would visit.
But watching Skye with the boy took away the worries. As though she were somehow working a magic that made him realize he’d been projecting his own fears from childhood on a kid who was happy, loved, and well-adjusted.
After three games of pool, they’d moved to the foosball table. Wyatt hadn’t even had to try to beat the pants off them, because they’d started talking about some video game, and they might as well have been speaking Swahili.
But they’d been laughing.
And shrieking.
And generally ignoring the game.
He left them playing darts and went upstairs to check out the pantry. After some digging, he found a package of granola bars, which he carried downstairs with a bunch of grapes.
Skye’s luggage outside the game room made him flinch.
Talk her into staying, Beck’s latest email had said this morning. She hasn’t been herself since that douchebag dumped her. Working herself to death, not sleeping, won’t go home. Is she eating? Make sure she’s eating.
If Beck had any idea what he would’ve done to help her get over any of her ex-douchebags, he probably wouldn’t have been so keen to have Wyatt stick around.
But there was the Nicholas factor too.
She had been right.
He could’ve cleaned that pool table.
But something in her tone had made him stop.
And think.
He had a bachelors degree in mechanical engineering, a masters in engineering management, a second masters in military studies, and yet, tonight, something had clicked, sort of like it had last night.
If he’d demonstrated to Nicholas all the various shots he could use in pool, he would’ve finished the game in five minutes.
And Skye would’ve left.
Tonight.
As it was, when he missed, she’d looked at him as though she hadn’t known him at all.
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