“Yes, obviously.”
“I want to explore possibilities, Regan. I’ve done what I was told, what was expected of me, for so long. Forever. I need to do what I want.” With a little sigh, she took a turn around the kitchen. “That’s what this is all about. Why do you think I chose the paranormal as a hobby? A first-year psych student could figure it out. All of my life has been so abnormal, and at the same time so tediously normal. I was abnormal.”
“That’s not true.” Regan’s voice was sharp and annoyed, and made Rebecca smile.
“You always did stand up for me, even against myself. But it is true. It’s not normal for a seven-year-old to do calculus, Regan, or to be able to discuss the political ramifications of the Crimean War with historians, in French. I’m not even sure what normal behavior is for a seven-year-old, except in theory, because I never was one.”
Before Regan could speak, she shook her head and hurried on. “I was pushed into everything so young. You can’t know what it’s like to go to school year-round, year after year. Even when I was at home, there were tutors and projects, assignments, and before I knew it my whole life was study, work, lecture.” She lifted her hands, let them fall. “Earn a degree, earn another, then go home alone.”
“I didn’t know you were so unhappy,” Regan murmured.
“I’ve been miserable all my life.” Rebecca closed her eyes. “Oh, that sounds so pathetic. It’s not fair, I suppose. I’ve had tremendous advantages. Education, money, respect, opportunities. But advantages can trap you, Regan. Just as disadvantages can. It seems petty to complain about them, but I am. Now I’m doing something about it, finally.” With a kind of triumph, she drew in a deep, greedy breath. “I’m doing something no one expects from me, something to give my stuffy, straight-arrow colleagues a marvelous chance to gossip. And something that fascinates me.”
“I’m all for it.” But Regan was worried as she opened cupboards for mugs. “I think it’s wonderful that you’ve taken time for yourself, that you have an interest in something most people consider out of the ordinary.”
Rebecca accepted the mug of coffee. “But?”
“But Shane doesn’t come under the heading of Hobby. He’s the sweetest man I know, but he could hurt you.”
Rebecca mulled it over as she sipped. “It’s a possibility. But even that would be an experience. I’ve never been close enough to a man to be hurt by one.”
She moved over to the window to look out. She could see him, in the field, riding a tractor. Just as she’d imagined. No, it wasn’t a tractor, she remembered. A baler. He’d be making hay.
“I love looking at him,” she murmured.
“None of them are hard on the eyes,” Regan commented as she joined Rebecca at the window. “And none of them are easy on the heart.” She laid a hand on Rebecca’s shoulder. “Just be careful.”
But Rebecca felt she’d been careful too long already.
She couldn’t even cook. Shane had never known anyone who was incapable of doing more at a stove than heating up a can of soup. And even that, for Rebecca, was a project of monumental proportions.
He didn’t mind her being there. He’d talked himself into that. He liked her company, was certain he would eventually charm her into bed, but he hated her reasons for moving in.
Her equipment was everywhere—in the kitchen, the living room, in the guest room. He couldn’t walk through his own house without facing a camera.
It baffled him that an obviously intelligent woman actually believed she was going to take videos of ghosts.
Still, there were some advantages. If he cooked, she cheerfully did the clearing-up. And it wasn’t a hardship to come in from the fields or the barn and find her at the kitchen table, making her notes on her little laptop computer.
She claimed she felt most at home in the kitchen—though she didn’t know a skillet from a saucepan—so she spent most of her time there.
He’d gotten through the first night, though it was true that he’d done a great deal of tossing and turning at the idea that she was just down the hall. And if he’d been gritty-eyed and cranky the next morning, he’d worked it off by the time he finished the milking and came in to cook breakfast.
And she came down for breakfast, he reflected. Though she didn’t eat much—barely, in his opinion, enough to sustain life. But she drank coffee, shared the morning paper with him, asked questions. Lord, the woman was full of questions.
Still, it was pleasant to have company over the first meal of the day. Someone who looked good, smelled good, had something to say for herself. The problem was, he found himself thinking about how she had looked, had smelled, what she had said, when he went out to work.
He couldn’t remember another woman hanging in his mind quite so long, or quite so strongly. That was something that could worry a man, if he let it.
Shane MacKade didn’t like to worry. And he wasn’t used to thinking about a woman who didn’t seem to be giving him the same amount of attention.
It was simply a matter of adjustment—or so he told himself. She was a guest in his home now, and a man didn’t take advantage of a guest. Which was why he wanted her out again as soon as possible—so that he could.
And if he just didn’t think overmuch about how pretty she looked, tapping away at her keyboard, those little round glasses perched on her nose, the eyes behind them dark with concentration, her long, narrow feet crossed neatly at the ankles, he didn’t suff
er.
But, damn it, how was he supposed to not think about it?