It only took a few minutes to buy the propane tank. Megassey’s was mostly staffed by teenagers on Saturdays and during the school vacations. Ember knew some of them by sight – older brothers and sisters of her elementary school pupils – but unlike Frank Megassey and his wife Lula, they weren’t chatty and wanting to talk. The boy who was at the register – Ben, according to his typed name badge – gave her the receipt, and inclined his head toward the back of the shop. “The tanks are out the back, by the door. I’ll page the associate in the back to remove a tank for you. You need any help getting it into your car?”
“No thanks. I’ve got it.” She flashed him a smile, then made her way down the aisle, past the shelves stuffed with screws and nails and old fashioned blown-glass models of whales and dolphins. She had a little smile on her face – it was okay to feel pleased with herself, wasn’t it? She’d averted a crisis with one little car trip. Girl power ruled.
Except when it didn’t. Apparently girl power only got you so far when it came to lifting a full tank of propane. She curled her fingers around the steel neck and tugged, but the tank didn’t move an inch.
Okay, deep breath. Time to find that girl power again. A propane tank wasn’t going to defeat her.
Ember looked back over her shoulder, her eyes picking out the boy who’d assisted her. Ben was leaning on the counter, smiling at a girl as she handed a photo frame over to him, the two of them talking rapidly. She could go over and interrupt them, requesting to take him up on his offer, but somehow the thought of it just rankled her.
She didn’t want to ask the boy for help, didn’t want to ask anybody for that matter. She could do this. She just needed to approach it from a different angle.
A moment later a bright idea hit her. The propane tank was cylindrical. All she had to do was get it on its side, and roll it out to the car. But even that was easier said than done. By the time she was pushing the bottle across the cracked concrete to her car, she’d already managed to work up a sweat. Her shirt was sticking to her skin, tendrils of dark brown hair that had fallen out of her ponytail were clinging to her neck. She lifted a hand to brush the perspiration from her brow.
She was almost there. Just the small matter of getting the propane tank from the ground and into her old Toyota. She only needed to lift it a few feet.
She gave the tank another tug, as if it had somehow changed properties in the minutes since she’d last tried to lift it. In spite of its weight, she managed to lift it half an inch above the ground before the effort became too much, and she released it back onto the ground of the parking lot.
“Do you need any help with that?”
She glanced up from her crouched position. A man had stopped by her car, and was staring down at her quizzically. Brushing some stray hairs from her sticky brow, she stood, trying to look casual. Slowly she lifted her face up to look at his, and she felt a strange fluttering in her chest.
He looked familiar, though she had no idea why. There weren’t many guys in Angel Sands with dark cropped hair and blue eyes so vivid she could imagine swimming in them. Her mouth felt dry as she took in his full lips and sharp jaw, still trying, and failing, to place him.
Maybe it was just her imagination. Most everybody in Angel Sands looked familiar. That’s what growing up in a town like this did to a person.
“I’m just having a little trouble—”
“You need to be careful with that tank,” he interrupted, staring down at the tan metal. “It’s pressurized. If you damage it, you could have an explosion on your hands. You shouldn’t be rolling it around.” He glanced over his shoulder at the hardware store, a frown furrowing his brow. “Didn’t Frank offer to have one of his boys bring it out for you?”
Ember shrugged. “They seemed a little busy.” She wasn’t going to tell him that she’d brushed off any offers of assistance. Not when she’d so clearly failed to move the damn tank herself. “I didn’t realize it was so heavy.”
“You want it in your trunk?”
“Yes, but I can go back in—” She stopped talking when she saw him bend down and wrap his hand around the steel neck, his bicep muscles flexing and pushing out the fabric of his grey t-shirt. Like Ember, he was wearing shorts, and as he stood she could see how defined his leg muscles were.
Will had never been to the gym in his life. He’d been too busy working to lift weights or run on the track, or that’s what he’d told Ember anyway. She’d never been particularly attracted to guys with muscles, but watching the way this man’s body moved was fascinating. They weren’t muscles without meaning, they had a function and they worked for him.
Right now, they were working for her, too.
“Be careful driving home.” He still hadn’t cracked a smile. “You really should look into deliveries. The trucks are risk assessed and built to carry dangerous loads. Having a loose propane bottle in the back of your trunk is asking for trouble.”
“I only live a few minutes away.”
“That’s all it takes.”
Okay, so he might have a body to die for, but his seriousness was grating on her. She wasn’t exactly a daredevil, was she? Last year when she and Will had visited the Grand Canyon, she’d been too scared to even look over the edge.
Mr. Serious-but-sexy could save his health and safety lectures for somebody who needed it.
“Well, I’ll be sure to drive carefully for those few minutes.” She flashed him a smile, determined not to let her annoyance show. “Thank you for your help. I appreciate it.”
With that, she got into her car and started it up, letting the breath she’d been holding escape. And if she snuck a last look at those muscles when she reversed out of the parking lot and onto the road, well it didn’t mean a thing, did it?
3
Lucas watched the Toyota until it left the parking lot, turning right onto Main Street before it was out of sight. He frowned, wondering why he’d been so worked up by the fact somebody was driving a propane tank home.
Yeah, propane could lead to explosions – he’d seen one or two of them in his time – but the woman had said she was a local, and he could see from the way she steered her car that she was a careful driver. It still didn’t stop his body from feeling as though he was on high alert. His blood pumping through his veins as if he’d just been on a long run.