Read Online Unbound: (InterMix) by Cara McKenna - Free Book Online Page B

like, four levels below the surface of what they’re actually
     saying or doing.”
    “We don’t stand a chance.”
    When’s the last time you kissed a woman? Months? Years?
“I’m not quite as good as my peers with that stuff,” Merry said. “I’m kind of shy
     around guys.”
    He shot her a dry look, that expression saying,
You could have bloody well fooled me.
    “Or I was,” she corrected. A hundred pounds ago. “I’m a late bloomer. This whole walking-across-Scotland
     thing . . . I wouldn’t have done this last year. I’m trying to find my balls, I guess.
     You know. Be more adventurous, before I wake up and discover I’m fifty.”
    “I’d say you’re on your way. Three weeks hiking, on your own? That’s farther than
     most people take themselves.”
    Though not as far as Rob had taken
him
self. Straight out of polite society. And permanently, it seemed.
    They sipped their coffees in companionable silence for a while. Merry was pleased
     she could sit with him this way, only the slightest bit tempted to plaster over the
     peace with chatter. With some people, you could almost guess what they were thinking
     during these wordless stretches, but not Rob, not now. His face was as placid as a
     lake on a breezeless day, same as he’d looked during target practice, before his audience
     had arrived. Still waters. He did seem the type to run deep, and she wondered what
     thoughts were coursing behind those sad blue eyes.
    After he drained his mug, Rob stood. “I have a few things to tend to.”
    You always do.
“Need help?”
    “No. You take it easy. I’ll make dinner in a couple hours. Nap ’til then if you can,
     if your head’s still hurting . . . Oh.”
    “Oh?”
    “Hang on.” He left her, disappearing into his bedroom, returning a moment later with
     something black in his hand.
    “You should borrow this, while you’re here.” He held it out—a late-model eBook reader.
    “Oh ho!” Merry made grabby hands at him. “I
knew
you had books around here somewhere. Though I hadn’t expected this . . .” She pushed
     the little list button and was rewarded with a library of nearly three hundred titles.
     “Wow. You’re voracious.”
    Rob smiled at that, turning her insides to butter. He tucked his hands in his pockets.
     “I’ve probably only read a few dozen so far. But when I came out here, I loaded it
     with every classic I recognized the name of. All those books we tell ourselves we’ll
     get around to reading.”
    She scanned the first twenty titles. “Awesome. And how surprisingly tech-savvy of
     you.”
    “I’m a hermit, not a Luddite. And that was far easier than lugging hundreds of paperbacks.”
    “What happens when the battery dies?”
    “I’ve got a travel charger, for the Land Rover.”
    “Oh, of course. Clever you. Thanks.”
    He shrugged. “Figured you must be sick of the view out that one window by now.”
    So he wanted her to borrow this . . . He wanted her to be entertained, and comfortable.
     So did that mean she was welcome to stay another day, perhaps?
    She wouldn’t say no. The wound at her temple didn’t frighten her as it had yesterday.
     She’d ditched the bandage, and the pain had faded to a dull ache, rising in the occasional
     crescendo, then receding almost to nothing for minutes at a time. She didn’t feel
right
, but the discomfort was no longer urgent.
    “I’ll let you relax,” Rob said, excusing himself to the bedroom once more. He reappeared
     with a tee shirt and towel in his hand and headed for the back hall. She watched him
     go, each and every step, until he disappeared.
    She stroked the velvety rubber corners of the eReader. Secretly, she hoped Rob would
     invite her to stay for an extra
week
, then make a move on her, but that probably wasn’t happening. She couldn’t spare
     the time, anyway—each day she lingered here was a day stolen from her visit to Inverness.
     And Rob surely couldn’t afford to keep pumping his