Page 8 of Bitten By Desire (Crooked Point #1)

Saturday

“So what do you think?” Bennett asked with an easy smile.

“Hmm?”

“The apple cider.”

Oh, right. I’d been too busy staring at literally nothing. I blew on the top of the cup and took a small sip. “Wow. You weren’t kidding. This is amazing.”

He smiled.

I loved apple cider. I rarely had it hot though. And I wasn’t sure if that’s why the flavors exploded on my tongue or if it was this apple cider in particular. Or maybe it was so good because of the witch brewing it.

“I’m glad I didn’t have to miss out,” Zoey said as she took a sip. “I wasn’t feeling great today. I really should probably keep my distance.” She took a step back from us.

No, please don’t ditch me right away.

“Actually, I think I see someone I know that I really do need to say hi to. Because I heard he had a cold too, you see.” She pointed at no one in particular. “You two go do something fun and I’ll meet up with you after I talk to him about not feeling well.” She hurried off before I could protest.

“That was not subtle at all,” Bennett said with a laugh. “I don’t think she wants to hang out with us. ”

I shook my head. “Nothing to do with you, that’s for sure.”

“Well you did kind of force her to be the third wheel.”

“I…I did not do that.”

But the way he was looking at me made me laugh. He’d definitely caught me in a lie.

“Fine. I kind of did do that.”

“Is the idea of hanging out with me really so terrible, Emma?”

I really liked the way my name fell from his lips. “Not even a little bit. How about you show me just how bad you are at these carnival games.”

“Get ready to eat your words.” He grabbed my hand that wasn’t holding the cider.

And it felt so…normal. To be holding his hand in a sea of people. In a sea of such strange people. It really shouldn’t have felt normal at all. We’d just passed a family of zombies.

“Which one did you want to show off your prowess at?” I asked.

“So many options to show you how amazing I am.”

I laughed.

There were all the normal games that involved aiming things.

Basketballs, water guns, rings. Actually most of the games involved aim.

Except the whack-a-mole. Although…technically you did have to whack them just so.

Bennett better have really good aim if he was going to stand a chance at winning one of these games.

“There,” he said and pointed to the dunk tank. “How about you sit on that and I hit the target? ”

“Um…I don’t think that’s how it works. You dunk the volunteer that’s currently sitting there. Not your date.”

“I’m sure for a few extra tickets we can get you up there.”

I laughed. “I don’t want to get all wet.”

“I certainly wouldn’t mind you getting a little wet.”

The way he said it made it seem like he wasn’t talking about the dunk tank anymore. I swallowed hard. “You’re trying to give me a cold much more real than Zoey’s fake one.”

He smiled. “Well, I certainly don’t want that.”

I felt like I was melting under his gaze. I was glad that Zoey had my sweater because I would have been sweating bullets if I was wearing it.

“This one.” I pointed to the ring toss. There were bottles set up in different colored glass. The ones in the middle aligned with smaller prizes. And the outside bottles were the huge stuffed animals.

“Ah the classic,” Bennett said. “Easy.”

“If it was easy there wouldn’t be so many stuffed animals still on display.”

“I mean easy for me. Let me go grab some tickets. I’ll be right back.”

I nodded and placed my now empty hand on my cup of apple cider to warm up. I watched as someone else threw a ring and it bounced right off the top of a bottle. I wondered what the trick was to getting it around the neck?

“How’s it going?” Zoey asked, appearing out of nowhere. “Scared him off already?”

“Ha. Ha. He’s just getting some tickets. ”

“Good. I was worried you were droning on and on about Callum or something.”

“I haven’t mentioned him once. But you were right…this festival has exactly the same vibe as his house. It’s seriously spooky.”

“I know, right?”

I nodded. I really didn’t want to talk about Callum anymore. For the first time in years I wanted to concentrate on the guy right in front of me. And I knew Zoey wanted the same thing. Which was why she’d run off to speak to some random guy. “How was that guy?”

“Which guy?”

“The sick guy you needed to talk to?” I raised my eyebrows at her.

“Oh, him. Yeah, he was good.” She winked at me, even though I already knew she hadn’t been checking in on anyone.

“Liar.”

She laughed. “Fine, you caught me. I just wanted to give you two a moment. I was hiding behind that barrel over there.” She pointed to a barrel that wasn’t quite close enough to eavesdrop. “And when I saw him walk off, I was worried.”

“I swear I haven’t scared him off. Yet,” I added.

“That really makes it seem like you’re planning on scaring him off.”

I shook my head. Honestly, I wasn’t. A chill ran down my spine and I turned around. But again…there was no one there.

“You okay?” Zoey asked.

“Fine.” I tried to shake away the cold feeling in my veins, but it stuck. “I keep feeling like someone’s watching me. ”

“I literally was just watching you. That was probably it.”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“Bennett at your 6 o’clock,” she said. “Back to my hiding spot.” She ran off before I could stop her. I saw her duck down behind a barrel right before Bennett rejoined me.

“Okay,” Bennett said. “Time to win you…” he stared at the options. “Are you more of a polar bear person or a tiger person?”

I didn’t want anything to do with a wildcat tonight. I just wanted that memory out of my head. “Definitely the polar bear,” I said.

“One polar bear coming right up.” He handed the man at the booth a few tickets.

I set down my apple cider and lifted my camera. I zoomed in on the rings to capture the perfect shot. I pressed the button just as the first ring hit the side of the bottle and fell to the table.

I looked up at Bennett.

“Just gotta get used to it,” he said and tossed another.

This shot hit the top of the bottle and bounced off. His next did almost the same thing.

I tried to hide my laughter behind my camera. I zoomed back out to capture him tossing the rings. He looked very confident doing it even though he was extraordinarily awful at this game.

“Are you laughing at me?” he asked, but he was smiling.

“Nope.” I pressed my lips together.

“Just capturing my humiliation on film? ”

I laughed as he tossed another ring and it bounced off and almost knocked over our apple cider.

“Well…I did tell you it was rigged,” he said.

“This game is not rigged,” the man at the booth said loudly to a family walking by.

I laughed harder.

Bennett cracked his neck to the side. “I’ve got this.”

He most certainly did not have this. He’d already gone through half his tickets. But he didn’t seem like he had any intention of stopping. And I found that extremely endearing. If not a little stubborn.

His next shot hit the top of one of the corner bottles and sailed into the middle. The ring landed perfectly around one of the center bottles.

I let my camera fall back around my neck and clapped.

Bennett smiled. “I meant to do that.”

“Suuuure. But it just so happens my favorite animal is a rabbit. And there’s a little one I had my eye on the whole time.” I pointed to one of the smallest stuffed animals on display. One that he’d won by getting his ring on one of the center bottles.

“I really can keep trying,” he said. “I think I was just getting the hang of it.”

“As fun as that sounds…I’d rather use those tickets for some rides.”

“Rides sound like so much fun!” Zoey said.

I jumped. She’d popped out of nowhere.

“Okay, you ladies win.” Bennett asked for the small rabbit and handed it to me. He looked a little embarrassed.

“I love it,” I said.

“Yeah? ”

“Yeah.” I stood on my tiptoes and kissed his cheek.

When I pulled back he looped his arm over my shoulders.

“Besides,” I said. “There’s still a ton to do and it would have been annoying to lug that huge polar bear around all night.”

“So true,” Zoey said.

“And this one will fit in my purse.” I flapped the rabbit’s ears. “Thanks for winning me,” I said in weird deep voice.

Bennett laughed. “Was that your impersonation of the rabbit? I have so many questions.”

“Well…it’s a boy.”

“Of course,” he said, like that made it all make sense. His smile was contagious.

I nodded. “And Captain Floppy Ears is such a score. Especially since that ring toss is definitely rigged.”

“The ring toss isn’t rigged,” the booth attendant said to more passersby.

Bennett laughed as we walked away from the games. “I’m glad you like Captain Floppy Ears,” he said.

I really did. But I liked it even more that he’d tried so hard to get him for me. The rabbit really was better than the bear. And I was actually really excited about some of these rides. This was a win-win scenario. Plus there were so many cute little pop-up booths to explore.

“Hey, look!” Zoey pointed to a booth showing off pictures of local real estate.

I groaned. “Aren’t we supposed to do that tomorrow?”

“But why wait when we can do it right now? ”

She grabbed my hand and pulled me out from under Bennett’s arm. I thought she was trying to push me toward him… But she was literally pulling me away.

“Hey,” the guy at the booth said. “The owner just stepped out, but I can show you a few things if you want.”

“Great,” Zoey said. “We’re looking for at least three bedrooms. And a nice sized yard to fit a shed or something.

Because she’ll need a place separate from her house to do work.

It’s always so hard to get work done on the couch.

Maybe something old-fashioned might be a good fit.

Oh, maybe something recently restored? Because you have to have a nice bathroom.

” She looked over at me. “Anything else?”

I was speechless.

“Oh…um…” the guy looked a little flustered as he sifted through some printouts of listings.

He seemed just as speechless by all the requests as me.

“I mean…maybe this one.” He handed a printout to Zoey.

“This one too.” He handed her another. “My boss really will be back soon if you want to come back in like ten minutes or so. He’ll know if we have something you’re looking for. ”

Zoey nodded. “These are both great…” her voice trailed off as she looked down at the listings. “Actually…never mind. I think we’ll probably go with a different realtor.”

“He really will be right back.”

“Yeah, not interested.” Zoey grabbed my arm and pulled me out of the booth.

I wasn’t actually looking for a place, but that had seemed a little rude. “What was that? ”

“Nothing,” she said. “I didn’t like that assistant. Did you? He didn’t seem to know anything.”

“I think he was probably a little flustered by all your very specific requests.”

“Well, a realtor should be able to deal with that.”

I shook my head. “I’m not even sure that guy was a realtor.”

“Exactly. So weird. I’ll go throw these terrible listings out.”

“Well, at least let me look.”

“No, they’re bad.”

“You said they were great two seconds ago,” I said.

“I was wrong…”

I snatched them out of her hand.

She snatched them back.

“I thought you wanted me to look at houses.” I didn’t really want to…but the fact that she suddenly didn’t want me to look made me want to look more. I knew it didn’t make sense. She was reverse psychologizing the crap out of me right now.

“Not houses he’s listing.” She said it like she seriously disliked that poor agent, or assistant, or whoever he was.

I felt like I was missing something here. She barely knew the guy. “I’m sure he’s not that bad.”

“He’s the worst.” She ripped the listings in two and tossed them into the trash before I could stop her.

“Wow, you really hate that guy,” Bennett said. He was just sipping on his apple cider and staring at us. A few other people were staring at us too. I hadn’t realized we were making a scene .

“Yup. I mean…I think. I don’t even know anymore. We should get away from this booth. How about the teacup ride!”

She was acting really weird. Well, weirder than usual.

“Sure,” Bennett said.

I nodded too. But as we started to walk away, I glanced into the trash can. The picture of the house was lovely.

“You go ahead!” Zoey called to Bennett. And then she grabbed my arm. “It’s Theo Gold.”

“What?”

“The owner of that real estate company. It’s Theo Gold.”

Now I knew why she was so upset. She didn’t want to bring up the Callum lookalike while I was on a date with Bennett. I peered into the trashcan. The house was lovely, but my eyes were focused on who the house was being listed by. Theo Gold and Associates.

And just like that, I forgot about the fact that Theo Gold probably wasn’t Callum. Just some guy that kind of looked like him. Because now I knew how to find him. “His assistant said the owner would be back in ten minutes. We gotta…”

“We have to what, Emma? You’re on a date with Bennett. We don’t even know if Theo Gold is Callum Walsh. And even if he is? Callum Walsh is an asshole. He broke your heart ten years ago, and I don’t want him to steal another ten.”

She had a really good point.

“You like Bennett, right?”

I did. A lot. I nodded.

“Then let’s forget about Theo Gold or Callum Walsh or whoever that is for the rest of the night. Okay? Give Bennett an actual chance. Please, I’m begging you. You have to let this go.”

More really good points.

“Come on, Bennett is waiting.”

I glanced once more at the real estate booth. And then I let Zoey guide me toward the teacup ride. But I still felt like someone was watching me. And now I was almost certain it was Callum Walsh.