Free Pilgrims Don't Wear Pink by Stephanie Kate Strohm Page B

and ambled over to me. “My kind of girl.”
    â€œNo, no, I’m wearing shorts.” Blushing like crazy, I lifted my shirt to show him. “See? Perfectly respectable chinos. They’re conservative. They’re J.Crew.”
    Cam laughed. “God, you have no idea how cute you are, do you?” He slung his arm around my shoulder, and we walked together off the museum grounds. “Which way’s your house, babe?”
    Babe? Babe? Oh my God, I was “babe”! I was also hyperventilating slightly. Being this close to him, especially with the memory of that kitchen kiss searing my brain, was almost too much to take. He smelled sort of salty, like a sea breeze, which should have been gross but was inexplicably intoxicating.
    We chatted—well, mostly he chatted, and I nodded—as I showed him down the sidewalk to my house. The five-minute walk felt a lot shorter without Ashling, much to my chagrin. All too soon, Cam dropped his arm as I pushed open the front door.
    â€œCareful!” I warned. “Don’t let it slam; it—”
    Too late. It slammed shut and wobbled dangerously but held.
    â€œLibby!” Ashling called shrilly. “HOW many times I have told you NOT to slam the door! And I know it’s you!”
    Cam raised his eyebrows.
    â€œWelcome to my nightmare.” I gestured grandly. “Come on, you can hang out in the living room while I get my stuff together. It’ll only take a minute.”
    I’d decided to use my third of my room in the house as my closet, and only to take the bare essentials—Camden Harbor uniform, underwear, toiletries, Chucks, PJs, bathing suit, flip-flops, a book—on the boat with me. I figured that way, everybody won: Ashling and Suze got more space, and I could turn my bed into a shoe rack.
    â€œYou might need to hold my hand,” Cam whispered. “It’s scary in here.”
    I took his hand and pulled him down the skinny hallway to the living room.
    Neil’s long limbs were draped all over the couch, extending off both sides. He shifted slightly over his radishes and hummus to reveal a heavily bandaged shoulder.
    â€œNeil!” I gasped. “What happened?”
    â€œI got shot,” he said through a mouthful of radish, muting the old
Monty Python
sketches he’d been watching.
    â€œWhat? Shot?” In my seventeen years, I’ve run across very few situations for which the word
flabbergasted
was appropriate. This, however, was one of them.
    â€œTurns out some of the last living lighthouse keepers are very, um, territorial about the lighthouses they keep.”
    â€œYikes.”
    â€œA lighthouse keeper shot you?” Cam looked impressed. “That’s awesome.”
    â€œAre you okay?” I asked. “I can’t believe you were shot!”
    â€œShot with what I believe was an 1873 Winchester still mostly in working order—what a find!” Neil finished excitedly.
    â€œI’m, um, happy for you?” I wasn’t totally sure what the correct response was when someone had enjoyed a near-death experience involving a rare historical artifact.
    â€œYeah, I was really lucky,” he continued. “If the gun had been in mint condition, I would probably be dead. Thank God for pH deterioration, right?” He chuckled.
    â€œUh, right,” I agreed.
    Ashling appeared in the kitchen door frame like a malevolent ghost in a floral apron, stirring a large chipped mixing bowl.
    â€œLibby, I’m not sure I’m comfortable with boys in the house,” she drawled.
    â€œUm, hello, there’s always a boy in the house. One lives here. What about Neil?” I pointed to him.
    â€œA necessary evil.” Neil frowned into his radishes. “I don’t want you parading your men through here at all hours of the night.”
    â€œIt’s three in the afternoon! And one guy is not a parade.” I turned to Cam, blushing.