if I’d ever see you again.”
CLAYTON TRAVERS STOOD in front of her, like a vision conjured out of a dream.
Seeing him hit her, whoomp, a thump to her chest, robbing her of air for a split second. Over the years his long, lanky body had filled out into a man’s lean frame, his shoulders wider than she remembered. Brown hair tinged with gold grazed the collar of his dark leather motorcycle jacket. Worn-in jeans suited him well, as did the scuffed boots. But it was his face that intrigued her most, his deep brown gaze roaming over her with interest that warmed her even in the crisp bite of a November wind.
With his high cheekbones and a cleft chin, he had become an extremely attractive man. The furtive look in his eyes that she remembered from his teens had been replaced with an easy confidence. A half smile curved his full, sensual lips.
And just like that, the attractiveness worked on her with a strange alchemy that drew her even as it chilled her again. Her feelings for him had grown oddly complicated over time.
“Clay,” she said semi-awkwardly. She might have hugged him if there hadn’t been a wooden porch rail between them. And, on second thought, that probably wasn’t the appropriate greeting for an old high school friend who’d been the recipient of her earliest flirting attempts. She wasn’t some starry-eyed teen anymore. “It’s great to see you again after all these years.”
Actually, it was sort of terrifying given the role he’d played in her past. A role he was completely oblivious to.
But she’d wanted to face him and here he stood.
“Good to see you, too. Time has been...really nice to you, Gabriella.”
Before she could recover from that latest whoomp to her lungs, he continued, “Are you meeting anyone for breakfast?” He nodded toward the Owl’s Roost. A couple of guys in bright orange vests lumbered past, to-go cups in their hands as they emerged from the diner.
“No. I’m staying at the motel next door and was lured by the scent of coffee and bacon. The in-room coffeepot left something to be desired.” She stuffed her fists deeper into the pockets of her hoodie, trying to separate the past from the present and focus on the moment. “Are you, uh, free to join me?”
No time like the present to get over the butterflies with him. She’d be leaving Heartache as soon as Jeremy Covington was in jail and she had the chance to check on Mia Benson.
“Sounds like my lucky day.” His grin was completely disarming. “Let’s get inside where it’s warm.”
Half an hour later they sat across from one another at a big wooden booth in one of Heartache’s best-known eating establishments. The owner, Rodney, was on the town council, and he and his wife had been running the place for as long as she could remember. There was a comfort in that, a place with some happy memories for her since her parents had taken her here a few times to celebrate birthdays in the good years before her father went to prison.
Still, it felt incredibly strange to sit across from Clayton. His guitar occupied the seat beside him in the booth, the instrument easily identifiable in the black nylon case.
She ordered a vegetable scramble and coffee while he got the “Big Buck” platter with some of everything on it. His appetite hadn’t changed. He’d always been a bottomless pit at mealtime. Familiarity felt good in the middle of so much change in him.
“I thought you were lured here by the scent of bacon?” he said when the red-headed waitress departed with their menus.
“I’m actually a vegetarian. Just because I don’t eat bacon doesn’t mean I can’t love the smell. I think it’s universally the most missed food of the vegetarian world.”
The waitress returned with two mugs and a coffee carafe, pouring them each a cup before hustling off to the next table. The place was busy with most of the tables filled and a half dozen uniformed wait staff serving the crowd. With a backwoods theme heavy on pine logs and willow branches in the decor, the restaurant hadn’t changed since the last time she’d been here, right down to Rodney and his wife holding court at a table near the kitchen with some other local old-timers including Mrs. Spencer and Harlan Brady. The two looked to be an item now, judging by the way he kissed her ringed fingers and whispered in her ear.
So sweet. Mrs. Spencer had been a widow for a long time even when Gabriella left town.
“In that case—” Clayton raised his coffee mug and clinked it to hers on the table “—cheers to your restraint.”
“Cheers.” Picking up her own cup, she saluted him briefly before taking a sip. The strong java soothed her nerves for a moment and gave her an excuse to plot a course of action with him. How much should she say over breakfast? She sure as heck couldn’t blurt out her past in the middle of Heartache’s most popular breakfast joint.
First, she’d do some fact-gathering. Get to know what he’d been up to these last years. Then maybe she could ask to see him another time. Privately.
Even thinking about it made her jittery all over again. Hot and cold. She swallowed hard and took another long swig of her coffee.
“So I just left your brother’s house.” He eased back from the table to sprawl one arm along the back of the booth. “I was staying with him to keep an eye on his fiancée after she was threatened, but it seems like Sam has nailed down where the threats were coming from.”
The mention of the threats made her struggle not to wince from the old guilt about not coming forward. But she needed to repeat the mantra from the counselor she’d seen. It wasn’t her fault. She wasn’t responsible for the actions of others.
Easier chanted than believed.
At least she wasn’t caught flat-footed by what Clay had said. Gabriella had spoken to her friend Amy Finley, who’d given her the heads-up that Clayton was in town, sparking last night’s bad dream. She hadn’t spoken to her brother much since his fiancée’s frightening ordeal with Covington, but it didn’t surprise her that Zach had hired someone to help protect the woman he loved.
“That was good of you. I haven’t called Zach yet to let him know I’m back in town. I just got in yesterday.” She had been on a speaking tour these last two weeks and had taken a last-minute engagement in Nashville prior to her trip to Heartache, putting her in town a bit earlier than she’d anticipated since she’d decided it wasn’t worth flying back home first.
And while she should have known, at least in a peripheral way, that Clayton might end up in Heartache for the Hastings’ family foster reunion, she hadn’t really expected he would show up until Amy had told her the news. For one thing, he had always looked forward to putting distance between himself and his birth father, who lived just outside Heartache. He’d made it clear he was never setting foot in this town after graduation. Besides, she’d probably only added to his reasons to dislike Heartache when she’d left without saying goodbye. Then again, maybe it was silly of her to think that her leaving town abruptly might have affected him one way or another.
“Did you come for the Covington trial?” he asked, his jacket drifting open to show off the gray tee underneath it and more muscles she didn’t remember.
The trial? Tough to chant the
