covered her mouth with her free hand. What was wrong with her? What was it about this man that made her lose her ability to filter? She turned her focus from the path ahead to look at him and was met with a similar appraisal.
“Explains what?” He had stopped and she felt his blue eyes question her more strongly than his words had.
“I just meant that …” Was it that he was the only man with scars and a tattoo that she had ever found sexy? Or that his bravery and strength in saving her had seemed so effortless it wasn’t surprising he was a professional hero?
“It’s okay, you don’t need to explain yourself.” He began walking again and she followed, still linked with him. Time went by as they made their way toward the hill’s base and she marveled at how comfortable the silence was between them.
“It’s a beautiful country.” His words finally broke through.
“Yes, it is,” she agreed, more comfortable with the neutral territory their conversation had achieved.
“Have you ever been here before?”
“No, but I feel like I have. My father grew up here and when I was little he would tell me stories from his childhood or sometimes just about this faraway country with princess castles and green grass and blue ocean as far as the eye could see.”
“I’m not sure the Scottish would take well to having a strong part of their heritage referred to as ‘princess castles.’” She looked back toward him and he was smiling. If she had thought he was handsome before, now he was devastating. She was shocked by the powerful wave of attraction his smile evoked and had to check herself against those feelings. Fortunately they had reached the end of the path, a natural place to say goodbye. She let go of his hand and was surprised by the feeling of loss. All the more reason to get away now before she let her attraction make her life more complicated.
“Thank you again.”
“I’ll walk you back to your hotel.”
She wanted him to, but knew better. “Thanks. But I’m okay from here. I can find my way.”
She knew he was going to argue with her so she didn’t give him the chance. Instead she turned and headed toward her hotel and never looked back at the kindest, most handsome man she had talked to in years.
She looked nothing like Sabrina but she reminded him of her nonetheless. Both women were beautiful, but that wasn’t the similarity that was troubling him. It was the look in her eyes that brought back familiar haunting memories. At first those large round eyes that he’d later learned were a deep blue had just seemed scared, but after she had been returned to safety their depth of emotion had changed from fear to sadness. A sadness he had seen in his sister Sabrina’s eyes years ago and which had set off warning bells in his head—not that she hadn’t already rung those bells hard by leaping off the hill’s edge. What would she have done if he hadn’t been there? Would she have followed through with her intention and let go?
He physically recoiled at the thought of losing her and stopped in his tracks. How could he already feel a connection to this woman he barely knew? Most people would blame the dramatic nature of their encounter, but truthfully, to him, that drama had been minor. He was a military trained physician and for the past five years had had a decorated career as a trauma specialist. Pulling a beautiful woman to safety was a nice day at the office compared to the horrors he had witnessed.
It must be the emotional resemblance to Sabrina. The first time he’d seen that look in Sabrina he had missed it. He had been away for too long and hadn’t noticed the sadness in his little sister’s eyes. His role as a big brother had circumvented his role as a physician and he’d missed all the warning signs of depression his sister had been experiencing. She had been thinner than he’d remembered, with dark rings of fatigue under her eyes. She had rarely smiled and when he had tried to arrange activities to cheer her up, she had gotten no pleasure out of things that had previously made her happy.
Classic depression, and he, her big brother, the physician, had missed it and had just thought she’d been heartbroken and would get over it. That she had been better off. But in the end that hadn’t mattered. Instead, Sabrina had suffered for over a year before she’d hit rock bottom and he had never stopped blaming himself. He should have been there for her. He should have recognized the signs and gotten help for her earlier. He had failed her. He hadn’t protected her from the man who had broken her heart and he hadn’t realized how badly she’d needed help to be put back together.
The thought monologue snapped him back to Erin. She had thanked him for saving her. He wished that it was enough to reassure him. Hadn’t Sabrina always smiled politely through her pain? The one thing he was certain of was that this was not their last encounter. Was it a sense of responsibility he felt to her? Intrigue at the cause of her sadness? Or the fact that she smelled of wildflowers and had felt soft and right pressed against him. At this point it didn’t matter, his mind was made up. This was not the end of their story, it was merely the beginning.
ERIN SPOONED ANOTHER morsel of the warm decadent bread pudding into her mouth and let both the food and the ambiance overwhelm her senses. The local pub she had ventured to for dinner had been everything she’d been looking for; the noise and activity were a perfect distraction from the constant replay of her own thoughts. She had almost died today. She might have died had Ryan not saved her. The worst part was it would have been a stupid reason to die.
She needed to take responsibility for inadvertent actions. For her constant ability to let people, mainly her now ex-husband, manipulate her. But today it stopped. When she’d got back to her hotel room, she had torn up the new messages that awaited her and instead lounged in a hot bath and thought about what she wanted in life. She wanted to make a difference to the lives of others, just as Ryan had done for her today. The best way to do that was through her work as an obstetrician-gynecologist. So there was no way she was going to leave her training at Boston General, no matter what demands her ex made.
“Is this seat taken?” A deep voice interrupted her repetition of the earlier inner pep talk. She looked up and saw Ryan. He had changed from his running clothes and was flawless in a button-down navy collared shirt and charcoal-gray dark denim. How was it possible in a city of five hundred thousand people she would run into Ryan again? Attraction followed by fear coursed through her. She wanted to say yes and protect herself from once again being swayed by a handsome man, but how could she? Ryan had saved her life. The least she could do was agree to let him join her table.
“No, go ahead,” she agreed, gesturing to the single chair opposite her.
“Are you staying nearby?”
“Yes. You?”
“At the Glasshouse.” She felt her eyebrows rise and her eyes widen as he named her hotel. It felt as if they were being drawn together and that was a tough feeling to reconcile in the face of her newfound decision to take charge of her own life.
“How long are you going to be in Edinburgh?” Maybe he would be gone before she had to worry about her feelings toward him.
“A few days. You?”
“The same.” Of course, she thought to herself. She took a long sip of the local rhubarb cider she had nursed throughout her meal.
“So you are not running away from your life permanently?”
