image strangely attractive.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
She looked up and grinned. “I was just picturing you in an apron.”
Something odd and strangely exciting seemed to curl through her stomach as she looked up at him. He was so reserved. Not just reserved...guarded. He’d mentioned an accident today but stopped short of giving any real insight. She found herself growing more and more curious about him.
“Blake, about this afternoon...”
At her serious tone he put a loaf of French bread down on the countertop beside her. The breakfast nook and stools were a great place for her to work but she suddenly felt like he was very close and her pulse quickened in response.
“What about it?”
“I think I owe you an apology. Some of your questions made me uncomfortable and I think I came across as rude.”
He studied her carefully until she wondered if she was starting to blush beneath the scrutiny. There was something simmering between them, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on, but it felt suspiciously like he could read her mind. She wasn’t sure she liked someone poking around in her thoughts.
“No hotel rooms available, eh?”
Heat flashed to her cheeks. She was definitely blushing now. He’d seen clear through her apology, hadn’t he? She was totally busted. A bit irritated, too, though—because her remorse was genuine.
“Even if there were,” she said quietly, “I was snippy with you and you didn’t deserve it.”
“Why were you?”
“You always ask the hard questions, don’t you?” She put down the cover of her laptop and looked up at him.
“Not hard. Just real.”
“From where I’m sitting they’re the same thing.”
His gaze softened. “I’m used to challenging people, I guess. Pushing to break through what’s holding them back.”
“I’m not here to be fixed or rehabilitated,” she reminded him firmly. He’d been rather cryptic himself, out on the ridge. But she wouldn’t bring that up right now. She was trying to smooth things over, not begin another argument. “I just keep to myself, you know? When I said today that your scar reminded me of someone, you asked if it hurt. It does.”
“Who was he?”
She paused, surprised that he’d assumed it was a man she was speaking of—though she supposed she shouldn’t be. She was thirty years old. Blake probably assumed she’d had relationships before. And she had, though never anything serious.
“Not a he. A she. My best friend. Her name was Julie.”
She took a breath, surprised that she’d actually come right out and said it. She never talked about Julie. Her throat tightened but she forced the heavy feeling away, shutting it out.
She swallowed away the pain and forced herself to continue. “We shared everything. Work, interests, TV shows...an apartment.”
“What happened?”
“There was a fire at a nightclub.” Hope’s throat felt like it was going to close over, and she fought to swallow, to keep going without thinking about it all too much. She could say it, offer a basic explanation so they could move on, right? “She was burned very badly. It was the worst thing ever to see her like that. First with all the bandages and then, briefly, without.”
“What happened to her?”
Hope blinked, but her eyes were stone-dry. “She died. It was too much for her body to take and she went into organ failure.”
She didn’t have to say more for them both to understand how it had been a long and painful illness.
“I’m sorry.”
She felt grief hover around the edges and began to panic. She had to change the focus. Put it somewhere else. She looked up and saw Blake’s scar before her eyes. Painful truth slammed into her heart. “I saw you yesterday...” She heard her voice shake and tried to steady it. “I saw you and it was like seeing her...”
She couldn’t finish.
Blake’s hand closed over hers, warm and strong. The contact rippled through her, past the wall she usually built around herself, past the wall she sensed he kept around himself, too. Oh, it felt good to be connected to someone again. Terrifying but reassuring all at once.
All too soon he pulled away. It was just as well, she thought, tucking her fingers into her lap. She didn’t trust it. Didn’t trust the caring, tender gesture. Didn’t trust herself to be objective.
“When?”
The simple question took her by surprise. “When what?”
“When did she die?”
Her gaze was drawn to his. There was no judgment in the blue depths, just patience. “About six months ago,” she found herself answering.
“You haven’t grieved yet.”
He was getting too close to the truth. It wasn’t any of his business if she had or hadn’t. What was the point in indulging in a fit of grief? Crying and self-pity wouldn’t bring Julie back and it wouldn’t fix anything—another lesson learned the hard way at too young an age.
If only tears had the power to make things right life would have been so different. For all of them. She and her sisters wouldn’t have been dragged from pillar to post. There wouldn’t have been the arguments that Hope had always heard, even through walls. There wouldn’t have been the crying for Daddy in bed at night with the covers over her head. She would have been able to hold them together. They would have been one big happy family instead of the mess they became.
“Of course I have,” she lied, more shaken than she cared to admit.
“Grief can be crippling in itself,” he explained. “At some point you have to deal with it.”
She was starting to get angry now. How dared he talk to her like he had her all figured out? He knew nothing about her.
She took a slow, deep breath and held her temper. Losing it wouldn’t do either of them any good. Instead she tried a smile that felt stretched and artificial. “Look, I just didn’t want you to think it’s...well, that it’s you. Or that I’m...” She found she couldn’t go on, couldn’t say the word that had flashed into her brain. Superficial. The words trailed away.
“That you’re prejudiced?”
Her gaze clashed with his. “Why would I think less of someone because of a scar?”
“I don’t know. It makes me wonder if you look for perfection in people like you do in your pictures.”
“People aren’t perfect. Everyone knows that.”
His lips curved up a
