crossed her arms and stared at the ceiling in hope that he could read nothing on her face. Oh, why couldn’t this confusing man just leave her as he had before—with no farewells, no speeches, no tenderness?
Why was he standing so close, smelling so good and looking like the man in her dreams? Why did her heart have to hammer and her throat swell up in a lump? And why, oh, why did she long to feel his arms around her just one more time?
“We’re both trying to start over, Bart,” she said when she trusted herself to speak. “If finding me is the beginning of your new life, it could be the end of mine. I don’t want any reminders of the past. I want to be a new person. I want to be alone, Bart. Alone!”
“Rosie,” he murmured, unlocking her arms and letting his big hands slide down to take hers. “Rosie, don’t push me away. Give me a chance.”
“I’ve always done what people told me to—my pappy, Dr. Lowell, you. I don’t have to live that way anymore.”
“But I’m not telling you to do anything, Rosie-girl. I’m asking. Please…give me a chance.”
She studied the design on her pressed-tin ceiling. “A chance to what?”
“To touch your face, Rosie.” He ran the tip of one finger down her cheek. “Remember how I used to pull the ribbons from your braids? I’d untwist your hair until it hung loose around your shoulders. You used to laugh and scold me because I could never put your braids back the right way, and you worried that your pappy would find out we’d been together. But I knew you didn’t really care, because you always leaned against my shoulder and let me slide my fingers through your hair.”
As he spoke, he slipped his fingers through the bun she had so carefully knotted that morning. Oh, how she tingled at his touch! The desert in her heart came to life for the first time in six years, and Rosie closed her eyes as a powerful yearning washed through her.
When he drew her closer, she sighed and moved against him. But she remembered too well the pain a broken heart could bring. At the sudden realization of her peril, her eyes flew open.
“Bart, you’d better leave,” she breathed out. “Just go!”
“Rosie?” Confusion darkened his eyes.
“I—I have to work the early shift tomorrow.”
“I’ve scared you, haven’t I?”
“I’ll be tired if I don’t get a good night’s sleep. You ought to head out while the moon’s up.”
She looked into his face. She longed for this man and she loathed him. She feared the feelings he evoked in her, and she craved them. She hungered for his touch, yet the thought of it terrified her.
“Goodbye, Bart.” She forced the words out. “It was good to see you again, and I sure hope your wound heals up.”
Before he could see the quiver in her lower lip, she turned away from him and hurried to the hook where her aprons hung.
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