That hit him harder than anything in the ruined shop.
Hell. Was she nervous…because of him?
He slowly set the book down. “Hey. Just so you know…I’m not violent. You don’t have to worry about me.”
* * * * *
Felicity’s brain shorted out at his words.
I’m not violent. You don’t have to worry about me.
She sputtered, heat rushing up her neck. “What? No. God. That’s not—” Her voice cracked, and she shook her head hard. “I didn’t mean to make you think I was worried aboutyou.”
Gabe didn’t look offended. If anything, he watched her with that same patience he’d possessed since they walked in here.
But the fact that he’d said it at all stabbed guilt into her chest. It reminded her of what he’d been through.
“I’m sorry, Gabe.” She pitched her voice low. “I’m just…frazzled.”
Understatement of the year, but it was the only word in her arsenal.
Gabe nodded once like it made perfect sense to him, then went right back to sorting. He didn’t say more or continue the awkward moment, just reached for another book.
They set to work again. Books scraping lightly across the floor, piles taking shape. Soon, she could look at the mess without her stomach dropping.
He didn’t pepper her with questions or fill the silence with meaningless chatter. As much as she adored Mina and Rina, they couldn’t have calmed her nerves as much as Gabe at this moment.
She caught herself glancing at him—more than once. Her gaze wanted to linger on the rugged lines of his profile and the way the collar of his flannel lay open to reveal his tanned neck, shadowed with beard stubble.
He’d been in the therapy program, and he left. She didn’t attend his going away party, but she recalled Honor telling her about it. He’d left the Black Heart, left the area…then came back.
He didn’t seem uneasy in the way she’d seen many of the vets in the program. On the surface, he didn’t appear to be struggling, and Carson clearly didn’t think so either. So what made him return?
She noticed that the stacks he made were neat and organized with the genres sorted perfectly. A closer look showed her that he’d placed the authors in alphabetical order like he’d worked here for months instead of twenty minutes.
She looked closer. “Wow—you even put the books in alphabetical order.”
He shrugged. “Not hard if you’ve spent any time in a bookstore before.” He eyed the mystery in her hand.
“You can borrow that if you want.”
His gaze flicked to hers, his deep brown eyes piercing with their intensity. “I already read it. Decker loaned it to me.”
“Of course he did. Decker’s read more than anyone I’ve ever met.”
He flipped the book over to skim the back.
“My favorite part was when they put the folded notes in the sugar jar,” she said, lightly testing him.
His stare snapped to hers again, and one dark brow lifted. “That’s book three.”
Her jaw dropped. “Okay…you caught me.”
His hard lips twitched at one corner, carving a perfect bracket in his stubbled cheek. “So I passed the test?”
She exhaled a breath that bordered on a laugh. “You passed the test.”
He shook his head, but that bracket settled deeper in his cheek around his lips with an enticing ruggedness.
