No.I could slap myself. Instead of dwelling on it, I hit the gravel and start towards her. I’ll give her props for not shrinking away as I do. This Lydia Sterling lifts her chin defiantly, the look in her eyes telling me she isn’t at all afraid of me.
I don’t want her afraid; that’s the last thing I want from my so-called saviour, the girl meant to rehab my image for my investors.
But I also can’t help but be a little intrigued by her. Maybe a little too interested in the challenge she so clearly offers.
Lydia takes a step towards me, but as she does, the toe of her boot catches on a larger rock hidden amongst the gravel. Shock fills her widening eyes as she goes down.
It takes me one long stride to catch her. To wrap my arms around her, pull her against my chest, and lift her off the ground before she can hit it.
The girl sucks in a breath, a deep red flush darkening her cheeks. One of her arms goes around my shoulders almost instinctively, though for a moment, she doesn’t say anything.
And neither do I. I’m lost to the dark grey of her eyes, which swim with confusion and embarrassment. The flush spreads down her neck beneath her knit turtleneck.
I wonder how far that spreads, I think before I can stop myself.
I blink hard and drop her. The arm around my neck falls away immediately as she stumbles back.
Clearing my throat, I take a step away from her. “Ms Sterling,” I say, voice suddenly hoarse, “I’m Mr Abernathy.”
I wait for the reaction I’m used to. The shock. The barely concealed anger. There are some in town who blame me for the fire, who think I’m just some greedy billionaire who let it happen because I refused to protect my staff. There are others who think the reason it happened was because I fucked up somewhere in building the lodge.
For a long time, I’ve believed both.
But instead of reacting, the girl nods, wrapping her arms around herself. “I’m so sorry about that.”
“About what?” I frown. “You tripped.”
“Right into you,” she says, covering her face with her hand. “That was not the first impression I was hoping for.”
“You didn’t trip right into me,” I tell her, taking a step towards her almost subconsciously. “I moved to stop you from falling. And that would have been worse.”
She looks at me from between her fingers like she doesn’t completely believe me. Although, seeing her on her knees…
I quickly shake that thought from my head. “You’ll need to pull your truck into the garage,” I say, motioning behind me. “I might not get many visitors out here, but I still don’t want speculation.”
The girl drops her hand from her face. “Speculation?”
I nod once, pulling my keys from my back pocket. I punch the garage button, which opens the automatic rolling door. “Yes. Speculation. About you.”
She clears her throat, the embarrassment quickly disappearing as she straightens herself. “Mr Abernathy, I totally respect that. But this is Willow Ridge, and you won’t find anyone interested inspeculatingabout you.”
My jaw clenches as I stare at her. “Excuse me?”
She doesn’t back down, and I’m not entirely sure why that has my belly twisting the way it does—or my heart warming despite the ice that’s been wedged in there for years. “You’re Cade Abernathy, infamous in ways you clearly don’t want to be. But you need to beseenin order to return to your life in New York. You need respect, a good image, and to be more than just your past. Right?”
My breath comes out harshly as I take one last step towards her. She doesn’t back down, but I don’t think I want her to. I should want her to fold, to tell Tobias she doesn’t think she can do this job, and I want her to leave.
But you don’t. The closer I am to her, the more I breathe her in. She smells of honey and lavender, and somehow it has my heart beating faster—harder. My skin prickles with an awareness I can’t explain. Or maybe I don’t want to understand the effect she’s having on me.
I’ll admit, I liked my fair share of women before everything went down. Liked having one on each arm, liked having them warm my bed. I’d been a playboy and that’d certainly put myaunt in more precarious positions than she’d like to admit. Hell, it’d gotten me in trouble more times than I can remember.
This feeling, though, is something else. Something I know better than to mess with.
My jaw ticks with frustration as I shake my head. “Take the truck into the garage,” I growl. “You’ll thank me later for it.”
Lydia opens her mouth like she wants to respond, but I don’t give her the chance. Something about her little growl of frustration goes right to my dick, though.
As I start climbing the stairs up to the deck, she slams her truck door shut. The engine starts, gurgling for a moment, and I can’t help but stop as I watch her drive into my garage alongside my truck.
