Every night for darn near a week, she’d been jolted awake at exactly three a.m., her heart hammering, the same faint melody like a distant whisper, soft enough that she wasn’t sure if she’d imagined it or not.
Then she’d get up, search, wait for it to stop, and cry, the notes ofWhat a Wonderful Worldechoing maddeningly in her head. An earserpent, not an earworm.
The second night, she decided she was overtired. The third, she was certain she’d lost the music box in her apartment and tore the place apart looking it. By the fourth, she was convinced George was sending her a message from heaven and, for some reason, he didn’t want her to sleep.
Some reason named…Matt.
Glancing to her left, she took in Matt’s strong profile behind the wheel of the Escalade he’d rented to navigate the winding mountain roads. Pines rose like sentinels behind snowbanks on either side of the canyons they cut through, sunlight glancing off branches so bright she had to squint.
“You okay over there?” Matt’s voice was like honey, low and kind no matter what he said.
She blinked and forced a smile. “I’m fine. Really. Just didn’t sleep much.”
He glanced at her before turning back to the road. “That’s the third day in a row you’ve said that. Are you feeling all right?”
The genuine concern touched her, a sign of a good man. Too good for her to confess that she thought her late husband was floating out from the heat vent in her apartment playing music so she would…not be in this car going to look at houses with that man.
“Did you find the music box you were looking for?”
She had told him about the lost box, but not why. And, once again, she chalked it up to class and goodness that he listened to her talk about something that might seem trivial to him.
“No,” she said. “I looked everywhere. I just hope it didn’t get bunched up in packing paper and accidentally thrown away.”
“When was the last time you saw it?”
She grimaced because she absolutely couldn’t remember, which was awful. Not only would she have lost a treasured memento, there’d be no explanation for the night music. None that wasn’t…supernatural.
“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “But I guess I’m just not sleeping well.”
Matt waited as bit, then asked, “Is it this…errand? Is that what’s troubling you, Mary Jane?”
Was it? Or was it the dear way he used her full name, which was not formal at all. On the contrary, it felt intimate and personal.
“Looking at houses for you to buy?” she asked, guessing that’s what he meant by this errand. “I don’t think I’m losing sleep over that.”
Or was she?
“Are you sure?” he asked, the question echoing her doubts. “I would fully understand if this felt like too much. We talked about pacing this relationship and I want to do that.”
That was true. He had promised that they wouldtake things slow. No sudden moves, no sweeping declarations. Just quiet companionship and a lot of patience. He wasn’t asking her to live in one of these houses…not yet, anyway.
She’d been grateful for that, but then that music woke her up every night.
“We’re just fine,” she assured him. “How many houses is it today? Three?”
“Three.” He smiled. “A Goldilocks tour. Too cold, too hot, and maybe just right.”
Just right for what, she wondered as she looked out the window. For him to live half an hour away from her and be her…boyfriend?
The word sounded preposterous at their age.
Would he eventually want her to live there, too? Of course, she wouldn’t do that without the blessing of marriage and they certainly weren’t at that point in this relationship.
But they could be…and then what? Did she want to leave the lodge? She loved her apartment! It was truly home, despite the recent torture.
“And she’s thinking so hard again.”
MJ laughed. “Sorry.”
