“I can’t.”
“Can’t come to LA with me, or can’t bewithme?”
Her eyes dart between mine like she’s searching for reasons… forexcuses.
“Say it,” I utter, trying to rein in the devastation that’s seeping through my body.
Her eyes drop from mine and they’re shining when she lifts them.
It’s the moment I realize I’ve lost her.
“My parents need me home. They’ve already lost one daughter. I can’t move over here. It would destroy them. You’re an amazing man.” Her breathing quickens and for a goddamn awful minute I know she’s about to cry. “If things were diff?—”
“Ssh, it’s okay.” I can’t stand a second of seeing her like this.
I lower her to the ground. I can fund her charity if she’d let me. But this is more. It’s about her being her own person. Doing what speaks to her heart after losing her sister. It’s about the people for Hallie. That much has been clear since the day I met her. She thinks of other people before herself, looks after their happiness before her own.
I wish she could see that I could take care of her without her giving any of that up. But she’s convinced it could all be jeopardized.
The thought that there’s more to it that she’s not telling me makes my throat tighten.
“Give me one thing?” I tilt her chin up with my pointer finger.
She nods, tears pooling along her lower lashes. “Anything.”
I stroke her cheek with the pad of my thumb. “A date.”
“A date?”
I give her a bittersweet smile.
“With the only woman I’ve ever wanted since the day I met her. Give me one date, Hallie. Just one.”
A lone tear slips free, and I brush it away.
“I’ll be in LA a day, maybe two. When I come back?—”
She dusts her fingertips over my lips.
“Okay,” she whispers. “When you come back, we’ll have our date.”
16
STERLING
“Fuck,”Denver grunts as he looks around the burned-out shell of Seasons, LA.
The stench of charred wood lances through my nostrils like acid, memories bubbling away just beneath the surface at the acrid aroma.
At least this time, it isn’t tinted with melted flesh.
“All this from one flame,” I mutter as I retrieve the remnants of a piano key from the floor.
“You want me to pay a visit to the guy, Boss?” Denver runs his tongue over his teeth and brings his thundered gaze to meet mine.
“No, that won’t be necessary.”
I drop the piano key into the ashes. A long-standing patron of ours, a judge, caused the fire when he got so pissed that he tried to light a cigar with a match and ended up dropping it into his drink. Rather than put it out calmly, he freaked and threw the glass away—straight into the top-shelf liquor behind the bar. The fire department said the place was an inferno by the time they got here.
