She licked her lips and he tried—and failed—not to focus on the tempting pink tip of her tongue. “You’ve seen and heard worse. Andyouaren’t jumping out of your skin.”
“Only ’cause I’ve had more practice at keepin’ calm and carryin’ on. Thunderstorms are hell. Fireworks are worse.”
“PTSD.” She grimaced.
“In our line of work, it’s inevitable.” He shrugged one shoulder. But he didn’t feel half as indifferent as he acted.
“Great.” Her voice flattened right along with her mouth. “Guess that means I need to find a good psychiatrist. My last one lives in New York, and I stopped seeing her when I moved here.”
He twisted his lips and broke the unwelcome news. “Problem with our current situation is we can’t exactly talk about anything we do, even to a professional.”
“True.” She stared off into the distance as if she was considering her options—or lack thereof. Then she drew back and looked at him. “You’ve thought about this, haven’t you?”
“’Course I have. I’m not an idiot. I reckon I’ll spend years on a shrink’s couch once I retire.” He used the subject matter to return them to something she’d said earlier about therapy. “Why do ya have abandonment issues?”
She blinked rapidly, momentarily discombobulated by the change in topic. But she recovered quickly enough. “According to my old therapist, it’s because my mom died suddenly and then my dad shipped me off to boarding school before I had time to mourn. I needed to cry on his shoulder, but he couldn’t be bothered.” The lamplight showed her lips thin. “It’s like you said, the one person I needed the most was the one person who taught me I didn’t really need anyone.”
Fisher had never been a huge fan of Leonard Meadows. But hearing her talk of needing her father only to be rejected by the man made him want to find the chief of staff and knock some sense into the old fart’s head.
With a baseball bat.
Before he could respond, however, she took a page from his book and switched subjects. “Aren’t you curiouswhyI couldn’t fall in love with Charlie?”
He had to take a moment to think about his answer. Eventually, he shrugged. “Just reckoned you were smart.” When her chin jerked back, he quoted A.E. Housman. “When I was one-and-twenty, I heard a wise man say, ‘Give crowns and pounds and guineas, but not your heart away.’”
She studied him in the golden lamplight. Again, he wasn’t sure what she was looking for. But just as he opened his mouth to ask, she said, “So what? You think falling in love is foolish?”
“Not foolish. But it can be dangerous for some people.”
People like me.
Although, in the still of the night, the dark, private part of himself admitted the truth. That he’d give anything to fall in love. To feelsafeto fall in love.
He’d recently seen a social media post where someone said they didn’t want to be crazy in love. They wanted to be calm in love, understood in love, happy and patient in love. And he’d thought to himself…because that’s real love. Not the desperate, frantic, addictive feeling that is infatuation and obsession, but the comforting, secure,healthyfeeling that is true love.
“That’s the second time you’ve used that word.Dangerous.Why?” She dragged his mind back to the conversation. “Because there’s a chance you’ll get your heart broken?” He started to tell her some folks just weren’t built for the emotion. Leastways not the healthy kind. But she plowed ahead. “But there’s also a chance youwon’t. And when it’s right, it’s so,soright. I mean, just look at the men who lived here before you, who still work here now. Have you ever seen anything more beautiful than the love they have for their partners?”
It seemed she was full of rhetorical questions because, again, she jumped ahead before letting him answer. “I didn’t know what true love looked like, what truepartnershiplooked like, until I came to work here. And now that I know, I won’t settle for less.”
He opened his mouth, but she wasn’t finished. “That’s why I didn’t say yes to Charlie’s proposal. Because he never looked at me the way Boss looks at Becky. Because he never dragged me into a dark corner to kiss me cross-eyed like Ozzie is always doing with Samantha. Because I had no desire to text him two hundred memes and TikToks and funny anecdotes a day the way Michelle does with Snake because she wants to be connected to him even when she’s not near him.”
Whether she knew it or not, she was putting into words all his thoughts.
The original Black Knights were the reason he knewcrazy in lovewasn’t the golden ticket, thatcalm in love, patient in love, and understood in lovewas where it was truly at. And he wished…ohhow he wished he was capable of those things.
The ache in the cold, hard pebble that was his heart was so intense his voice came out hoarse. “So why are ya wearin’ his ring?”
She looked down at the massive diamond that caught the glow of the lamp and refracted sparks of fiery light around the room. “Because he slipped it on my finger before I had a chance to answer. And the next second the gunman stepped onto the patio.”
He watched breathlessly as she pulled the giant stone off her finger and leaned over to gently place it inside the top drawer of her nightstand.
When she laid back against her pillow, staring at the ceiling and the strange shadows that danced across it thanks to the rain running in rivulets down the windowpane, her expression reflected the self-flagellation of her thoughts. “Would he have sacrificed himself for me if he’d known what my answer would be?”
Her lower lip trembled and tears once more gathered in her eyes. He wasn’t sure it was wise. Hell, he was pretty positivenoneof his decisions this night had been wise. But he pulled her back into his arms.
She came willingly. Eagerly, even. And that pleased him in ways he didn’t dare examine.
“I feel so guilty, Fish.” Her breath was hot against his neck. When her tears fell on his skin, they were hotter still. “I feel like I deceived him or?—”
