My lips curl. “Do you even know what you’re not supposed to ask a woman? You go right for the jugular!”
He snorts, his dark eyes twinkling. “You aren’t old enough to have to worry about that. What are you twenty-five?”
“I’m twenty-eight. What about you?”
“Name…Monroe. Age…thirty-eight.”
“Wow. That’s succinct. Monroe Stephens. What brings you back here?”
“Talk about going for the jugular,” he mutters under his breath. He sighs and massages his left thigh. “I was a cop. You know that?”
Nodding my head, I sit forward, enthralled with his big, tanned hand working on his thigh. I can almost picture those hands sliding on my skin, working my muscles.
I jump when he clears his throat. Heat hits my cheeks and I cover them with my hands, hoping he didn’t see.
“I got shot.”
My head whips up, my eyes wide, shocked. “What?”
“Yeah.” His head stays down, his dark hair falling into his face. “I got shot. There was a robbery at a jewelry store. The alarm was going off. It was the middle of the night and I didn’t wait for backup, just went in. And I didn’t hear him coming up behind me until it was too late. Luckily for me he was a lousy shot and he only got me in the leg instead of straight in the head.”
“Oh my god!” I breathe. “I’m so sorry. Are you okay now?”
His lip curls and he looks up at me, his dark eyes piercing even in the dim red-tinged lighting. “Do you actually care?”
Flopping back, I glare at him. “What kind of question is that? I would never want anybody to be hurt like that! It had to be so traumatic.”
He looks away again, his hand automatically rubbing at his thigh again. “It wasn’t the best thing in the world.”
“I bet. Is that why you left the police department?”
“Yeah. I’ve got a permanent limp. My left leg is damaged and weaker than my right.”
“You can’t do physical therapy and see if it gets better?”
“It’s not going to. It tore up the muscles of my thigh. It’s kind of a mess with scars. Not pretty at all.”
“I bet most women wouldn’t give a damn if you had scars.”
His head whips around and he grunts angrily. “I bet they would.”
“Please tell me that your girlfriend didn’t leave you over that.”
His smile is barely there and there’s no warmth behind it. “Of course not. She was my fiancee.”
“Oh shit. Well, she must have just been an absolute wench.”
Chuckling, he glances over at me again. “I wouldn’t say that. I mean…I don’t care if you do. But I shouldn’t.”
“Fine. I’ll do it for you,” I huff. “She was a wench. Not worth thinking about at all.”
He sits back and grunts and I can’t help the soft, fuzzy feelings that his broken stare makes well up inside me. I want to hug the man so badly. My fingers actually twitch with it.
“So tell me about yourself, Fee.”
Sitting back, I sigh. I can’t not answer. He just told me the worst thing that’s ever happened to him. Surely he deserves just as much.
“I’ve been running the flower shop for ten years. Right before I was due to leave for college in the fall, the cops showed up at my parents’ house in the middle of the night. They were gone on their date night. They’d decided to make a night of it in a hotel after they ate at a really popular restaurant a couple of towns over. I wasn’t expecting them. So I was sleeping.”
