“Thank you, Rhett,” I murmur.
He turns to me, dark eyes flitting up and down my body. Am I imagining that, or do I just want it to be true?
“Don’t mention it,” he says, reaching into his pocket. “I hope you don’t mind. I borrowed some paper.”
I roll my eyes. “We’d better call the cops.”
He chuckles, and I smile tightly. It feels too good to make him laugh. “It’s my number,” he says. “Just in case you need anything else.”
I reach up and close my hand around the paper. His rough hand brushes mine, and a spark runs up my arm. It’s electric and dangerous. I snatch my hand away.
Mira leaps up, skips over, and takes the paper from him. “Thank you, neighbor,” she says, her voice like sunlight through clouds on a murky day.
“I’ll take the rest of this inside,” Rhett says, keen eyes scanning me again, up and down, from my toes to the top of my head as if he likes what he sees.
“I’ll keep this very, very safe,” Mira says, folding the paper carefully.
When Rhett smiles down at her, she brightens, beaming up at him.
That ice around my heart creaks and groans as I watch my little sister open up for the first time in months.
I rush down the porch steps. “I’ll get the last few boxes, Rhett. You’ve done enough.”
“It’s no troub?—”
“I said I’ll do it,” I cut him off.
As I lean down to pick up the box, a terrifying idea grips me. I don’t know this man, and I’ve just turned my back on him and Mira. I look over my shoulder, still bent at the hip.
Rhett isn’t looking at Mira. He’s looking at me, staring, as if memorizing every detail, his fists clenched at his sides, his chest rising and falling as if he’s struggling to contain some emotion I’m not sure I want to identify. When he sees me looking, he quickly glances away.
But it’s too late. I saw.
My cheeks flush, making me appear like a naive know-nothing whose life a man hadn’t obliterated a year ago. I’m here for a new start with my sister, not to do… whatever this is.
I carry the box up the porch, nodding at Mira. “Go inside and get washed up for lunch.”
“Can Rhett stay for lunch?” Mira asks sweetly.
“No,” I say with too much force in my voice, instantly regretting it.
She sighs and sticks her thumb in her mouth. I don’t have it in me to tell her she’s too old for thumb sucking. I turn to Rhett. He shifts, as if debating taking the box from me, but the look in my eye must be enough to make him stop.
“Thanks for the help.”
He nods. “Thanks for letting me help.”
I snort out a laugh.
“Something funny about that?” he says.
It’s the thing sinful men say to seem like a good guy.
“No,” I say.
His lips curl into a smirk, and his eyes glint. “Then I guess you’ve got some kind of spontaneous laughing condition?”
I turn away so he won’t see my smile. “Have a good day, Rhett.”
