“Don’t blame yourself, Wren,” Naomi murmured, looking wistful.
Ruby planted her hands on her hips. “Why do women do that? Why do they always assume they are the problem?”
“I don’t think she is,” Effie said in her lilting voice.
Naomi and Ruby straightened. Silas clasped his hands behind his back and leaned in, curious despite himself.
“Women have come so far,” she continued, “in such a short time. I like who you are today.”
“Sometimes it feels like our fight to be seen as equals was all in vain,” Ruby muttered. “But what do I know? I was one of the foolish ones. I chased my no-good lover halfway across the state. Lost everything, my dog and my life. All because I wanted a man to love me.”
Effie smiled at her with quiet understanding. “Wren isn’t angry. She’s trying to understand him. To figure out what he’s thinking.” She paused. “And, God help her … she’s trying to work out where she stands, too.”
“Talk to me about her bonfire note.” Madame Calliope’s change of subject was a conversation jolt.
Naomi slapped her hands to her mouth in shock. “We spoke about that recently! How doyouknow about it?”
Madame was as impatient with ghosts as she was with humans. “I’m a medium, woman. I talk to spirits.Explain.”
Lila explained about the bonfire note Wren wrote when she was younger, a wish that she would find someone who would stay. “We’re wondering if the doctor is that person. We like him.”
Madame turned her witchy eyes on Silas, and despite her human limitations, he felt the force of her power. “You don’t think so,” she spoke directly to him, her tone accusing.
He lifted his chin and straightened. A man had to stand up for what he believed in. “I don’t dislike him, ma’am. I just believe Dr. Trafford has more important things to do than waste his time on a woman.”
Naomi sighed. “Nothing is more important than falling in love. So, Madame, is Dane her person? The one who is going to stay?”
They all looked at Madame expectantly, waiting for a prediction, but the woman shook her head. “I could tell you, but where’s the fun in that?”
She lifted her nose and, with Effie at her side, walked away. Silas shook his head; they were unlikely friends anywhere but in Solstice Springs. Thinking he could really do with a whiskey, he sent a longing look at The Bar, tempted to be among the sensible and the logical. Lila draped her arms over Naomi’s and Ruby’s shoulders and steered them away. They passed straight through a family of four. The parents shivered. Theirtoddler—big-eyed and delighted—grinned and waved. Ruby blew him a kiss, and he giggled.
Children often saw what adults could not.
Ruby stopped, turned and glanced at Wren, worry etched into her face. “I don’t want to leave her alone, Lila.”
Silas stepped forward, touching the brim of his hat. “I will see Miss Wren home,” he said.
Ruby smiled at him. “Thank you, Captain. That makes me feel better.”
It shouldn’t.
Because Silas Blackwood fully intended to spend the entire ten-minute walk explaining—whether Miss Wren could hear him or not—exactly why she should not pursue a relationship with Dr. Dane Trafford. By the time she reached Miss Luna’s front door, she’d understand, he hoped, how romance had a way of derailing even the most honorable of men.
* * *
After letting Wren precede him into the bar, Dane looked around the place and nodded. Yep, this was somewhere he’d feel comfortable hanging out after a hard day’s work, meeting his friends, playing pool, throwing darts.
With its plain, huge, and solid L-shaped counter, wood paneling on the walls, black vinyl booths, and a small dancefloor where couples shuffled to a slow song on the jukebox, it wasn’t a place where you brought a date you wanted to impress. Was this a date? He didn’t actually know. And as a guy in his mid-thirties, heshouldknow.
Especially since he’d come so very close to kissing her earlier. On Main Street, where a lot of residents were running, biking, and walking, taking in the balmy summer evening. Because Wren was a gorgeous woman, she invariably attracted attention, and he’d caught the side glances, felt the eyes on them. A lot of eyes.
He’d sensed a lot of interest in whatever was happening between him and Wren. If they knew, he wished they’d tell him.
Anyway, the sense that they were being watched was why he’d stopped at the last minute, why he’d pulled back.
Did she think he was playing her? He wouldn’t blame her if she did.
God, he was so out of practice, he didn’t know how to navigate situations like this anymore. Since his divorce, he didn’tdatedate. Oh, he’d had a fair bit of sex, but hooking up was different from buying a woman drinks, talking to her over a couple of hours, contemplating whether there was potential for more. He couldn’t do more, didn’twantto do more. And really, shouldn’t he figure out his life first, his next steps—how to handle his mental block and PTSD, how to restart his career—before he started seeing someone?
