Page 14 of Her Loving Hero

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“Emily,you don’t have to get everything done today. I wasn’t expecting all of the shelves to be stocked until Friday.”

Emily looked up at Kim in confusion, then looked down at the pile of empty boxes around her feet. “Oh, I guess I got carried away.”

“That’s been happening a lot this week. Wanna talk about it?”

Emily stepped down from the short ladder she had used to reach some of the higher shelves. She loved this bookshop, it was the ‘go-to’ place in San Diego for all types of books, and wonders of wonders, it was solvent. She wiped her hands on her jeans, then picked up one of the empty boxes.

“Let me start breaking these down, then I’ll come up front and we can talk.”

“Those can wait,” Kim said kindly.

“You know they can’t. They’re cluttering up the aisles. Just give me twenty minutes, and I’ll get them in the cardboard recycling area out back.”

“No, just rest them near the door.”

“I’m a big girl. It’s one p.m. on a Thursday in the glitzy part of town. I can certainly take these out back,” Emily said with a grin. What’s more, she felt confident about it too.

Score one for Team Hoag!

Emily took her time using the big Exact-O blade cutting the boxes down. She might be getting better at handling a moment out back by herself, but she knew she wasn’t the most coordinated girl on the planet so she was going to be extra careful so she didn’t cut off her thumb. Before she picked up the last box, Wyatt softly called her name.

“Hey, don’t sneak up on me like that,” she protested. “I could have ended up cutting myself.”

He smiled his Wyatt smile. “I waited until you were between boxes. I didn’t want to have to take you to the hospital.”

“Oh yeah, you know how clumsy I am, don’t you?” she said with a resigned smile. “You know everything.”

He pulled the blade out of her hand and easily cut the box down flat in a third of the time it would have taken her. He eyed the pile.

“Where do these go?”

“Out back, near the dumpster.”

“You weren’t going to take them there, were you?” he asked.

“I was.”

Take that, she thought as she lifted her chin and stared him in the eye. She was doing fine without him.

He looked at her then nodded. “I see,” he said slowly. “But since I’m here today, instead of taking multiple trips, how about you let me take it out. Might as well use me since I’ve proven I have more brawn then brains.”

“Well, when you put it like that.” Emily struggled not to smile.

Bad girl. You’re supposed to be mad at him.

She held the door for him as he took the flattened boxes out to the pile behind the store. She felt herself blush when she noticed how his muscles bulged as he pushed the pile into a semblance of order.

Emily had spent the last five days really thinking about how she’d left Wyatt’s house. He’d tried to stop her. It hadn’t worked. She had the Uber App on her phone. Another score for Team Hoag.

One of the things she’d realized over the weekend is that part of the reason she’d left wasn’t just because he hadn’t opened up to her, it was because she was uneasy with some of the feelings he was arousing in her, so she’d ended up running away like a little girl. Heck, any one of the girls at the youth center would have handled things better.

“Emily, if you keep biting your lip like that, you’ll make it bleed.”

Her hand flew up to her mouth. Her lip was stinging. She blushed as he stood two steps below her on the loading dock. They were eye-to-eye.

“I asked Halindra where you’ve been, she said you went over to the center in Temecula. I hate this shit. I miss you. What can I do to make this right?”