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Her eyes flashed up to meet mine, shock written all over the beautiful curve of her lips.
“Riel…” she breathed. “That’s never a way to think.”
I shrugged.
“Doesn’t mean that I don’t think it, though,” I told her. “I do. If I could switch places with Luca, I would.”
Her eyes went soft.
“That makes me an asshole to say what I said earlier,” she told me. “It’s not nice. And I hate that I think it.” Her eyes studied my face. “I don’t ever want you to think that I’m not happy that you came home. I am. I just wish Luca had come home, too.”
I grabbed her hand and squeezed it lightly before letting it go.
“Want to grab some lunch?” I asked.
She narrowed her eyes. “Are you inviting me to lunch because you don’t want to eat by yourself and I’ll hopefully deflect some of the town’s attention away from you?” she wondered. “Or do you have ulterior motives?”
Ulterior motives for sure.
I wasn’t sure why I felt the way around her that I did.
But when she was near, the screaming emptiness in my head didn’t feel quite so debilitating as it usually did.
I grinned. “Busted.”
She rolled her eyes.
“They’re just as infatuated with me as they are with you. Even more so, as a matter of fact.” She paused. “The day after you and I had dinner with your crew, I got a call from Ember, Luca’s mom, saying that she’d had several reports that we’d been seen out to dinner together.”
I frowned hard.
“Was she mad?” I asked, ready to defend her even though I had a feeling that it wasn’t like that with Ember and Gabe.
She shook her head.
“Honestly, she was happy that I was getting you ‘out and about’ and not letting you ‘hole up in your apartment.’” She grinned. “Though, I had to tell her that I was the one to see you there. I hadn’t dragged you anywhere.”
I grunted out a, “Shit.”
She rolled her eyes. “They care about you. Just like they do about me. You’re going to have to get over it.”
I scratched my head and she stood up, walking over to the refrigerator and getting her food out.
I blinked when I saw her remove an entire pizza box.
“That’s the lunch you prepared?” I asked, grinning.
The scars pulled around my mouth, but I didn’t care.
Not when the woman was so full of surprises.
She rolled her eyes. “You don’t remember this, but I can burn water.”
My brows rose.
“I have a shit ton of pots and pans in storage,” I said. “I apparently can cook. People that can’t cook don’t have that kind of shit in the first place.”
She smiled, looking sad for a few seconds.
“You and Luca used to see who could cook the best meals,” she said. “The week that y’all were off for leave? I ate like a queen.”
I felt my chest puff up.
“If I can remember how to do that,” I said, “I’ll cook you something.”
She winked, even though she looked sad.
I wanted to bring her into my arms and hug the shit out of her.
Instead, I sat back and allowed her to heat me up half the pizza before she did the same for herself.
“I know you don’t like pineapple,” she said. “So, you’ll have to pick those off.”
I picked up the piece of pizza and examined it.
It was so weird.
There were things that I just knew instinctively.
Like how to clear a jam in an AR-15. Or how to pie a corner when I’m clearing a house.
Then there were the little things. Like finding out I didn’t like mint toothpaste, it tasted like absolute ass and made me gag if I used it.
Or the fact that I didn’t like chocolate but loved peanut butter.
Or even the sweet tea at the restaurant when she’d joined me with my team.
Honestly, it was the littlest things that surprised me.
Like finding out that I didn’t like pineapples.
Because smelling the shit was making my mouth water.
I took a hesitant bite and moaned at the taste.
“Shit,” I said. “This is good.”
When I looked up at her, she was staring at me oddly.
“What?” I asked.
She frowned.
“I made you try pineapple once when you were here with us,” she said. “You threw up thirty seconds after you ate it.”
I took another hesitant bite, expecting to become sick to my stomach, but felt nothing but pleasure at the taste.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But this is fucking good.”
“Luca turned me onto pineapple on my pizza,” she said softly, looking at me with her seeking eyes. “He said that it was the best thing that I’d ever taste. I haven’t eaten any other kind of pizza since.”
I didn’t know what to say to that.
“I’m not the same man that I used to be,” I admitted. “I don’t know who that other man was, nor do I know who this one is. But I can tell you that I wish I would’ve gotten the chance to know your Luca. He sounds like he was a great man.”
