Page 31 of Passion in Bloom

Before I could say anything else, she brushed past me and opened her car door. “Just go away, Roarke. I slept like crap. I’m tired. And I have to go to work. Not stand around and deal with whatever you want or think you need from me.”

All I wanted from her was...her.

It was a damning thought to be obsessed with at work. And it didn’t help when others wanted to discuss the arrival of this “stranger from Chicago” visiting in town.

When Eric approached, though, I knew he had the same thing on his mind. He’d been off sick for a few days, but it seemed he hadn’t lacked in hearing about David showing up.

“Todd mentioned you were there with her,” he said during a slow moment of work.

“I was. I was driving home and saw her on the front step facing him off.”

He looked pensive for a second. “Did she look...all right?”

“No. She looked scared. Panicky and terrified.”

He coughed into his hand. “That asshole.”

“Yeah, he was an asshole, insisting that Heather had to leave and go ‘home’ with him because he was her boyfriend.”

Eric grunted. “And that was that? He assumed he could tell her what to do?” He shook his head. “Heather’s always been independent. No one tells her what to do.”

While I was hungry for more information about her, I had already assumed that much about her. A person didn’t become that independent overnight. She had to have had a lifetime of practice to be that jaded and stubborn.

“He seemed to think he could boss her around, though?”

“He did,” I replied.

“So she was running from Chicago to leave him,” he deduced.

I had to agree with that. I’d connected those dots already. But after I accused Heather of running from me, last night, I hated that I could be putting myself in the same category as the arrogant man who’d tried to tell her where to go and what to do.

I wasn’t ordering her to tell me anything, but I was making sure that I was here to listen to her whenever she wanted to open up. I wasn’t demanding that she do anything, but I intended to have her understand that she could count on me.

I was here. I wanted to help. And it cut at my soul that she couldn’t deem me trustworthy after I’d freely shared with her, after I showed her patience, and after I let her touch me and do whatever she wanted.

It wasn’t often in the habit of making myself vulnerable for the hell of it. I’d been vulnerable and exposed enough after what Veronica did to me. The hellish experience of our divorce had left my flayed and raw, cut open with my heart bleeding.

To think that Heather could view me as someone similar to David...

No. She can’t think that.

She simply couldn’t.

“I’m glad you were there,” Eric said, setting his hand on my shoulder. “I appreciate your help in keeping her safe.”

Oh, boy. If only she heard you saying that.

What he said helped assuage my guilt and worries about overstepping though. I was right to stand up for her, no matter how conflicted she was about letting anyone into her life.

For the rest of the day, she remained on my mind. I replayed every word of what we said when we argued, and I revisited the memories of how good she’d made me feel. I wouldn’t ever forget the look of satisfaction on her face when she made me come. Even though I’d gotten off, she looked pleased and relaxed.

After work, when I saw her car parked at her cabin, I went home, curious if Navaeh was there. I was lucky that she hadn’t popped over when Heather had come over. But when I saw the signs of a window being forced open, I was too pissed to think straight. Because this window was higher up, I doubted she’d try to break in.

But she had. Only Navaeh could’ve been slim enough to slip through that narrow of an opening. I saw the evidence of the lock being pried. I found more evidence in half of my food gone from my fridge and cupboards. Of course, the root beer brand that she liked, that I always bought just for her, was gone. And worst, feeling like I was a detective following a Goldilocks, I saw evidence of her taking the cash I’d set aside in the bottom drawer of the nightstand I seldom used.

“Dammit!”

I wanted to punch the wall. To scream. To rage.