Page 26 of One Wild Wish

Ignoring the queasiness, I made for the door, hoping to find Rachel and clear my head. Luck was on my side. She’d stopped a few blocks down to rummage through her purse. Probably for her cell. Last session it had vibrated incessantly until she’d shut it off. A guy calling her, maybe. Someone in her life who didn’t spin hot and cold. That didn’t seem like her style, to flirt with me and go home to someone else, but if my ex Sophia taught me anything, it was people weren’t always who they seemed.

I glanced at my bike and debated leaving, not pursuing her pull. Not offering some weak explanation for my behavior. That would mean sitting through another session, waiting for a glance from Rachel. A twitch of her lips. Any reaction to me.

Fuck it all to hell.

She was on the move and turned into a grocery store. I jogged after her, unsure what I was after, unable to stop.

I found her in the produce section. A bag of cherries was in the basket on her arm. Her hips swayed in her black skirt, the folds of her white blouse whispering across her skin as she moved. She always wore conservative clothes, always black, white, or gray. I couldn’t be sure who the real Rachel was—the woman with the witty humor, sexual appetite, and wild laugh, or the woman who wore prim outfits, straightened her pens, and couldn’t come with any other man’s head between her thighs. If I had to guess, I’d say she didn’t know her true self, either.

Her back was to me as I approached, her attention fixed on an employee. “Do you have black currants?”

He scratched his pock-marked cheek. “Only dried, I think. Aisle three, with the bulk foods.”

“And licorice? The real kind, black. Not the strawberry Twizzlers.”

“Aisle two, with the candy. Should be there.”

Cherries in her basket, currants and licorice—she either had some odd eating habits, or she was training her nose for the Cabernet Sauvignon tasting.

“You don’t want licorice,” I said.

Her shoulders jumped. She swiveled, surprise in her wide brown eyes. Her attention lingered on my leather jacket and dipped down the front of my T-shirt, landing on my belt buckle. Her eyes flicked up to my face, irritation replacing her desire. I saw it, though—the quickening of her breath, the parting of her lips. All wasn’t lost.

“If I asked for licorice,” she said, “then I want licorice.”

“Not if you’re using it to prepare for next class. For that, you need star anise and these.” I grabbed a pint of blackberries and tossed them in her basket.

Her scowl was adorable. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Helping you.”

The pink tinge on her chest rushed to her cheeks, indignation in her hitched shoulders. “I don’t want your help, Jimmy. Since you need it spelled out, I don’t want anything to do with you. I don’t know what you’re playing at, but this cat-and-mouse game doesn’t do it for me.” She grabbed the blackberries and shoved them at my chest. “Keep your hands out of my basket.”

Except I wanted my hands in her basket, my fingers smudging her refined edges. I returned the blackberries to her bin and smirked.

She huffed. “You’re incorrigible.”

“I’m determined. I need to explain about last session.”

She stepped to the side, hand on the berries to return them herself, and my heart stopped. No, not stopped. It lurched against my ribs, the muscle nothing but a giant bruise.

Sophia.

She was a few feet away—the woman who’d used me, chewed me up, and spat me out. The woman I hadn’t seen in two fucking years. Her blond hair was shorter, no longer to her waist, but her lips still shone red, her ample curves emphasized in a tight red dress. The dress we’d bought together in Greece. That was also where I’d purchased the engagement ring she’d refused. I stumbled back, history and memories slamming into my chest.

What a goddamn week. First the blind Pinot Noir tasting, a sip of my family’s wine secreted onto my tongue. Now Sophia.

Rachel appeared in front of me and placed her hand on the center my chest. My heart nearly leapt into her palm. “You okay?” she asked.

Our first round in the cellar, the same sympathy had softened her face. Right before she’d marched over and sat beside me. Her position now blocked Sophia from my view, and bitterness redirected my shock. “My ex is here, and I haven’t seen her in a couple years.”

Instead of removing her hand, she flattened her palm. “I’m guessing the relationship didn’t end well?”

Understatement of the century. “If her turning down my proposal constitutes not well, then yes, I’d agree.”

She glanced over her shoulder, still touching me. “The blond?”

I grunted, pulled between preserving Rachel’s closeness and getting the hell out of Dodge. I chose immobility.