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Leave it to her to not sugarcoat her feelings . . . exactly opposite of him, who hid behind his at every opportunity.
“Can I come in?” he asked, shoving his hands in his pockets, feeling like a complete moron.
“Why should I let you? So you can hurt me again?”
Zach swallowed. He’d known he’d hurt her, damn it, but he hadn’t been able to stop his words. Hearing her say it so boldly, though, did something to him that nearly crushed his soul. He’d die before he hurt her again.
“I want to apologize.”
She said nothing as Zach waited. Waited for her to slam the door in his face, which he deserved. Waited for her to step aside and let him in. Waited for her to verbally attack him and tell him what a jerk he’d been to her for years.
Without a word, Sophie turned and walked away, leaving the door wide open. The cat darted off down the hall, disappearing into what Zach assumed was a bedroom.
He figured the fact that she’d not slammed the door in his face was his cue to come on inside. He crossed the threshold and closed the door behind him, trying like hell not to inhale the familiar floral aroma that seemed to hover everywhere Sophie was.
When he stepped into the living room, Sophie was shuffling papers together on the coffee table. One slid to the floor and he crossed to pick it up for her, but froze when he saw the drawing.
A pencil sketch. Similar to the ones in Chelsea’s old apartment. Similar to the framed prints in Sophie’s office.
No, not similar. Exactly the same.
Zach stared another moment before looking back up at her. She held the other sheets against her chest as she stared down at the sketch he held.
“You drew all of these?” he asked, amazed that she had such talent and he’d never known about it.
“Give me the paper, Zach.”
“Why aren’t you selling these?” His eyes roamed over the perfectly placed shadowing, the strong lines of the house.
He stared at a sketch of the Sunset Lake house and was utterly baffled at her ability to capture every single detail. She’d not portrayed the house as it stood now, but a vision of what it would be, what it probably once was.
“I was just doodling. No big deal.”
She reached for the paper and he let her have it. He’d already ingrained the image into his head and there was no way she was blowing this off as a random drawing or a hobby to pass the time.
Sophie took the stack of papers and laid them on top of an antique secretary in the corner of the room. When she turned back around, the opening in her robe had inched farther down, giving him a glimpse of something equally silky and lacy beneath.
He deserved this penance. She was all polished and perfection, smooth and classy. Zach was everything on the opposite end of the spectrum—rough, hard, and dirty.
“I shouldn’t have said what I did earlier,” he started, knowing full well she wasn’t going to say a word and the floor was all his. She wouldn’t make this easy, but she hadn’t kicked him out, so the fact that he was still there was more than he deserved.
“I can’t take it back and I can’t make it right, other than saying I’m sorry. When I hurt, I lash out, and you’re the last person I want to be on the receiving end.”
Her shoulders relaxed as she crossed her arms and remained silent. Zach swallowed, wondering how much he should reveal, how far into his soul he needed to go in order to receive her forgiveness.
“I’m not using my pain as an excuse,” he continued. “There’s no excuse for what I did. I know you love my house, I know you have memories there just like I do, and I know you care about my family, even though I’ve been an ass to you. But I can’t focus on what’s best for everyone and still carry out Chelsea’s wishes, because at the end of the day, that’s what I’m focusing on.”
Sophie nodded. “I know you are, Zach, but after all we’ve been through, after everything in our past, whatever is happening between us now only makes this new pain harder to deal with.”
He didn’t want to address what was going on with them now. And he sure as hell didn’t want to keep getting sidetracked by that creamy exposed skin.
“Nothing is happening now,” Zach stated, wondering if the words came out as strong as he’d intended. “You know why it can’t.”
Sophie tipped her chin in defiance. “I know what I feel. I also know I’m done with trying to get you to open up to how you feel, to face that all of these emotions haven’t gone away in years. Years, Zach. But if you haven’t owned up to your feelings by now, you never will.”
She started across the room with a slight limp, her eyes never meeting his as she walked by. “You’ve apologized, now you can go and feel better about yourself.”
Zach remained still. He didn’t feel better about himself. He didn’t feel good at all, because even though he’d apologized, Sophie was still hurt. Years of his actions, or non-actions, had damaged her.
