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And just like that, there were only the two of us. Lea sniffed, wiping a wayward tear from her cheek. “Tell anyone you saw me cry, Marshall, and I will make your coffee weak and your bacon cold.”
“Cold, soggy bacon… how would I cope? But I promise not to tell a soul.”
Chapter 7
Lea
Ididn’tcry.Imasked my feelings behind a smile or humor, but tears weren’t my style. I was raised like it. I loved my parents, but being open about our feelings wasn’t something that was encouraged and my brother and I had gone through enough therapists over the years to know that it affected how we formed and built relationships. I sometimes wondered if that was why I craved more; more people to care about me, more people to dilute my feelings, more people to comfort me when I needed it. Maybe my sexual desires were in fact selfish ones.
I brushed another stray tear from my face, hating that I was being so vulnerable in front of someone I’d only known for a few hours.
“You okay, Sugar?”
“S-Sugar?” I stammered.
“It’s a common name where I’m from, nothing more.”
I took a minute to look at Marshall. Wide shoulders, thick thighs, defined muscles, sun-kissed, perfectly styled blond hair, deep blue eyes, the soft twang of his Southern American accent. There was no denying he was hot.
I shook my head. “The last couple of days have been a lot. Nee has been missing for months. Honestly, I thought she was hurt somewhere or worse.” I sniffed back a sob, wiping my runny nose across the back of my hand, making Marshall screw up his face. He stood from the table and reached for a paper towel, passing it to me. When I’d blown my nose, making a noise that sounded like a trucker, he held out his hand.
“You wanna sit on the sofa?”
I nodded, placing my palm in his. “Your hands are huge.”
He winked as he sat and I couldn’t help but appreciate the way his tight t-shirt pulled against his biceps or how his jeans hugged the outline of those thick thighs as his legs fell open. It took every thread of control I had not to crawl into his lap and experience what it would be like to let him comfort me.
“Talk to me, Sugar.”
I sat, keeping my distance and pulling my legs under myself as I turned to face him.
“I’ve missed my friend and now my friend doesn’t remember a thing about me other than what she wrote to herself before the operation.” Marshall looked confused. “The clever girl knew she might lose her memory, so she wrote herself a book of all her important memories.”
“Wow. So why didn’t she remember Archer? I thought they were engaged.”
I took my glasses off and placed them on the coffee table. “She didn’t include him. Archer’s mum had early onset dementia. She died about a year ago. Nee didn’t want him to have to go through something similar with her. She thought that by leaving and forgetting about him, she was saving him.”
He paused, licking his plump red lips. “But he found her anyway?”
“Exactly.” I couldn’t have been happier that they’d found each other again, because they were perfect together.
“But that’s not all… right?”
I lifted my head so my eyes locked on his and suddenly my mouth started moving without my permission. “No. That’s not all. Work is crazy. I’m planning an event that will be shown all over the world and I only have a few weeks left to do it. I have left a whole heap of work to be here and while I wouldn’t miss seeing Nee for anything, the stress of what I have to sort while I’m here is a heavy burden to carry.”
Marshall stretched out his hand, placing it on my knee. “But you have help?”
“I have a team, but this is a much bigger gig than we’re used to and I’m having to micromanage everything. God, it’s exhausting, but I can’t tell anyone because I don’t want to seem ungrateful.”
He shook his head. “Asking for help isn’t you being ungrateful, it’s you admitting you can’t do it all.”
“I guess.” I let out a sigh of relief, getting everything off my chest, and then I continued talking. And then there’s Fox.”
He paused. “Fox. As in Fox, in the band with Archer?”
“Yeap.” I let out another breath, unsure why Marshall was so easy to talk to. It was as if I’d known him for a lifetime. “And Dawson.”
A look of realization flashed across his face. “I thought Fox and Dawson were… something.”
