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Ten
Emilia slammedthe front door behind her and fled from her house. She had to get out. Had to escape Blaine and every dark memory and yearning he pried from her. Her running didn’t just come from how close he’d been, either. His perceptiveness posed a huge problem too.
That man could open his mouth and say things she would never utter to another person. Unlike him, she wasn’t from a small town, a place where everyone got into each other’s business and asked all the personal questions. In her world, anything worth a damn went unsaid.
She raced down her veranda steps, her head bowed and the heel of her hand pressed to the hot damp of her cheek. She hadn’t even cried the day she’d left Anthony. The day she’d left her entire life behind. But this… this shecried over.
“Hiya, hope I’m not interrupting—”
She stopped dead in her tracks, and her gaze slammed into Aggie trudging down the path, an enthused grin on her face as she waved a plastic spray bottle filled with a dark green solution in the air. “I saw you made a start on the garden and thought I’d bring—” Her smile dropped, and she lifted her wrinkled fingers to her lips. “Oh dear, are you okay?”
Emilia opened her mouth to say everything was fine. Everything would be fine. If she could only leave for a walk to clear her head. But the loud crash of her backdoor cut her off, the crunch of footfall over gravel soon growing louder.
Blaine marched out from the side of her house, his scowl pinned ahead and freezing her out. Aggie tried to utter a “Hiya,” to him too, but he stayed on mission, barreling past, white-hot resentment etched in every hard line of his face.
Aggie shuffled closer to Emilia, her cheeks pale and head shaking. “What on earth?”
An invisible force squeezed Emilia’s heart. She didn’t know how to answer that question, much less want to. Poor Aggie already had one emotional person charge past her without reason, and as much as Emilia wanted to, she wouldn’t be the second.
She swiped at the remnants of cold tears and gave the older woman a wobbly smile, but no matter how much she tried to conjure words, nothing came.
“Oh, child.” Aggie scrambled forward and put her arms around Emilia’s hunched shoulders. Meanwhile, Blaine’s truck roared to life. “How about you take a seat on that lovely porch swing of yours? I’ll go inside and make us some tea.”
Emilia allowed Aggie to coax her toward the veranda swing while Blaine’s truck sped away, leaving her momentarily alone with the strong afternoon sun and a lingering cloud of road dust ahead.
She’d woken this morning with a simple plan—get her furniture delivered and spend the afternoon alone in her garden. Now, she didn’t even want to be near her house, much less in the same state as Blaine Callaghan.
A rush of memories hit her square in the gut, causing her to hunch with real-world pain. The scene in her bathroom. He’d stepped closer and brought with him that paralyzing hot rush of need. There’d been her hesitation. Her fear. What giving in to her need had cost and would cost again. The past was a crushing predictor of what could happen. Then there was the bitter memory of a time she’d been free to reach for him, to pull him into her without reservation.
I’m free, but not free.
He’s not free, either.
That stupid, inane moment. Her first bit of genuine intimacy in years. Her first taste of someone’s genuine concern. And that person was Blaine. That moment now sat like a branding iron pressed to her palm. As quick as she’d been to get away, the damage was done. The feel of his heat was enough to spark something in her heart.
She groaned, her reaction everything ridiculous. Anthony might have been a classically attractive guy, but their relationship had always lacked connection. Maybe because few people took well to being controlled, and that’s exactly what he’d done to her, year in, year out, day after day. But Blaine. Holy hell. Blaine. He pulled emotions from her that were something else entirely. Something untamed and frightening.
She slumped forward and pitched her elbows on her knees before resting her head in her hands. She didn’t want to think of what any of this meant. All she wanted was the peace she’d sought when she’d first escaped.
But the encounter replayed in her mind, over and over again.
In light of her conversation with her dad last night, she wanted to cave and let Blaine look after her. Oh, but she’d let others take the reins in her life before. That hadn’t turned out well at all.
She couldn’t tell him everything. Couldn’t fall into the safety of his arms or allow his gentle coaxing to cloud her better judgment. Even if he was the embodiment of everything she craved but lacked in her life. One overriding thought stopped her. She’d lost him before and wouldn’t cause him any damage once again. Not now that she knew what her family was capable of. Not now that she knew about Sarah.
Her chest jolted over a shuddering sob she worked hard to hold within, and she pressed her hand to the base of her throat. “Hold it together. Just let him go. You’ve done it before.”
The whispered chant didn’t help. All she could think about was how she’d spent ten years as Anthony’s shadow, never really getting much of what she wanted, a husk of the woman she could have been. So much time and opportunity had gone to waste. She wanted to rage, to seek revenge, when logic now called her to focus on the boring but necessary task of surviving.
“Let him go.” She commanded herself on a hard whisper, closing her eyes in search of relief. She had a chance to build some semblance of her own life. That was something. Everything. Right now.
“Hush, now.”
She jolted at the sound of Aggie’s gentle voice, then snapped her attention to her right and the woman extending a cup of steaming tea. “Tea makes everything better. Drink.”
Emilia did as she was told and took her first sip, the hot liquid uncoiling a small portion of her tension. If she kept sipping, if the tea came in a bucket or a trough, maybe then her problems might disappear.
She huffed out a small laugh and lowered the cup.
