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He looks at me assessingly. Then he darts indoors and returns with a small tool that he flicks open with an expert maneuver. A hunting knife. Before I know what’s happening, he’s grabbed the hem of the shirt I’m wearing and he’s slicing off the last eight inches.
“No—!” I yelp. “What are you doing?”
“Almost done,” he mutters, teeth gritted in concentration, and a moment later the excess fabric comes away.
“Your lovely shirt!” I examine the tattered ends.
“Need to make sure you look the part.”
As I stand still, too stunned to move, he unfastens the last three buttons and ties the two loose ends together. The fabric pulls tight across my breasts and waist. I feel him drawing me closer, into him, as if he’s molding me. A master craftsman, cinching me in his hands.
He stands back, measuring his handiwork. “Pretty,” he says. Then he lifts a hand and sweeps my bangs to the side. They’ve gotten too long to hang straight down, and somehow he knows this. This raw, masculine man has a tenderness about him that I’ve never come across in a person before.
As his hand drops, his fingertip grazes my cheek, then the corner of my lips. So lightly, I wonder if I imagined it.
But that thought is enough; heat floods me, spreading down through my chest, to that spot between my thighs that hasn’t quit aching since Beau came into my life.
“Too pretty. They’re gonna love you.” He says it in a strange way. Sad, almost angry, as if he doesn’t like the thought of that. Then he turns away sharply.
“Been working on your shoes.” He hands them to me. They’re cheap, black canvas. Embarrassing, like the rest of my clothes. But they’re no longer covered in river mud, and by some miracle, they’re almost dry.
“Thank you, so much—” I mutter. Words are nothing like adequate to acknowledge what he’s done for me.
“Can’t have those little feet of yours wet all day.” He coughs, casts around. “Are you about ready?”
I snatch up my dirty backpack, guilt flooding me. He probably had his whole day planned out before a little river rat intruded on it.
“Sure am.” I force brightness into my voice.
He pulls on a pair of sneakers. “Let’s go.”
I follow him across the parking lot, confused as hell. A big hollow opening up inside me again.
