Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
L ucy’s first official day off in a week came both too fast and not fast enough.
On the one hand, allowing Della out in public every day put her at risk of discovery. It wasn’t smart.
On the other hand, being in the house alone with her spawned an unexpected war with Ward’s inner demons, and he wasn’t sure who was winning.
He was hyperaware of her location at all times, which he tried to convince himself was just part of the job.
It wasn’t.
Right now, she was one floor and a few steps away, curled up on the sofa like a contented cat. She was wearing that damned flannel shirt that was a little too big. She never seemed to notice that it slipped down one arm to reveal a bare shoulder.
She had no idea what that shoulder did to him.
The problem with a secure, off-the-grid location? There were no distractions. There was nothing for him to do but be close to his protectee twenty-four seven and wait. Wait for his team to make any kind of progress. Wait for the stalker to do something stupid.
Wait for him to lose his own damn mind.
He couldn’t take a day off because the cover story he’d set up wouldn’t allow him to bring in a replacement. It would cause too many questions.
He was stuck here with her looking like a present he’d like to unwrap.
He scrubbed his face with both hands, then put on one of his dad’s old work shirts and went out back to split wood they didn’t need for the fireplace.
He set a log on the chopping block and faced it like an enemy.
Thwack!
It broke in two and fell to the sides. He picked up the pieces, stacked them, then selected another log.
Thwack!
Over the last week, they’d settled into a routine that felt entirely too comfortable. Late mornings were followed by afternoons and evenings at Sevens, where Della quickly shed that awkward first day like a worn-out coat.
Now she tracked her tables like a veteran. She had a way of making everyone feel special and seen. Even him.
Rule one slapped him upside the head for what felt like the hundredth time this week. She ’ s your protectee. Not your girlfriend. Remember?
He hit the next log a little harder.
Thwack!
She was in there. Right now. Bare shouldered.
Thwack!
It was getting hot out here, even with the fall breeze.
Thwack!
Thwack!
Thwack!
The smell of roasting meat reached him, making his mouth water. The neighbors must be barbecuing.
Odd. The closest neighbors were in their eighties and didn’t do that kind of thing anymore. But he hadn’t been around much over the past couple of years. Things might have changed.
He shrugged it off and hit another log.
Two days.
They had two whole days with nowhere to go and nothing to do but stare at each other.
Thwack!
His body quickly reminded him that there were a lot of ways to fill downtime. An image of Della wandering into the kitchen this morning in a T-shirt that barely reached her thighs flashed through his mind and revved up everything south of his navel.
Rule goddamned one , he reminded himself and split four more pieces of wood.
The muffled sound of a smoke alarm sang from inside the house.
A second later, the kitchen window was thrust open, letting wisps of smoke out.
He threw his shirt on as he jogged back to the house. There was a fire extinguisher under the kitchen sink, but he doubted Della knew that.
He found her frantically using a magazine to fan the smoke detector in the kitchen.
“Shit! Shut up, you stupid thing!” Della spared a glance at him and cringed. “Nothing’s on fire. It’s just smoke.”
Smoke belched from the oven. He eyed it with amusement.
“Sure about that?”
She coughed. “Sweet Jesus, that smell is vile.”
Ward crossed to the stove and peered at a baking sheet that contained two black lumps that might, at some point, have been chicken breasts.
He tried hard not to laugh. She’d learned how to serve food, but her ability to cook it was nonexistent.
What had she been living on all these years?
Someone else’s cooking, he guessed.
“I don’t know what I did wrong!” Della shouted over the relentless blaring. “The recipe said bake for forty minutes. It’s only been ten.”
“What temperature?”
“Three fifty.” Della stopped waving at the smoke detector and glared at it instead. “Doesn’t this thing ever shut up?”
“Give it another minute or two. It’ll reset.” He checked the settings. “You have it on broil, not bake.”
She blinked at him. “That’s not the same thing?”
“No.” He turned off the oven. “And you managed to set the clock, not the temperature.”
The siren stuttered to a stop, leaving them in blissful silence.
“Finally.” She stuck out her tongue at it, then dropped the magazine on the counter. “So…can I interest you in some broiled, slightly blackened, probably raw chicken?”
His lips twitched, then stretched into a laugh.
“You’re laughing at me.” She put her hands on her hips. “I made you lunch and you’re laughing at me.”
“That’s what that was?”
She wrinkled her nose at the chicken charcoal. “Sadly, yes.”
He jumped on the excuse to escape the stench and the temptations. “Let’s go out.”
Della looked relieved. “Good idea. Where? Sevens? I still haven’t tried the meatloaf.”
“It’s your day off. Let’s go somewhere you’ve never been.”
Yeah, sure , said an inner voice that sounded a lot like Annie. That’s why you want to go. It’s definitely not because you like seeing her smile.
She raised her eyebrows. “Interesting. And easy enough since I haven’t been many places around here. Where are we going? Should I change?”
“You might want to get a jacket.” It would cover up that damn shoulder. “I’ll grab a quick shower, and we can get out of here.” He started up the stairs. “Wear the boots.”
“Okay,” she drew the word out. He thought he heard her say, “Boots. Because every nice meal needs heavy footwear.”
He chuckled, then stripped to take yet another cold shower.
The place he took her was a thirty-minute drive and a million miles away from stalkers, stages, and screaming smoke detectors. The winding road stretched across rolling hills and acres of ripening corn.
“It’s really beautiful out here,” Della said. “I used to love it when we toured by bus because the view was constantly changing. You really can’t see how pretty a place is from a plane.”
“Sure you can. Just a different perspective.”
“I guess.”
They passed a small sign that read “Hellerick Farms Next Right.”
“You’re taking me to a farm?” Della glanced at him. “Are we going to a tractor pull?”
“You’ll see.” He didn’t know why he was teasing her. This wasn’t a date.
He shifted in his seat, fully aware of how delusional that thought was. This had stopped being a protection detail a week ago when he’d watched her drop that tray of mugs.
His first impulse hadn’t been to stay on the sidelines to watch for threats.
No, his first impulse had been to get her a fresh shirt.
“So I guess we’re not getting Mexican food out here.” She licked her lips. “Shame. I could go for some tacos.”
“Not a lot of that in this part of the country.”
“Amish?” She looked around. “Pennsylvania is Amish country. They have the best potpies. You can’t get stuff like that in the city.”
“True. But no. Not Amish.”
“Bummer.” She sighed like a melodramatic soap star. “You’re a giant tease, you know that?”
“Sometimes.” He tried not to smile as he turned onto the narrow lane that led to the farms. The drive pushed through fields of corn and opened onto a clearing that contained a two-story, all-white farmhouse, a giant red barn, and several other outbuildings.
It was a real working farm, but it was also basically a country theme park, complete with a play area filled with swings and slides, a corn maze, you-pick-them sunflower fields, and some of the best food trucks in the state. Families came from as far away as New York and Philadelphia to experience the latest maze since the layout changed every year.
She gave him a quizzical look. “Are we harvesting our own meal? We did one of those places once with Daddy. It was interesting. Mattie loved it. She spent all her time chasing butterflies. Piper and I ate more than we picked, and Lizzie spent most of her time trying to keep track of us.”
He pulled into an empty patch near the fence and parked. “It’s something like that. Come on.”
They got out and headed for the booth where tickets were sold.
Della slipped her hand in his, and it felt like the most natural thing in the world.
The tall, dark-haired girl at the booth winked at them. “Hey, Storm. I wondered if we’d see you two out here.”
“Molly?” He dragged up what he knew about the youngest Hellerick. She had four older siblings, but there was a significant gap in their ages. If he remembered right, Molly had been a later-in-life whoops. She was the smartest of the bunch, graduated top of her class. “Damn. I’ve been gone too long. You out of school?”
“Not yet. I took a year off to help out around here. I finish up my business degree next May. I’ll be running things here when Mom and Pop decide to kick off retirement.”
He nodded his approval. “Can’t think of anybody better.”
“Thanks.” She smiled at Della. “Hey, Lucy. I’m glad you’re finally getting to explore the town. You two want the whole deal, or just the sunflowers?”
“Sunflowers?” Della’s eyes widened with delight. “You brought me to see the sunflowers?”
“Give us the whole deal,” Ward interjected as he pulled out his wallet.
“Gotcha.” Molly took his money and handed him a flyer. “Entrance is through the breezeway. Have fun.”
They stepped away from the booth.
“This is so cool!” Della beamed at him. “Who needs dinner when you have sunflowers?”
“There’s food out here, too.” He tried and failed to get the defensiveness out of his tone.
It was wrong. He knew it was wrong. This wasn’t secure at all. It was too exposed. As a bodyguard, this was the last place he should have taken her.
But he was starting to realize he’d bend a lot of rules to see that look of joy on her face.
“You know, underneath that GI Joe Rambo shell, you really are a sweet man.” Della gave his arm a squeeze.
“Don’t tell anybody.”
Her eyes twinkled as she crossed her heart. “It’ll be our secret.”
He led her through the breezeway to where a dirt path split off in three directions and scanned the area by force of habit. It was a fairly small crowd, considering how popular this place was.
The entrance to the maze was surrounded by parents waiting for their giggling kids to find their way back out.
Nobody stood out as a threat. They hadn’t been followed. Nobody even knew they were here.
It was safe enough.
He led her toward the food trucks. “Let’s grab a bite and then do the flowers.”
“Okay.” Della’s eyes danced with excitement as she looked this way and that. “This reminds me of a county fair. I hope they have cotton candy.”
After hot dogs and cotton candy, which she ate with glee, they followed the path around the house and over a small hill.
Acres of sunflowers came into view, their vivid yellow and gold blooms nodding in the afternoon breeze.
“Oh.” Della’s slow smile brightened her face. “Oh. I love this. Have you ever seen anything so happy?”
She beamed at him, then let go of his hand. “Race you to the middle.” She took off, glancing over her shoulder. “Come on!”
He followed at a slower pace, at war with himself. Should he stay back and make sure nobody came close to her, or chase after her?
Della stopped and waved at him. “Hello! You going to let a girl beat you like that? What kind of Marine are you?”
His feet made the decision while his head was busy listing all the reasons he shouldn’t.
When he got close, she giggled and darted into a row of sunflowers.
Della stopped mid-row and spun to face him, her red curls bouncing. The smile on her face made his heart catch in a way he wished he could blame on the run. “This is so cool! Look how tall they are. And so big! The ones at Sevens weren’t this gigantic. This one’s bigger than my head!”
She pulled one down and covered her face with the blossom, then peeked out from behind the yellow petals.
The laughter in her eyes was worth bending a thousand rules. “Glad you like it.”
She released the stem and raised her arms to the blue sky and twirled with her face lifted to the sun.
It was all he could do not to kiss her right there.
Before he did something stupid, Ward pulled out his pocketknife and cut off a slightly smaller bloom. “Here.”
Her face softened as she took the flower from his hand. “Thank you.”
He coughed. “Sure.”
She put a hand on his arm and looked into his eyes with an intensity that shook him. “I mean it. Thank you. I needed this. It’s…this is perfect.”
The air between them felt charged like the sky during a thunderstorm.
He should look away. He shouldn’t get this close to her.
Her lips parted, then closed, leaving whatever thought had just passed through her mind unsaid.
Della glanced down at the flower, and the connection was broken.
He stuck his hands in his pockets to keep himself from reaching for her.
She tucked the flower behind her ear. Yellow petals spilled over her brilliant red hair, and into her eye before the too-large flower teetered and fell.
Della chuckled as she picked it up. “Okay, this one’s a little big. Maybe I’ll just hold it.”
He gestured to the stalks around them. “It’s the last week. You’re allowed to take as many as you can carry.”
“Really? We can take them home?” She looked like he’d just offered her a pile of gold. “I can carry a lot, you know.”
She demonstrated by holding her arms wide.
“Go for it.”
“Great, because they’ll look perfect in the living room. Oh, and they’ll totally match the curtains in the kitchen. It could use a little brightening after what I did to it this morning.” Della plucked at a nearby stalk. “Let’s start with this one.”
He dutifully cut the stem, then followed her up and down the rows, hunting for the perfect specimens.
It was easy to forget there were other people out here. The sunflowers spanned several acres, and they’d grown tall and thick. It was just the two of them walking through a field of yellow and green.
There was nothing to threaten them. Not today.
“Why does Rachel want you to sell your house so badly?” Della asked as she arranged the flowers in her arms.
He frowned, momentarily lost at the change of subject. Then his conversation with his ex came back. “She thinks she can turn back time.”
Della picked another flower for him to cut. “I don’t see how you selling your house helps her do that.”
“She doesn’t just want to sell it. She wants to buy it. She’s always loved that house.”
Della studied the flower he liberated. “The house? Or someone who lived there?”
He grunted. “She loved an idea.”
“Hmm.” Della sounded dubious. “So this idea she’s in love with is never going to become reality?”
“Meaning?”
“She won’t ever get you to change your mind about her…idea?”
“Hell no.”
Della looked extremely satisfied with his answer. “Good. Because Lucy promised your brother she’d burn the place down before we’d let her have it.”
He barked out a laugh. “How’d he take that?”
“Oh, he doesn’t want you to sell, either. I doubt anybody does except Rachel.” She pointed at a bloom so large it would cover her chest. “That one. Definitely.”
He reached in to cut the thicker stalk. “Not sure this will fit in the truck.”
“Did you know Mason mows the lawn and trims the bushes at the house every Saturday? He only stopped when we got here. He wasn’t sure you’d want him to come over.”
Surprise shot through Ward. “Thought Dad was paying a service, not Mason. Surprised he doesn’t want me to sell. It would be less work for him.”
“I’m not surprised at all. You should hear him talk about it. He loves that house.” She gave him a sly glance. “It’s yours.”
“It’s Mom’s house.”
“Not to him.”
They walked a little further down an extra-long row in silence.
Della paused at a clump of medium sized stalks. "Why are you holding on to it so tight? I mean, I know why I would. But why are you ? Oh, I love this one.” She tweaked the stalk toward her. The flower was more red than gold. "Look, it matches my hair.”
Her question made him uncomfortable, so he didn’t answer it. “Your hair’s a lot brighter.”
She pulled a handful of her curls out straight and tried to eyeball them. “Really? I can’t see. I’ll take your word for it. Anyway, let’s take this one. And don’t think I didn’t notice you avoiding the subject. I see you, Warden.”
She gave him a knowing look.
“Donovan,” he corrected. He cut the stalk and handed it to her.
He never talked about the house with anyone, not since the day Dad had signed it over to him. “ So you always have a place to come home to.”
It was an unspoken, unexamined understanding between them. Neither of them wanted to sell the house because doing that would be like losing his mother all over again.
That wasn’t going to happen. Ever.
Not that he’d ever said that out loud.
“You’d keep it?” He tried to sound casual, but even to his own ears, his voice was pinched.
“Oh yes. Definitely. It’s…well, home.” She shrugged. “That’s not easy to find, you know. My daddy sold our house when we started touring. But even if he hadn’t, I’m not sure I’d want to go back there because truth is, it’s not my home. It’s just a house. My whole life has been on the road with my sisters. Home is wherever they are.”
“Your childhood was very different from mine.” He cut another stem. “I didn’t see anything outside of Pennsylvania and New York until I joined the Marines.”
“I can’t even imagine what that’s like. Sitting in one place for me would basically be torture. Come to think of it, that’s exactly what I thought this would be.” She chuckled. “I like moving around. I like seeing new places and people. But I think for you, this town and that house are your anchors. I mean that in a good way, not in a trapped kind of way. I felt that the second I walked through the door. It wraps around you like a hug. No matter what happened when you were seventeen, it’s still your home. That’s why you brought me here, isn’t it? Because it feels safe?”
“It’s better to stake your ground somewhere familiar.” Ward wondered if that was all it was anymore.
He had logical, well-reasoned excuses for bringing her here. It still made sense. Even if it was a little uncomfortable having her infiltrate his personal life so completely.
“Tell me about your mother. Please?” Della asked softly. “She must have been an amazing woman.”
“She was.”
Maybe it was the way she said it, or the easy way they’d been talking while they picked flowers, or maybe it was just that this was the most relaxed he’d felt in months, but he found himself wanting to tell her.
So he did.
“She loved to paint. All of the paintings in the house are hers. There’s more scattered around town. Especially at the opera house. Aunt Martha scooped them up.”
“I’m not surprised. She was really talented.” Della nodded like she’d been an art expert her entire life. Then she gave a rueful sigh. “I’ve never even tried to sketch something, much less paint.”
“Me either.”
Della tilted her head. “What else?”
He sifted through once painful memories, finding it not nearly as hard as he’d expected it to be. “She sponsored all of my school trips, even the ones that took us all over the state for late-night games. Her apple pie always won the contest at the festival.” He studied the flowers without really seeing them. “She had a kind word for everybody, and she was everybody’s mom. She never met a kid she didn’t take under her wing. Including Rachel. Guess that’s why she likes the house so much.”
“Hmm. Not sure that’s the whole reason.” Della tugged a flower down to her face and sniffed. “I never knew my mom. I always wondered what it would have been like.”
“Mine would have adopted you too, if you’d been here.”
“Oh, don’t get me wrong, I didn’t suffer. I had my sisters. Lizzie’s been like a mom to me my whole life. It’s not exactly the same, though. Not that I’d ever tell her that.” Della pointed at another stalk for him to cut. Her arms were getting full, but he had a feeling she’d keep going until they overflowed. “How did someone like your mom… Well, out here, it just seems so far away from the crazy. You know? How did she wind up with a stalker?”
“He knew her in high school.” He stabbed the next stalk a little more viciously than he intended. “His name is Aaron Garner. His family moved to Wires Crossing when he was a sophomore. According to Elyse and my dad, he managed to worm his way into my parent’s circle of friends. He had several classes with my mom, and he seemed harmless enough, at the time. It wasn’t obvious at first. But he was always there. Always asking for Mom’s help with homework or trying to go with them to the pep rally. That kind of thing. They brushed off his attempts to get close as just awkward social skills, but that’s the thing about stalkers.”
He looked at her to make sure he had her attention.
Della had covered her panic button pendant with one hand as if to reassure herself that it was still there. She watched him with wide eyes.
“Most of the time, it’s someone familiar. Someone who’s already there in the background. Like Hannibal Lecter says, we covet what we see every day.”
She had to see the similarities between his mother’s case and her own. Even if they hadn’t pinned down who it was, his gut still told him it was someone she’d already met. Maybe even someone she’d smiled at. Signed an autograph for. She might have even gone on a date with him once or twice.
Della swallowed and pointed. “That one. With the splotch on the side.”
He snipped the one she indicated and handed it to her. “I shouldn’t be telling you about this.”
“Yes. You should.” Della put a soft hand on his arm. “I want to know. It helps.”
He wasn’t sure if she meant it would help her deal with her own situation, or if she thought it would help him deal with his own.
“The day she died was the first time I saw him. Hell, it was the first time I’d even heard about him. Mom and I were at the gas station and boom, there he was. He kept getting closer. Asking Mom questions. Like he was an old friend, catching up. But I could tell he made her edgy. The way he wouldn’t back off…so desperate to get her attention…it tripped my trigger.”
“What did your mom do?”
“She blew it off. Told me not to worry about it. He was harmless. Just someone who had a crush on her back in the day. No big deal.” He kept his eyes on the flowers, but he knew his words had to be hitting home with Della. They were so similar to what she’d said when she got the first letter. “I couldn’t let it go. So when she dropped me off at practice, I waited in the parking lot instead of going to the field. I just had this feeling that he’d been following her, you know? Sure enough, just after she left, his truck showed up. We jumped into Brick’s car and took off after them, but…”
His spine stiffened with remembered guilt and anxiety. “We couldn’t catch up. We barely made it in time to see him pull in front of her. He was trying to get her to stop, but they were on the bridge. There’s no shoulder. She swerved to avoid him, then went over.”
“Oh my God.” The sunflowers tumbled out of her arms. Della’s hands flew up to cover her mouth. “You saw it. You were there and you saw it happen. I didn’t know. I’m so sorry.”
He half shrugged and looked away. The flowers blurred into a mass of green and yellow in front of him. “I shouldn’t have told you all that. It was inappropriate.”
“You needed to tell someone. That’s too much to carry all by yourself.” Her arms snaked around his waist and squeezed as she buried her head against his chest. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry that happened to her. To you. To your dad. It’s not right.”
He sank into the comfort of her arms, lost in the memories he’d locked inside himself.
In that moment, he didn’t give a damn that she was his protectee and he was her bodyguard. He didn’t give a damn about rules or what he should be doing.
He needed this. He’d needed it every time he’d crossed that bridge, but he’d never told anyone.
When they separated, he saw that she’d been silently crying the tears he refused to shed, and it almost broke him.
He looked away. He had to get a grip.
“No wonder you don’t want to spend any time here,” she whispered.
He rubbed the back of his neck. He ached, as much from the log splitting as the emotional heavy lifting just now. “It was a long time ago. I’m past it.”
“Not sure I’d ever get past that.” She hugged herself as if she were cold. “Not sure anyone could."
He knelt to gather the flowers she’d dropped. “That’s why I won’t sell the house. Not to Rachel. Not to anybody. Mom loved the life she built in that house.”
“So do you. It’s okay to say it, you know. You should love that house. It definitely loves you.” Della joined him, stacking flowers to form a bundle with the blossoms sticking up past her shoulder. “Did they catch the guy?”
“They didn’t.” He reached for a flower that had tangled in the nearby stalks. “I did.”
She blinked at him. “What did you do when you caught him?”
He kept his grip loose, even though he wanted to clench his fists. “I dragged him out of his busted-ass truck and beat the shit out of him. If it weren’t for Brick, I’d have killed him. I wanted to.”
He swallowed against the anger that still rose every time he thought about that day. Della had to know what kind of man he was. That he was someone who could kill a man…that man…and not think twice about it.
“I would have done the same thing. If I could.” She took a deep breath and blew it out. “But the lady who was driving drunk never even knew she hit my dad. They both died that day. I wanted so much to be mad, to have someone to shout at or beat up. But there was nobody. It would have felt good to have someone to punch, I think.”
“Be glad you didn’t. It didn’t really help.” He handed her a bunch of stems and watched as she incorporated them into her larger bundle. “It changed my life. Not just because Mom was gone. Garner got off light because of what I did. He was sentenced to seven years for vehicular manslaughter. Got out in five. He’s now working as a mechanic at a garage in New Hope.”
“Seven years.” Della sat back on her heels, balancing the bundle of stems on her lap. “That’s it? Seven years?”
“His lawyer spun some bullshit about how it was all just an accident, and that he was the real victim because I pounded on him for, and I quote, no good reason.” It felt like he was chipping each word off a block of stone. “It wasn’t just an accident. I saw him push up next to her and jerk the wheel. Saw him run right into her. But I was just a teenager, and I was the one who beat the son of a bitch to within an inch of his life, so they didn’t take my word for it. Instead, they charged me with assault and attempted murder. Could have gone to prison myself, but the judge saw what was what and offered me a shot at wiping my slate if I joined the military. I picked the Marines.”
“Now you protect people like me,” Della added so softly he almost missed it. “Even when you hate them.”
“I don’t hate you.”
“You don’t?”
The insecurity in her voice echoed in her eyes. It tugged at his heart to think the woman who commanded millions of fans wanted his approval. “I never hated you.”
“Really? Because it sure seemed like you did.”
“I didn’t.” He stood abruptly and put out a hand to help her up. “We should go.”
“Oh.” She juggled the long flower stalks until they were neatly tucked into the crook of one arm, then accepted his hand.
It felt like coming home. Warm, comfortable, and familiar.
She must have felt it too because her expression shifted into an unspoken invitation and she leaned toward him in clear invitation.
His entire body wanted to say yes.
He wanted to know what her lips tasted like. He wanted her legs wrapped around him right here in this field, ethics and professionalism be damned.
The world around them faded into the background. His grip tightened on hers as he tilted his head down for a kiss.
Logic and reason pounded at his brain to stop. There was bending rules, and then there was breaking them.
He couldn’t do this. He should not be doing this.
She was his client.
His protectee.
And the mission wasn’t over.
He let go of her hand.
Took a step back.
The space between them filled with regret.
“You might not hate me, but you don’t like me.” Her voice cracked a little. “You still see me as the pop princess.”
“It doesn’t matter how I see you, Lucy.” He picked up the flowers she’d missed and handed them to her. “I have a job to do.”
Della searched his face. “That’s all I am? Just a job?”
He kept his gaze steady on hers. “That’s it.”
She pressed her lips together, then looked down at the flowers in her arms. “Well, it’s not my job, so I can say this. I didn’t like you when we met either. I thought you were a robot masquerading as a human. You were a jerk who thought I was a selfish, self-centered party girl.”
A rueful smile played on her face. “It’s okay. You were right. But you constantly surprise me. You brought me home and introduced me to your family. You’ve made this entire thing a lot easier for me, even if it was because you had to, and even when I acted like a spoiled brat. I think this place is special, and I’ll always be grateful that I got the chance to know you. So thank you for telling me about your mother, and thank you for bringing me here.”
Della looked out over the fields of gold with the saddest, smallest smile he’d ever seen on her face. “I’m really happy I got to see this. For what it’s worth, I don’t hate you anymore. I like you. A lot.”
His mood lifted at the simple, straightforward declaration. Once again, he fought the urge to take her into his arms and make her forget every mean thing he’d ever said to her.
She glanced at him, then let her gaze drop to the ground somewhere in front of his feet. “Not that it matters.”
His heart twisted.
Hell.
It did matter. It mattered entirely too much.
And this was why he had rule one in the first damn place.
Remember the mission, and remember what happened last time you failed.