Chapter Eleven #2
“My aunt and uncle didn’t like me. I think every year I didn’t turn into the perfect obedient robot, they hated me a little more.
I don’t know that if I’d been their biological daughter they would have felt that way, but I was tainted.
I was a burden, and they were the type of people who thought burdens should pay the person who shouldered them back.
I did not subscribe to that belief. Defiantly. ”
“Good,” he said emphatically, reaching across the table and putting his big hand over hers. He had a scar across two knuckles. There was something about that scar, his story, hers, this moment that seemed to work together to offer her a few realizations.
One, her first and immediate dislike of him had been born out of this feeling right here. A warm, excited unfurling. Like she’d seen him and recognized something in him would…be a threat to the very careful, distant life she’d built in Hope Town.
The second realization was that she’d been distant not because of her secrets so much as because…
She really didn’t think anyone would ever be able to see beyond who she’d been or what she’d done.
But if anything, Gard’s story about how he’d come to open his eyes to his family was such a clear indicator that he’d… give her a lot of grace.
Which of course, made her even guiltier that she couldn’t share it.
“You don’t have to finish the story, Lia.” He squeezed her hand. His smile was kind.
She hated it.
“No, it’s okay.” She would tell him what she could. She made a promise to herself to always tell him what she could.
The waitress came by with the dessert they’d ordered, and one more glass of wine, and Lia steeled herself to tell a portion of the story. A portion that hopefully was enough for Gard to feel like she wasn’t…holding back.
“I’m not sure I would have run away all on my own.
I had this friend. I was a freshman. She was a senior.
I look back and realize she…probably had worse problems at home than I did, but we commiserated about that.
She was planning to run away after graduation.
She’d met some guy who claimed he could give her a great job in California and I just…
begged her to let me come with her. So I did. And I never looked back.”
And that was about all she could tell him. Even though she could read the questions in his blue eyes. Even though she thought maybe he’d…actually understand.
“So even now, you’ve never contacted your aunt and uncle? You just…stayed away forever?”
“For all they know, I’m dead,” Lia said, knowing she sounded flat and perhaps a little bitter. “I assume they hope I am. I hated them, so I didn’t care what they thought.”
“Past tense?”
Lia really sat with that question for a moment, sipped her wine.
“No, I still hate them. I’m just not sure it’s the healthiest feeling so I try not to.
In their warped way, they tried. They never treated me like theirs, but I still went to the private school their kids went to, and those damn etiquette classes. ”
“Private school and etiquette classes,” Gard echoed. “You’ve been holding out on me.” He pointed a fork in her direction. “Lia Blair was raised with money.”
He was lightening the moment, and it made her smile in spite of herself.
“Charity money, it was made very clear. Although if I had been a fine, upstanding ward they might have happily used me to marry someone who could give them better social standing or whatever the hell it was they wanted. But I just…couldn’t be that.
I wouldn’t even answer to my full name they insisted on using. ”
Which was the wrong thing to say. A slipup of…too much real.
“And what is your full name?” he demanded. “Please tell me it’s as stuffy as Gardner Elliot Fairhurst the Fourth.”
She didn’t have a clue as to how he made her want to smile in this awful moment where she’d have to lie to him. She could hardly give her real, full name to a cop. No matter how hard she was falling for said cop.
Some of his amusement in his expression turned to concern when she didn’t answer. “Did I strike a nerve?”
“No.” Not the way he meant. She couldn’t give him the real real name, but couldn’t she at least…give him a little? Lia was the only part of her Hope Town name that was real-ish. So the full name of that couldn’t be a mistake. “Cornelia.”
He made a noise, kind of like a snort, but he tried to cover it with a cough.
“Are you laughing at my name?” she said, shocked at how bad he was hiding it.
“No! No, of course not. Cornelia is…” He covered his mouth, made another coughing sound—clearly meant to cover up a laugh. “It’s a name.”
He didn’t even have a clue. Her real name was even more ridiculous. And for some insane reason, she wanted to tell him. She wanted to see him try to hide laughing at that.
What’s the harm? He wouldn’t know your real last name.
He cleared his throat, even with amusement dancing in his eyes, his expression was serious. “Okay, what’s the middle name then?”
“Oh, no. I don’t think so, Mr. Laughy.”
“Come on. Cough it up. It can’t be that bad.”
She raised an eyebrow at him. It was a dare, and she couldn’t resist a dare. “Edwina.”
He just stared at her. “You’re messing with me.”
“I am not.”
“Your name is Cornelia Edwina Blair?”
No, her name was Edwina Cornelia Pitt, but that was a hell of a lot closer than she had a right to be telling anyone. But Gard was grinning, and she just couldn’t hold on to all the shoulds. “That’s not nearly as stuffy as being a fourth.”
“I beg to differ.”
“That’s only because you’re a fourth,” she replied, grinning at him. The waitress came by with the bill and Gard paid and they got up to leave.
They walked out, and Gard took her hand in his, entwining their fingers.
It just felt normal. Better than normal actually, because her life could be lonely, just as Sammy had once accused her of. It was a lonely of her own making, which meant sometimes it wasn’t so bad, but Gard made it feel…
Well, like she wasn’t all that interested in being alone.
They got in his truck, and he took her hand again, holding it the whole drive back to her house.
They talked about the restaurant, their mutual fear of Sarabeth, and Gard told her about how he was thinking about getting Sammy a dog for her birthday in the spring but was worried neither of them really had the time for it.
When he pulled into her driveway, he let her hand go and pushed the truck into Park. But he didn’t turn off the ignition. He just turned toward her.
“Well, I didn’t track Sammy’s phone for hours, and I have you to thank.”
She chuckled at that. “Any chance that lasts through the night?”
“Not a one. The second you’re inside, I’m making sure she’s where she’s supposed to be.”
Maybe she shouldn’t laugh at that, but he just…cared so much. She wondered how her teenage years might have been different if anyone had cared about her even half as much.
She shook her head. No use going down that depressing road.
“I had a really nice time, Gard.”
“Me too.”
She hesitated for a second. She should get out of the truck, but wasn’t he going to kiss her good-night? And at least—
His mouth touched hers before she could finish the thought. She sighed into the kiss. It was an awkward angle, leaning over the center console, but his lips made her forget about that. His fingers brushed down her neck and she shivered in response.
When he pulled back, she blinked up at him. That moment held for a second or two, making her sluggish heart pound hard against her ribs. Because it was a serious look, a serious moment, a heavy, kind of scary thing fluttering there in her chest.
He smiled at her, but his jaw was tight. “Night, Lia.”
Kind of like a dismissal. Which was…a little weird, but maybe she was just misreading a sign or something.
“Night,” she offered, not sure why she felt…off-kilter all of a sudden. She slid out of the truck and into the cold night. She huddled into her jacket and felt oddly…emotional.
The date had been great. The kiss had been great. The moment after… Well, certainly he’d felt it too. So maybe it had put him off-kilter. Maybe he wasn’t looking for something that…deep.
Because he’d just said good-night. He hadn’t mentioned doing it again.
Oh God, had she made some kind of fool at herself, but she was so bad at this she didn’t even know it?
Halfway up her walk, she heard the engine cut out and the door slam shut. Then Gard’s voice saying her name.
She turned back to face him. He was moving toward her, something like…intent written across his features.
Her heart leapt, her stomach clenched. Uh oh.
She didn’t want to have to explain to him she wasn’t quite ready for that step, but she was very afraid her body wouldn’t let her explain it. Because when he got close, reached out, and pulled her to him, she just…let him.
He was so tall and broad, it was like being enveloped by a blanket straight out of the dryer. An immediate shock of heat against the cold night. Especially when his mouth dropped to hers—demanding and needy all at the same time.
She just…melted into it all. Forgetting everything else except the hard press of his body against hers. Her skin was vibrating again. Everything inside of her was vibrating.
He eased away, but his breath was as unsteady as hers. He looked at her like he was searching her face for something, but he didn’t know what. “What do you do when the bakery is closed on Monday?” he asked.
Which was a…really weird segue she didn’t fully understand, but she answered anyway. “If I have admin stuff I’m behind on, I do that. Or sometimes I just take the day off and relax.”
“I don’t work Mondays, and Sammy’s got school. Why don’t we go to lunch?”
“O-okay.”
“Pick you up at noon?”
She nodded.
He released her and cold air rushed in between them. A reminder she…she had a lot of work to do before whatever came after a kiss like that was going to be acceptable.
“Good night, Gard,” she said softly, stepping away from him.
“Night, Lia,” he replied. He also took a step back, then moved for his truck. He got in, but he didn’t drive away—and she knew he wouldn’t until she was safely inside.
Where he could be too, if you invited him.
She shook that thought away as she stepped inside, locked the door behind her.
She wasn’t quite ready for that step. Well, she was, but she needed to make a few choices about…honesty and what a future looked like when someone had secrets as big as hers.
But for the first time since she’d come to Hope Town all those years ago, young, traumatized, and scared… She really wanted to figure it out instead of hide from it.