Passion in Bloom (Hometown Heartstrings #2)

Chapter 10

Roarke

I only went to the bathroom to clean up and have a moment to recover from the rush of her going down to her knees and giving me head so spontaneously like that. She’d rocked me. She’d made me weak in my damn knees, trying to stand and not collapse from the rush of pleasure.

I set my hands on the edge of the vanity, sighing and thinking back to what she’d said.

It was a defense mechanism. I knew it had to be. Her quip about preoccupying herself by sucking me off.

No, she was not better off doing something so filthy and good like that instead of using her mouth to talk to me.

Sex, at the basis of it, was just sex. I knew it’d be good with her. Two people with the amount of raw, electric chemistry that we had couldn’t get together and not have mind-blowing sex.

But that in no way meant that I didn’t want to really have something solid with her. Something that was more than sex. A connection. A bond where I could know she trusted me to help her when she needed it but couldn’t ask for it. Where I would be able to let her realize she didn’t have to face David, or any other fears, alone.

I turned on the water to wash my hands, but the damn pipes squealed and whined like they had been.

“What the hell did you do, Todd?”

Ever since he’d tried to tackle the old problem of water issues to the cabins, I’d been dealing with issues like this. Low pressure. No water. And those awful, grinding sounds of something trying to open up and move in the pipes.

I gave up waiting for the water to heat up past the lukewarm it was. I rinsed with cold water and didn’t care.

Any second now, Heather could slip away. I bet she could be just as flighty as my niece was.

Sure enough, when I returned to the living room, I saw that I was alone.

“Dammit.” I sighed and let my shoulders drop.

So much for a chance to talk tonight.

The next morning, after a shitty night of sleep where I tossed and turned and wondered if Heather and I would ever figure out a way to be together, I got up madder than I had been when I went to bed.

I left later than usual, lucky to have a delayed start time at the ranch because of working ahead last week. On my way down the bumpy road, I caught sight of her walking out of her cabin.

Braking quickly, I stopped and got out of my truck to confront her.

Yes, she wanted her privacy. She demanded it. But hell, after what she did last night, she’d be giving me mixed signals if she got fussy about me stopping to talk to her now. I wasn’t some boy toy or thing to play with and cast aside as she pleased.

“What, Roarke?” she asked. “I need to get to work.”

“So do I.” I stood with my feet shoulder-width apart and crossed my arms, letting her see how I wasn’t going to budge. I didn’t miss how she scanned her surroundings, like she had to scope out the scene in case David was watching. He wasn’t. Or he wasn’t by way of driving here. Todd and I had set out cameras near the main turn to come back here, and no alerts had come to signify a car passing through.

“You ran again.”

She narrowed her eyes, propping one hand on her hip. “Excuse me?”

“You ran. Last night.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? Again ?”

“That’s what you did. What you do. You snuck away last night instead of—”

“Instead of what?” she snapped. “What did you expect me to do?”

Expect? Hell, I just wanted to talk. “I didn’t expect anything but to talk.”

“And I’ve told you that I don’t want to. That I’m not ready to.”

Before I could say anything else, she brushed past me and opened her car door. “Just go away, Roarke. I slept like crap. I’m tired. And I have to go to work. Not stand around and deal with whatever you want or think you need from me.”

All I wanted from her was...her.

It was a damning thought to be obsessed with at work. And it didn’t help when others wanted to discuss the arrival of this “stranger from Chicago” visiting in town.

When Eric approached, though, I knew he had the same thing on his mind. He’d been off sick for a few days, but it seemed he hadn’t lacked in hearing about David showing up.

“Todd mentioned you were there with her,” he said during a slow moment of work.

“I was. I was driving home and saw her on the front step facing him off.”

He looked pensive for a second. “Did she look...all right?”

“No. She looked scared. Panicky and terrified.”

He coughed into his hand. “That asshole.”

“Yeah, he was an asshole, insisting that Heather had to leave and go ‘home’ with him because he was her boyfriend.”

Eric grunted. “And that was that? He assumed he could tell her what to do?” He shook his head. “Heather’s always been independent. No one tells her what to do.”

While I was hungry for more information about her, I had already assumed that much about her. A person didn’t become that independent overnight. She had to have had a lifetime of practice to be that jaded and stubborn.

“He seemed to think he could boss her around, though?”

“He did,” I replied.

“So she was running from Chicago to leave him,” he deduced.

I had to agree with that. I’d connected those dots already. But after I accused Heather of running from me, last night, I hated that I could be putting myself in the same category as the arrogant man who’d tried to tell her where to go and what to do.

I wasn’t ordering her to tell me anything, but I was making sure that I was here to listen to her whenever she wanted to open up. I wasn’t demanding that she do anything, but I intended to have her understand that she could count on me.

I was here. I wanted to help. And it cut at my soul that she couldn’t deem me trustworthy after I’d freely shared with her, after I showed her patience, and after I let her touch me and do whatever she wanted.

It wasn’t often in the habit of making myself vulnerable for the hell of it. I’d been vulnerable and exposed enough after what Veronica did to me. The hellish experience of our divorce had left my flayed and raw, cut open with my heart bleeding.

To think that Heather could view me as someone similar to David...

No. She can’t think that.

She simply couldn’t.

“I’m glad you were there,” Eric said, setting his hand on my shoulder. “I appreciate your help in keeping her safe.”

Oh, boy. If only she heard you saying that .

What he said helped assuage my guilt and worries about overstepping though. I was right to stand up for her, no matter how conflicted she was about letting anyone into her life.

For the rest of the day, she remained on my mind. I replayed every word of what we said when we argued, and I revisited the memories of how good she’d made me feel. I wouldn’t ever forget the look of satisfaction on her face when she made me come. Even though I’d gotten off, she looked pleased and relaxed.

After work, when I saw her car parked at her cabin, I went home, curious if Navaeh was there. I was lucky that she hadn’t popped over when Heather had come over. But when I saw the signs of a window being forced open, I was too pissed to think straight. Because this window was higher up, I doubted she’d try to break in.

But she had. Only Navaeh could’ve been slim enough to slip through that narrow of an opening. I saw the evidence of the lock being pried. I found more evidence in half of my food gone from my fridge and cupboards. Of course, the root beer brand that she liked, that I always bought just for her, was gone. And worst, feeling like I was a detective following a Goldilocks, I saw evidence of her taking the cash I’d set aside in the bottom drawer of the nightstand I seldom used.

“Dammit!”

I wanted to punch the wall. To scream. To rage.

I tried. I tried to do right by her and offer her a place to sleep and food whenever she needed it. She was family, and that mattered to me. But I’d be damned if I gave her money again after stealing from me like this.

I’d had enough.

That cash was a safety net for me. I wouldn’t be destitute without it, but it was my hard-earned money. It was my attempt to rebuild all that I’d lost in my divorce with Veronica.

Gavin didn’t question me when I asked if he wanted to meet at the bar for a drink.

It seemed he was stressed out from his kids and a medical bill that popped up and caused an argument with Wendy.

“Women or money,” he said once I sat down next to him. “I swear, those are the two things that will always give me a headache.”

“You got that right.”

“What’s with you?” he asked. “You don’t make a habit of drinking on Mondays.”

“My niece,” I bit out, still so furious that she’d go so far to take what wasn’t hers.

“What’d she do now?”

“Broke in through a different window. Cleared out most of my groceries.”

He cringed. “And that shit isn’t cheap. Even for a bachelor like you. Everything’s fucking expensive now.”

“Then she stole some cash I had hiding.”

He shook his head. “What the fuck?”

“I don’t know what to do. I’m not going to enable her and just give her money. She’ll do fuck all with it. Dye her hair a hundred times and blow through it all. She’s got no drive to get a job. To finish her GED. To do fucking anything.”

I nodded my thanks to the bartender for sliding me my drink.

“But...” Gavin scratched his head. “What does she do? I mean, where does she go? Where’s she staying when she’s not stopping in with you?”

“I have no clue. I have no fucking clue and I’m sick and tired of women thinking they can manipulate me by holding back the truth.”

“Wo men ?” he asked.

I didn’t bother to drink my beer yet, nodding. “Yeah. Nevaeh. Heather.”

“I, uh, didn’t realize she was starting to matter that much to you.”

I frowned at him.

“As more than a neighbor and all.”

“She—”

I narrowed my eyes at a man behind him. Over his shoulder, I spotted none other than David Kenning. “Hold that thought,” I growled at him as I stood.

“Roarke? Hey, wait—” His stool scooted back as he rushed after me, the legs scraping on the floor.

I strode straight for the fucker who thought he could scare Heather.

“Oh. It’s you again,” he said, snarling as he eyed me. “The redneck who thinks he can tell my slutty girlfriend what to do—”

I grabbed the front of his shirt and lifted him off the stool he’d taken.

It was his bad luck that I was just spoiling for a fight now.

“I thought I told you to get the fuck out of here.”

He squirmed, trying to get me to release his shirt. “You get your hands off me now or—”

I tightened my fingers on the fabric, not letting him go. “You’re not welcome here, asshole. Go back to Chicago.”

“Like you’ll order me around.” He kicked out, barely hitting my shin. “You pathetic piece of shit—”

Quicker than I could give him credit for, he reared back his arm and punched me right in the side of my face.

That was all it took to make me snap.

My anger boiled over. My fury controlled me as I gritted my teeth and punched him right back, starting a brawl.

For her.