“How about we start with dinner and we can go from there? Least I can do.”
A scatter of butterflies lifted in my belly and frantically flapped their wings. Because I was attracted to this man in a way I’d never been with anyone before. Not even with Bates. Bates had been a slow love. The kind I’d grown into. The kind that was supposed to be permanent.
That right there was reason enough for me to step away.
“That’s a bad idea.”
“Bad idea, huh?”
I nodded.
Yep. Terrible, horrible, bad idea.
Because I didn’t have any place left inside myself to get ripped up and torn to pieces.
And somehow I knew this man would tear me to shreds.
His eyes narrowed before he turned away. He began meandering through my store as if he were just another customer browsing the selection, his presence bold as his big hands reached out, fingertips running the wood and fluttering over the designs of the reclaimed antiques that hung from the walls.
Contemporary Comfort had been my mother’s dream. She’d always wanted a tiny antique store tucked deep in the heart of the Historic District of Savannah, and had opened it on her forty-sixth birthday. I’d been four. My sister and I had basically grown up surrounded by sanders and paint strippers in the back room that acted as wood shop and storage.
This place had always been my comfort and my play before it’d become my everything.
It was the last thing I had left.
Anger vibrated in my spirit.
And now Bates would be responsible for taking it away, too.
He tugged at an old fashioned price tag tied to a rocking chair with a piece of thin twine. I’d painted it a country red then sanded it down until dappled spots of smooth white wood peeked through.
A frown pulled at his brow, and he continued on, doing the same, piece after piece. For whatever reason, I felt uneasy watching him browse. It felt as if by digging through my art, he were sifting through my mind.
I had this pain in my gut, an intuition that urged me to beg him to stop, but I found I was unable to form the words.
Ever so slowly, he turned and stared back at me. His question sounded like an accusation. “Why’s everything half off?”
“Because I’m trying to weed out some things.”
Lie. Lie. Lie.
I was sure it was obvious, too. I’d never been any good at hiding things. I wore my emotions on my sleeve for everyone to see. It was why I’d pretty much hidden out here where it was safe for the last two years.
His forehead twisted. “Where does this stuff come from?”
I attempted to clear the rawness from my throat. “I find it and then resell it.”
He stared in my direction, those blue eyes ablaze as they narrowed to slits. Heavy boots echoed on the hardwood floors. My pulse lit up in a steady bang, bang, bang the closer he came.
“Then why does everything…look the same? And I don’t mean the same. Looks like it all came from the same place. The same hand.”
Shock stilled me. I was completely surprised this man who seemed larger than life would take the time to actually notice something like that.
I hesitated, before the admission scraped free. “Because I find what’s broken and put it back together.”
Awareness hung between us, before something significant tilted his head to the side. “Huh. Finding the broken and putting it back together seems to be your specialty, now doesn’t it?” he said, voice dropping with the implication.
The man inched closer.
Shivers rolled.
God, I needed to get him out of here. Because he was clouding my senses. Distorting my judgment. Making me entertain thoughts I had no business entertaining.
Whoever this man was, he lived a million miles from my world, and I clearly had no place being a part of his.
Besides, I recognized his type. And his type definitely didn’t want what I had to give.
Trouble was written all over him in broad streaks and bright lights.
His lips pressed together in contemplation as he approached.
I blinked toward the ground, wanting to run and hide, yet my feet were pinned to the floor.
“Tell me why you’re sellin’ out.”
“She’s selling out because she’s going under.”
We both jerked our attention to the intruding voice. Emily stood in the doorway to the back, tossing out my business as if it was hers to give.
My mouth dropped open. “Emily,” I reprimanded, hard and fast.
“What?” she said, shaking her head as if she were disappointed in me. Her blonde ponytail swished behind her as she stepped out behind the counter. “It’s nothin’ but the truth, Willow. Maybe if you stop lying to everyone around you, you might stop lyin’ to yourself.”
I loved her.
I did.
But right then, I wanted to throttle her for embarrassing me this way—right in front of this man who was already ruining something inside me.
Ash looked back at me before turning away again, eyes skating the store. “Yeah?” he uttered like an inciting question. “How much?”
His attention turned back to the woman who was supposed to be my best friend. The one who’d been there for me through thick and thin. And here she was, ratting me out. “Fifty thousand.”
“Done,” he said as if it didn’t cost him a lick.
Anger spiraled through my body, and my hands clenched into fists at my sides. Who I was angriest with, I wasn’t sure. “Oh no…there’s no chance on God’s green earth you’re giving me a dime. I’m no beggar, Mr. Evans.”
“Owe you,” he returned, blue eyes flashing white fire.
“No way. My mama taught me to work hard for what I have.” There was a chance I stomped my foot like a petulant child. “And I promise you, that isn’t about to change now. Any trouble I’ve gotten myself into, I brought on myself, and I’ll be the one working myself out of it.”
It was out before I could stop it.
“So, you’re telling me you need to work it off?” That flirty tease was back in full force, and damn it, my heart did that crazy thing, that battering bang, bang, bang.
My own eyes narrowed. “I’m no one’s whore.”
He laughed. Laughed so hard he howled. “Oh, darlin’, make no mistake, taking you to my bed sounds about like the best idea you’ve ever had. Looks to me like you might need it, too, and I promise, I don’t disappoint. But I had something else in mind.”
Dumbfounded, I just stared, waiting for him to explain.
“You see, I have this big old rambling house that just might fit your flare. Most of it has already been renovated. All except for my bedroom that’s been waiting on something extra special to come along. Think I might have found it.”
My head shook. “I don’t—”
“What do you say you come to my place and pour all the love you obviously pour into this place into that room? Decorate it. Paint it. Fill it with the furniture you’ve restored. Leave your touch all over it. My budget is big.”
The innuendo was blatant.
“And believe me, I’ll sleep better at night.”
I sucked in a breath.
“And you’ll pay her fifty thousand plus renovation costs?” This from my best friend who seemed to have no issue throwing me under the bus. But I knew her intentions. They were good and she was only trying to help out. But I got the feeling she was only making matters worse.
“Gladly,” he said. “Upfront and in full.”
“This is a bad idea,” I whispered again, but this boy just took one step closer. He was so close that I was breathing his air, all man and sex and danger.
He wound a single lock of my hair through his fingers and lifted it to his nose. He inhaled deeply then exhaled the words as a whisper against my cheek. “Peaches…just what I thought.”
He stepped away, grabbed a pen from the counter, and scribbled his address on a scrap of paper.
&n
bsp; Then he strode out the door, tossing out a casual, “I’ll see you Monday, darlin’,” as he went.
He left me a gaping, confounded mess in the middle of my store.
five
Ash
I sat staring up at the wooden sign hanging out beside her door. It gently swung on the metal hinges.
The wood was carved with the store’s name.
Contemporary Comfort.
Chiseled next to the words was the store’s logo. A dandelion that had gone to seed. The stem was curved and a portion of the little white tufts swirled up from the floret like they’d been lifted by the wind. They danced across the top of the carving, getting smaller and smaller before they disappeared.
A frown pulled between my eyes, and I squeezed the steering wheel.
Couldn't help but feel shaken.
Staggered.
Like I owed this girl more than I could ever give.
It didn’t help that just looking at her knocked the breath from my lungs.
Fuck.
She was gorgeous.
Big chocolate eyes.
Face like one of those classic heirlooms displayed in the cases on her counter.
Body a temple of seduction that had me shakin’ at the knees.
Not to mention the hint of a honeyed drawl. Every word that dropped from those full, red lips shot straight to my dick.
All of it was wrapped in this mind-blowing talent I’d recognized the second I’d stepped through her door.
The sum of it amounted to this fascinating girl who was shy and sweet and fierce.
It took about all I had not to bury my face in those mahogany locks and get a real good whiff of peaches. That scent had been haunting my mind since I’d woken up in that hospital bed. It'd required all my restraint not to let my nose go trailing across the expanse of creamy skin I was betting would be sweeter than sugar.
I was well-accustomed to reaching out and just taking the things I wanted. Used to having them laid at my feet like an offering.
I both loved it and hated it that her first reaction was to shoot me down. Thing was, I usually liked easy and, in my world, there was plenty of easy to go around.
Not this girl.
What got me most was this familiarity that wouldn’t let go. It was a sense of being tied to her in some fundamental way.
Knew it was the fact she’d saved me.
She’d bound herself to me in a way I was sure neither of us could quite understand.
They said traumas did that to people. Tangled their souls together, and I couldn’t stop feeling like mine was tangled with hers.
More than that? I’d seen it—blazing hot in those molten eyes. That same unsettled intrigue she was feeling for me. That pull that had ricocheted between us.
Combustible.
Mix the two together, and I was sure we’d be a flash fire.
It’d be really stupid for me to even consider going there. I got the feelin’ I wasn't the only one who couldn’t afford it. My boundaries hadn’t been set in stone for nothing.
I cast one last glance at the big windows, which glittered and gleamed with the reflection of the sun. Somehow I knew she was still standing there, staring out.
Resolution took hold of my spirit.
At least saving this place was one thing I could afford.
six
Willow
The expensive dark gray SUV pulling away from the curb seemed to snap me back into reality. A rush of disordered anger came sliding back.
I turned all my attention on Emily, who was reorganizing some trinkets behind the counter as if she didn’t have a care in the world.
“What were you thinking?” I demanded, taking a step her direction.
She looked up, blinked back at me with feigned innocence in her light blue eyes. “What do you mean?”
“You know exactly what I mean. How could you have told a complete stranger that? You made me look desperate and pathetic.”
A scoff climbed from the back of her throat. “In case you hadn’t noticed, Will, you are desperate. I’ve gone over the books a hundred times. Looking for something…anything that would help you. And come next month, you aren’t gonna have the money for your mama, the house, and the store. The foreclosure will kick in. There are no more extensions. You’ve taken the last of what they’re willing to give. And you know what they say, desperate times call for desperate measures, and that measure just walked out your door.”
Emily Matsy and I had been friends since second grade, and she had stepped in to help me when things had gone south.
Way, way south.
She was the only person left alive that I trusted. The fact she’d basically been working for me for free for the last two years to keep this place afloat promised me where her loyalties lay. I knew she was just looking out for me, trying to find a solution I’d begged her to find.
She shrugged as if that solution was plain as day. “You saved him, Will, and now he wants to save you. That right there is what they call fair. This isn’t you being needy or getting a handout. That boy walked in here wanting to repay you, and he couldn’t have found you at a better time.”
She tipped her head to the side, all coy and cute. “I’d go so far as to call it kismet.”
Kismet.
I suppressed bitter laughter.
Well, I’d already established a long time ago fate wasn’t my friend, so her argument wasn’t winning her any points.
Frustration tugged at my forehead. “That wasn’t your choice to make. I’m not even qualified to do a job like he’s asking me to do…let alone one he’s going to pay me fifty thousand dollars for.”
That in and of itself was insanity. Madness.
“What if I mess it up? Disappoint him? Besides that, I don’t even know him, and I’m supposed to show up at his house on Monday?”
Panic and intrigue and some of that attraction I didn’t want to feel took turns doing backflips through my belly. I blinked, almost begged the words. “God, Em, who has fifty thousand dollars just lying around? I mean, did you see him? He could be a drug dealer or a hit man or maybe one of those bikers…like…like in that show you forced me into watching?”
Yes. Yes. That had to be it. No man could be that recklessly gorgeous without having some dark skeletons lurking in his closet.
Her eyebrows disappeared behind her bangs, the words a disbelieving mutter all mixed up with an incredulous chuckle. “You really don’t get out much, do you, Will?”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
Laughing quietly, she shook her head. “You honestly don’t know who he is? All last week when you were completely distracted and on edge—and don’t pretend like you didn’t give me a reason to notice—you didn’t look him up?”
Nervously, I rubbed the pads of my fingertips against my thumb. “Of course not. That’s rude.”
Not that showing up at the hospital because I couldn’t stop thinking about him wasn’t.
Of course, I’d stayed in my car, unable to force myself to get out of it and just go inside. I had sat for almost twenty minutes, debating back and forth over my foolishness, but then he’d come striding out.
He’d robbed me of breath when he’d stood there, that hypnotizing gaze searching, as if he felt me.
Right then was when I knew I needed to stop entertaining dangerous thoughts about a clearly dangerous man.
And then he’d just turned around and come waltzing through my door.
On a sigh, Emily turned to the back counter, grabbed her iPad she’d left sitting there, and tapped something into it. She slid it across the counter in my direction.
“What is this?”
“See for yourself.”
Tentatively, I took a step forward, then another, eyes peering down, wary to find the secrets revealed on the screen.
My stomach twisted and that fearful allure flamed.
Sunder.
The man who’d been haunting my days and stalking m
y nights stood in a group of men on a stage. Each of them gorgeous. Brilliant and intimidating. Bad and bold and confident.
But the only one I could see was the man who stood to the right with a bass guitar strapped around his big body, power in his stance and an arrogant smirk riding his too-attractive face.
Ash Evans.
I was such an idiot. I should have seen it from a mile away.
The entirety of Savannah had been abuzz over its new larger than life residents that had taken the city by storm three years ago. The band from LA had rolled into town and ignited an uproar of gossip and speculation.
Paparazzi had descended, and all of a sudden, things around here had become far more interesting.
These boys had been both a blemish and a gain.
But never in a million years would I have imagined I’d cross paths with one of them because I wasn’t exactly the type who stepped out and into the places these types of boys frequented.
And of course the one that stepped into my lane had to be the one who made me tremble and question and want.
A crash collision.
Beautiful chaos.
Ash Evans was famous for all the things I despised. That over-the-top, seedy rock star lifestyle. Easy sex and squandered days.
I wasn’t sure rock star was any safer than any of the other options I’d tossed out.
“I don’t know if I can do this.” It was a whisper.
Emily slammed the old-timey register shut. “No, Will? You really think you can’t? You want to let your mama’s dream go? That dream she instilled in you? Give up and give in when you have a solution staring right back at you? Fine. Go ahead. But I promise you, you’re gonna regret it for the rest of your life. You’re the one who told me you’d be willing to do just about anything to save this store. It meant that much to you.”
She was right. But this felt…different. Terrifying and exhilarating. That seemed a hazardous combination.
Blue eyes narrowed as they stared me down. “But before you decide to throw it all away, I think you’d better answer yourself a couple questions…like why it is you’re actually sayin’ no.”
On the other side of the counter, she took a step my way, her tone pointed and severe. “Because yes, I saw him. And yes, I saw the way he was looking at you, too, and I sure didn’t miss the way you were looking at him.”
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