Page 92 of Rosabel and the Billionaire Beast

That wasn’t how things would work with Rosabel.

Wait, what was I even saying?Nothingwould work with Rosabel. I couldn’t even go there. Eudora might have a few screws loose, but she was spot on about one thing?—

I could never tell her how I felt about her.

Not her. Not anyone else.

“You okay?”

I blinked from my stupor and stared at the Civil War memorial of a soldier posing atop a pedestal of limestone bricks and gripping his stone musket with a somber expression. An amphitheater’s curved roof stood beyond a rock wall behind the soldier. And in front of the soldier was the circular green railing offering a view of the original spring for which the town was named.

We’d already made it to the Balm of Life memorial?

I cleared my throat. I vaguely remembered walking alongside Rosabel beneath the awnings of shops along the street, but I’d been so distracted, so trapped by my thoughts, I hadn’t realized how far we’d gotten.

“I’m fine,” I lied. I searched the area, desperately looking for a distraction. “See that hotel?”

I pointed past the kiosks being set up by vendors wanting to sell merchandise during Mustang Week, past the layered stones serving as retaining walls for the mountainside, to a large hotel reaching high above the trees.

“What about it?”

“Ripley’s Believe It or Notsaid it’s the only hotel in the world where all seven stories lead out onto a ground level. Because of the mountain it’s built into. We can go inside, if you want.”

She tucked her lips together. “Maybe. Right now, I’m curious about this. Balm of Life?” She gestured to the thick archway near the street bearing that title.

I was eager for the subject change—although the sight of this brought Eudora and her mysterious postcard to the GGs back to mind once more. What had really brought the old lady to Eureka Springs? To abandon her friends?

“This used to be a healing ground,” I said, explaining the history I’d heard many times over since my youth. “Many people believed the water here had curative powers.”

I wiggled my fingers for good measure.

“Civil War soldiers from both the Union and Confederate sides came here to be healed.”

I could use some of that water right about now. Maybe its curative powers could heal the scalpel-style worries slicing beneath my ribs.

I leaned against the green railing and peered down toward the sidewalk. A small trickle was visible through the grate blocking the well down there.

“And did the water work?” Rosabel asked.

“I think so. People think so, anyway.”

Our shoulders brushed. She leaned over the railing, too, peering down before standing upright. She brushed her dark hair away from her shoulders and tucked her lips between her teeth.

“Duncan,” she said. “I’m sorry your deal with that house didn’t work out.”

I lowered my head before turning toward the street and the shops there. I wasn’t sure why, but I didn’t want to talk about that anymore. Maybe it was because talking about my failure to get the house was too related to what I wanted with Rosabel. What I could never have with her.

“Want to grab something to eat?” I deflected. “I think the Mustang Rally will be starting soon. Maybe we can find a seat at a window and watch the cars drive through town.”

She set her jaw. “Fine. Then we can talk about how you’re going to reconnect with your grandma.”

“There is no other option. That house was my only shot.” And now, it was one I could never take.

Did Eudora really own that house now? If not, what had she been doing there?

Those were all questions Noah could help me answer once I heard back from him. For now, it was time we moved on. Saw the town. Got Rosabel back to the lake house before anything happened.

“I doubt that,” she said.

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