Page 39 of When You Are Mine

It wasn’t there.

She raised her head, staring at him. Tears wet his cheeks, too. She trailed her fingers down the carved planes of his face, tipping her head to the side with a watery smile.

“What did you do to me?”

This man had reset the broken bones in minutes, during one conversation in a dimly lit gazebo. He smiled, reaching behind her where he had laid the orchid, replacing it in her hair.

“Feel better?”

“You could say that.” An understatement.

She felt lighter, cleaner than she had since she was ten years old. While she had been nestled in the protective circle of his arms, the world had faded, a blurry reality they could hide from. Now the cooler air of the dying night raised goose flesh on her arms, and she remembered. Remembered Cam. Remembered Sofie. She needed to get away from Walsh, away from these moments that could so easily muddy the path she needed to take.

She stood, smoothing her wrinkled dress.

“We’d better get back in before Sofie sends out a search party.”

“Sofie?” Walsh lowered both brows, confusion crowding out the warm tenderness she had toasted in moments before. “Why would Sofie be looking for us? If anything, Cam’s the one looking.”

“You’re probably right about that.” She turned to leave the gazebo and this strange and wonderful interlude.

“Hey.” Walsh took her elbow gently, turning her back toward him. “Can I ask you something?”

She nodded without hesitation, sure that there could be no subject more awkward than the one they’d just discussed.

“Are you planning to marry Cam?”

Well…maybe there could beonetopic as awkward.

“Um, why do you ask? I know you’re his friend, but—”

“Don’t do it.” He squatted from his superior height until he could pierce her eyes with his. “He’s not right for you, and you’re not right for him. You’re not meant for each other.”

“Meant for each other? You mean like destiny? Fate? Soul mate kind of stuff?”

“You don’t believe in that?” He didn’t take his eyes off her face.

“No, I don’t.” She steeled herself against the sweetness left over from the moments they had shared. “I believe in making choices. Every time I’ve been left at the mercy of fate, or destiny, it’s ended badly for me. So excuse me if I decide to take one of the most important decisions of my life into my own hands. Not wait for ‘fate’ to deliver some nonexistent soul mate to me.”

“That’s mighty cynical of you.”

“Hearing my story, you don’t think I should be cynical?”

“Hearing your story and knowing you’renotcynical is what I love about you.” His voice was so soft and sure. “It took faith, belief, hope—something for you to press through what you experienced to be who you are.”

Kerris remembered hope. She’d hoped TJ would not come back to her room, that he would leave her alone, but he had come again and again and again, each time peeling away her illusions and pillaging her girlhood.

She tugged to free her arm, but Walsh didn’t let go.

“What do you feel when Cam kisses you?” Walsh backed up his demand with the heat of his eyes.

“That’s none of your bus—”

“What do youfeel?” He tightened his fingers around her elbow and held her hostage to his intensity.

“I won’t talk about this with you.”

“So you can be honest with me about the most traumatic thing that ever happened to you, but you can’t tell me how you feel when Cam kisses you?”

---