Page 80 of Finding Forever

“I’m not very hungry.” His head still felt like it was being split apart and it was robbing him of his appetite.

Her eyes sharpened on his face and if he was the type to squirm, he would shift beneath that astute regard.

“Why are you doing that?” Her question baffled him and he watched her in confusion, remaining seated while she hovered not too far above him.

“What?”

“Your eyes are narrowed into slits,” she said. “At first, I thought you were doing your usual glarey, glowery thing. But this is different.”

“What glarey, glowery thing?” he repeated, mild outrage creeping into his voice at the lowering description.

She scrunched up her face and stared at him through narrowed eyes, with her lips pursed. She looked cute as hell but he wasn’t entirely sure why she was doing it until she spoke.

“You know? The terrifying way you glare at someone that makes them think they’ve done something wrong and they need to repent immediately or face the dire consequences of your wrath.”

“So, wait… that expression on your face is meant to be terrifying?”

“Isn’t it?” Her face fell.

“Not quite,” he fought to keep the wobble from his voice. This conversation had gone from exasperating to one of the most entertaining exchanges he’d had with anyone in years. “You look like you ate something mildly unpleasant. A lemon maybe.”

“I’ll have to work on that,” she murmured, her voice thoughtful as if she was speaking to herself. “Practice in the mirror maybe.”

“It’s not my intention to terrify you,” he said after a moment, while she continued to comically arrange her face into different grimaces. That cleared her expression up immediately.

“I didn’t think it was,” she said. “It’s your resting brood face.”

“You’ve said that before,” he recalled, fighting back a smile.

“But youdohave a killer glower. I’ve seen you use it on my stepsisters and Granger.”

“It must be wholly ineffective then, because I don’t recall any of them being particularly intimidated by me. Your ridiculous stepsisters were all over me like a syphilis rash.”

She made a delightful high-pitched squeaky sound and clapped her hand over her mouth to contain the burble of laughter that followed the initial startling noise.

Fern didn’t wantto laugh, damn him. Not after what she’d overheard him say, not after he’d pretty much laid waste to her tentatively hatched plan that they separate after he returned to London. A plan she intended to revisit very soon. She didn’t want to find him funny or charming or inadvertently sweet with his small considerations, like shifting the umbrella to protect her from the sun.

And yet, after his ridiculous responses to her spiraling worst case scenarios earlier and now this, shedidfind herself unwillingly charmed by his rough, endearing attempts to—she assumed—cheer her up.

“Are you going to tell me what’s wrong? Or are you going to keep deflecting?” she asked and she could tell that the directness of her question surprised him.

He stared at her for a long moment, his eyes still narrowed in a way that had nothing to do with his mood, and then his shoulders slumped and he admitted, voice weary, “I get headaches sometimes… I find it best to ignore them and just power through.”

She chewed on her lip as she processed that information and he watched her keenly as if assessing her minutest expression.

“You shouldn’t be sitting out here in the sun if you have a headache, it’ll only make it worse. Come on.” She held out her hand without thinking and then immediately felt self-conscious at the impulsive gesture when his probing gaze dropped to her hand. His expression went from searching to bemused, as if he wasn’t quite certain how to react.

Then he shocked her by actually enfolding his large, beautifully veined hand around hers and getting up.

Caught off guard, Fern froze for a moment, not sure what to do with that hand now that she had it, but one look into his pain glazed eyes, made the decision for her. She walked purposefully toward the door, gratified when he followed all docile like. The quintessential wolf in sheep’s clothing.

The refreshing cool air-conditioned interior of the living room presented a welcome escape from the oppressive heat of the day. Fern led Cade to the huge sectional couch that looked out at the panoramic view and urged him to sit.

Fortunately, he was dressed in a pair of blue board shorts and a crisp white T-shirt. His feet were bare. Her stomach did a lazy little swirl at the sight of his long bare feet, and she swallowed—the sound embarrassingly loud—before speaking.

“Don’t move.” Her voice was husky and she swallowed again, then cleared her throat, in an attempt to remove the breathless rasp. “I’ll be back in a second.”

She went to her room first to retrieve a couple of essential items, then to the kitchen before rejoining him. He hadn’t moved and she was rather gratified by that fact.

---