Page 101 of Forbidden Harmony

She looked at the clock, trying to hide hersigh of impatience.

“My day was fine,” Preacher said.

“That’s good.” Maybe if she took off herbra and waved it at him, he’d get the hint.

“The new guy, Nix, seems to be working outokay. But he’s from New Cassel so we’ll see if he can stick it out. It can behard going from a city to a small town.”

“Do you ever wish you still lived there?” Despitehow much she just wanted to bang Preacher and forget about her pathetic life fora little while, her curiosity about Preacher’s life was kicking in. She knewnothing about him other than he was originally from New Cassel. She would bean idiot not to take advantage of his weirdly chatty mood.

“Nah. I like small town life. Once Gideonmoved back here, he encouraged me to move here too. I was trying to open a shopin New Cassel, but it” he paused for a beat, “wasn’t working out. Gideon convincedme to open a shop here instead.”

“It seems to have worked out well for you,”she said.

“I do okay.”

She laughed. “You do better than okay, andyou know it.”

He grinned at her. “Hell, yeah, I do.”

“How did you and Gideon meet?”

“He came into the shop I was working at andI did his tattoo.”

“So, just completely random,” she said.

He nodded and she smiled a little. “It’s weirdto me to think about meeting your best friend in some random kind of way. I’vebeen friends with Harper since we were kids.”

“You live your whole life in Harmony Falls?”Preacher ate the last bite of chili before setting the empty bowl on the coffeetable and picking up his glass of water.

“I have. Pretty boring, I know, but bothmy parents grew up in Harmony Falls and they never had any desire to leave. Theywanted Daniel and me to have the same childhood they had. And honestly, I haveno real urge to leave either. I love it here, always have. Harper has an adventurousspirit, but I’m a homebody. Plus, I’m pretty close to my mom and the thoughtof living more than half an hour from her makes me sad.”

“What about your old man? You like him?” Preachersaid.

“I do. He’s an engineer and the last tenyears or so he’s travelled a lot for work, but he’s a good dad and I love him.What about you? Are you close to your parents?”

“No.”

He didn’t say anything else and while shewasn’t that surprised, she wished he would give her a little something more.

As if he’d read her mind, he said, “My oldman was in and out of prison a lot when I was a kid and my mom was too busyshooting heroin to care much about what I was doing.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “That must have beenvery upsetting and difficult.”

He shrugged. “I had an aunt who looked outfor me.”

“Does she still live in New Cassel?”

“She died when I was seventeen,” he said. “Drunkdriver hit her car.”

A flicker of pain flashed in his eyes and withoutthinking about it, she scooted across the couch until she was pressed againsthim. She took his hand, squeezing it gently. “I’m so sorry.”

He studied their clasped hands. “It was along time ago.”

She didn’t reply and he rubbed his thumbabsently against the palm of her hand. “After my aunt died, my mom startedusing every day. My aunt used to keep her somewhat in line, but with her gone…my dad was doing a stint in prison and Mom was prostituting herself out to buydrugs. There was a line up of strange men in and out of our fucking apartmentevery goddamn night.”

She pressed even closer and rested her freehand on his arm, rubbing lightly as he continued to stare at their clasped hands.“She was using all the money she got to buy more drugs and eventually we were evictedfrom our apartment. She went to live with some guy she knew.”

“Where did you go?” she said.

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