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Liam grinned. “I did, for a time. But my heart is here. My family, friends, memories, and now you’re here too. The best times of my life were all here. Most of them with you.” Sophie was staring at him as if lost in a dream. “What is it?”
“What?”
“You’re looking at me funny.”
“I’d forgotten how handsome you are. I always thought you had the most beautiful eyes. Fiercely intelligent. And your silver hair accentuates them.”
“I don’t have silver hair.”
“You do, but just a little. It’s very striking.”
“You don’t think it makes me look old?”
“Not at all.”
Liam studied her, his expression unreadable. “Do you regret it? Our time together?”
Sophie exhaled slowly. “Not for a second. I’m not even sure I regret all of our time apart.”
Liam arched a brow. “No?”
“If you hadn’t traveled and done everything you did, would you still be where you are today?” she asked, then she sighed.
“You mean to tell me you don’t regret marrying?” She didn’t answer quickly enough. His jaw tightened, but his voice remained even. “Do you?”
Sophie snapped out of a brief trance. Suddenly a whole flood of regrets had come rushing in to make themselves known. “Oh, I regret that, all right! Believe me!” Sophie let out a short, humorless laugh. “But I just wonder… if we had stayed together, would we have grown bored with each other?”
“Would I have wondered about all the ‘what ifs’ until they drove me mad?”
She nodded her head. “That young, hopeful spirit that whispers ‘what if’…”
“We both had to silence it, I suppose. And I have. I’ve experienced enough.”
“Me too.”
“Apparently not or have you forgotten that you’ve just moved across on ocean to open a pub with your brother? I’d call that an experience.”
“True. I guess I haven’t learned my lesson yet.”
And on that note…
“I don’t know about you but that cheese and fruit didn’t cut it. How about some spaghetti? I made sauce yesterday.”
A small moan escaped from her throat. “I love your homemade sauce. All right, I lied. I’m starving.” Keefe was right. Liam was her oldest friend and didn’t deserve to be lied to.
“That’s my Sophie.” Liam stood up straight and returned to the kitchen area talking over his shoulder. “I made it just in case a friend came around for dinner. It’s even better now than it was. I learned a few things while I was in Italy.” He got behind the counter and slipped an apron over his head. Sophie barked out a laugh when she read it: “All this and an artist too.”
His cheeks turned a little pink. He’d forgotten what the apron said. “A Christmas present from my mother.”
“I see! So, Italy? Is that where you’ve been hiding? I always watched for your name in the art magazines. I saw it a couple of times. I always wondered, how was Paris?” That’s where he’d gone after they broke up.
He crossed the kitchen floor to the refrigerator where he retrieved the large pot of sauce then placed it on the hob to heat. “Not bad. I learned a lot but the city… I could take it or leave it. The French countryside is nice though. There’s a place there that reminds me of—nothing, sorry.”
“What were you going to say?” Sophie asked.
“I was going to say there was one place I would go to all the time. I must have made hundreds of sketches but I could never quite get it right. I went there because something about it made me think of you. I couldn’t tell you why though.”
He poured her another brandy then held it up in his hand for her take from across the counter. When she took it from him, their fingers touched. For a long moment they both held the glass together. She looked into his eyes. The familiar, blue eyes of the boy she had loved so dearly, now a man, but the same eyes.
