Page 8 of Over Verdant Irish Hills

“Sure, Donal and—”

“Donal is beside the point.” She was starting to see red. “You and I need to come to terms over this. I don’t want to lose you as a friend—”

“AndI’mtrying to preserve our friendship,” he interrupted while drumming his fingers on the table.

“By not speaking to me today?” she continued, feeling her face flush. “Look, I know things got weird at dinner last Saturday.”

“It’s forgotten,” he added too hastily. “Like that little squirt of an artist.”

Her heart swelled in her chest. Somehow he always knew what she was thinking. She’d called the artist a squirt in her mind but hadn’t said that out loud. “The arts center is important to both of us, and we need to work together. So I have a proposition for you.”

His brows slammed together. “I’m not sure I’m up for hearing it.”

“Too bad.” She took a deep breath as she watched his sky blue eyes shutter. “I think we should give this a go.”

“Give what a go?” he asked suspiciously.

“Us. For a month. If we run out of steam, we’ll set it behind us and go back to being friends. I happen to know I’m capable of that. Donal and I have had no trouble putting the past behind us.”

His mouth turned down into a prominent scowl. “Maybe I’m not the man Donal is. And how in the hell do you know we’ll run out of steam?”

He might as well have tossed her into that lobster pot because her entire system flooded with heat. “I don’t, but I want to find out. I think you do too.”

“There’s a million miles between wanting to and giving in to the urge.” He grabbed her water again and took another long drink, like the topic was heating up his system too. “We’re old enough to know better.”

She stood quickly, the hurt slamming into her throat. “I’m tired of being old enough to know better. I’ve fallen into the trap of thinking so before, and it didn’t give me anything but a whole lot of boring days and unfulfilled nights. We might not have kissed yet, but I happen to love you, dammit. And I miss you, you infuriating cowboy. If you honestly think you’re too old forthat, then I don’t want you.”

He snagged her hand before she could stalk off. “Now I’ve made you upset, and for that I’m sorry. Sit down, Bets. I seem to be mucking this up every which way to Sunday.”

Her heart was knocking in her chest, and a part of her wanted to run from the room and forget she’d ever brought it up. But then he ran a thumb over the back of her hand, his touch both tender and inflammatory. She sat down and got choked up when he didn’t release her. In fact, he inched his chair closer to hers and tipped her chin up with his free hand.

“This ain’t easy for me, but I’d rather cut off my own hand than hurt you, so here goes. The truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God. Bets, I fell for you the moment we met. Why do you think I whisked you off to Paris that first night?”

He’d shown up on her doorstep looking for his daughter, only to invite Bets out for dinner. Both of them had been feeling low, Bets because she’d fought with Donal and thought they might be over, and Linc because his dog had just died. She’d thought it a friendly invitation to dinner in a neighboring town; he’d been interested in more. Hence Paris.

Then she’d told him about Donal, and he’d passed the whole thing off as a dinner between friends.

“So you’re finally going to admit to me that you took me to Paris that night on a date?”

“You usually aren’t that slow,” he said in his deep, sexy voice. “In the candlelight of my favorite restaurant—one I’ve never taken anyone but Ellie to before now—there you were. A woman with fire. The heart of an adventurer. You loved to travel. You loved art. And you were so beautiful and funny, I felt even better than I did the day I made my first million. It crushed me when you told me you were with someone else.”

His mouth twisted in pain, and she laid her hand over the one he had on her arm. “I’m sorry.”

“My feelings. My problem. But I found a way to shove it into the proverbial Pandora’s box, and I’ve been fighting like hell to keep that sucker closed.”

Her throat tightened as his blue eyes warmed. “Maybe I don’t want you to keep it closed anymore. My feelings came into focus for me when we went to Provence to see Sophie. I realized why I always wanted to see you. Why I light up inside when we’re together. How you make me laugh. How we’ve always been able to talk about anything. How much we share when it comes to the arts center. But that’s not all. I want you too, Linc, so much I’m flushed with it.”

He blew out a heartfelt breath, as if his control was fraying. “And I want you. Badly. So much I have to keep my fists clenched from reaching for you.”

That made her insides tremble.

“But we both know I’m a horrible bet in the relationship department. That punk artist threw it in my face the other night, but he was right. Neither of us can discount the past. They say you’re supposed to learn from that sort of thing.”

“Maybe I suck too,” she shot back. “I want to get married again about as much as you do. Heck, we might be perfect for each other.”

“Sugar, you are like no other woman on this earth. Most of the women I’ve met can’t talk about marriage fast enough.”

“Not me,” she said. “And sure, we’ve both been in relationships that didn’t fulfill us, but I’ve never been with you, and you’ve never been with me. We don’t know how we’d be together.” She paused, studying him. “Do you think I like missing you? Wondering about you all the time?”

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