Heroes Are My Weakness: A Novel

“Well . . . I was at the end of the hall, right by the turret door, and I felt this chill coming from the other side.” She’d always been a truthful person, and she couldn’t imagine how she’d gotten so comfortable with lying. “It was as though somebody had left a window open, except ten times colder.” She had no trouble manufacturing a slight shiver. “I don’t know how you can stand living in that place.”

He took out a carton with half a dozen eggs. “I guess some people are more comfortable with ghosts than others.”

She looked at him sharply, but he seemed more interested in inspecting the contents of the grocery bag than in being spooked. “Interesting that we like so many of the same brands,” he said.

He’d find out as soon as he talked to Jaycie, so she might as well tell him herself. “Somebody canceled my grocery order. I’ll replace everything when the ferry arrives next week.”

“This is my food?”

“Only a few things. A loan.” She began pulling out the groceries she’d stuffed in her backpack.

He grabbed the package closest to him. “You took my bacon?”

“You had two of them. You won’t miss one.”

“I can’t believe you took my bacon.”

“I’d liked to have taken your doughnuts or your frozen pizza, but I couldn’t. And do you know why? Because you didn’t order either one. What kind of man are you?”

“A man who likes real food.” He pushed her out of the way so he could see what her backpack held and picked up a small chunk of Parmesan—a piece she’d cut from the wedge he’d ordered. “Excellent.” He tossed it from one hand to the other, then set it on the counter and began opening her cupboards.

“Hey! What are you doing?”

He pulled out a saucepan. “I’m making my dinner. With my groceries. If you don’t piss me off, I might share with you. Or not.”

“No! Go home. The cottage is mine now, remember?”

“You’re right.” He began tossing the packages back in the plastic bag. “I’ll take these with me.”

Damn it. Along with coughing less, her appetite had begun to return, and she’d barely eaten all day. “Fine,” she said begrudgingly. “You cook. I’ll eat. Then you’re out of here.”

He was already rummaging through the bottom cupboard for another pot.

She put Leo away in the studio, then went to her bedroom. Theo didn’t like her—definitely didn’t want her around—so why was he doing this? She traded her boots for sock monkey slippers and straightened up the clothes she’d left lying on the bed. She didn’t want to be around a man she was more than a little afraid of. Even worse, a man some part of her still wanted to trust, despite all the evidence stacked against him. It was too much like being fifteen all over again.

The smell of sizzling bacon began to fill the air, along with the faintest scent of garlic. Her stomach growled. “Screw it.” She went back into the kitchen.

The delicious odors were coming from the iron skillet. Spaghetti boiled in the saucepan, and he was beating some of her precious eggs in a big yellow mixing bowl. Two wineglasses sat on the counter, along with a dusty bottle from the cupboard over the sink. “Where’s the corkscrew?” he said.

She drank good wine so seldom that she hadn’t thought about opening any of the bottles Mariah had stored. Now the lure was irresistible. She rummaged through the junk drawer and handed over the corkscrew. “What are you making?”

“One of my specialties.”

“Human liver with fava beans and a nice Chianti?”

He cocked an eyebrow at her. “You’re adorable.”

She wouldn’t let him dismiss her so easily. “You do remember I have a lot of reasons to expect the worst from you.”

He pulled out the wine cork with one efficient twist. “It was a long time ago, Annie. I told you. I was a screwed-up kid.”

“Take this in the spirit with which it’s intended . . . . You’re still screwed up.”

“You don’t know anything about who I am now.” He filled her glass with bloodred wine.

“You live in a haunted house. You terrify small children. You take your horse out in the middle of a blizzard. You—”

He set down the bottle a little too hard. “I lost my wife a year ago this month. What the hell do you expect? Party hats and noisemakers?”

She felt a stab of remorse. “I’m sorry about that.”

He shrugged off her sympathy. “And I’m not abusing Dancer. The wilder the weather is, the more he loves it.”

She thought of Theo standing bare-chested in the snow. “Just like you?”

“Yeah,” he said flatly. “Just like me.” He grabbed a cheese grater he’d found somewhere and the wedge of Parmesan, shutting her out.

She sipped her wine. It was a delicious cabernet, fruity and full-bodied. He clearly didn’t want to talk, which made her determined to force the issue. “Tell me about your new book.”

Seconds ticked by. “I don’t like to talk about a book while I’m writing it. It takes away the energy that belongs on the page.”

A challenge similar to the one that actors faced performing the same role night after night. She watched him grate the cheese into an oblong glass bowl. “A lot of people hated The Sanitarium.” Her comment was so rude she was almost ashamed.

He grabbed the boiling pot of spaghetti from the stove and dumped the contents into a colander in the sink. “Did you read it?”

“Didn’t get around to it.” It went against her nature to be so blunt, but she wanted him to know she wasn’t the same timid mouse she’d been at fifteen. “How did your wife die?”

He transferred the hot pasta to the mixing bowl and beaten eggs without losing a beat. “Despair. She killed herself.”

His words made her queasy. There was so much more she wanted to know. How did she do it? Did you see it coming? Were you the reason? That last question most of all. But she didn’t have the stomach to ask any of it.

He added the bacon and garlic to the pasta and tossed the mixture with a pair of forks. She grabbed some silverware and napkins and carried them to the table set in the living room bay window. After she’d fetched the wineglasses, she took her place. He emerged from the kitchen with their loaded plates and frowned at the garishly painted plaster mermaid chair. “Hard to believe your mother was an art expert.”

“It’s not any worse than a dozen other things in the cottage.” She inhaled the scents of garlic, bacon, and the roughly grated Parmesan on top. “This smells delicious.”

He put down her plate and sat across from her. “Spaghetti carbonara.”

Hunger must have fried her brain because she did the stupidest thing. She automatically lifted her glass. “To the chef.”

He locked eyes with her but didn’t lift his own glass. She quickly set hers down, but his gaze held, and she felt an odd prickling, as if something more than the draft coming through the bay window had stirred the air between them. It took her only a moment to figure out exactly what was happening.

Certain women were drawn to volatile men, sometimes out of neuroses, sometimes—if the woman was a romantic—out of the naive fantasy that her particular brand of femininity was powerful enough to tame one of these rogue males. In novels, the fantasy was irresistible. In real life, it was total bull. Of course she felt a sexual pull from all that dangerous masculinity. Her body had been through a lot lately, and this reawakening meant she was healing. On the flip side, her reaction was also a reminder that he still held a destructive fascination for her.

She concentrated on the food, twirling her fork in the pasta and pushing a messy bite into her mouth. It was the best thing she’d ever tasted. Rich and gooey, savory with garlic and smoky with bacon. Completely satisfying. “When did you learn to cook?”

“When I started writing. I discovered that cooking was a great way for me to untangle plot problems in my head.”

“Nothing quite as inspiring as a butcher knife, right?”

He raised his unscarred eyebrow at her.

She was starting to feel a little too snarky, so she relented. “This might be the best meal I’ve ever eaten.”

“Only compared with what you and Jaycie have been fixing.”

“There’s nothing wrong with our food.” She couldn’t muster up much conviction.

“Nothing much right with it, either. The best you can say is that it’s serviceable.”

“I’ll take serviceable. Serviceable’s good.” She chased a bacon morsel with her fork. “Why don’t you cook for yourself.”

“Too much trouble.”

Not an entirely satisfying answer, since he seemed to enjoy cooking, but she wasn’t going to show enough interest to inquire further.

He leaned back in his chair. Unlike her, he wasn’t wolfing down his meal but savoring it. “Why didn’t you order groceries for yourself?”

“I ordered,” she said around another mouthful. “Apparently someone left a message canceling it.”

He cradled his wineglass. “Here’s what I don’t get. You haven’t even been here a full two weeks. How have you managed to piss off somebody that fast?”

She’d give anything to know whether or not he was aware that she might have something valuable hidden here. “I have no idea,” she said, twisting a strand of pasta around her fork.

“There’s something you’re not telling me.”

She dabbed at her mouth. “There are a lot of things I’m not telling you.”

“You have a theory about this, don’t you?”

“Yes, but unfortunately, I can’t prove you’re the one behind the trouble.”

“Cut the bullshit,” he said harshly. “You know I didn’t trash this place. But I’m starting to believe you might have some idea who did.”

“None. Swear.” That part was true, at least.

“Then why did it happen? Despite the company you keep, you’re no dummy. I think you have your suspicions.”

“I might. And no, I’m not sharing.”

He regarded her with a shuttered expression that was impossible to read. “You really don’t trust me, do you?”

It was such a ludicrous question that she didn’t bother answering, although she couldn’t resist rolling her eyes. Which he didn’t find amusing.

“I can’t help if you won’t level with me,” he said in the voice of someone used to instant obedience.

No chance he’d get that from her. It would take more than fabulous food and great wine to wipe out her memory bank.

“Tell me what’s happening,” he went on. “Why is someone after you? What do they want?”

She placed her palm on her chest and drawled, “The key to my heart.”

A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Keep your secrets then. I don’t care.”

“No reason you should.”