“No: I mean why did you let everyone think it was me?”
“Yeah. Well, that’s a lot more complicated.” Carla paused. “I’m not proud of it,” she said quietly. “But the best I’ve got is that I really wanted to be brave and strong and independent—like you.”
“Me,” Aubrey repeated.
“Yes. I wanted to not care what people thought of me,” Carla said. “I wanted to be…” She smiled sadly. “Well, you, Aubrey. But I wasn’t. I wasn’t anything close to you. I could only wish I was.”
Aubrey stared at her. “Seriously?”
“Hand to heaven,” Carla said, and bit her lower lip. “I’m sorry. So sorry. I was rude when you tried to apologize to me, and that was guilt. You’re forgiven for that stupid internship thing; of course you’re forgiven.”
Aubrey felt a weight lift. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. And thanks for bringing me food and watching out for my plants. You went over and above, and I’m so grateful for you.” She drew in a deep breath. “And now…well, I’m sort of hoping you’d forgive me. For not owning up to my mistake and letting you take the fall.”
“It’s ancient history,” Aubrey said honestly. “And anyway, I did plenty of stuff in that library I shouldn’t have. Karma was bound to come around and bite me on the ass at some point.”
“You’re not mad?” Carla asked softly.
“Trust me. In the grand scheme of my life, that incident was nothing.”
“But you were grounded for three months,” Carla reminded her. “And Dad…well, he never let you forget it. You took it, though—you took everything he dished out to you, always.”
Aubrey shrugged. “I had Mom.”
Carla hesitated, and then nodded. “So we’re good?”
“We’re good,” Aubrey promised. And then the two of them shared what might have been their first genuine smile.
The next evening, right after the bookstore closed for the day, Ben went to work on paint touch-up. He’d spent the last few nights painting walls, and the place was looking brand new.
Aubrey came down the stairs from her loft. She was in her coat and boots, her purse over her arm, and he nearly opened his mouth to ask if she’d consider modeling just those boots again. Clearly the paint fumes had gone to his head. “Going out?” he asked.
She faltered briefly. “Yes.”
He took in how carefully made up she was, and his stomach clenched. “On a date?” Not that it mattered, he told himself. He hoped she was going out on a date, because then it would prove that they weren’t anything to each other.
Which is what he wanted.
Totally.
Completely.
Yep—that’s what he wanted, all right. To be free…so it made no sense at all that he held his breath for her answer.
“Not a date,” she said.
He didn’t want to think about the relief that hit him like a Mack truck.
She moved to the door and then hesitated, her hand on the handle, her back to him. “I don’t suppose you sabotaged my car again?”
“Nope,” he said. “If she doesn’t start, it’s because she’s a piece of shit.” He put down his paintbrush and made an executive decision. “How about a ride, Sunshine?”
She glanced back, and he was quite certain she didn’t realize that she looked hopeful. “You have more ass-kicking to do to Jack on your phone?” she asked.
“Always,” he said. “Give me a minute to wash up.”
“It’s okay,” she said, in motion again. “I’ve got this.”
He caught up with her. She’d been good with makeup, but he could see the faint smudges of exhaustion beneath her eyes. She hadn’t been sleeping. She was worried about something, probably whatever she was going to do tonight. “A minute,” he said again, and, to be sure she didn’t leave without him, dragged her with him to wash up.
The bathroom was tiny, but he nudged her into it and then crowded her up against the sink as he cleaned up.
“I could’ve waited out there,” she said, sounding a little breathless.
He reached around her for a towel, and she sucked in a breath and then licked her lips. Ben put a hand on either side of her hips and caged her in between his body and the counter.
“What’s with the he-man act?” she whispered, her gaze on his mouth.
He smiled. “You think I’m acting…he-man?”
“Yes. What I don’t know is why. You trying to impress me, Ben?”
“You’re already impressed.”
She let out a low, almost reluctant laugh. “You think so?”
“Uh-huh.” He leaned in so that they shared their next breath. Her eyes drifted closed, and her lips parted, waiting for a kiss.
But he didn’t kiss her.
Her eyes flew open, and he laughed softly.
“You’re such an ass,” she said with no heat. “And to think I almost admitted that I was going to sabotage my own car so you’d have to give me a ride.” When he laughed again, she gave him a push so she could get around him and out of the bathroom. He followed, grinning, enjoying the fact that he’d coaxed her out of her melancholy mood.
It’d started to rain as they dashed out to his truck, and he grabbed her hand to steady her. “Where to?” he asked when they were inside, shaking off the rain.
“Kingsbury.”
Kingsbury was a town about twenty miles northeast of Lucky Harbor. She gave him an address in an upscale neighborhood, where the houses were big and bigger and the yards were all cared for by hired hands. “Someone from your list?” he asked.
“There. Park there,” she said instead of answering, gesturing to a spot across the street and halfway down the block from the address she’d given him.
It was dusk. In Lucky Harbor, dusk lasted about two minutes, and in those two minutes between light and dark, everything turned a pale blue. When he’d been a kid, he’d always thought it was a magical time, when anything could happen. As an adult, he knew there was no magic.
Aubrey was studying the house intently, not giving much away. But he knew she knew the truth as well—that nothing happened unless you made it happen.
In fact, she was working on just that—working hard—and it touched him. Much more than it should have.
As dark settled around them, a car pulled into the driveway of the house. A man got out from behind the wheel and came around to the passenger side. He opened the door and assisted a woman as she got out of the car. For a moment, the man’s face and the woman’s face were highlighted by the porch lights.
Beside him, Aubrey gasped.
“What?” he asked.
She put a hand to her mouth and shook her head.
“It’s something,” he insisted.
The couple ducked through the rain together, laughing.
“Who are they?” Ben asked.
“Professor Stephen Bennett,” Aubrey said, her voice soft, almost as far away as she seemed from him right now. “He was my English professor.”
Ben got a very bad feeling in his gut. “And you came here to what—thank him for teaching you the classics?”
The couple had made it to the covered porch, where Professor Bennett pulled the woman in close to him and was kissing her with considerable heat.
“Time to go,” Aubrey said tightly.