Hook, Line, and Sinker (Bellinger Sisters #2)

Fox zipped his attention back to the stove when Hannah faced the kitchen once again. “That smells amazing.” She stopped at the island behind him, and Fox could sense her working up to something. He should have known she couldn’t just pretend this afternoon didn’t happen. That wasn’t her style. “About what happened today . . .”

“Hannah.” He laughed, adding a forceful shake of pepper to the pot. “Nothing happened. It’s not worth talking about.”

“Okay.” Without turning around, he knew she was chewing on her lip, trying to talk herself into dropping the subject. He also knew she wouldn’t succeed. “I just wanted to say . . . I’m sorry. I should have stopped sooner. I—”

“No. I should have let you have your privacy.” He tried to clear the pinch in his throat. “I assumed you would want me there, and I shouldn’t have.”

“It wasn’t that I didn’t want you there, Fox.”

Christ. Now she was going to try to make him feel better over the rejection? He would rather turn the hot pot of soup upside down over his head than listen to her explain she was being true to her feelings for the director. “You know, it’s totally possible to just eat this soup and talk about something else. I promise your urge to hash out every detail of what happened will pass.”

“That’s called suppression. It’s very unhealthy.”

“We’ll survive just this once.”

She moseyed around the far side of the island, dragging her finger along the surface. Then she reversed her course, filling one cheek with air and letting it seep out.

Man, it was wild that he could be frustrated with her inability to drop a sensitive subject while being grateful for it at the same time. He’d never met anyone in his life that gave a shit as hard as Hannah. For other people. She thought that compassion made her a supporting actress instead of a leading one, and didn’t realize that her empathy, the fierce way she cared, made her something bigger. Hannah belonged in a category far more real than the credits of a movie. A category all her own.

And he wanted to give in to her. To rehash what happened in the bedroom earlier, his reaction to being made . . . useless. At least in that moment, he wanted to give in and let her sort through his shit, no matter how much this discussion scared him. Because every day that passed, she came a little closer to going back to LA, and Fox didn’t know when he’d have her near him again. Maybe never. Not in his apartment. Not alone. This opportunity would be gone soon.

He used a ladle to fill two bowls with the thick soup, added spoons and slid one across the counter to Hannah. “Can we just work up to it a little?” he said gruffly, unable to look at her right away.

When he did, she was nodding slowly. “Of course.” She visibly shook herself, picked up the spoon, and blew on a bite, inserting it between her lips in a way he couldn’t help but watch hungrily, his abdomen knitting together and flexing beneath the island. “Should I distract us by telling you I had a terrible day? Not because of”—she jerked her head in the direction of the guest room—“not just because of that.”

His vanity was in fucking shreds. “Okay. What else was terrible about it?”

“Well, we didn’t get the shot we needed, because Christian wouldn’t come out of his trailer after lunch. Might mean adding days to the schedule, if we’re not careful.” Fox shouldn’t have been surprised when his pulse jumped happily at the possibility of Hannah staying longer, but he was.

How intensely did he feel for this girl and in what way? Everything, every feeling or non-feeling, was usually wrapped up in sex for him. Only sex. Even if the director wasn’t in the picture, was he capable of going beyond that with Hannah?

“And I tried twice to approach Brinley, but she was pretty determined to blow me off. I’m not sure I’m going to get the experience I was hoping for and . . . don’t tell anyone this part.”

Fox raised an eyebrow. “Who am I going to tell?”

“Right.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I don’t love the direction she’s going with the score on this film.”

Containing his amusement was difficult. “Your shit-talking needs work.”

“I’m not talking shit. I just . . . Sergei shifted gears by changing the location to Westport, and I don’t think she shifted gears with him. There is grit in her choices. An LA club-scene vibe.” He kept his smile in place when she mentioned the other man, but it took an effort. “The songs don’t fit, but I can’t make suggestions without looking like a know-it-all.”

“What about talking to”—he tried to lick the acidic taste out of his mouth, gave up, took an extra-large bite of soup—“Sergei?”

“Go over her head?” Hannah drew an X onto the surface of her soup with the tip of her spoon. “No, I couldn’t do that.”

He scrutinized her for a second. “If you were in charge, what would you do differently?”

“That’s the other terrible part of my day. I don’t know. The songs aren’t coming to me like they usually would. I guess . . . something that captured the timeless spirit of this place. The layers and generations . . .” She trailed off, quietly repeating that last word. “Generations.”

When she didn’t elaborate, Fox realized he was holding his breath, waiting to see what she said next. “Generations . . . ?”

“Yeah.” She shook her head. “I was just remembering the sea shanties my grandmother gave me the other day. A whole folder of them she found. They were written by my father, apparently.”

“Wow.” He set down his spoon. Almost said, Why didn’t you tell me? But thought it would sound presumptuous. “That’s exciting, right?” He studied her features, noticing the tension around the corners of her mouth. “You’re feeling some kind of way about the whole thing, yeah?”

She made a wishy-washy sound. “It’s nothing.”

“Oh no. Nope.” He pushed his bowl aside, crossing his arms over his chest. “You want to bury my feet in cement and force me to talk about shit that makes me uncomfortable, Freckles, you’re going to do the same.”

“Uh, excuse me. Where do you get off being right?”

He cracked a smile, waved her on. “I’m waiting.”

Glumly, she shoveled a final bite of soup into her mouth and made a whole show of mimicking him, pushing her bowl aside and crossing her arms. “Look. This is me stalling.”

Why did he have to like her so fucking much, huh? “I can see that.”

“This isn’t going to distract me from the actual conversation we’re going to have,” she warned him.

His lips twitched. “Noted.”

“Well. Fine.” She dropped her hands and started to pace. “It’s just that . . . you know, Piper, she really connected to the soul of Henry Cross. When we were here last summer? And me . . . I was kind of pretending to.”

She stopped pacing to look at him, judging his expression, which he kept impassive. On the inside, he was curious as hell. “Okay. I get pretending.”

Hannah studied his face thoughtfully before continuing. “I was two years old when we left Westport. I don’t remember anything about Henry Cross or this place. No matter how much I dig, I can’t . . . I can’t feel anything for this . . . invisible past. Nothing but guilt, anyway.”

“Why are you under pressure to feel something?”

“I’m not under pressure, really. It’s just that I usually would. Feel something. I can watch a song play out in my head like a movie and bond with the words and sound, connect with something written about a situation I’m not even familiar with. I’m an emotional person, you know? But this . . . It’s like zip. Like I’ve got a mental block on anything related to my father.”

It was really bothering her. He could see that. And thus, it was bothering him. Not only that this lack of connection with Henry Cross was under her skin, but . . . what if he couldn’t find the right words to make it better? Comforting women wasn’t exactly his forte. “Do you want to forge some kind of bond with the past? With Henry?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why were you drawn back here?”