He smiled, secure in the knowledge that she was joking. “How many steps to the street?”
“I have no idea,” she whispered, giving him the same answer she gave him every day now. “All I need to know is if I jump the fence, you’ll come with me.”
“Damn right.” Connor leaned in to kiss her again. How could he help it?
After a slow-burning kiss, she pulled back. “I have to tell you something.”
She looked nervous, so he smoothed a thumb between her eyebrows. Didn’t she know by now there was nothing she could say that could hurt them? “What is it, sweetheart?”
“You asked me a while ago what I wanted to do with the money. Well, I decided.” She wet her lips. “I kept thinking about the schoolteacher…the one you told me about? The one who smiled every day and the children loved her?”
Connor nodded, unable to speak. What was she saying?
“I asked Polly to look into your military file. Find out the name of the village you were in when…the incident happened.” She seemed to be searching his eyes for a reaction, but he couldn’t give her one yet. He was too stunned. “It was easy from that point on since there’s only one school in the village. She…Ashira…still teaches at the school. I sent her half the money and the rest to the school.”
So many feelings were at war inside him, he didn’t know which to address first. Gratitude, awe, love for this amazing girl. There was another part of him that wished he’d done a better job convincing her to keep some of the money for herself. Convincing her she deserved it, that it might come tainted but if it was hers, it could never remain that way.
“I don’t know what she’ll do with it,” she continued. “Maybe she’ll give it to her husband. Maybe she’ll leave and find a better life. But if you saw the good in her, then I know it’s there.”
In the end, all he could do was grasp her face between his hands and attempt to fight the emotion clogging his throat. “Erin, I don’t know what to say.”
“You gave me a place to feel safe. You made me feel safe. I just wanted to pass that feeling on to someone else.” She turned her head and kissed his hand. The hands that were the first to touch her without pain. Thank God. “Connor, you freed me.”
The weight of his love for her closed in around him until all he could see was her, the center of his universe. His breath. His sustenance. “No, Erin.” He buried his face in her hair and inhaled. “We freed each other.”
Austin settled back against the brick wall with his newspaper, pretending to peruse the finance section. He’d gone with the reliable hipster businessman look today, one of his favorites because it only required thick black-rimmed glasses, a fake beard, and a unique suit. The suit in question was camel-colored, with an eagle embroidered on the breast pocket. He’d picked it up years ago at a thrift shop in London, knowing it would come in handy, but also because it appealed to his sense of humor. The mannerisms for this particular character were easy enough to carry out. Look bored, pretend you don’t notice everyone eyeballing your silly throwback attire, turn the newspaper page with efficiency. Try to impress on everyone passing by that you are interesting. You are special. But you don’t feel like talking.
He tilted his wrist and consulted his watch, once again casting a look across the street toward the dance studio. Five more minutes.
Really, he shouldn’t be here. He should have stayed at the damnable barbecue and listened to cops swap potato salad recipes. That’s where he should be, but instead he was here. Somewhere he’d promised himself he wouldn’t go. It only made matters worse each time. Then again, hadn’t his entire move to Chicago been about this place? This person? Oh, he’d told himself moving here had been about the job, but he didn’t care a whit for the job. Might have quit after the first day, if it weren’t for the girl. Polly. Keeper of secrets. Secrets he wanted to know, if only to figure out what was taking place behind her green eyes. Watchful eyes that saw right through him as if he were invisible.
Or so she tried to pretend.
He knew all about pretending, though, so he was supremely qualified to call bullshit.
She’d been the only one who didn’t laugh that afternoon at the barbecue when he’d proven himself a shitty babysitter. One single minute. He hadn’t been able to hold the captain’s baby a single minute while Ginger, his wife, refreshed her guests’ drinks. Not because he didn’t know how to hold a baby. But because it was too hard. It had conjured memories to the surface like a sorcerer and landed him here. Where he shouldn’t be.