LITMIR.BIZ

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but still…crying? That was really pitiful.

      “I’m sorry. I don’t normally burst into tears in front of strangers,” Victoria said as they walked back into the kitchen.

      “I understand,” Noah said, but Victoria suspected he was merely being polite. He had that look about him, with his sandy-brown hair and deep green eyes, that said he’d let you down easily and wouldn’t intentionally hurt your feelings. And yet, she saw something else, some other side of him that flickered briefly in those depths of green. Something that told her she could trust him.

      The compulsion to tell him, to talk to someone, to share with a human, instead of these empty, silent walls, propelled the words forward. “My dad,” she said, “used to lean against the half-wall like that whenever he talked on the phone. Uncle Joe called him every Saturday morning and the two of them would go on for hours, debating taxes, the governor’s choices, whether I-93 or 128 had more traffic.” She let out a little laugh, the memory still sharp with grief but also tinged with a slice of happiness. “He died six months ago and there are funny things that will hit me sometimes, just out of the blue. I’m sorry.”

      “It’s okay,” Noah said, taking her hand, making her feel for the first time in a long time that it was, indeed, all okay. His eyes weren’t filled with that awkwardness she’d seen so many times already, the kind where people felt compelled to say something, do something, if only to cover up their own discomfort about being so close to someone who had experienced a death. Instead Noah had reached out, his touch light yet sincere. “I’m sorry about your father.”

      The words were enough to send the tears rushing back to her eyes. She blinked them back. “Thank you.”

      “Hey, Charlie,” she said, changing the subject and bending down to the dog, whose pointy little ears perked up at the mention of his name, “you’re welcome to stay for dinner, too.”

      The dog wagged his skinny tail, then jumped up on her legs, miniature nails scraping lightly at her bare skin. She lowered herself to her knees, scratched him under his chin.

      “Watch him,” Noah said. “He’s…temperamental.”

      “Him? He’s a sweetie-pie.” As if living up to what she’d said, Charlie dropped to his back and offered up his belly for the personal treatment. His tail beat ferociously against the linoleum floor, keeping up a steady tempo of “you-like-me.”

      She let her fingers trail along his nape, then his ears, toying with the velvet tips. Charlie let out a groan and wriggled even closer.

      “Now you’ve gone and done it,” Noah said, laughing.

      She jerked up to look at him. “Done what?”

      “Spoiled him. Now he’s going to make me get out the silk bed again.”

      She arched a brow. “Silk bed?”

      “Charlie is the king of my mom’s castle. He has his every whim indulged, sleeps on better sheets than Elvis did and even has his own teddy bear. She’s only been gone twenty-four hours and already called me three times to make sure I’m treating him right.”

      “And are you?”

      “Well, I drew the line at the silk bed and the Burberry trench coat.”

      Victoria chuckled. “He’s a nice dog, though. I can see why she spoils him.”

      Noah wasn’t so bad himself. Though “nice” might not be the first word that Victoria would use when asked to describe him. Gorgeous, with a haunting quality that told her a lot of him was kept behind a locked door.

      Silence hummed between them and once again, Victoria wanted to kick herself. She was a complete and total social moron. She’d spent too much time here in this house, away from the real world. Away from other people.

      But that was going to change.

      She scrambled for something to say, something to fill the uncomfortable gap between them, to help her stop noticing the deep color of his eyes, the way one lock of dark hair stubbornly fell against his forehead. Strong, sexy and most of all, unaware of the effect he could have on a woman.

      Focus, she told herself. Focus.

      “I almost forgot about the mechanic. Larry is the guy we use. Used,” she corrected herself, since the car hadn’t needed service in a long time because she had yet to muster the courage to get behind the wheel again. She’d learned to drive years ago, but had never driven outside of Quincy. The thought of taking the car on the highway—or into the city—was way too much. “Anyway, his number is on the corkboard beside the phone.”

      “Thanks.” Noah crossed the kitchen, found the name Larry on the neat, alphabetized list of names and numbers and dialed. When the phone was answered on the other end, Noah explained he was looking for Larry and needed a tow as well as a few repairs. “That’ll do. Thanks,” he said finally, then hung up the phone.

      “Is Larry on his way?” Victoria asked, pretending she didn’t care, that the thought of company to help while away the long evening that stretched before her wasn’t as tempting as a bucket of chocolate.

      “Yep. Be here in half an hour.” As he said the words, his stomach rumbled. “Listen, if my being here is difficult for you, we can forget dinner. I’ll get out of your hair.” He looked down at the dog, who had taken a proprietary space between Victoria’s feet. “We’ll both get out of your hair soon as the tow truck arrives.”

      “You can’t leave,” she said, grinning. “Or I’ll end up eating leftover pot roast three times a day for a week.”

      “Pot roast? I haven’t had that in about a hundred years.”

      “Sorry it’s nothing more fancy. The roast happened to be what I had in the freezer. When I put it in the Crock-Pot, I knew I’d have way too many leftovers since it’s only me here, but—” She laughed. “Can you tell I haven’t had any company in a while? My mother used to say once my motor was running, there was no turning it off.”

      Noah laughed. “I have a brother like that. Talks a blue streak sometimes about absolutely nothing. He—”

      The words cut off as abruptly as they came. Victoria wanted to ask, to press him for more, but wouldn’t. She liked her privacy. She certainly couldn’t fault him for wanting the same.

      And yet, in his eyes, she saw defeat, weariness. The emotions were too powerful, too private, and her gaze went to the floor, as if studying the black-and-white squares would provide some answer from the cosmos. They didn’t. What did she expect from forty-year-old linoleum anyway? “So, how do you like your roast?”

      He grinned, clearly glad for the change of subject. “Done mooing.”

      She laughed. “Do you like your potatoes baked? Or cooked with the meat?”

      “Are you making gravy?”

      “Of course.” Charlie started running excited circles around them, as if he understood the conversation.

      “Then in with the meat.”

      “Biscuits?”

      “Homemade?” he asked, clearly teasing. Maybe even…flirting?

      “Is there any other kind?” she said, returning the smile, the vibrations in the air.

      “Not in my book.” His smile turned into a wide grin that seemed to take over his features and cast them in an entirely different light.

      A sexy light.

      The kind that lit a fire within Victoria’s belly that had never really been lit before. She swallowed, suddenly very glad she’d paid attention when her mother taught her to cook. “Carrots?” she said, the word a squeak.

      “The whole works,” Noah replied, his gaze on hers.

      The whole works. Well, heck, then she was going to bake a pie. Maybe even find that lone bottle

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