Heartstrings that long ago should have been snipped.
Richard took the Sharpie and shifted on his feet at the door.
Unsure. His gaze both ruthless and wary when it traveled my way.
“Come in, silly,” she told him, taking his hand with her uninjured one. She gave him a tug. “You got to come inside.”
My daddy shot him a death glare. Daggers and ice and the most dastardly of curses.
It was a wonder he didn’t drop dead right there.
I sighed. “Just…come in and sign the cast.”
Richard nodded, those eyes on me as he angled by my father.
Goodness. This was a straight-up disaster.
Daisy moved over to the antique table that sat under the window overlooking the porch. She climbed onto a chair and pointed at the one next to it. “There. You sit right there, Mr. Richard.”
She grinned with all her might, her black hair swishing around her cherub face, dimples denting in.
He pulled out the chair, shifted it around to face her, and eased down to sitting, gazing at her as he did. As if she were a strobe of light. A beacon in the middle of a raging storm.
Because that’s what this felt like.
A hurricane that gusted and blew.
Hitting us at gale force.
I suppressed a cry when he reached out and touched her chin, when he murmured the words, “Was worried about you. How are you feeling?”
“Not so bad that I can’t be in the weddin’. Let’s be clear about that.” She quirked a brow to let him know that was absolutely out of the question.
He chuckled a rough sound that reverberated through the space, though it was still filled with concern.
Chills lifted. The man touching me when he wasn’t even looking my way.
Why? Why? Why? Why did he have to affect me this way? Why did it have to hurt so bad?
“We wouldn’t dream of letting that happen now, would we?” he said, smiling soft and somehow sad. “My sister is going to need your help. Not a chance someone could do it better than you.”
“Yep. I’m gonna do the best job ever! She’ll want me to be in all her weddin’s.”
Through the emotion, I choked out an amused laugh. “I think Emily is hoping it’s her only wedding, sunshine.”
Yeah, I guessed I’d been hoping for that myself.
“Oh, right, yes,” she said, nodding her head. “Together forever,” she sang.
Richard suppressed one of those rough chuckles, his eyes cutting through the room to land on me.
Connection blinding.
I swallowed around the thickness, hardly able to stand under the force of it.
I had no idea how long we remained like that before Richard finally cleared his throat and turned back to look at Daisy. “Let me see that arm of yours.”
Climbing onto her knees, she angled his way and leaned her arm on the table. “There you go. Do you like pink?”
He bit down on that plush bottom lip like he was trying to keep something on lockdown. Like he was struggling. This undercurrent of rage and desperation that I didn’t understand mixed up with his care. “Do you?”
“Um, yes! I gotsta like pink. You know how many flowers are pink?” she said in her exuberant way.
Another grumbly laugh. “No. Do you?”
“Um…a gazillion million at least.”
“Well, if you like pink, how could I not, considerin’ how much I like you?”
I wanted to scream. Rip her away from him and keep her protected because I could feel the seams of our fabric getting snipped apart. The bindings that held me together getting clipped.
I couldn’t let him do this.
Weasel his way into our lives. I’d wanted him there once.
The only thing he’d done was trample all over me.
Worse was the way I had that flicker of a feeling.
The dire need to believe it might be true. That maybe there was a bit of the man I’d thought he’d been, after all.
He scrawled something on the cast, something I couldn’t make out from where I was standing. “There.”
She beamed one of those smiles that could bring an entire town to its knees.
“It’s pretty now.” She waved it around.
He smiled this afflicted smile that stabbed and slayed.
My stomach tipped and my heart did that unforgiveable thing. The thing that went haywire whenever I got into his space. That thing that made me vulnerable and weak.
“Daisy…what do you say for the shoes?” I reminded her.
She threw herself at him.
Okay, that was so not what I meant. A simple thank you would suffice.
He caught her. Awkwardly at first. Then he hugged her back about as hard as she was hugging him.
Those strong arms wrapped around that little girl like he didn’t want to let her go. His eyes closed and that spirit I’d always felt weeping something mad.
God. Was that all deceit, too? The way I’d felt like I’d known him to the very core? Tapped into his darkest, most private places?