Beneath the Patchwork Moon (Hope Springs, #2) by Alison Kent Read Free Book Online Page B

she gasped with it. His fingers stilled; his eyes opened. He kept his gaze cast down, and she heard an audible click as he ground his jaw.
    Stupid. She was so stupid. She should’ve left him alone. “Why didn’t I know that you played?”
    “There are a lot of things you don’t know about me,” he said, setting the guitar on end in the window seat. Then he looked up. “There are a lot of things I don’t want you to know. A lot you never will.”
    His words shouldn’t have hurt. Or at least they shouldn’t have caused more than a twinge of reaction. But to hear him put them out there with such bluntness was like being punched in the midsection by a fist.
    His striking out was driven by Sierra’s death and Luna’s survival and the ten-year anniversary reminding him of both. She knew that as sure as she was standing here near tears, aching from the inside out, hurt by his indifference when her feelings for him were… No. Her feelings for him were nothing. She had to believe that.
    He made it easy when he stood and turned to face the window, his hands shoved into his pockets, his shoulders slumped.
    He didn’t care about her memories, or what his family had meant to her—and not just Sierra, but his parents, hisyounger siblings. How much she’d loved them all. How much she’d loved him, past tense, because she’d known him only then. And this man was not that one. He was so different, angry and mean, and so much more, with the things hiding behind his eyes.
    She didn’t know what to say to him, if anything at all, because she didn’t know what he wanted, or needed, or what he was going through. What coming back here had done to him, was doing even now. And so she turned to go, helplessness like a scythe cutting her in half, one part unable to leave, one part unable to stay.
    As she reached the door, her footsteps slowed, then faltered, then stopped completely. She shook her head, closing her eyes and seeing again the picture of his silhouette framed against the bare window. He was alone, and lonely, bereft. How could she leave him? How could she continue to be so selfish, thinking of her loss, expecting him to think of hers, too, when his was so much greater?
    Knowing she could very well be making a huge mistake, she retraced her steps, continuing to where he stood, waiting long enough for him to know she was there, then placing her palm on his back. He didn’t flinch. In fact, a shudder ran through him, and he flexed as if doing so would keep her near.
    Except she didn’t know if it was her he wanted, or just… someone. She didn’t need to. All the things that had brought him here were things she was aware of, for the most part understood, in many cases shared. But touching him without his rejecting her, learning the man he was now, gave her such incredible pleasure that she pushed aside the issue of his wanting her there. It was where she wanted to be.
    She slipped both arms around him, laid her cheek against his back, and stacked her hands over his belly. His muscles there contracted as she did. He was warm and solid, and she loved the feel of him, and she didn’t want to let him go, and oh, how had she forgotten what he felt like? It had been so long, and she shouldn’t have missed this so much but she had, and she hated that she had. Hated, too, that she was giving too much meaning to the moment. He would shake off the melancholia soon enough, then shake her off for bearing witness to the weakness.
    But he surprised her, covering her hands with his instead, turning in her arms, breaking her hold. She looked up, and he looked down, and whatever he saw in her eyes decided him. So many emotions, like vapor trails, or wisps of smoke, manifested and then vanished, nothing clear or defined, even to her. She was wrapped up in the short years they’d had together, and a decade of deception, and Angel’s arms. Only the last remained as he lowered his head, and through his reluctance, his mouth found