You're Still the One by Janet Dailey, Elizabeth Bass, Cathy Lamb, Mary Carter Read Free Book Online Page B

gold eyes of yours, all that hair, your smile . . .”
    I fixed my gaze down the hill on my dad’s run-down home, sagging and sad in the distance. In contrast, Jace’s home was an architectural delight, modern but log cabin-y, too. That’s the only way I could describe it. The great room had high ceilings, the wooden rafters exposed. There were wood floors, a two-story rock fireplace, leather furniture, and windows that invited in the expansive view of mountains, hills, vineyards, orchards, and farmland from all corners of the home.
    His deck, where we sat, wrapped around most of the house. As he said, “I can see the sun come up and the sun go down. It’s like watching the world move.”
    When we arrived at Jace’s house, I actually took a shower. It was embarrassing to ask, but I had to. I was sure I smelled Spunky Joy on me, and both dogs, dear as they were. He had jokingly said in a singsong, “Sure. I’ll be in there in a minute, honey,” and I had said, “The door is locked; don’t you dare.”
    I drummed my fingers on the arm of my chair. “Don’t say that I’m more beautiful now, because I don’t want to hear it.”
    “Why?”
    I was trying real hard not to get sucked in by him and his engaging, masculine, he-man, most alluring personality. He was danger on wheels, and I knew it. “Because I’m not ready for it.”
    He nodded, and I knew he got it. “When will you be ready for it?”
    “I don’t know, Jace.” I rubbed a hand over my forehead. “I’m still the same head case you knew before, only older.”
    “You were never a head case, Allie.”
    “Yes, I was. I hid it. I pretended things were better than they were. I pretended I had confidence, that I knew what I was doing, but I didn’t.” Childhood scars have a way of wrapping around your whole soul. They weave in and out and grip you tight.
    “You were independent—still are, I can see that. You’re outrageously intelligent. And funny. Very funny. You kissed incredibly well, I remember that most of all. Hugged well, too, and—”
    “Stop that, too. No flirting.” I tried to smother a smile. It was hard.
    “Why?”
    “I appreciate the breakfast. I appreciate you sewing me up, bandaging me up, and taking out my splinters. I appreciate all of it, but we can’t . . . we can’t . . . see each other again.”
    Those dark eyes flashed and his face stilled. “Why not?”
    I ran my hands over my hair. I needed a haircut. I needed makeup. I needed a decent outfit on. “We were . . . in the past. And the past is over, and we’re over . . .” and I am so attracted to you still.
    “We did have a past. And now we have now.” His eyes sharpened up. He was a very bright, perceptive man.
    “What’s now , Jace? I’m not staying here. I’m moving. I have to get a job. I mentioned I’m unemployed? I don’t want to be in my dad’s house.”
    “I understand completely. What does that have to do with us not talking again?”
    “I don’t think we need to talk again, after today.” A shooting pain blasted through my heart.
    He leaned forward, broad shoulders and all. “I think we should.”
    And there it was. That tone, that intensity, that will.
    Jace could be seen as an easygoing man. Watching him in action at the hospital only reinforced what a talented doctor he was, with his calm and calming bedside manner. He cared about all his patients. But Jace was no pushover. He was strong willed, like me; independent because he’d had to be, like me; and he had a tough side, like me. He was a wall of steel, a man in the fullest sense of the word, one who did not back down, and anyone who overlooked that part of him was a fool.
    “No, Jace.” I studied the scenery and wrapped my arms around my body. My brain said no to him, but my body said, Heck yeah!
    “Allie, we were together a long time ago. We broke up under really sad circumstances, which I still don’t understand.”
    “And I don’t want to talk about those