It wasn’t like she hadn’t enjoyed it. She needed to look at it for what it was, and not what she wished it could be.
Searching for the slightest bit of dignity, she slipped back into her coat and boots.
As she opened the back door and prepared to leave, she heard him creep back into the room.
“Need a ride to your car?”
“No, it’s only a few feet past the edge of your driveway. But thanks.”
He slipped his hands into the front pockets of his jeans, his posture calmer than before—less rigid.
“Thanks for the cupcakes.”
“You don’t like sweets, remember?”
He shrugged.
“It was still nice of you.”
He sounded like he had to work hard to get the words around a cement block that had been shoved in his throat.
But at least he said them.
“Warming to me, huh?” She allowed the smile to reverberate through her words, trying hard to help him let his guard down.
Instead of relaxing, he visibly stiffened.
“Don’t flatter yourself. You’re a girl. I’m a guy. I don’t exactly have girls showing up at my door and throwing themselves at me. Don’t feel special.”
And then he turned away, leaving her pride to puddle on the floor along with the melted snow beneath her boots.
Chapter Three
Ethan stood in the shadows of his living room, hiding behind the curtain as he watched Simplicity stumble down the driveway. He had flipped the light on as a courtesy, but he didn’t feel like a gentleman.
The glow of the sparkling snow dimmed in comparison to Simplicity’s natural light.
His hands tightened into fists.
She deserved better than the treatment he had given her.
But he couldn’t let her get close.
In two short visits, she had already come closer to the buried humanity in him than anyone had in the years since he returned from captivity.
They had turned him into an animal, and he hadn’t been able to find himself again.
He shouldn’t have allowed his base instincts to drive this thing between him and Simplicity. He should have growled and sent her on her way.
Something he couldn’t explain made him want to open up to her. Made him want to soften. Made him want to tune in.
When he was touching her, he felt like he had been welcomed into the warmth of a heavenly society, where people didn’t hurt people and family didn’t betray.
She had cocooned him in the safety of her touch, and he had liked it.
He shuddered—he didn’t deserve that kind of comfort, and she didn’t deserve to get tangled in his poisonous web.
He couldn’t undo what they had done, but he could prevent her from ever wanting or hoping for a repeat performance.
When enough time had passed that she should have made it safely to her car, he slipped into his boots and trudged down the driveway to make sure she had driven away safely.
Fresh car tracks in the newly fallen snow indicated that she had made a three point turn in the street. She hadn’t even wanted to pull into his driveway to turn around.
Good. It was better that way.
Ethan dragged himself back to his house. He was too wound up to go to sleep, so he hit the workout room. Two hours later, when his muscles were too sore to lift anything else, he collapsed on the futon in his room, suitably punished for his bad deeds.
***
Simplicity strode into Miss Molly’s store as if she were on top of the world. Okay, so maybe she was feeling lower than the seventh layer of dirt under the pavement in the sidewalk, but nobody had to know that but her.
If she acted happy, she’d feel happy. She’d been there before. She knew the lengths she had to go to prevent slipping into a deep depression.
She’d never allow herself to feel like dragon doo over a guy again. Ever.
When she had arrived home after the Ethan incident, she had decided that she’d tell Miss Molly she couldn’t take the job after all. No one would be surprised. She doubted they’d even be disappointed. They had all known she wasn’t equipped for the task.
“Well, hello there, sweetie.” Miss Molly came tottering around the counter, her arms open wide for a hug.
Miss Molly had loved the fact that Simplicity was a hugger. From the first day they had met, they had clicked.
Simplicity’s gut started rolling. She’d have to tell Miss Molly that her belief in Simplicity’s ability to do the job was misplaced.
“How did your first day of shopping go?”
Miss Molly’s one good eye bore into Simplicity.
“I like your new patch,” Simplicity hedged. “The sparkles are very becoming.”
“Thank you. I do like a little bling.” Miss Molly laughed at her own joke. “Only problem is that the sparkles keep flying free and getting lodged in my other eye!”
“Oh boy—that is a problem!” Simplicity reached out to swipe a piece of glitter off Miss Molly’s cheek. “Want me to go grab you a replacement?”
“That’s sweet of you, but I’ll be fine. What brings you in today?”
Simplicity nibbled the inside of her cheek.
“And you didn’t tell me—how did things go with Ethan?”
“That’s actually what I came in for, Miss Molly.”
Simplicity slumped against the counter.
“Did you have a hard time finding something on the list? Some of those nutrition bars are rather obscure. I don’t know why he can’t just eat a vegetable every once in a while.”
“No…” Simplicity forced herself to stand up straight and look at Miss Molly. “I can’t take the job. I’m very sorry, but I’m sure there’s someone more suitable.”
“So you’ve met our Ethan.”
Simplicity refused to answer. She valued honesty, and she didn’t want to insult Miss Molly’s judgment or let on to what happened between them.
“There’s something about your interaction that you don’t want to tell me…” Miss Molly tapped the side of her eye. “Like I keep telling you young people, I may only have one eye, but I can see everything.”
Simplicity allowed her pent up breath to pass through her lips in the form of a raspberry.
“This is terrible.” She buried her face in her hands. She’d never be able to look at Miss Molly again. She might as well pack up and move.
Miss Molly’s cold hands covered Simplicity’s before pulling them gently away from her face.
“Sweetie, there’s no shame in finding love.”
“Love?” Simplicity guffawed. “I hardly think that’s how you’d describe this situation.”
Miss Molly tsked. “You may not see it now, but I haven’t earned the title of Miss Matchmaking Molly for nothin’.”
“I trust your intuition on almost all things, but I’m sorry to say you are wrong on this.”
She wasn’t about to explain the dangerous pull Ethan had on her—no way would she talk about the sex or the lust—but she couldn’t give any false hope about a love match between Simplicity and Ethan. Clearly Miss Molly held him in high regard.
“I may be as old as a dinosaur fossil, but I know all about this thing you young people call ‘hooking up.’”
“Miss Molly!”
“Oh, come now. Do you really believe we didn’t have such a concept in my days?”
“I’m going to die.”
Shoot, she said it aloud.
“Nonsense, dear. You put on that happy face of yours and go do the job you signed up for. Don’t let that cantankerous man drive you away. Lord knows he needs to keep you close.”
“He doesn’t want me there.”
“We can’t let him win. He doesn’t want anyone there. That’s why I need a strong woman to stand up to him. He needs us to help him hold on to his humanity.”
“I definitely didn’t sign up for that!” But she felt her spine straighten with the strength of resolve.
“Go ahead and
do the shopping. If he gives you a hard time, he’ll have to deal with me. You go on and tell him that if he runs his mouth at you.”
Simplicity sighed.
“It’s not—”
“Yes it is. Now off with you. I know you told Rogan you’d pick his kids up when they get out early—it’s a half day at school.”
“Oh, thanks for reminding me!” Simplicity leaned down for another hug, then rushed toward the door. “Wait, how did you know that?”
Miss Molly tapped her eye again.
“Miss Molly sees everything.” She wiggled her eyebrows. “And Rogan stopped in this morning.”
Simplicity shook her head and smiled.
She ran to her car and did her best not to speed in the school zone on the way to the elementary school to pick up the kids. She’d been pulled over too many times by Jenkins, and she was afraid his patience would run out and he’d give her an actual ticket.
Once she had all the school-aged kids securely fastened into the car, she allowed them to persuade her to take them downtown for an ice cream.
“You realize it’s like twenty degrees out there, right?” Simplicity glanced over at Dylan, Rogan’s oldest. She considered telling the kids about the horrors of the dairy industry, but stopped when she remembered Rogan’s reaction to her lecture about hot dogs.
He smirked, a smirk quite like his handsome daddy’s.
“Okay, but if you catch pneumonia, you’d better defend me against your father and Freedom!”
“You don’t catch pneumonia from being cold. Didn’t you go to school?”
“Yes, I went to school. But don’t believe everything they teach you, kid.”
“Blue and yellow make green!” The tiny, sweet voice of Rogan’s kindergartner, Sophia, piped up proudly from the back seat.
“Everyone knows that, Soph.” Matthew, the almost-eight-year-old (as he liked to tell people) shot back with the superiority that only a kid his age could muster.
“You are very right about that, Miss Sophia,” Simplicity sang to her little friend. “Maybe later we can experiment with the colors in the kitchen again.”
“Yeah!” Sophia lifted her hands in the air.
“Can I, too?” Matthew asked, apparently deciding that he wasn’t too superior for an art experiment.
“Of course. But first your brother would like some ice cream.”
The ice cream chant began, and Simplicity joined in.
She couldn’t find parking close to the ice cream shop, thanks to the rush of people stopping in town after picking up their kids.
“Can we go to the park first?” Matthew asked, bouncing up and down with excitement.
“It’s freezing, Matthew,” Simplicity said, leaning in the back seat to help Sophia unbuckle.
“Just for one minute. Please? I want to go in the tree house and look out the new giant binoculars to see if I can see any icicles in the trees across the pond.”
“Yeah! Me too!” Sophia echoed.
“Okay, fine. We’ll stop for five minutes. And then we’ll grab some ice cream. And then we’re going home.”
“I thought we were going to Reed’s?”
“Well, yeah, isn’t that your second home? I promised you guys a rematch on the ice hockey table in the rec room. Don’t think you’re getting out of it so easily!”
“When are we gonna live with Reed, anyway?”
“That, my darling, is a question to ask your dad.” Simplicity batted at the pom-pom on top of Sophia’s hat.
“I asked the other day,” Dylan said, looking up from his handheld game system long enough to see the curb before he tripped. “They said they had to decide where to live. Reed doesn’t want to be too far from her business, and Dad said we can’t all live in our own cottages at the cottage motel. So I think they’re gonna have to build a house on Reed’s property, but they haven’t decided yet.”
Simplicity smiled. She loved that her sister had become so much a part of Rogan’s chaotic family life. Freedom loved all five of the kids—even the toddler and preschooler who were with their grandmother today—as if they were her own. Simplicity was proud of Freedom. She had been adamantly opposed to motherhood, but her love for Rogan transcended her into Mother of the Year. Well, almost.
“I want my own cottage!” Matthew declared before breaking into a run across the park toward the tree house.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t mind one myself.” Simplicity laughed after muttering to herself. She had been begging for her own cottage for months. Freedom insisted that since she had invited herself to town, she could deal with the cot that Freedom had set up in the living room of the tiny main house.
She didn’t mind, though. She liked being close to her big sis.
“Sophia! We’re not going near the pond today. Go ahead up the ramp of the tree house!” Simplicity ran to catch up, smiling at the crunch of snow and ice beneath her boots.
She loved being outdoors, being one with Mother Nature. Even if it meant freezing.
She caught Sophia’s hand just as she was about to try to walk across the icy pond.
“Oh no you don’t. I don’t know how thick that ice is. I’ll race you to the top of the tree house!”
After the allotted time was up, the kids darted through the park, heading in the direction of the ice cream shop.
How they could still want ice cream was beyond her, but they were kids and this was their special day.
Simplicity thought she had hallucinated a nightmare when she saw Ethan Witherford striding through the park, looking every bit the bad boy with his black corduroy coat, dark jeans, sunglasses and ear buds firmly in place.
She turned away from his direction, pretending to fuss over Sophia’s jacket. Sophia tried to shove her hand out of the way, but Simplicity maintained the farce. She could not see him. Not today. Not like this. Not without a plan.
Not ever.
“Dylan, look out!”
Matthew’s warning came too late for Simplicity to do anything but to watch in horror as Dylan stepped off the curb, not paying attention to anything but his video game.
Tires screeched and time slowed as Simplicity sprang to action, desperately hoping to defy the rules of time and space in order to reach him before the car hit Dylan.
She didn’t have to. A blurry dark object stepped between Dylan and the car, taking the hit as he pushed a startled Dylan off to the side.
She crouched beside Dylan, checking him over for injuries.
Before she could make sense of what had happened, Ethan was beside her.
“He okay?”
She swallowed.
“Seems to be. Dylan, are you okay?”
“Yes, but my stupid screen cracked.”
“That stupid screen nearly got you killed!” Simplicity couldn’t keep her voice from shaking.
“Let me see.”
Dylan handed it over to Ethan.
“I have one of these lying around my house. I’ll send it over to you.”
“Really? Thanks!”
“You don’t have to do that.” Simplicity sent her words in Ethan’s direction but didn’t lift her eyes.
“I know.”
He stood to walk away, and she noticed red drips on the ground where he had squatted and a dark spot spreading on the back of his jeans.
“Wait—you’re bleeding.” Simplicity called out to him, but he kept walking, not even limping. The car must have given him quite a gash for so much blood to be obvious already.
Simplicity wanted to chase after him—well, she didn’t want to, but the guy was injured and didn’t seem to notice—but she couldn’t leave the kids alone on the side of the icy road, either.
By the time she ushered them all into the car, Ethan was long gone.
“What about ice cream?” Matthew whined from the back seat.
“I remembered that we have some ice cream in the freezer at home. We’ll have that.” No way in the name of the goddess was she about to roam with these kids unrestrain
ed for the rest of the day!
They whined a bit, but what could she expect from disappointed kids? If she hadn’t been so shaken up, she probably would have whined, too.
She muddled through the rest of the afternoon, behaving as if the kids were fragile pieces of glass until Rogan came to pick them up. Dylan glossed over the story of the car incident when Matthew brought it up, and Simplicity didn’t feel the need to flesh it out.
Neither of them wanted to be in trouble.
Since Freedom had planned to go to Rogan’s for a movie night with the kids, Simplicity was scheduled to cover the front desk and manage the resort for the evening.
Probably a good thing, too, since she couldn’t stop wishing she could go check on Ethan.
Better to be trapped in the safe spot than to lead herself into a war zone—a zone she had no hope of surviving.
Chapter Four
Guilt. That’s why Simplicity showed up at Ethan’s house the next day with a car full of groceries, only half of which had been on his list.
Guilt. That’s why she had jimmied open a window and climbed through when she discovered he wasn’t home.
Guilt. That’s why she was chopping veggies and sautéing garlic in his kitchen to prepare a vegan meal.
Yeah, okay. And she was Wonder Woman, having an illicit affair with Iron Man while Captain America waited for her at home.
Ugh.
When would she stop fooling herself?
Guilt wasn’t the word for what she was feeling.
She lost sensation in her limbs when she heard a car pull into the driveway.
Oh, dragon dung. This was real.
Would he kill her quickly or would he savor the punishment?
Simplicity shuffled the garlic around in the oil, added the freshly grated ginger to the mix, and turned back to chopping the veggies. Best to have a knife in her hand when he came in. Yeah, a weapon. Good plan.
She plastered a smile on her face when he entered his home.
She wished she had thought of catching his reaction on camera.
Out of respect for him, she had left the living room lights off, even though she was dying to see him in full light. She had caught a glimpse of him yesterday in the daylight, but his hoodie and glasses shielded him from view. Besides, she didn’t exactly look at him. She had pretty much completely avoided any eye contact or appearances of attempted eye contact.
Loving a Wildflower Page 3
