Halfway to the truck, Elizabeth came to a sudden halt. “Wait. I forgot your blueberry cheesecake in my car.”

To James’s relief, she sounded more like herself again, cheerful and steady. But was that the reality or just an attempt to smooth over any awkwardness and shield her vulnerability?

And for God’s sake, why had she brought him yet more food when she couldn’t even afford necessary medical care?

“It’s colder than a witch’s t—” He cleared his throat. “Colder than a witch’s nose out here. Why don’t you get in the truck and I’ll grab the cheesecake for you?”

“I would, but we’re approximately two feet from my parking spot.” Faint amusement curved her wide mouth. “Didn’t you notice?”

He hadn’t, actually. He hadn’t been thinking about anything but her. Her glorious takedown of Brindle and her predicament, of course, but also the icy chill of her fingers and how much he wanted to bundle her into his truck, turn on the heated seats, and adjust the thermostat until they could roast a good-sized turkey in the cab.

He smiled back at her. “Guess not.”

Within moments, she’d produced her favorite springform pan from her old Honda’s trunk and locked the car tight, and they continued on their way.

While digging for her keys, though, she’d let go of his hand, and it felt odd without hers in it. Empty. An inexplicable reaction, since before tonight, he hadn’t held a woman’s hand in at least four years. Maybe longer, since he and Mel had abandoned hand-holding long before they divorced.

After James helped Elizabeth into the truck, he paused. “Do you want me to take you home? Or would you like to order Carmelo’s at my house?”

She had a decided soft spot for their chicken parmesan pizza, and he was prepared to employ every trick, every advantage he had to keep her with him. Because if he gave her any time to recover herself, he suspected those defenses of hers—the ones he’d just noticed—would snap into place, and she’d be back to pretending that everything was fine. That she was fine.

In thirty years, she’d never asked for help, even though she’d surely needed assistance at some point. He wanted to know why she hadn’t reached out. Why she hadn’t trusted him to care for her. But no matter her reasoning, suffering alone was no longer an acceptable alternative for her. Not now. Not given the terror he’d seen in her eyes tonight.

“Pizza sounds good.” She strapped herself in. “We can have the cheesecake for dessert.”

“Perfect.”

By the time he buckled up and backed out of the tight space, she was slumped in the seat, her eyes half-closed, and his heart ached at the exhaustion painted in blue shadows beneath her eyes. But he couldn’t let her sleep. Not until he understood the situation and whether it required immediate action.

“Elizabeth…” He turned left out of the lot and headed home. “You were incredible in there. But based on what you said, I have a few questions.”

He kept his eyes on the road, but he could hear her let out a slow breath. “I bet you do.”

Might as well cut right to the heart of the matter. “When did you lose your insurance coverage?” He snuck a quick glance her way, but it was long enough to see her drop her chin to her chest. “And how?”

Dammit, he didn’t want to hurt or embarrass her. But he needed to know the story, so they could work out a happy ending together one way or another.

She deflated against the seat, and her words emerged one by one, slowly, as if she were forcing them from her mouth. “You know I work two jobs now.”

Yup. Since she’d sold her bakery a couple years ago, which he still didn’t understand. Every time he’d visited, customers had been lined up at the counter and poised to order boxes and boxes of doughnuts and pastries and cookies from her fleet of clerks, and she and her assistant had been working in the back, laughing and swaying to terrible, synth-heavy music from the eighties.

But since she’d said she was happy about the sale, he hadn’t inquired further.

Tonight, he was going to find out what had happened. Because it was rapidly becoming clear she’d been a much better friend to him than he’d ever been to her, and that was going to stop right this fucking second, even if it made them both uncomfortable.

He told her the sum total of what he knew. “Last I heard, you worked part-time at the art supply store on Tidewater Avenue and a few hours a week for that custom art company.”

“Yeah.” Her voice was quiet. “Artify Yourself! I’m a customer service rep for them, and they let me work from home.”

That wasn’t a local business. “How did you even find the job?”

“One of my regulars at the store, Jenny Meyers, became my friend. She works for Artify Yourself! And after the Chronicle story came out about those Napoleon portraits she painted for Larry Bigelow—”

“Wait a second.” He shook his head, shocked. “Artify Yourself! was the company in the news? And your friend was the portrait painter Bigelow tried to pay with charity money?”

Elizabeth fiddled with the hem of her sweater. “Yup. That’s how I got the job. Business boomed after the article came out, and she knew I needed more income. So she encouraged me to apply for a customer service job there, since she said management could work around my hours at Bradshaw’s.”

That explained a few things, but not others. “Let me guess. Neither job offers health insurance for part-time workers.” When she nodded, he decided to wade into deeper, choppier water. “And you can’t afford to pay for your own insurance?”

At that, she sat up straight, her chin tilted high. “Actually, I could. I did, thanks to the ACA.”

“Then what happened?”

“Mom…” Abruptly, she turned to look out the window. “I tried to keep her home as long as possible, but those last few months, she was in and out of the hospital so many times. And since I was the only kid left in Marysburg, I was the one to be there with her. I went anytime I wasn’t working. Sometimes I slept in a chair by her bed for days on end.”

Her mom had struggled with dementia for years by that point, and Elizabeth had seemed to handle the situation with her customary ease. She’d moved her mother into her home, set up the sunny basement suite as a virtual nursing facility, and hired nurses to care for her mom during work hours and when she needed to run errands or take a break.

Thinking about it now, that must have been fucking expensive. But somehow, his friend had still managed to smile whenever she saw him, to chat about his work and his pitiful attempts to jog and the movies they’d streamed recently.

Late last autumn, though, she’d essentially disappeared from his life for a few months, only to reemerge after her mother’s funeral in January. She hadn’t told him the reason for her absence, and he hadn’t thought to ask. Fuck, why hadn’t he thought to ask?

“Oh, God.” In a rush, Elizabeth turned to him, her face frantic with apology and wet with tears. “I’m not complaining, James. I swear I’m not. She deserved all the time and love I could give her.”

Jesus, she broke his heart. “I know you’re not complaining.”

He reached out his right hand and clasped hers again. It felt right, and she didn’t move away. Instead, she gripped him tight. Tighter, as she continued her explanation.

“Late last year, I chose a new, cheaper plan through the ACA and set up autopay. Or at least I thought I did.” Defeat and grief freighted her voice, turning it heavy and slow. “When Mom got pneumonia, things became disorganized at home, and I never confirmed anything. I just assumed the payments for this year were going through, but they weren’t. And I wasn’t opening my mail or checking my e-mail very often, so I didn’t notice until it was too late.”

Even during college, she’d been the responsible roommate. The one who’d ensured their landlord got his check on time. The one who’d researched the least cruel ways to evict the mice in their little pantry. The one who’d forced him and Mel to drink water when they partied and drank too much.

And she’d failed to notice her health insurance hadn’t gone into effect?

Even before the mammogram, she’d obviously reached the limits of her endurance.

And he’d been nowhere to be found. Other than when they’d met for dinner and he’d accepted her offerings of food.

He was dirt.

So was her insurance company. “They kicked you off your plan?”

“Yes. And I’m not allowed to get a new one until the end of the year, during open enrollment.” She gave a shaky laugh. “I was just hoping to ride out the year without any major health issues. But here we are.”

“So you found the”—he swallowed hard—“lump and got a free mammogram. You must have been terrified.”

Another too-loud laugh. “An understatement.”

“And you went alone?”

She paused. “Yeah.”

He’d known that. Somehow, he’d known that before even asking the question. “Why didn’t you ask me to come with you? Or one of your other friends? Why did you go by yourself?”

The thought of her scared and isolated gutted him, and he didn’t understand the necessity for it. He knew she had a trusted, faithful circle of friends. Why hadn’t she called them into service?

Most of all, why hadn’t she called him?

And why did that omission sting so fucking badly?

She shifted in her seat. “Most of them have kids at home or work during the day. I didn’t want to bother anyone.”

He had to ask. He couldn’t stop himself, much as he didn’t want to make this—any of this—about himself.

“What about me? You know I can set my own schedule most days, or at least take an hour off if I need one. And my kids are already out on their own, so I’ve got nothing but time.”

“Most guys are uncomfortable with female stuff.”

He slanted her a look.

She immediately caved. “Okay, okay. I know you’re not like that. Mel always bragged about how you’d buy her tampons without an ounce of self-consciousness.” Another look, and she squirmed again. “But…I guess I thought you’d…”

When she trailed off, he narrowed his eyes on the road. “I’d what?”

He’d be too busy? Or impatient? What?

Her tone was reluctant, but she said it. “You’d been through enough drama already. You’d spent enough time trying to help everyone around you. I didn’t want to be one more burden.”

Mel. This was about Mel.

And maybe Elizabeth wasn’t entirely wrong about his current stance on drama. He avoided it whenever and however he could, which meant no contact with his ex. No dating. No plans for another marriage. Nothing but work and occasional visits to the D.C. area so he could help his boys settle into their adult lives.

But there was drama, and there was need, and Elizabeth should know he could differentiate one from the other. “Helping a friend isn’t an imposition. I would have come with you to the mammogram. Gladly. You’re my friend, for God’s sake.”

“I asked you to come with me to the town hall.” She offered the reminder like a gift, something to pacify his obvious discontent. “I didn’t bother DMing anyone else.”

He could feel his chest puff out a tad. God, he was pitiful.

“Because you knew I’d say yes?”

“That.” With a faint rustle of clothing, she turned to him, and he could feel her gaze against the side of his face like the sun. “And you’d support me no matter what I said or did. You’re a rock in times of trouble.”

She knew about the failed rehab attempts near the end of his marriage. The ways he’d tried to patch together his splintering relationship despite late-night phone calls from unfamiliar bars and police reports and texts from Mel’s boss wondering where she was.

He wouldn’t go back to any of that. But a few years of therapy had left him able and willing to handle everyday trouble. The grief and problems of normal life, not addicted life.

Pulling into his driveway, he hit the remote for the garage door. And after positioning the truck inside the oversized berth, he turned off the engine.

Her fingers, now warm, were still laced through his.

“Then let me be your rock,” he told her.

“What…” Her broad forehead creased. “What does that mean?”

She needed a financial buffer. His wasn’t huge, not after divorce expenses and alimony and lingering rehab bills, but he had one, and he was more than happy to share it with his longtime friend in distress.

She needed support through the biopsy process and—God forbid—any necessary follow-up treatment. He could provide that. He wanted to provide that.

And most urgently, she needed health insurance. He had that, and he could give it to her. Under one circumstance.

It was an extreme solution, out of character for them both. But how would he feel if he did nothing, and she suffered unnecessarily? If she—fuck, he didn’t want to consider it, but he had to—

What if she died when he could have helped?

How would that feel?

Could he stand by and watch her waste away because he refused to act?

No. Shit, no.

The steady, warm light of her goodness wasn’t getting extinguished on his watch. No fucking way.

“James?”

She was smiling uncertainly at him, despite her exhaustion and fear. Even under the harsh light of the garage door opener, her hair glowed like a halo. Her bloodshot blue eyes were deep and kind and so beautiful he almost wept.

And he finally understood.

That was why he hadn’t insisted on getting answers from her before. Why he hadn’t dug deeper and tried to get closer and discovered the heart of her.

First, he’d been with Mel. Then he’d needed to recover from the disastrous aftermath of his marriage. Either way, he’d chosen not to play with fire.

For him, Elizabeth was a flame.

If he’d insisted on answers, if he’d learned her inside and out, he’d known what would happen. On some level, he’d always known.

If he got too close, he’d care too much. She’d incinerate his marriage. She’d incinerate him.

But for the first time in almost three decades, he was ready to get burned.

He took a deep breath and met the gentle, confused eyes of his longtime friend.

“Elizabeth,” he said, “Will you marry me?”