Chapter 14
Joshua
I’d never considered myself a particularly emotional dude. I wasn’t one of those pussies who wept in romantic movies or even watched them. I was the guy who enjoyed action-thrillers or historical throwbacks with a tumbler of whisky.
I held the flowers behind my back and walked up the grated steps that led to Eve’s apartment door above the butcher’s place. The sun seared the horizon, sinking lower by the minute, and I envisioned another night with her – warm skin on mine, supple flesh beneath my fingertips.
I knocked twice on the door, ignoring the squirming feeling in my gut. That was new. I’d felt nerves before, but never about a woman. I’d never focused much on the ‘feelings’ stuff.
Silence stretched out and I frowned, checking my watch. She should’ve been home by now.
“Eve?” I knocked again.
“Just a minute.” Her voice was muted, and boy, she didn’t sound happy to hear from me. Footsteps on the other side of the door, the scrape of a latch and the door opened a crack.
“Hey,” I said, with an easy smile. “How was work?”
“Fine.” She didn’t open up all the way.
“Are you sure? You look like you had a bad day,” I said, then produced the bouquet from behind my back with a cheesy flourish. “These are for you.”
Her eyes widened a little. “Oh,” she said, “oh, thanks.” Eve finally opened the door all the way. She was in a pair of PJs – cotton shorts and tee – and my throat closed. Just the sight of her bare thighs brought back flashes of last night.
I handed her the flowers then swept her into a hug, inhaled the coconut scent of her shampoo, ran my hands up and down her back. “Looks like it was a rough day.”
Eve stiffened. She slipped out of my grasp. “I guess. Yeah, I guess so.”
“May I come in?” Shit, this wasn’t meant to be awkward. When I’d left her this morning, she’d been in a great mood. We’d laughed our way through cow poop and grass, and feeding time, and I’d dropped her off at Cowboys n’ Cuts with a smile on her face.
What the hell had changed?
“Yeah,” she said, then bit her lip. “Come in.” She didn’t sound sure.
I planted my feet. “Okay, what’s going on? You don’t look like you want me to come in, Eve. I’m not the type of guy who beats around the bush. Something’s bothering you.”
“It’s nothing. I said come in, didn’t I?” Eve turned on her heel and padded down the hall, leaving a trail of her scent. She disappeared through an open doorway and the trickle of water came a second later.
Fuck it. Something had gotten under her skin and I’d be damned if I wouldn’t find out what it was. Already, I thought of her as my woman. My Eve. I moved across the threshold, then shut and locked the door behind me.
I walked down the hall and followed her into the kitchenette – a tiny space with just a portable gas stove, a few cupboards, sink, and mini-fridge to fill it. Not what I’d expected from a big city chef.
What did it mean? This place was tiny. I peered into the equally small living room and frowned. There were boxes in there, still packed from her move to Hope Creek. But she’d been here for six months. Unless, she’d packed her boxes again to leave.
“You going somewhere?” I asked, keeping my tone casual.
“What?” Eve looked up from the sink. She’d already placed the flowers in a jug. Not a vase. Maybe she’d already packed that, too.
“Your boxes are packed. You leaving town?”
She pursed her lips and didn’t answer.
“Eve.”
“What?!”
“Are you leaving town?”
“No,” she said. “They’ve been like that since I got here.” But she didn’t look sure about not leaving. She was pissed about something.
“What happened today?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Tell me.”
She slammed the flowers onto the counter and turned, fists on her hips. “What the hell, Joshua?”
I didn’t budge, met her stare for stare. “What the hell, right back at you,” I said. “I came here expecting to take you out for dinner, maybe over in Heather’s Forge or back at my place, and instead, you’re –”
“What? What am I?” she asked. “I’d love to hear it, since you must have such a well-formulated opinion about me.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you don’t know jack shit about me. About what I want or who I am.”
“Jesus Christ,” I said. “This was not what I expected when I came here tonight. I’ll leave.” I walked out of the kitchenette and back down the dingy hall toward her front door.
“Wait,” she called, softly. “Joshua, I-I’m sorry. I did have a bad day. I shouldn’t take it out on you. I just – this is so much pressure. There are so many things happening and I –”
I stared at the bare wall beside the door. No pictures, no frames. This wasn’t a home, it was a halfway house, and I was a distraction on her path to the next big adventure. The next big thing. I didn’t turn. Stood there with my fists clenched tight.
Her bare feet padded up behind me. She placed her hand on the back of my neck. “You don’t understand what this is like for me.”
“Then explain it.”
“Joshua –” But the sentence cut off. She’d choked up.
“No, you say I don’t know you well enough. Enlighten me.” Her hand had mellowed my anger, but the words still came out in a growl. I wasn’t accustomed to this intensity of emotion. It fucked with my mental image of who I was. In control, calm, the farmer guy. So much for that, right?
Her hands slipped down my back and to my elbows. She squeezed lightly and tugged.
I rotated on the spot, and the sorrow in her eyes floored me.
Eve’s expression belonged in a painting, her face was a work of art, and her mind – I hadn’t begun to unravel the complexities of it.
“Talk to me, Eve,” I said. “Tell me who you are. Tell me what’s bothering you.”
“It’s difficult.”
“I know.” I took her hands and led her through to her living room. We sat down on the sofa, surrounded by boxes and with nothing but a blank wall for company. Eve didn’t have a television, let alone a coffee table. “What happened?”
“It’s not about what happened today,” she said. “It’s about everything. I came here and I didn’t plan to stay. I’m sure you can tell from all of this crap.” She aimed a kick at one of the boxes.
“You didn’t move here to stay,” I said.
“No, I didn’t. I moved here to get away from… from everything.”
I stroked her cheek and she flinched away.
“Don’t,” she said. “I can’t concentrate when you touch me. It makes this difficult. It makes talking about this impossible.”
I placed my hands on my knees and kept them there, studying her.
Eve shook her hair out of her face and took a breath. A long one. “You aren’t the only one who met a partner in college. That was when I met Bryan.”
“The ex.”
“Yes,” she said. “Look, I told you that I’m divorced and that I left him, but I didn’t tell you the whole story. He was – he broke me. He remade me into what he wanted me to be and the only part of me, the only real part of me, left was the chef. The cooking. Whenever I doubt something, I cook. I find myself when I’m doing it.”
I waited for more.
She let the silence grow for a full minute, then finally continued, “Bryan was learning to be a chef, as well. He was the one who excelled in our classes in the beginning, probably because his parents owned a restaurant. But, after a while, I caught up with him.”
“He didn’t like that?”
“No,” she said, “but by that time we were already dating and I was too in love to care about the signs. Those little signs of his jealousy that showed through. We both graduated and started working in different places. We met different people. We got married. We drifted apart. But Bryan had this way of always, I don’t know, he always brought me down. He would make sure that when we attended parties together, he was the one telling the jokes. Most of the time they were at my expense.”
I ground my teeth. Sounded like Bryan needed a swift kick in the ass.
“I found him in bed with my best friend eight months ago,” she said. “The affair had been going on for years before that. Bryan laughed at me for being too dumb to figure it out sooner. He blamed me for it. Said that if I hadn’t been so focused on work and out-competing his restaurant, it wouldn’t have been a problem.”
“His restaurant. You didn’t work together?”
“No. He never wanted me in it. He franchised eventually. I – yeah, I gave him everything when I left, just because I wasn’t emotionally prepared to deal with him face-to-face after the break-up.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, gruffly. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”
Eve shifted and skewered me with her gaze. “I’m sorry, too. I find it very difficult to trust anyone. I find it really difficult to even talk about it, but I’m talking about it with you because I like you way too much. And I don’t like saying that out loud, either.”
“You know I like you, too.”
“Do I?”
I reached for her again and this time she didn’t flinch away. I dragged her into a hug and rested my chin on top of her head. “I won’t hurt you.”
“I’m afraid of hurting myself again,” she muttered.
This morning, she’d been so happy. Something had to have happened to spur on this doubt. It couldn’t just be the boxes in the living room that had brought it all back. “What happened at work today that upset you like this?”
“It’s nothing,” she said.
“No. It’s not nothing, otherwise you wouldn’t feel this way. Talk to me. Please.”
“Faith bought Cowboys n’ Cuts,” she said. “She’s the owner of the place now, and I don’t see myself working there much longer. She’s difficult to get on with.”
“Christ.” I palmed my forehead. Faith and I were ancient history, yet this problem came back repeatedly of late. She’d managed to keep her obsession with me in check until now. Now, that I actually found another woman attractive. “It’s my fault. She wouldn’t have bought it if it wasn’t for me.”
“No, it’s her fault. She’s fucking crazy,” Eve replied. “Like, I can’t even believe how crazy. And it doesn’t matter. I’ve only allowed myself to be bullied once in my life, and then only because I was blinded by love. Never again.”
She was so strong. Stronger than any woman I’d met before, and she was impervious to materialism. She’d walked away from everything after her ex’s betrayal. “Let’s forget about her. Let’s have dinner.”
“Ugh, I don’t want to go out. And I don’t want to go to the restaurant either.”
That didn’t leave us many options, apart from a trip out to my place or over to Heather’s Forge. “I’ve got a couple beers in my fridge at home. And I might be able to whip up something for us to eat. Something tasty.” I rose from the sofa and held out a hand, no questions asked.
A shadow of a smile flickered over Eve’s lips. Those gorgeous, full lips. She took my hand, but the hesitation was still there. She was guarded, and I’d do everything in my power to break down those walls.