Thirty-six days later, Riley was going nuts. There’d been nothing. No empty envelopes. No cryptic three-word messages. No flowers. Nothing to get them any closer to finding answers. To finding a solution. To doing anything other than losing her mind.

Instead they were in a holding pattern.

One thing Riley hated was not being able to move forward.

This place she was in right now—the floor of it was littered with eggshells. And every time she stepped on one, it wasn’t a little crunch she heard, but a loud screech like those ugly nasty long curly record-breaking fingernails running over the world’s largest chalkboard. She wanted to put her hands over her ears and scream.

“Do you mind not doing that in here?” she asked Trevor.

He looked at her from where he was standing over the garbage can in the kitchen, clipping his nails. At least they weren’t record breaking.

“Where would you suggest I do it?” he asked, calmly, continuing on.

She was banging things around the kitchen of his house. The kitchen with old countertops that she couldn’t get clean enough, even if she used a power sander. The cabinets that creaked when she opened them, the oven that only warmed up to four hundred degrees and then stopped, if it didn’t shut off completely.

“Not in here while I’m trying to cook.”

“I can let them grow,” he said, grinning at her.

She didn’t want him to be funny right now. She was sick of him always being so calm. “That’s disgusting.”

“Yep, it is. You didn’t like the scratches they left last night on your hips. If I remember correctly, you’re the one who told me to do this,” he said, leaning his hip against the wall, looking at his nails that really weren’t long at all, but perfectly fitted to his large hands. She was being petty last night, she knew. “And now you’re getting pissy because I listened to what you said.”

“You never listen any other time, why now?”

He narrowed his eyes at her and she saw his jaw tighten. “Riley, I understand you’re on edge. We all are. We just have to live our lives and put this aside. You aren’t doing anyone any favors, acting like this.”

“Like what?” she asked, picking up a jar of roasted red peppers.

He moved closer to her, standing a foot away. “A little bit like a brat.”

She bared her teeth at him. She knew he was doing it on purpose and she was falling for it. She twisted the jar with more force than needed and when it opened, the juice flew all over his shirt and pants. There was nothing else to do but to burst out laughing.

He frowned, but other than that, didn’t have much of a reaction, just grabbed some paper towels and started to wipe it off.

“You’re going to stink. You need to change,” she told him.

“And now you’re my mother?” he asked, lifting an eyebrow.

Again, not much of a reaction. “That’s what you get for getting in my personal space.”

He threw the paper towel down and backed her against the counter so fast she didn’t have time to react at all. “You’re like water, Riley. Calm and soothing, churning and crashing, sucking me in and throwing me out. This beautiful ocean when you want to be, this treacherous beast when you don’t.”

“I’m a beast,” she said. She shouldn’t have said that. Not when his eyes were shooting flames, his jaw clenched, and his hands caging her in. Should she be getting turned on? Probably not, but there it was.

He took a deep breath. “We need to take a step back.”

“Then do it,” she said, holding his stare. He turned and took a few steps away from her. She wanted to cry. She wanted to scream at him and when he walked out of the room, she did. “Why can’t you feel what I do? Why can’t you let me know you’re angry, too? Why can’t you tell me you’re pissed off we aren’t getting anywhere? Why do I have to be the one who looks like a fool over this?”

He walked back in and stood in the doorway. “I feel all those things you do, Riley, but I can’t let them out. I can’t do my job if I do. I can’t help you if I do.”

“That makes no sense.”

“You’re having trouble reining it in. If I let go, if I let myself feel what you’re feeling, act the way you are, then it’d be worse for you. We can’t both be that way. We can’t feed off each other. Why can’t I be the calm hand that soothes you? Why can’t I be the reasonable voice that talks you down when you get like this? Why can’t you stop fighting everything so much until you just burst open and have a moment like this?”

 

***

 

Riley stood there staring at him as he voiced those words. There was no anger in them, but probably more heat than she was used to seeing.

He was just as frustrated as her over the past month. He wanted answers, too. But he wasn’t going to get them snapping at people.

If there was one thing he’d learned about Riley since they’d been living together, it was that she didn’t want anyone to see her being weak.

Not once.

Not at all.

To hide her tears. To hide what was weakness in her eyes, she snapped.

He was simmering and bubbling under the surface, but keeping a lid on it, just waiting for her to boil over. It seemed now was the time. The key was for them both to not get burned.

“Come here,” he said, walking toward her. But she didn’t make a move forward.

She was fighting tears, he saw it in her eyes and he wasn’t going to let her continue. So he took those few steps, pulled the jar of peppers out of her hand and put it on the counter, and yanked her into his arms.

Then he held her and whispered in her ear, “Just cry. No one needs to know. No one needs to see it. You’ll feel better if you do.”

And she did and he held her.

Not that he had a choice in the matter. If his own eyes welled up with excess moisture, she couldn’t see it. She didn’t need to.

They stood there in his old beat-up kitchen, the one she had been cooking in for weeks without complaint, even though he knew she hated every bit of it. She cried and cried, until it seemed like there might not be a tear left in her body. Then he picked her up and carried her to the living room and cradled her on his lap.

“You can’t let this stop you from living right now. You can’t let this control your happiness in life. Be aware it’s there. Be aware we’re working on it. But live. Enjoy. Be yourself.”

“I’m trying,” she said, wiping her nose and eyes on his shirt. He wanted to make a comment about that being disgusting, but was smart enough to keep his lips sealed.

“I know you are. You need to try harder. You need to break a little now and again. These little cracks can be fixed easier than a whole wall crumbling. Don’t let the wall crumble again.”

“You sound like a psychiatrist or something.”

“Yeah, well I’ll bill your insurance for the session later.”

She giggled a little and it was what he’d been hoping for.

“Is there something else going on?”

“Not really,” she said.

“Which means there is.” Again he could see she was afraid of letting go completely.

There was some silence and she finally blurted out, “I’m going to be thirty years old tomorrow.”

It’d really be reckless to laugh at that comment. “It’s just a number.”

“But it’s not where I thought I’d be in my life. I’m not even close. And not only that, I feel like I can’t even celebrate it because I’m worried about this other mess.”

“It sounds to me like you don’t want to celebrate anyway.”

“I do. I always do. I always go out to dinner and have a glass of wine. I toast myself and I make plans and goals for the next year.”

Not surprising. “So what is so bad about this birthday, then? Other than the number, which I repeat is just a number.”

“I didn’t reach any of my goals or plans this year. Nothing. I always reach something,” she said, sobbing on his chest.

Little Miss Overachiever. “What were your goals for this year?”

“I thought I’d be engaged. I thought I’d at least be living with someone.”

“Jason?” he asked, trying not to snarl.

“I didn’t know it was going to turn out like this a year ago. I didn’t know he’d be the person he ended up being. A year ago, none of the signs were there.”

“Instead of looking at what didn’t happen and being upset over it, why not look at what did and be happy.”

“What’s that?”

Her hand was rubbing his thigh now, but he wasn’t sure she was even aware. He was always hyper-aware of every movement she made, especially when she was touching him. “You found out what a jackass he was.”

“True.”

“That’s a good thing,” he pointed out. “You’ve got your own practice.”

“Yeah, that is pretty awesome. My goal was thirty-two for that.”

He laughed. “Then you reached it early.” He shouldn’t be surprised she had ages for different stages in her life all planned out.

“Good point.”

“And you are living with someone,” he said.

“But it’s not by choice,” she argued.

“If it was? Would you say yes? If I asked you to stay when this was over?”

He didn’t know why he was asking that right now, but he’d known for the past few weeks that he had no intention of letting them live apart again. He just figured they’d have time to work on that later.

“Are you asking me to move in here permanently?” She pushed back and looked at his face, her eyes searching his.

“I’ll redo the kitchen for you,” he said, smiling. He thought he already asked her and she didn’t answer, so he wasn’t asking again.

“Any way I want it?”

“Sure.”

“Then let’s start looking at designs.”

He should have known she wouldn’t come right out and say yes. That would be too simple and easy, and if Riley Hamilton was anything, it wasn’t simple or easy. But her answer was good enough.