The sun had moved lower in the sky, the light hanging like honey in the slowly emptying coffee shop. They’d been sitting for well over an hour, but he still hadn’t had enough of looking at her.

Would never have enough of looking at her.

She was talking about the store, about the fear and excitement of starting it, about the first few months when she’d been so scared and excited she could hardly sleep, would often open the doors of the store hours early just to be there, knowing it was hers.

Her face glowed from within like he remembered, lighting up when she was excited about something, which was often. She hadn't been like the other kids at college that way — carefully bland when she was upset about something, her excitement tempered by the cynicism young people seemed to wear like a badge of honor.

He was happy she hadn’t changed. She was just as vibrant, just as alive as he remembered. It had been one of the things that made him want to take her to bed back when neither of them had much experience — not the carnal need for release but the desire to be inside all that light.

She paused suddenly. “Do I have something on my face?”

“No. Why?” he asked.

She leaned back in her chair, tipped her head at him the way she had a million times before, a hint of amusement on her face. “You’re staring.”

“Because I still like looking at you,” he said, holding her gaze.

The moment seemed to expand between them, filling the space between the table. He felt the silken rope of her hold on him tighten. Didn’t bother resisting it.

She sat up straighter all at once. “Oh, my god… what time is it?” She pulled her phone out of her bag. “Jesus… I’ve had the store closed for almost three hours. I have to go.”

“I’ll walk you.”

They stood and headed for the door. Elle raised a hand in greeting to the guy behind the counter, and Locke suppressed a wave of jealousy, telling himself the other man was probably just a friend.

Hoping it was true.

The sun was low in the sky, working its way toward the horizon. He didn’t like the longer days of fall and winter. Dreaded the additional hours of darkness when there was no sun or surf to block out his memories of her. The loss was so familiar, so much a part of him, he was almost surprised to find her walking beside him. Almost surprised to realize that for the moment, at least, he didn’t need to try and forget her.

They made their way down the block without speaking, and for the first time since she’d crashed into him, the silence between them was heavy. He would have been relieved when she finally stopped walking if it didn’t mean his time with her was almost up.

They stopped at a quaint storefront with children’s books in the window, the door painted a deep green, like the entrance to a secret garden. He looked up, took it in, his eyes coming to rest on the sign that read Matheson and Matheson in gold letters. He felt a surge of happiness at the sight of them — the exact color and font as the original store — then pushed it away. He didn’t have the right to be happy about the store. She had rebuilt it in spite of what his family did to her. Hathaway Holding, the company named after his father’s mother, had made it necessary.

He had made it necessary.

“Do you want to come in?” she asked.

He lowered his gaze to her, shook his head. “I should be going.”

It wasn’t true. He didn’t have anywhere to go, anywhere to be. But entering the store felt like hallowed ground. Like his being there would be a betrayal of all she’d been through.

“Alright,” she said.

He looked at her for a long moment, taking a mental snapshot, committing everything to memory: her hair shining like a freshly minted penny in the dying sunlight, her luminous skin lit from the inside out, green eyes like the ocean when he got out past the breakers.

“I can’t tell you how nice it was to see you,” he said.

She hesitated, drew in a breath, smiled. “It was nice to see you too, Lachlan.”

He reached out, dared to wrap a lock of her long hair around his finger like he had when they'd been young. When touching her had been a daily privilege. “Locke.”

He hadn’t told her about his new last name, chosen for its generic nature, but he couldn’t let her call him Lachlan. The old name made him feel too close to the boy who had lied to her, and he was no longer that boy.

No longer that person.

Her smile faded, and for a few seconds she was so still he thought she’d stopped breathing. “Locke.”

He let the hair spring free from his finger, turned around to go before he made an ass of himself.

“Hey,” he said, remembering something.

“Yeah?” She was still there. Still watching him.

“You never told me why you were upset outside Bolton’s.”

“Their new bookstore…” She stopped without finishing her sentence, then shrugged.

He nodded. “I’m sorry.”

She gave him a sad smile. “Not your fault.”

Not this time.

The words were unspoken but there between them just the same.

He lifted a hand and continued to the crosswalk, forcing himself not to turn back.

There was no going back. Deep down he knew it, even if everything inside him rebelled at the knowledge that there was no universe in which Elle Matheson would ever give him another chance.