Feeling leaked inside the block of ice he’d become. Almost like he was absorbing the tears she wasn’t shedding.

  “And sometimes late at night, when I’ve come home from a full day of meetings and fancy meals, I let Lindsay Warren sneak off into the office and work on her website. It’s a practical thing, I tell myself. It’s not like I can hire someone to do it for me.”

  The way she referred to the woman he’d just that day told himself he loved—as though she wasn’t even real—seemed criminal to him.

  Angered him.

  For his sake, or hers, he couldn’t tell.

  Maybe for Lillie’s.

  The old girl...

  It took a real shyster to get one over on Lillie.

  Thankfully the beautiful collie was asleep and didn’t have to be privy to the ugliness coming out into their living room.

  “Who are you? What’s your real name?”

  “I can’t say.”

  “Bull...” He finished the expletive with no shame.

  And Lindsay, or whoever the hell she was, took it as though she deserved it.

  And more.

  Sucking in the lips he’d kissed all the way to heaven, she bit down, and then with an obvious deep breath said, “I told you that my father ran out on us. That he wasn’t named on my birth certificate. And that I had no idea who he was. That was all true.”

  Too little to matter.

  “Everything I’ve told you is true,” she said then, as though, stranger that she was, she knew him well enough to read his mind.

  Which pissed him off some more.

  “What I didn’t say,” she continued as though he’d nodded encouragement, or was still at all open to anything she might want to impart, “is that Savannah Compton—the lawyer partner in Sierra’s Web—and I became friends several years ago...”

  He waved a hand to stop her. Like he cared who the heiress he’d mistaken for his lover palled around with.

  “...she’s the one who suggested that I look for my father,” the powerful woman continued in spite of his signal to cease talking to him.

  And she had his attention again. A flash of her pain when she’d talked about her parents hit him.

  “Sierra’s Web found him through one of those family DNA searches, and then, picking up a paper coffee cup he’d thrown away, they were able to get an official match. He’s here in Shelter Valley. And while his past is shady—including the fact that he or one of his family members sold my mother the drugs that killed her—I needed to see him. To find the pieces of myself that were preventing me from being little more than a successful, dutiful robot.”

  Another bolt of sensation shot straight to his heart.

  “Sierra’s Web saw the ad Elite Paper had put out for an artist contractor, and I took that as a sign that I was meant to come to town and meet my father, without him knowing. I was going to get my answers, and get out without anyone getting hurt.”

  “You didn’t intend to tell him who you were? To ask him why he left?” His curiosity won out over the anger for the moment. Just to get the facts.

  A good lawyer knew it was all about the facts.

  “Honestly, I don’t know what I intended at first. It was all just this nebulous idea. And then I took one step toward making it happen and another, and suddenly I’m living in Shelter Valley, doing work that lights me up inside and...falling in love.”

  She looked at him then. The tears that pooled in her eyes, and fell, almost broke him to the point of hauling her into his arms.

  But not quite.

  If he hadn’t handed her that clipboard that morning, she wouldn’t be coming clean with him.

  “You played me, like you did the rest of the town, so you could get what you needed.”

  It was one point in her favor that she didn’t try to deny the accusation. “I never intended anyone to get hurt,” she repeated. “I thought I’d be in and out, you know, like on vacation, you meet people, but you don’t really get to know them. You’re a piece of dust on their radar. Maybe a nice thought in the moment that fades to not remembering.”

  The ache in him grew. He didn’t want to care for the stranger on his couch.

  But he did.

  And he thought of Nicky on that swing long ago.

  Loving someone wasn’t enough.

  As much as he’d wanted it to be different, they hadn’t fit.

  “Who is he?”

  “I can’t say, Cole. He’s got a good job here in town. A house and a wife. Kids. People seem to like him. He helps out like the rest of you.”

  Another horror struck. “He was there today?”

  “Yes, but I didn’t speak to him. He has no idea who I am and it needs to stay that way.” The stranger was back, as though addressing a boardroom filled with men far more powerful, more wealthy than Cole ever wanted to be. “I’ve hurt you, and I will live with that for the rest of my life, but I can get out now and not hurt anyone else. Can you at least see that? If I say who I am, expose his past, who knows what it will do to his wife? His kids? His home in this town? Innocent people will be hurt. Children, Cole. I can’t do that.”

  He didn’t want to get it. God, he tried hard not to do so.

  Just like with Nicky.

  It was like the ten years he’d spent making certain that he didn’t ever again feel that excruciating pain had never existed.

  “I understand,” he said, bowing his head and wishing he hadn’t eaten so much for dinner.

  The food wasn’t sitting well in his gut.

  Neither was the truth.

  Whatever name had been given to the woman on his couch, he loved her far more than he’d ever loved Nicky. Loved her differently.

  The forever kind.

  But just like Nicky, he was going to have to let her go.

  * * *

  Lindsay needed to get up and leave. To pack her car and head to Phoenix that night. For that matter, she didn’t even need to pack.

  Lindsay Warren’s six hangers and footwear would fit nicely in the seat beside her. The rest, the groceries, toiletries and cleaning supplies, she could just leave.

  “I never lied to you, Cole,” she said, instead of standing, the words tearing up out of her. “I swear to you, I never lied to you.”

  His head rose slowly and she braced for the anger, the hatred, the distaste that she’d see there. Instead, his red-curly-topped green-eyed gaze held hers steadily. Intense, searching...

  She withstood the scrutiny. Would sit there the rest of the night if that’s what it took.

  In the midst of all her bad news, she’d just told him that she’d fallen in love. Had already told him that he turned her on like no other man ever had.

  If she could just leave him with the truth of those words...

  What?

  He could spend the rest of his life pining for a woman he couldn’t have?

  Was she being selfish after all? Needing him to know that he was it for her? So that she could go away feeling like she meant something to him in return?

  Weary from all the emotion, from life in a world where there was more than just fundraising and keeping up appearances, she thought again about climbing in her old yellow car and heading back to Phoenix.

  To her real world—whether she liked it or not.

  “Just tell me who he is.” He finally broke the silence between them, but not the glance they shared.

  “I can’t.” She shook her head. Lost eye contact. And felt bereft.

  “Then at least tell me who you are.”

  The next shake of her head seemed to hurt every bone and muscle in her body. “He’d know the name. And you can’t come find me. Not unless you were willing to leave Shelter Valley and everyone you know and love here behind, without a forwarding address.”

  His nod broke her heart.

  “This is why I didn’t want to get involved with you,” she told him then. “I let myself think that a vacation, short-term-only thing would be okay, because...you know...you hear about people having flings on vacation. And you were fully apprised of that part of the situation. And I couldn’t seem to help myself. I’ve never been attracted to a guy like I am to you and... I’m sorry.” She started to cry then. Ms. Bohemian tears, sobs and all. “I’m so sorry.”

  Cole’s arms reached for her. But pulled back before they touched her body. And as bad as she hurt at the rejection, she knew he was right. Sucked up her pain and dried her tears.

  They couldn’t have what they wanted.

  So they had to be done.

  When he stood and grabbed his keys, she followed him wordlessly to the door.

  A last glance back into his home showed her Lillie, on the couch, sleeping blissfully on.

  The old girl was obviously done with her.

  Lindsay Warren-Smythe wasn’t even worthy of a goodbye.

  * * *

  As Cole led Lindsay out the door to his SUV, he was wracking his brain, trying to figure out who in town had a history of drugs in their past. Or a family member who’d sold them to a young girl in Southern California nearly three decades before.

  Even more, who in Shelter Valley would abandon a young pregnant girl, and the resulting child as well?

  Didn’t matter if he’d made good...walking out on your family...never looking back...a person didn’t get a “bye” on that one.

  He buckled himself in. Started the car. Pulled out of his drive. “I know him, don’t I?”

  “Cole, don’t.”

  He had to. He was seething. The life he wanted had almost been within reach, and was imploding right before his eyes.

  The woman who loved him was hurting and he couldn’t find a way to help her feel better.

  “What kind of a guy abandons his family and then just goes on and has a great life?” He didn’t even try to temper the bitterness in his voice.

  Or to find something to smile about, either.

  “Maybe he’s spent his whole life making amends for wrong choices he’d made as a kid.”

  Stopped at a vacant corner, he stared at her, his heart open and seeping all over the front seat, not that it made a difference. “You’re seriously making excuses for the dude?”

  “He’s my father, Cole.”

  Right. A part of her, she’d said earlier. The words hit home with a little more force as he sat there trying to right wrongs he had no control over.

  But was somehow paying for.

  As was she.

  If they let the guy...

  “But...” He started in and stopped when she shook her head.

  “You and I...we did this...we started something when we both knew I had to leave...we agreed we wanted our great vacation even knowing it would have to come to an end. That man’s wife, his children, the people who have befriended him, who value his friendship in return... I won’t hurt them so that I can live on permanent vacation.”

  When she opened her mouth as though to say more, and then, closing it again, shook her head, his frustration grew. “What?”

  “Shouldn’t you go?” She nodded toward the stop sign.

  He shrugged. “There’s no one around.” The sooner he pushed on the gas pedal, the sooner she’d be leaving his car for the last time. “What were you going to say?”

  “It’s not just the people here,” she said then, sounding more distant even though he was buying a few more minutes in her presence. “My grandparents, and the slew of people who depend on me back home...they’ve been there for me my whole life, Cole. They need me. And Shelter Valley needs you.”

  She wasn’t going to change her mind. There was nothing he could say to get her to stay. “I need you.”

  “I know, and I need you, too, but we’ve known each other a matter of weeks. And we’re both strong people. We’ll survive.”

  She was right, of course. They’d survive. He’d just be living with a permanent ache in his heart. Pushing the gas, he started slowly toward Main Street.

  “At least tell me your real name.” He cringed even as he said the words. Like some schoolboy begging for crumbs. “Just in case...”

  His gut hit rock bottom as he pulled into her complex. “In case what?” she asked him.

  How the hell did he know? “You know how to find me. What if I ever need to find you?”

  “You could hire someone to try to find where Lindsay Warren, LLC leads, but I can already tell you that at this point, it will lead right back to Sierra’s Web.”

  “How do you know I won’t show up at one of Lindsay’s shows?”

  Her gaze lightened for a moment. His gut felt the reaction.

  “I hope you don’t.” Her words belied the emotion he knew he’d just read in her expression. “Because saying goodbye to you a second time would be excruciating...”

  Her voice broke. He heard the sob as she opened the door, slipped from the seat and walked out of his life.

  Sitting there while he blinked back the unheard of moisture in his own eyes, Cole watched her climb the steps and unlock her front door, waiting for her to look back one last time.

  She didn’t.

  She’d said her goodbyes.

  And if he loved her at all, he had to honor her wishes and let her go.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Lindsay watched from her window as Cole drove away. She grabbed her six hangers, her flip-flops, her Lindsay Warren laptop, threw her underthings in a bag, and with her purse already over her shoulder, headed out the door she hadn’t closed completely behind her.

  She’d email the file of valentine designs she’d completed that week as soon as she got to Phoenix. Stopped at the light waiting to enter the freeway ramp, she pushed her phone screen already set up for directions and sent a command for a voice text to Savannah.

  She wasn’t even on the freeway when her friend called her back, on speaker phone, insisting that Lindsay come to her place, not a hotel.

  Warren-Smythe would never have done so. Not in her old life. She’d have checked into a quiet, elegant hotel and hidden out until morning.

  With a more complete, albeit bruised self on board, Lindsay didn’t argue with Savannah’s request. She simply used her phone’s voice command to change her destination.

  And then, tearlessly, almost emotionlessly, she drove that hour and a half until her phone told her she’d arrived.

  She didn’t cry with Savannah, either. And though her friend gave her a concerned look or two, Savannah asked no questions. Instead, she gave Lindsay the space she needed to get on with her life. Starting with a hot cup of chamomile tea, and a welcoming guest room bed with soft sheets.

  After sending her one email to Chief of Personnel at Elite Paper, attaching the designs for which he’d contracted her, along with a formal letter of resignation, she stripped off Lindsay Warren’s park-dusty clothes, showered and went to bed. Surprisingly, Lindsay slept. Well. For several hours.

  And when she awoke, it was almost as though the past month had been a dream. One that had changed her perspective of herself, certainly, had given her dimension where she’d been flat, but hadn’t changed her daily life.

  “Do you regret going?” Savannah asked her over coffee the next morning. “Did we make the wrong choice?”

  An unequivocal yes, born from the depths of Ms. Bohemian’s broken heart, didn’t make it to Lindsay’s lips. “No.”

  Because while she was hurting, sometimes to the point of being unable to draw air, the thought of never having known Cole, of not showing him how very desirable he was to women—at least one woman—and of not knowing of her own capacity to love, was worse.

  And the abandoned girl in her was at peace, too.

  What Brent Wilson did to her mother—and to baby her—was inexcusable. But the man had spent his life proving that there was more good than bad in him. He’d given his life over to blessing others.

  And in so doing, he’d given his firstborn daughter something good to cling to, to take on, as the part of her that came from him. To feel less flawed in her darkest places.

  She flew home to San Diego that same day and stopped to see her grandparents, telling them that, instead of going on a cruise, she’d spent some time with Savannah and helped with a horse therapy fundraiser. And she basked a bit in their pleasure, their pride in her, as she described the horse therapy program.

  She was pleased with their ready offer to support, with time and money, her desire to add a pet therapy charity to her portfolio.

  On Monday, she woke up and lived her normal life. She caught up on financials for her current list of charities, scheduled meetings, assessed needs and started planning events. That evening, she joined several dog rescue sites, putting Lindsay Warren’s email on lists for notification of pets available, and she toyed with some ideas for a three-dimensional depiction of Lillie on the mountain path overlooking Shelter Valley.

  She did what Lindsay Warren-Smythe had always done. She kept busy. Contributed more to society than she took from it. Set goals, and then kept them.

  The one major difference in her post-Shelter-Valley life was the time she carved out for Lindsay Warren. Thinking of Kaitlin Wilson, of the way Brent and Emily encouraged their daughter’s talent, of Elite Paper and all the good that came from the company—and needing an outlet for the overabundance of emotion that threatened to overflow on her days—she let go of the lease on Lindsay Warren’s small apartment. Instead, she set up a studio in her own home, and worked there before bed every single night.

  And for several hours every weekend, too. She carved her creative time out specifically, and guarded it as though it were sacred.

  As part of her plan to live a more honest, cohesive life, she showed some of her card designs to her grandparents, and refused to be discouraged when they gently told her that her pictures were nice and then changed the subject. She went home that night, searched out upcoming art shows and reserved space for Lindsay Warren at three of them, adding them to the website that very same night lest she let her practical side try to cheat her out of living as complete a life as she could.