Harper gave her a long, slow wink. “I got myself punched in the face. And it got me waking up staring into the beautiful eyes of Luke Garrison. I think I owe you a lifetime of friendship.”

Gloria’s mouth stretched into an honest-to-goodness grin. It felt strange on her face. “I went to school with Sophie and Luke. He’s a good man.”

“Yes, he is.” Harper nodded.

A memory of Luke and his best friend, Aldo, surfaced. It was a Friday night football game, and the two were strutting victoriously off the field. While Luke’s then-girlfriend Karen jogged up to him for a kiss, for one shining moment, Aldo’s dark gaze had met and held hers. Just like that, late-blooming sophomore Gloria had developed her very first crush.

Gloria insisted on washing the plates while Harper put the sandwich fixings away.

“So, how do you feel?” Gloria asked. “You got knocked around pretty hard.”

She saw it in the way Harper’s gaze skated left, in the tiny lift of her shoulders. Secrets. Violence left its dirty fingerprints on a person’s soul.

“It wasn’t so bad. And may I repeat: Luke Garrison.”

“Well, there is that,” Gloria said, letting it drop. She glanced at the clock on the microwave. “I’d better be getting back.”

“I’m so glad you came,” Harper said, walking her down the hallway to the front door.

“It was really nice officially meeting you,” Gloria told her. “And one more time for the record: thank you, and I’m sorry.”

Harper rolled her eyes on a bubbly laugh. “And again, no thanks or apologies necessary. I fully plan to be BFFs with you, and we should have dinner sometime soon.”

Friends. Gloria wanted to cry with hope, with gratitude, with relief. Was there a possibility that she wasn’t permanently damaged?

Harper opened the front door, and Gloria froze to the spot, staring at the shirtless, tattooed, sweaty man in front of her.

5

His heart was lodged somewhere between chest and throat. The last person Aldo expected to find at his best friend’s door was Gloria Parker. She stared at him with wide dark eyes full of shadows and questions.

“Did someone say dinner?” Aldo asked with what he hoped to God was a charming grin and not a fish gape. He was vaguely aware of the fact that he was shirtless and sweating profusely. Fortunately, that was one of his best looks.

“Hi, Aldo,” Gloria said shyly.

He whipped off his sunglasses to see her better. Thickly lashed eyes, a smooth, tawny complexion that hinted at her heritage. The bone structure of a fucking model wrapped up in the body of a tiny pixie.

That’s how he had always thought of her. Fragile, too pretty to touch.