I stopped walking, thinking his fiancée might not be too keen on that. Then again, I doubted she would see me as a threat.

Brock turned sideways, sliding the carton toward where I stood. I glanced over, and I stopped thinking when I saw what he’d brought.

“Glazed doughnuts,” Brock said. “Just glazed. Nothing weird hidden inside them. I know how much you used to hate biting into something and having no idea it’s filled with cream or fruit. They’re fresh, too. Picked them up at the bakery in Shepherdstown that makes them all day.”

I did hate biting into any food and having something unexpectedly squirt into my mouth. It was freaking gross, but I wasn’t focused on that aversion.

Sitting atop wax paper really were large glazed doughnuts.

It was so simple. Just glazed doughnuts. Nothing fancy or spectacular. But he remembered, and I didn’t know why that meant anything to me. I was sure serial killers remembered things about their victims, but I felt some of the tension easing out of my stiff muscles as I blinked back sudden hot tears.

Gah, I was so over-emotional. It was just doughnuts. “Thank you.” I cleared my throat. “That’s really nice.”

His gaze flew to mine, and I hastily lowered my chin, walking past him into the kitchen. “Jillian—”

“You’re eating one if I am,” I said, snatching several sheets off the paper-towel roll. God, I was such a damn mess, but I . . . I missed this—missed having someone in my life who knew me inside and out, because no one, no one knew me like Brock had. I turned around only when I was sure I didn’t look like I was seconds from exploding into tears, and went to the island, placing the towels on the counter. “I mean, I’m not going to eat three gigantic doughnuts.”

“Since when?”

A strangled laugh escaped me. “Well, I’m not seventeen anymore.”

“I can see that.”

A fine shiver coursed over my skin as I looked up. There was an intense, almost predatory glint to his stare, one I didn’t understand. And it suddenly struck me, really hit me, that after six years, Brock Mitchell was standing in my apartment, in my world, and I would never in a hundred years have expected this.

But there he was, larger than life itself, turning what was a roomy apartment into something that now felt entirely too small. He was one hundred percent grown man who was not just breathtaking to behold, but a walking legend in the world of mixed martial arts. More than that, though, he was a man who overcame such a terrible childhood, beating statistics and naysayers. Demolishing everyone’s doubt as he rose through the ranks, suffering a career-threatening injury to come back and win it all, over and over.

Brock had fire in him.

He always had.