Women in her real estate office would be using their manicured nails to scratch each other’s eyes out if they came in to buy a house. Hell, they would probably hand their own home over.

The main difference between them was the way Matthew made her feel. She had never been attracted to a man the way she was to him. That was the main problem with her—she had never been truly attracted to a man before. When she had dated a single father after moving to Ohio, she hadn’t moved past a few dates when it became plain she could not reciprocate his burgeoning feelings for her, and couldn’t give him the smallest intimacy, such as a small kiss, without recoiling.

Far from recoiling, she wanted to wind herself around Matthew’s body until he would need pliers to peel her off him.

Realizing she had been staring at him like a lovesick teenager, she raised her bandaged hand. “I tried playing with fire and got burned.”

“You can’t live your life afraid of pain. I hear childbirth involves a lot of pain. Women still have children. I burned myself numerous times when I started working with fire. The shop I have now is the third one. The other two burnt down. You learn to minimize the pain and move on. That’s why women have more than one kid, and I built my last shop of out of metal.”

“I love how you compare losing your shop to childbirth. If men gave birth, humankind would cease to exist.”

“I can’t argue about that. Dad made us boys watch a video of a woman giving birth.” Matthew hung his head. “I think it emotionally scarred Jody,” he whispered, as if sharing a family secret.

Alanna tore another bite off her sandwich then handed the rest to him. “I must have seen the same film.” She laughed “Made me feel better about not having any.”

Matthew’s smile vanished.

She laid her bandaged hand down on his. “It’s okay. I learned to deal with the knowledge since I was thirteen.”

“That’s a young age to find out something like that.”

Alanna looked over at the small pond that Matthew had told her was created by run-off from a mountain stream.

“Could have been worse.” She shrugged. “I could have not known then been blindsided when I was ready to start a family.” Turning her eyes back to face him, Alanna caught the tormented expression on his face. “Hey, it’s okay. I shouldn’t have told you. I don’t know why I did. I’ve never told anyone, not even my foster mother.”

Matthew rewrapped what was left of his sandwich. “Alanna …”