She’d loved him.

The truth of it struck true like an arrow. From day one, she had loved Brick Callan, and he’d broken her heart twice. What kind of a masochist kept coming back, kept asking for more?

She wanted to run. Wanted to get out of the tent, away from everyone. Wanted to turn up her music and pick up a brush and lose herself in the feelings. She wanted to exorcise the feelings onto canvas to make sense of them. How could she love a man she didn’t trust with her heart?

How could she trust him not to hurt her again? He would protect her. She had no doubt of that. Brick would lay down his life for her. But would he share it?

Dizzy, she started to pull away, but Brick held her there, anchored to him with a solid grip that made her feel like running and staying at the same time.

His thumb brushed hers rhythmically, insistently.

The pictures flashed forward on the screen. Christmases, birthdays, Fourth of Julys. They all got older. The house changed. The town changed.

Remi tried to focus on the slideshow and the colors the music produced as they floated up to the peaks of the tent and wove their way around the people gathered to celebrate with them.

“What colors do you see?” Brick’s voice was low and rough in her ear. His lip grazed her lobe, and she shivered involuntarily at the contact.

“I see greens and blues billowing like smoke,” she whispered back. The desire to slide into his arms even after her revelation was intense.

She glanced back at him, but his gaze was on the screen. The strong jaw under the neatly trimmed beard, the crinkles around his eyes. The firm set of his mouth.

His grip tightened without warning, and she sensed him tensing next to her. Scanning the room for the threat, she spotted the photo on the screen.

Brick looking dapper and stalwart on his wedding day. Audrey, stunning in white lace, beaming at him. Darlene and Gil posed next to them like family at the altar.

She remembered then. The why this wouldn’t work. He’d made his choice, and it hadn’t been her.

40

She gave serious thought to ignoring the knock on her door but recalled the shower incident and changed her mind.

“You ran away,” Brick said, pushing past her, not waiting for an invitation. While she had changed into her oversized hoodie and knee socks, he was still dressed for the party in dark slacks and a tie.

“I did not. I walked home at a leisurely pace,” she lied. As soon as the party wrapped, as soon as she’d done enough to help with the clean-up, she’d ducked out and run like hell before slipping on a patch of ice and almost taking a header through a tidy picket fence.

“You ran away. And that was after you shut me out.”

“I would hardly call giving you a blow job shutting you—”