“I remember being in the basement with you and Danny, and seeing the smoke. Then running up the stairs. That’s it.”

He’d always figured what had happened after that had to be her biggest nightmare, but had also figured she’d put enough time behind her to soften the horror. But that she’d never remembered, and had never really faced it because of that, hadn’t occurred to him. “Red—”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” She gave him a weak smile. “Not tonight.”

He opened his mouth, but she set a finger to his lips. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she repeated. “When I can see you had a rough one too.”

He thought of the fire scene he’d just left and tensed. “Yeah.”

“Can you tell me about it?”

No. Hell, no, but on the night air, over the sound of the waves, the screams came back to him. The sight of the body bag being carried out, the shape in it so small. So defenseless. He closed his eyes.

“Was it the fire I smelled earlier?”

“Probably.”

“What happened?”

“A bad residential fire. A little kid—” His throat closed. He shook his head.

“Oh, Joe.” She had a charm bracelet on her wrist, probably for good luck. She’d always believed in that stuff. It jangled when she skimmed her fingers over his. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, and squeezed his hand.

“I think it was arson,” he managed to say. Christ, he shouldn’t be telling her this. “I think his father killed him.”

Only she would know how that would get to him above all else, and with a soft sound, she stepped even closer. A breeze shuddered over them, and a strand of her hair slid over his jaw now, clinging to the stubble. He left it there.

“Do you ever think about him?” she asked quietly. “Your father?”

“No.” But lying to her had never been possible, and he let out a long breath. “Not that often.”

“My mother wrote me when he died last year. Did you two ever…get close?”

By the time his father had stopped drinking and had come along looking for forgiveness, Joe had been graduating from college and hadn’t been able to find any forgiveness within him. “No.”

He thought he’d said the word forcibly. With confidence. Without a hint of the doubts that sometimes plagued him. But Summer’s eyes searched his and read his deepest, most darkest thoughts, the way no one else ever had. Ever.

“He didn’t deserve your forgiveness,” she said fiercely, holding his hand tight as she brought it up to her heart, cushioned between the soft warmth of her breasts. “When I think about all those times you came into my window, bruised, bleeding—”

“Red, don’t.”