If You See Her (20 page)

“Hi, Hope.”

She glanced over as a slim blonde came out of the café, arm in arm with a man. The woman looked vaguely familiar, but Hope hadn’t met the guy with her, she didn’t think. “Hi … ah, it’s Roz, right?”

“Yes.” Roz smiled. “We’ve only met once. And you haven’t met my husband … this is Carter, Carter Jennings.”

Jennings
. Hope arched her brows, cocked her head. “Jennings?”

Carter gave her a smile. “Yeah. This town is lousy with them. My dad and Hank and Remy’s dad were brothers. There were seven of them, although only four of them stayed in the area.”

“Ah.” She studied him closer, trying to see something of Remy there. The eyes were blue, but not as blue. He was a little older, too, she thought. Didn’t seem as … well, warm, as Remy was. “Just how many of you are there?”

“I don’t know. I stopped counting.” He smiled at her. “How are you feeling? I’ve heard about your … ah … ordeal.”

“I’m fine.” She jammed her hands into her pockets and looked away. The hunger in her belly faded, replaced by a heavy, leaden weight.
Ordeal
—what a polite word. And
which
ordeal had he heard about? The bullshit version or the real one?

She started to turn away, but a laughing group of women came out of the café at that exact moment. They caught sight of her and their laughter died—cutting off so abruptly, it was almost painful.

Most of them looked past her, through her, around her.

But one of them just stared at her.

Her face was familiar—too familiar.

Hope didn’t know her name, but she knew that face; she’d been one of the women trying to talk Remy into arresting Law.

Her pale, almost colorless eyes locked on Hope’s face and a sly smile curled her lips. “Well, hello … Hope, right? How are you, Hope? Recovering well? You’ve had a traumatic few weeks … I tried to tell you that Law Reilly was trouble, but you wouldn’t listen to me, would you?”

“I never was very good at listening to malicious old gossips,” Hope said, curling her lip.

Next to her, Roz made a strange choking sound, like a smothered laugh. Hope ignored her, too busy staring at the malicious old gossip in question while she opened and closed her mouth like a landed fish.

She finally sputtered a few furious words. “You … I … why …”

Hope snorted and shook her head. “You’re pretty vocal when you’re talking about others, but when it’s directed at you, you get kind of tongue-tied.”

“Hello, ladies.”

A shudder raced down Hope’s spine. Remy.

Heat flooded her belly and she had to lock her knees to keep them from melting on her.

All from the sound of his voice … and the memory of one all-too-innocent kiss.

Her mouth dry, she glanced over as he strolled up to them. He wore one of his slick lawyer suits, a briefcase in one hand. The sight of him should have been enough to chill the rush of heat his voice inspired—
lawyer, trouble, hello
—but it didn’t.

Now it was her turn to be at a loss for words as he came to a stop, subtly placing his body between her and the other woman. Without looking at her, he said, “Lovely day, Deb. You and the gardening club working out the details for the town meeting?”

“That’s for Wednesdays.”

Hope smothered a smile as the woman drew her shoulders back, her face pinching with disapproval. “Today is
Tuesday
, Remington. We discuss
books
on Tuesday.”

“Oh, yeah. How silly of me.” Then he glanced at his watch. “You always do lunch before you have the club meeting at the bookstore, right?”

Deb sniffed. “Yes. I’d better get going—Morgan Henshaw is always looking to take my place as the discussion
leader, too.” With her skinny shoulders rigid, she sailed away and her cronies fell in step behind her.

Roz flashed Remy a grin. “You know just what buttons to push.”

“Part of the job description.” He shrugged. “Hey, Carter.”

“Heya, Remy. You out for lunch?”

“Yeah. It’s about that time.”

Small talk … awesome. They were making small talk. Hope measured the distance to her car, decided she could just sort of quietly mosey her way toward it as these three chatted—so far, Remy hadn’t so much as given her one look. While that might have crushed any ego she possessed, if she had one, it was going to make it easier to just slip away, too. Trying to cheer herself up, she figured it would also give her a reason to go
I told you so
to Law.

But as she went to take the first step, Remy shifted his body, placing that lean, oh-so-nicely muscled form directly in her path. “Roz, Carter, I hope you two don’t mind, but I’m going to be rude and ditch you. I want to talk to Hope for a while.”

Mind! Please. Say you mind!
Hope shot Roz and Carter a desperate look, but the blond had already tugged on her husband’s arm, pulling him along down the sidewalk with a chuckle.

Her heart slammed against her rib cage, then shifted to lodge up in her throat as she stood there on the sidewalk.

“Have you had lunch?”

Lunch
—Hope swallowed, then darted a glance at the café. Had she had lunch? “Um. No.”

“Me, neither. Why don’t you eat with me?”

“I can think of a hundred reasons,” she mumbled, looking everywhere but at him.

“Ouch.”

Hope shot him one quick glance and then looked away, staring at the window of the café. People were staring at them—some pretended not to, but others weren’t that polite.

“So, you can give me a hundred reasons why you shouldn’t, but are any of them a no?”

Blowing out a breath, she made herself meet his eyes. She couldn’t keep just standing there looking everywhere
but
at him, after all. For one, it was making her feel a little foolish.

But once she met his eyes … whoa.

The world just fell away.
Again
.

“Well?”

Hope blinked. “Well, what?”

A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Are you going to have lunch with me or not?”

“Oh. Lunch.” She caught her lower lip between her teeth. Lunch—

“Look, I’ll make it easy … I’m going to go inside and sit down.” He gestured to the café. “And you think about those hundred reasons of yours. If one of them has something to do with not being attracted to me, then you just get back to whatever you were doing. But if maybe you are, well … the invitation is open. Your choice, all the way. No pressure.”

He gave her another one of those slow, easy smiles and then started toward the restaurant.

A fist wrapped around her throat.

My choice
.

Hope closed her eyes.

Okay, her choice.

And she didn’t even have to think through her hundred reasons.

But no pressure?

Shit.

Remy focused on the menu. Of course, he knew the damn thing, front and back, including the prices and the daily specials that weren’t even listed. But it was either focus on the menu … or stare out the window and see what Hope was going to do.

He gripped it so damn hard, his knuckles were going white. And when the bell over the door jangled thirty seconds after he’d sat down, he refused to let himself look up.

If it wasn’t her, it was going to gut him, he knew it.

But then the chair across from his scraped against the floor.

Forcing his white-knuckled grip on the menu to relax, he looked up.

He was pretty sure she looked almost as terrified now as she had that first day he’d seen her—that day on the square.

“Hi.”

She swallowed, glanced past him to stare at the wall for a few seconds, then looked back at him. “I’m still thinking of those hundred reasons.”

“Okay.” He laid the menu down and leaned back. “Don’t suppose you want to tell me some of them, do you? I’m not a bad guy, you know. Even if I am a lawyer.”

She opened her mouth, but before she said anything, Natalie Greer appeared, coffeepot in hand, an easy smile on her face. “Hey, Remy.” Then she shifted her gaze to Hope. “Hi … you’re the lady living with Law, right?”

“Ahhh. I’m staying at his place, yeah.” Hope squirmed on the seat uncomfortably, staring pointedly at the table.

“You’ve had a rough few weeks.” Natalie grimaced. “It’s usually a lot calmer around here. A pretty nice town for the most part—of course, you don’t really have any reason to believe that.”

She didn’t say anything else, just quickly took their orders and after that, she disappeared. Once more left alone with Hope, Remy focused on her face. “So … you going to give me any of the reasons?”

She scraped a fingernail on the worn Formica tabletop. “What does it matter?”

“Well, because I’m wanting to ask you out on a date and if I know some of these reasons, I can figure out the best counterargument when you tell me no,” he said.

“That sounds a little too lawyer-like.”

“Is me being a lawyer part of the problem?”

She paused and flicked him a glance, then resumed tracing a pattern on the tabletop. “No. Not really.”

“Seriously. You’re telling me you don’t have any sort of issue with it. After what was going on a couple of weeks ago? You want me to believe you don’t have any issues with me?”

A sad smile curled her lips and she shrugged. “I won’t lie and say it’s not weirding me out a little, but I’ve gotten past worse things than that. If it was that bad, I wouldn’t be here.”

He waited, but she didn’t add anything else. “You know, getting you to say much of anything is a lot like pulling teeth.”

“If you were trying to pull teeth, we’d have a much bigger problem. I hate the dentist.” The ghost of a smile danced around her lips for a second and she leaned back on the chair, tucked her hands into her lap.

“Something we’ve got in common then—my mom always had to bribe me to make me go.”

“Mine, too.” She smiled again.

“Okay, so if the lawyer isn’t one of the hundred reasons …”

Hope snorted. “You’re persistent.” Then she sighed and reached up, only to pause, then lower her hand.

Her hair, he decided. A nervous gesture—she toyed
with it when she was nervous and she still wasn’t used to it not being there. “Persistence goes with the territory.”

“You’re a guy.”

Remy cocked a brow. “Yes. Born that way. So, are you telling me if I was a woman, you’d be more inclined to go out on a date with me?”

She blushed.

It was the sweetest damn thing to watch, too. It started at the neckline of her shirt, and Remy couldn’t help but wonder just
how
low it started. Jerking his thoughts away from that direction, he stared at her face, only her face, watched as her cheeks went pink and her green eyes glinted with a mix of amusement and embarrassment.

“No. That’s not what I’m telling you. It’s … just, um …” She looked away and nibbled on her lower lip. “I haven’t been on a date since high school, Remy, and then it was just one guy. I married the only guy I ever dated, and that didn’t end well.”

“Your ex-husband was a bastard,” he said, his voice flat and hard.

She looked at him. Softly, she said, “Yes, he was.”

Then she braced her elbows on the table, studying him. “Why were you asking Law about me? About my ex?” Shit.

That was one question he hadn’t been prepared for, not from her. With that shy, nervous exterior, he wouldn’t have expected such a simple, direct question.

Natalie appeared just then, giving him a few minutes to come up with the right answer, although he was still composing that answer sixty seconds later when they were alone again.

With the food sitting untouched between them, he eyed Hope. “Should I apologize?”

“That depends on whether or not you can offer a sincere
one,” she said, shrugging. “Although I still want an answer.”

“I can sincerely apologize for upsetting you,” he said quietly. Then he leaned forward and reached out, closed his fingers loosely around one narrow wrist. Tugging lightly, he drew her left hand toward him. He eyed the pale strip of flesh on her ring finger. “It hasn’t been that long since you’ve taken your ring off, has it?”

“No. Six months.”

“Since he was such an ass, why did it take so long?”

“Because he
was
such an ass. It … I don’t know, it just took a very long time before I
could
take it off.” She glanced down at her food. “And if I talk about him much more, I’m not going to be able to eat. I know I need to eat something, too.”

She went to tug her hand away. Reluctantly, he let go and picked up his sandwich. “So basically, you’re just not up for the dating scene, and it’s not me personally.”

“Well …” She picked up her fork and eyed the plate in front of her. “I wouldn’t go that far.”

Remy put his sandwich back down. This woman was going to kill his ego. “It
is
personal?”

“Yeah.” She was studying her meal, and although Remy knew the café’s open-faced sandwiches were pretty impressive, he didn’t think they took
that
much concentration. She started to cut into the sandwich and gave him another one of those quick, nervous glances. “You’ve got this way of looking at me that makes my heart about to stop.”