Total pages in book: 133
Estimated words: 124341 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 124341 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 622(@200wpm)___ 497(@250wpm)___ 414(@300wpm)
Bill stopped by and brought more groceries, asking her covertly how everything was going, the look in his eyes telling her he continued to worry. She smiled and reassured him that they were both doing well and keeping themselves occupied. But she only had another week and a half off work. She needed to decide what to do, not only with herself but with Sam.
She quizzed Bill about what was going on in the outside world as related to the crime they’d been involved in. Bill told her that the news reports were dying down, which simultaneously caused her relief and made a knot form in her stomach. No one should ever stop talking about those little kids who were targeted and suffered injuries, a few physical but all of them emotional. Not ever.
There would be people who didn’t though, even if the world moved on. Their families, their friends…the community. It was their collective job now to love and comfort those children as well as they were able.
However, to know that even the mention of a mysterious “Good Samaritan” was no longer front and center in Americans’ minds would soon begin to open up their options.
Ever since Sam’s first hot shower, tension had been swirling in the air like the steam that had enveloped their naked bodies. They watched each other now, lingering looks and furtive glances. Autumn’s breath would catch and her heart would stall when she looked up and caught him staring at her, a primal look on his face that Sam quickly blinked away. His expression was often first surprised, then remorseful, melting into dejection as if he was busy disciplining himself for whatever he’d been thinking.
He’d lived a strict life of discipline, Autumn knew. Of denying himself. But oh, she wanted to know what brought on that heated look, the one that made his eyes grow lazy and fierce all at once.
She desperately wanted him to kiss her. Truthfully, she’d been waiting since she was fourteen years old.
But she was pretty darn certain that he was not going to make the first move. She’d given him the opportunity.
If you want this, you’re going to have to take charge, plain and simple. Sam is not a man who will sweep you off your feet.
Yet in his own way, he’d done exactly that.
Autumn had once struggled with her own physical identity. As someone who had been sick for so many years, she was extremely careful with her body, and it’d taken her quite some time to feel comfortable in her skin. She’d had one serious boyfriend in high school, but they’d run their course once graduation came along and he’d gone to college in another state. She’d realized then that he’d been more of a friend than anything and that she hadn’t felt passion for him so much as that he made her feel safe. Which, at the time, she supposed, was what she’d needed.
Sam didn’t make her feel safe. In some ways, just the opposite. But Autumn finally knew what the scalding wash of passion felt like whooshing through her veins and muddling her mind.
And he hadn’t even kissed her yet.
So okay then, she’d be brave. She’d help him remember that he was too. And that she was worth the risk.
They walked together, she read as he rested, and they both cooked meals and gathered firewood. In some ways, the complication—the size and scope and overarching ramifications—of their situation melted into sweet simplicity in that small cottage by the lake. Yet Autumn was all too aware that it could not last.
One night after dinner, Autumn asked, “What do you say to bundling up and taking a walk? Do you feel up to it?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, great.”
They finished their meal, and then Autumn put her sweater and gloves back on, also grabbing a beanie this time. She tossed Sam a zip-up sweatshirt lined in fleece from the closet, and then they stepped out into the clear, chilly evening as the sun began to dip below the water.
She led him to the path that meandered between the trees at the edge of the lake, just wide enough for two, and Autumn found that she felt strangely shy walking so close to him like this, the plumes of their breath meeting in the air in front of them. “I made a wish out here last week,” she told him.
He glanced down at her. He was so tall, so masculine, and she could feel the heat of his body even though they weren’t touching. “What did you wish?”
“For answers,” she said.
He looked away as they walked, out to the water, golden and rippling under the lowering sun.
“But also,” she went on, “for you to heal.” In every way.
“I’m already almost healed.”
“I’m not totally convinced of that,” she said, giving him a sidelong look. “But I know a way to test it.”