“No, I, um…”
Her voice drifted off as she realized the question was probably rhetorical. She smiled. “I think you’re about the last person I expected to see way out here.”
Aidan shrugged, his forearms leaning against the broad wood railing, his strong, masculine hands clasped tightly together. She couldn’t be sure, but given the grooves on either side of his mouth, he had been thinking heavy thoughts too.
She squinted at him, remembering the first time she saw him ten months or so ago. He’d been walking down the street outside her shop, much as he did every morning. But back then he had looked more anxious somehow. Terribly alone. And his brown eyes had held a sadness that seemed to reach out and clutch her heart.
She remembered it so clearly because she was seeing the same expression now.
“I went out for a walk after dinner and lost track of time,” he said by way of explanation.
Look at me, Penelope silently found herself saying.
“Did you say something?”
He finally looked at her, and the full impact of the soulless shadow in his eyes nearly took her breath away.
Max barked, startling them both, then laid his head back down on top of his paws.
“No,” Penelope said quietly. “I didn’t say anything.”
Although, it was the second time that day that he had appeared to hear her thoughts.
The first time she had silently willed him to kiss her.
She felt her face go hot, then she turned back toward the water and tucked her hair behind her ear. “You know, my mother used to say that there are only a few people in the world who are capable of hearing another’s thoughts.” Actually, her mother had told her that there would be one other person capable of hearing her thoughts, and that one person would be the one she was meant to spend her life with. But she wasn’t going to say that to Aidan for fear that he would think her strange. Most of the townspeople already thought that. She couldn’t bear it if he believed the same.
“My… There was another woman who told me that once.” Aidan said it so quietly that the light breeze that had kicked up nearly stole the words before they reached her ears.
Penelope shivered again, but this time it had nothing to do with a chill, but rather a burst of heat.
She pushed from the railing and looked down at her watch. It was already after seven. “I didn’t realize it was getting so late.”
“Do you have a date?”
Penelope laughed, then stopped when she realized he was serious. “No. I don’t have a date. I, um, was just heading to the market to pick up a few things.” And a man for my grandmother, she reminded herself.
Maximus lumbered to his feet, nudging his cold, slimy nose into her hand. She absently patted him, then picked up his leash.
“I’ll walk back with you,” Aidan said.
“Okay.”
They’d gone a ways, Max keeping pace between them, when suddenly the tree-lined route curved into a two-lane street and the trees morphed into buildings.
Aidan looked at Penelope walking leisurely beside him. It had been a long time since he’d been with someone who didn’t demand that every second be filled with conversation.
But Penelope…
“What?”
He blinked, realizing she’d grown aware of his attention and was even now playing with her leather bracelet in that way she did when she was nervous.
He shook his head and smiled. “Nothing. I was just thinking that I never did get a straight answer to the question I asked this morning at the shop.”
She seemed to think back to that morning, when they’d shared that heated moment of awareness. But the image of the sheriff eyeing him suspiciously wiped it out of Aidan’s mind.
“What question?”
“Hmm? Oh. Well, since I could really use some help with putting together the Fourth of July town celebration, would you consider coming to the next meeting? It’s tomorrow night.”
Her gaze flitted away and she fell silent.
“At the rate things are going, we’ll end up with something that could have been cut and pasted from the 1950s. I could really use someone to back me up, help me urge everyone into the new millennium.”
She still didn’t say anything.
“Is everything okay?” He leaned forward to capture her gaze.
She smiled, but there was no happiness there. “Sure. Why wouldn’t it be?”
“It’s just that you got awfully quiet there for a moment.”
“I was just thinking…”
What? What had she been thinking?
Aidan refused to speak the question aloud, but he found he was curious about Penelope in a way he hadn’t been curious about a woman in a long time. While capable of walking in companionable silence with her for long stretches, he was filled with a desire to reach out and touch her, to urge out whatever it was she was holding in her mind…in her heart.
They’d come to a slow halt, a block short of the General Store. Max sat down, panting while Penelope turned to Aidan. To thank him for his company? More than likely. But she hesitated when she looked into his face.
What was there? he wondered. What did she see?
He found himself reaching out to cup her chin. Just a gentle play of his fingertips up along the delicate line of her jaw. So soft. She blinked those big dark eyes, appearing startled yet curious as her tongue darted out and moistened her lips.
Lips that Aidan wanted more than anything to kiss.
And in the next instant, he was doing just that.
First there was the welcoming shock of skin against skin, his lips pressing against hers, tenderly, tentatively.
He’d closed his eyes, but he opened them now to see that she watched him through a fringe of black lashes. He read fear, surprise and a wistful yearning that shot straight through him. His throat tightened to the point of pain, and a craving for this woman, so urgent, so overwhelming swept over him, paralyzing him with its unexpected power.
“Mmm,” she whispered. “That was nice.”
Aidan had experienced his share of kisses, and what they had just shared was definitely not simply “nice.” It was honest. It was sweet. And it was hot.
He stepped back away from her even as a voice deep inside him protested the move.
What was he doing?
He’d promised long ago that he would not involve anyone else in his problems. Would not subject them to what he had lived with for so long that it seemed as natural as the shadow that followed him. Especially since everything finally seemed to be coming to a head.
Yet a few minutes with Penelope found him shoving all that aside, left him seeking a bit of something outside himself. Something that called out to him from her.
He remembered her on the bridge when he’d first walked across to stand next to her. Her expression had spoken of a woman with secrets that seemed to run as deep as his. And he found himself feeling connected to her in a way he hadn’t felt connected to anyone in a long time.
Only, Penelope’s secrets didn’t have the power to hurt others.
She laughed nervously. “I’d…better get going before the store closes.”
Aidan blinked at her, wondering how long they’d been standing there looking at each other. What others thought didn’t concern