Page 51 of Liberating Lily

Oh, shoot. Maybe he didn’t want her eating the cheese. Perhaps he was going to use it for something.

“Sorry,” she said. “Did you need the cheese? I can have something else.”

“No, I don’t need the cheese, and you can eat anything that you want. Whatever is in here is yours as well as mine. Understand?”

She didn’t really understand, but she nodded anyway because she didn’t want to argue with him. Plus, she was really hungry.

“Go sit at the island,” he told her, placing a hand on the small of her back to guide her over to the large kitchen island. Then he lifted her onto the stool and turned it.

Once more, she thought about protesting the way he bossed her around. She wasn’t a child. But somehow, she didn’t think he saw her like that.

More like someone who needed guidance because their judgment couldn’t be trusted.

Which was probably pretty fair considering the way she’d acted this last year.

“Right, what do you want to eat?” he asked.

“Oh, I was just going to make a cheese sandwich, something simple.”

“How about some grilled cheese and soup?” he asked.

“You really don’t have to go into any trouble.”

“It’s no trouble. Soup is made. I just need to heat it up and make the grilled cheese.”

Lily watched as he moved around the kitchen. He was so efficient. There was no hesitation in the things that he did.

She couldn’t help but stare at his hands. They were tanned and strong-looking. She thought a lawyer’s hands might be weak and pale, but not Harvey’s. Mind you, there was more to him, wasn’t there?

A lawyer didn’t have a doctor on their payroll who made home visits.

Harvey placed the bowl of soup and her grilled cheese sandwich in front of her. “You should have used the bell I gave you rather than coming downstairs on your own. What if you’d gotten dizzy and fallen?”

She paused with the spoon halfway to her mouth. “You were serious about that bell? I thought you were joking.”

“I’m not really a joking sort of guy,” he told her.

“Are you sure? I’ve seen you smile a lot.”

“Oh yes, I smile. But I don’t joke.”

Um. Okay.

“So next time, use the bell,” he told her sternly.

Lily swallowed a mouthful of soup, relieved as the warmth hit her stomach and didn’t immediately want to come back up.

“There won’t need to be a next time,” she said. “I’m up now. I feel a lot better.”

He raised his eyebrows, giving her a look that said he wasn’t convinced.

“I’m guessing from your expression that I don’t look much better. Do I look awful?”

“Well, I wouldn’t have put it that way,” he said. “But you don’t look the picture of health.”

“I think that might take some time,” Lily said as she took a bite of the grilled cheese sandwich.

Oh, wow. That was so good. She moaned.