Page 157 of Her Wicker Guardian

His gaze stays on mine.

“It brought you here. Everything after that was you.”

His fingers close gently around mine. “No,” he says. “I stayed because I wanted to.”

“I know.”

Behind us, Shannon says, “I feel like this calls for something.”

Tom gives her a look.

“What?” she says. “He built a bear, survived an asshole, and got his first commission all within forty-eight hours. I’m celebrating.”

Locke looks around at all of them, then at me. “Is this normal?”

“No.”

“Good.”

The terrible tightness in my chest finally eases, and he takes my hand.

I thought the fire would end something.

I didn’t know it would be the beginning of us.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Rachel

By the time we get home, the adrenaline has worn off enough for me to discover that my hands are shaking.

I don’t notice until I’m standing beside the workshop while Locke gathers several lengths of fresh willow from the bundle left over from the bear. He chooses them one at a time, bending each carefully between his fingers before placing it in a stack. The first two go back into the pile. The third goes into his new stack.

“What are you doing?”

“Repairing this.”

He touches the damaged place high on his chest. The broken ends have shifted during the drive, and the sight of the crushed weave sends the same sick jolt through my stomach that hit me in the town square.

I reach toward him and stop before touching anything. “Can you fix it?”

“I think so.”

Not exactly the reassurance I was looking for. Locke picks out three more slender green switches, then heads toward the cottage with them tucked beneath one arm. I follow close enough that I’m probably hovering, but after watching Trent’s fist break pieces of him, I’ve decided I’m entitled to hover for at least another hour.

“What if you’re wrong?”

He glances at me. “Then we learn something.”

“That’s a terrible answer.”

“It’s the answer I have.”

I hate that it’s also the only honest one.

He carries the willow upstairs to the bathroom. The room feels even smaller with the two of us and half a shrub in it. Locke sets the fresh switches beside the tub, strips off his shirt, then pauses with his fingers at the button of his jeans.

I’m already reaching for the faucet. “Don’t even think about suddenly developing modesty.”