Faked (Ward Family #2)(37)

Too fucking right, I did.

If I had to be trapped in a small space with a woman I really, really wanted to sleep with but who seemed to overlook me entirely, then I would take the moments where I could get them. Including random pillow sniffing to catch just a little whiff of whatever fruity concoction she used.

More lights were on when I got back inside, and Claire was coming down the narrow staircase that led up to the loft, tucking her phone into the waistband of her leggings. "He doesn't go crazy living in such a small space?"

I shook my head before I tugged my jacket off and hung it on the coat tree next to the door. "He's a simple guy. Give him outdoors to explore and a mountain to descend at a rapid pace on a small piece of fiberglass, and he's happy."

She smiled. "Does that describe you too?"

Looking around, I realized that my condo in Whistler did look an awful lot like this. The space was small, my furniture serviceable, and there was not much in the way of decoration.

"Yeah, I guess." I shrugged. "Why spend money on pictures and trinkets and crap that collects dust when I could use it to experience the world instead?"

Claire stopped and stared at the wall next to the stairs. A small framed picture hung crooked of me and Scotty after my first big win.

He was almost a foot shorter than me, tufts of silvery-white hair sticking out from underneath his lucky black hat, but his grin was so big, so proud, it was almost hard to look at now. His arm was around my shoulders, and I was clutching the medal in my hands, a giant-ass grin on my face and goggle marks lining my wind-whipped cheeks. That was two years after I met him for the first time, when my wrists had been in handcuffs, and he’d told the cops he wouldn't be pressing charges.

"You love him," Claire observed.

I found myself answering honestly. "He's my best friend. The only person who's ever ... believed I could make something of my life."

Claire didn't look at me, just kept her eyes on the photo. I wanted to do something, anything, to shock her. Because for some reason, all of this felt too intimate, and she felt too intriguing, too fascinating for me to even contemplate.

"The first time I met Scotty, I was in handcuffs because I'd just wrecked the hell out of the side of his garage." I kept my voice even as her shoulders tensed visibly. "It wasn't hard for the cops to find me because the blue spray paint I'd used on the side of his house was on my hands. I'd cut myself breaking the windows on his garage."

She inhaled. "Why'd you do that?"

"Who knows?" I admitted. "I was seventeen and bored, and my friends probably thought I'd be too chicken shit to do it. Adele was really happy with me then, when the cops brought me home and told her it was only because of Scotty that I wasn't going to have a misdemeanor for destruction of property and vandalism on my record."

Claire was a loud thinker, I was coming to realize. Especially when she was trying to figure something out. And right now, she was trying to figure me out. She stared at that picture so hard, I was surprised it didn't jump off the wall.

"No wonder," she murmured.

I stepped closer behind her and took a slow inhale. It was stronger than it had been on the pillow, that incredible scent. I had to fight not to bury my nose in her hair, wrap my arms around her from behind, and glory in how warm and soft she'd be tucked into my body.

It was so clear she wanted to put me together like a puzzle that no one had sorted. But eventually, she'd see that it wasn't as complicated as all that.

I was what my family thought. A screwup and a disappointment.

I was what Scotty thought too. A hothead who didn't think things through.

"No wonder what?" My voice sounded rusty.

She turned and faced me, and I refused to budge even a single inch. But then again, Claire didn't move either.

I inhaled deeply, and my chest almost brushed hers, that's how close we stood. I wanted to kiss her. For a lot of reasons.

Because of how she'd looked in that yellow dress.

Because she still wouldn't tell me why she lied in the first place.

Because she was trying to find something inside me that didn't exist, something good and sweet and thoughtful that meant my parents hadn't completely jacked me up.

"No wonder you turned out to be a good man," she said quietly.

The breath caught in my throat.

She gently laid her hand over my heart, and I slid my palm up her arm to anchor it there. Her skin ... it was so, so soft.

"I'm glad they didn't ruin you, Bauer."

Claire tugged her hand out from under mine and brushed past me, stopping to fiddle with the radio on the kitchen counter.

I braced a hand on the wall, pinched my eyes shut, and tried to figure out what was happening inside my chest after just a few words from her. Because that simply, that quickly, she'd completely ripped the rug out from underneath me.

The station she turned on was news, and she turned a few knobs to lessen the static.

"Well, everyone," the disembodied voice said. "This is shaping up to smash the previous record snowfall for April in Vancouver, and it won't be stopping for the next twenty-four to thirty-six hours. So stay safe, stay warm, and enjoy the snow."

I turned my head to stare at her. Looks like I had some time to figure out the answer to my own puzzle—what the hell to do with Claire Ward.