Ginger's Heart (A Modern Fairytale, #3)(111)

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“Fuck!” Cain yelled as he threw the wrench across the bay and popped his thumb into his mouth. He’d pinched it badly because he wasn’t concentrating. But damn it, it was just about impossible to concentrate on anything lately.

He’d pushed her too hard.

Too f*cking hard.

Before driving her home two weeks ago, she’d asked him to please leave her alone, and because his head was so f*cked-up over the way he felt about her that night, he’d agreed. His reality? He couldn’t honestly say that he was pursuing her only for Woodman’s benefit anymore. It had started like that, yes. He’d shown up at her door out of obligation, to fulfill a promise to his dying cousin. But things had changed so quickly; he found himself living for the moments he spent with her, hoping she’d like his place, be proud of his business. He was coming up with ways to cross paths with her, to spend time with her. He was f*cking falling for her, and the timing was shit. Total shit. She wasn’t even over Woodman yet. Not by a f*cking mile.

And hell, he wasn’t a grief counselor, for f*ck’s sake! He didn’t know what the f*ck he was doing. He was trying to help her get her old life back—church, job, riding—but the reality was that her old life was gone. G-O-N-E. And he had no right to tell her how to mourn her dead fiancé.

What the f*ck did he know? Maybe it was okay that she didn’t seem to acknowledge that Woodman was actually gone. Maybe it was okay that she seemed normal except when Woodman’s name came up. Maybe it was better that she didn’t face it yet if it was too painful for her.

“I don’t know,” he growled, huffing out a breath and feeling like shit.

He missed her.

That was his f*cking reality.

He missed her, and he thought about her nonstop, all the time.

Klaus had visited his family in Austria while Cain spent Christmas Eve and Day with his mother, thanking the Lord that his aunt and uncle had opted for Barbados instead. He’d been to his pop’s a time or two over the past week since he’d been home, and saw her white SUV going up and down the driveway from time to time, so at least she wasn’t staying holed up in her house again, which was good. And if she hadn’t backed out of the job, she’d be returning to work on Wednesday, which was also good. But none of that helped with him missing her.

He’d tried going out in Versailles, and even met a woman who seemed pretty nice. Cain didn’t have a whole lot of experience with dating—f*cking was far more his style—but he was enough of a man to admit that he was lonely and needed some friends. Cassidy was a waitress at Kennedy’s, and last week he’d taken her out for dinner, but when she invited him into her apartment at the end of the night, he did something he’d never done before—not ever in his entire life. He said no. He thanked her for the date without even kissing her. And he left.

Since then, he didn’t have the balls to show his face at Kennedy’s.

Why had he turned down a perfect opportunity to f*ck a good-looking woman?

Because Ginger’s face had appeared front and center in his mind. Blonde hair. Deep brown, sad eyes. The feeling of her arms around him. The soft skin of her fingers clasped in his. She hadn’t even come to terms with Woodman’s death, let alone gotten over it enough to be with someone else . . . but her availability didn’t seem to matter. Cain wanted Ginger. And though wanting Ginger in the past hadn’t prevented him from being with someone else, now it did. He wanted her, and only her.

To try to make friends outside Kennedy’s, he’d stopped by the Apple Valley Fire Department a couple of times to see the guys, and went out for a beer with Scott Hayes. Scott had come down to Versailles to help Cain attach an especially sweet antique bike to bolted cables and extend it from the showroom ceiling. It made him shake his head to imagine that he’d end up friends with Mary-Louise Walker’s husband, but he guessed that weirder things than that happened in real life.

As he readied Wolfram’s Motorcycles for his grand opening next week and furnished his townhouse little by little, his thoughts always returned to Ginger, and lately his mind had concentrated greatly on the fateful day he’d found her in bed with Woodman, three years ago.

But instead of letting his anger blind him, he tried to really examine what had happened that day. The way she’d poured her heart out to him. How he’d rejected her, not because he didn’t want her—he had wanted her desperately—but because he couldn’t take her away from Woodman when he felt she was integral to his cousin’s wellness. Nor could he betray his cousin by sneaking around with Ginger behind his back after Woodman had made his feelings so clear. But Cain recalled the devastated look on her face when she said, I know you love me, Cain. I can see it. I can feel it. I know it’s true. And it made him ache.

It was true. She was right. He had loved her so much at the time, it was killing him, and yet he’d let her walk away from him. No. Not just let her walk away. He’d called her disgusting names and insulted her. He’d pushed her away with all his might. And not just away. Into Woodman’s arms.

Finding her with Woodman had hurt Cain, but for the first time in years, he questioned whether he had a right to that hurt. He’d taken her tender, beautiful feelings and smashed them to smithereens. It didn’t really matter that hours later he’d had a change of heart and decided to apologize to her. The damage had already been done. There was every chance he had broken her heart that day, which was the very thing that had made her run to Woodman for comfort. Seen in a certain light, Cain was responsible for the fact that Woodman and Ginger had ended up together.