Once in a Lifetime(51)

He went with her. He could have gone back to Luke and Jack. He could have gone home. He had no reason to stick with Aubrey. No reason except that he wanted to.

They walked off the pier, and she kept going. Past Eat Me, the Love Shack, the post office, the flower shop, the bakery, her own bookstore. They walked the length of Commercial Row and ended up at the rec center.

“You’ve been working here,” Aubrey said. “With the kids.”

He nodded.

“I heard you’ve turned Craft Corner into a huge success,” she said. “Leah said more kids show up each time.”

He wasn’t comfortable with taking the credit. “I’ve gone twice. And it’s all Jack’s doing.”

Her expression said she wasn’t fooled. “You’re enjoying it.”

What the hell. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m enjoying it.” He was still surprised at that. But when he’d gone for the second time a few days ago, the director had found out he was certified as an EMT and had asked him to be a staff member. They’d given him a key to the building and a big welcome in lieu of a stipend. Which was fine. His old job—the one that was now going to be his new job—would provide a surprisingly decent salary.

“And you took your old job back,” Aubrey said, as if reading his mind. “You start soon.”

He laughed low in his throat at the power of Lucky Harbor’s gossip mill. “Leah?” he asked. “Or Ali?”

She laughed, too, a little guiltily, he thought. “Facebook,” she admitted. She paused for a long beat, studying the rec center quietly. “If Hannah were still alive, you’d probably have a bushel of kids enjoying this place by now.”

A few years ago, just the thought would’ve given Ben a stab of pain. But whoever had said that time heals wounds had actually been right. His wounds were healing. Their gazes met. “Most people tiptoe around the subject of my dead wife.”

“I don’t tiptoe very well.”

No, she didn’t. It was wrong of him to even try to compare the two women. It was wrong to compare anyone to Hannah. Especially since, with her death, her image had changed in his mind, and her imperfections had faded. He knew that it was simply a coping technique, and that it probably wasn’t all that healthy. But Hannah had always been his calm, his eye in the storm, his refuge. She’d had such a quiet, soothing energy, and it’d suited his adventurous soul well.

He hadn’t been lying when he told her he’d been with women since Hannah, but his attention wasn’t captured. He’d not been tempted to go for another relationship.

Not once in five years.

So the fact that he was suddenly, irrationally tempted by Aubrey made absolutely no sense to him, not a single lick. Aubrey was…not quiet. Not soothing. She was wild and unpredictable.

Hannah’s virtual opposite.

Aubrey was watching him now, with those hazel eyes that seemed to see far more than he wanted anyone to.

“Show me what you’ve done with the kids here,” she said.

He grimaced. “It’s not all that impressive.”

“Show me.”



He pulled a set of keys from his pocket and opened the door for her. The place was empty, closed up for the night. Leaving the lights off, he took her hand and led her down the darkened hallway to the room he’d been using. The moonlight slanted into the classroom through the wall of windows, illuminating a series of hanging dream catchers. He’d been taught how to make them by the children on a Native American reservation in Montana when he’d been there several years ago after a devastating flood.

“Pretty,” she whispered, standing there in the dark room.

Sadness seemed to come off her in waves. Sadness and…loneliness. God, she was killing him. “Aubrey.”

“You give back,” she whispered. “You were gone for five years, and still you came home to a place that loves you and you found a way to give back to your town.”

“You’re trying to give back,” he said.

She didn’t respond to this, didn’t confirm or deny. Or even move. So he moved instead, closer to her, putting a hand low on her back, letting her know he was there. “Tell me what happened tonight.”

“It’s not important,” she said, and shifted to move away, but he caught her.

“It is to me,” he said. “Talk to me.”

“Sometimes,” she murmured quietly into the night, her head turned away from him, resting on his shoulder. “I feel like a really bad person.”

He stroked a hand down her back, physically aching for her. He’d like to tell her she was a really great person, but she wouldn’t believe him. The only thing he could do to coax her out of this mood was to do something he was really good at—which was annoy her. “You’re not all that bad,” he said.

She went still, and then snorted. “And maybe you’re not a total first-class jerk.”

“Oh, I’m still a first-class jerk.”

She lifted her head. “No,” she whispered.

“Yes. Here’s why.” And he kissed her.





Chapter 19



Aubrey was never prepared for what Ben’s kiss did to her. It was like she spent ninety-nine percent of her time walking around in a black-and-white world, and then when he kissed her, colors bled into her vision like a painting.