Playing for Keeps (Heartbreaker Bay #7)(67)

“I’d like to talk to her.”

“Why?” Rocco asked, shoveling in another bite of his salad and crunching aggressively.

Caleb blew out a breath. “She told you.”

“She told me things were fucked up.”

“Yeah,” Caleb said. “And I’m here to apologize.”

Rocco and Mini Moe looked at each other in surprise.

“What?” Caleb asked. “What’s so weird about that?”

“Nothing,” Rocco said. “Except I don’t think a guy she’s been into has ever cared enough to apologize for anything.”

He’d guessed as much, but hearing it made Caleb feel like an even bigger dick. “Does that mean you’ll tell me where she is?”

“Apparently, he’ll tell you anything you want,” Sadie said darkly from behind him and he turned to find her standing in the opened doorway to the back rooms.

“And,” she said to Rocco, “you know what else is gluten free? Shutting up.” She turned to Caleb, cool and remote.

“Hey,” he said quietly.

Sadie didn’t acknowledge this. She simply glared at Rocco and Mini Moe.

Rocco offered his fork with a grape on it.

She shook her head. “I don’t consume wine in pill form.”

Rocco shrugged and went back to eating.

Caleb handed her the travel tumbler he’d stopped for, filled with her favorite coffee.

She eyed the container and the words on it:

I like my coffee black like my soul.



She gave a reluctant smile.

“Can we talk?” he asked and felt a déjà vu since only an hour ago she’d told him they needed to talk. That hadn’t gone so well. He was hoping this went better.

But she hesitated. He actually thought she was going to turn him down flat, but she finally nodded and jerked her chin toward her workstation. She yanked the curtain around her area and pulled herself up to sit on the counter. Her body language said Closed Off as she sipped the coffee he’d brought her, watching him from eyes that weren’t giving much away.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “You were right about what was happening, but I want you to know I didn’t ask for you to be vetted. I wouldn’t have done that without telling you first. My sisters are going to cease and desist and leave you the hell alone. If you want to be done with this, with me, I’ll understand, but I hope that you’ll give me another chance.”

She stared at him for a long beat and he stared back, wishing he could get a bead on what she was thinking.

“Did you get filled in on whatever they dug up about me?” she finally asked.

“No.” This was the utter truth and it would remain so. He had zero intention of reading the file sitting in his unopened e-mail.

She processed this for a long moment and then nodded again.

“Go out with me,” he said.

She gave him a long look. “We already had a date.”

“So let’s check date number two off the list.”

She sipped some more coffee, not nearly as composed as she wanted to be because he could see her hands shaking. “My list doesn’t have a date number two on it,” she said.

“What does your list have on it?”

“A lot of things.” She ticked the points off her fingers. “One, men suck. Two, dump any men in my life. Three, men suck. The rest of the list isn’t important right now.” She set down the mug and slid off the counter.

He caught her by the hand when she went to walk away. “Are we done then, Sadie? Is that what you’re saying?”

She stared into his eyes and said nothing.

His heart did a belly flop, but he nodded. He’d told her he would understand, and he stood by his word. Regardless of the way his heart threw itself against his ribcage, he let go of her hand and turned and walked out.





Chapter 22





#UnderHerSkin



Watching Caleb walk away, Sadie stood stock-still for several seconds in rare indecision. He’d told her he could be emotionally detached, and she’d believed him.

But she would bet the bank that she was better at it than he was. Except . . . normally when she detached and made a decision on someone, she never looked back. Sometimes it was an emotional cut, such as with the previous men she’d let in. They’d had to go for her mental health. Same with her family. She still saw them, she participated as a family member, but after all that had happened during her rough teenage years, she’d cut off their ability to hurt her.

The problem was, emotionally detaching in one area of her life had slowly bled into other areas as well, until she’d been emotionally detached from just about everything.

Until Caleb.

He’d come along and pulled her into his vortex, stripping her emotionally naked far before he’d ever gotten her clothes off. The truth was, she didn’t want to be emotionally detached from him. But here was the thing, she wasn’t sure how to be anything other than who she was. And deep down inside, she wasn’t sure that who she was would be, could be, enough.

Still, she was a scrappy sort of survivor and knew how to change up a situation to her favor when she needed to. And this was most definitely a situation she wanted to change up. She’d overreacted and worse, she’d let him walk away thinking she didn’t want him. So she grabbed Lollipop’s backpack, urged the dog into it, and then shouldered the pack. Then she ran out of the shop past a startled Rocco, Mini Me, and Blue.