Lizbeth was quiet the whole ride home.
She didn’t say a word except a warm, “Thank you for picking me up,” and “It was okay.” Once back at Adventura, I helped her carry her packages to her cabin, then she thanked me again and closed the door before I could offer to build up her fire.
I hovered there for a second, torn.
Had something happened?
Was she really okay?
The urge to knock on her door and ask again almost overwhelmed me, but I pushed it down. Finally, I reluctantly retreated. The sound of paws on snow joined me as I looped around the office to enter from the front. Justin and Atticus were there. Atty greeted me with a quick lick on the hand.
“Everything all right?” Justin asked, studying me.
“Fine.”
But I wasn’t fine. I was worried and pissed and annoyed that I was worried and pissed. Justin hesitated, then nodded. He and Atticus headed back toward his cabin while I trekked to the kitchen. If I couldn’t climb, I could make and knead some dough for breakfast tomorrow. That would release some of this . . . tension.
The next day, Lizbeth started work before Mark and I woke up. When I made it down the ladder, she was sitting in Mark’s desk chair, her hair in a single ponytail over her right shoulder. A coffee mug sat on the desk next to her. She wore no makeup today. The flicker of light on her pale lashes fascinated me.
“Morning, Lizbeth.”
She waved distractedly but didn’t take her gaze off the laptop. “Good morning.”
A pile of papers sat next to her computer. Probably waiting to be scanned. How long had she been awake? The coffee was already lukewarm.
Once in the kitchenette, I paused. Something looked different. Before I could figure it out, Mark slipped down the ladder.
“I think we’ll be able to close on the pizza shop today,” he said as he yanked a jacket on and stepped into a pair of boots at the same time. “I’m late, see ya!”
He dashed out the door. Lizbeth glanced up, then back down. I turned back to the kitchen, completely confused. What was different? Wait, were our curtains a different color? At one point they’d been Mark’s old Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle pillowcases, but we’d swapped them out for the far classier old beige.
As I poured my coffee, stumped, Lizbeth broke the strained silence. Words flew out of her like they’d been stuffed inside waiting to get out.
“It totally sucked.”
My head popped up.
She stood behind Mark’s desk, hands planted on the papers in front of her, glaring at me.
“What?”
“The date.”
She straightened, arms folded across her middle. Her eyebrows knitted together as she swallowed hard.
“He . . . Tyler . . . might as well have walked out of a romance novel. Everything was perfect. His hair. His voice. He even smelled the way I’d imagined an alpha billionaire—or maybe just a millionaire—would smell.”
To give myself something to do, I had a sip of hot coffee. An alpha billionaire? What was she talking about? The scalding feeling in the back of my throat felt better than the one inside my chest. Lizbeth, on a roll, kept going. Except now she was pacing behind the desk and making almost no sense at all.
“He gave me roses. There were candles on the table. Curtains. Can you believe that? Curtains, JJ. And rose petals. The violinist?”
My brow lifted.
“Oh yeah,” she said before I could utter a sound. “Rose. Petals.”
Another hot sip that burned, burned, burned.
“Then he was so intense and . . . he ordered for me in French . . . and he insisted I was safe. I mean, elk chop? C’mon! I’m clearly a pasta girl! But, of course, I probably wasn’t safe. Or maybe I was and we just weren’t suited? I don’t know, he was angry at the end.”
“He what?”
She waved a hand. “He didn’t touch me. But . . . that freaking walking violin was distracting me and . . . it was . . . so weird. I’ve read that date a hundred times. I used to love alpha-billionaire novels—”
What was she talking about?
“But now?”
She threw her hands in the air.
I paused, my mug halfway to my lips. The silence told me she wanted me to say something, but I could barely keep up with her fragmented thoughts.
“Can I get this straight?” I asked.
She gestured with a wave of her hand again.
“So he was handsome?”
Emphatic nod.
“He gave you flowers.”
Another nod.
“He picked a romantic setting. There was a violin playing in the background?”
Another nod, this one more tentative. She chewed on her bottom lip.
“And you hated it?” I asked.
“Yes.”
This didn’t add up. If a guy like that couldn’t pull off romance, the rest of us lowly suckers were clearly doomed.
“Why?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
She said it with such desperation, such soulful despair, that I couldn’t stop myself from setting aside my coffee and closing the distance between us. She stood there, bottom lip between her teeth, and watched me approach.
I stopped a foot away. “Why are you so sad?” I whispered.
“Because that should have been the most romantic date of my life. It was classic, storybook romance. Straight out of one of my favorite novels.”
“And you didn’t like it.”
She nodded, then ran a hand over her eyes and collapsed into the chair behind her. “It’s . . . frustrating. I’ve had two very romantic experiences recently, and neither of them felt the way they were supposed to.” She faltered for a moment before adding quietly, “They were just too real to be romantic at the time. It’s disorienting.”
“Please tell me that one of them wasn’t seeing your cabin free of mice for the first time?”
Her lips twitched. “That wasn’t it.”
“Good.”
A hint of her usual lightness reassured me. Somehow, I suppressed the urge to ask what her other romantic experience was. Instead, I crouched in front of her. The feeling of her skin on mine when I put a hand under her chin sent a little shiver through me.
“It was just one date, Lizbeth. You don’t have to give up on romance because of one date.”
“Says you?”
“Says me.”
A half smile teased her lips. “I’m not giving up on romance. I’m just frustrated that it hasn’t felt the way I wanted it to. But maybe that’s just reality.”
“That’s fair.”
“When I lived with my dad, romance books were the only things that felt safe. He’d be drunk. I’d hear him breaking things. Threatening to hurt Ellie. Screaming Mama’s name. Sometimes he’d come after us. Sometimes he’d go after Ellie, but I’d get in his way. The only thing that really took me away from him was my books.”
“Where you felt safe,” I whispered.
She nodded.
Well, that totally sucked. Love wasn’t just some breezy distraction for her. Romance had actually saved her life. The revelation of life with her father was new to me. It explained so much.
When I imagined a bruise coloring her porcelain cheeks, I forced myself to take a deep breath. I needed to climb. Rise above this rage and get it out in a safe way so she didn’t see it in me.
This was about her.
A hint of color pinked her cheeks, and she chuckled self-consciously. “Sorry. This is . . . I’m sorry. I just couldn’t stop thinking about it and . . . had to let you know that maybe you’re right.” She drew in a deep breath and met my gaze. “I fully concede a point to you in our debate, JJ.”
With that, she withdrew. Her warmth and smell drifted past me before the back door closed. I balled my hands into fists and let out a long, steady breath.
That was one point I’d give back all day long.