What The Heart Finds (5 page)

“I really cared for
both of them in different ways. They were both just… always
there for me whenever I needed anything. Kind, patient…”

“Wait… we
are talking about the same Eric, right?” Lena laughed.

“I know. He wears
that sexual energy right out there for everyone to see. But he’s
genuinely a good person underneath.” Her face went a little
guilty. “Don’t ever tell him I told you that. He made me
promise to let him uphold his reputation.”

“Scouts honor,”
Lena agreed. “So what happened? Why did you end up with Sam?”

“I guess I was
being just… selfish dating them both. I knew Eric had strong
feelings for me and I kept going to him even though a part of me knew
it was meant to be Sam.”

So Eric had loved Anna.
Looking at her, she could see why. Even if Anna seemed a bit too
young for him. She was just adorable and sweet, an air of innocence
hung around her like a force field. It would be hard to not love
someone like her. Even someone as aloof as Eric O’reilly must
have seen that.

“How long have you
two been together?”

“Well… about
two years. Give or take the first few months.”

“He seems like a
great guy,” Lena said, feeling a strange emptiness inside, a
nagging feeling that she was missing out on something that Anna had
obviously found for herself.

“He really is,”
Anna agreed, smiling.

A short silence hung in
the air, Anna looking off into the distance. “So how can I get
that soap of yours in the city?”

The rest of the afternoon
was a blur of meeting townspeople, eating too much food, and
pretending to avoid the ever-present eye of Eric who seemed to have
finished fixing the tractor and was carelessly lounging around, and,
surprisingly chasing around a couple of small children.

Before she had even
realized it, it was well after four in the afternoon and her stomach
was grumbling for something more substantial than cheese and
crackers. She looked around for Maude, realizing it had been a long
time since she spotted her.

“Hey Anna,”
she called, walking over to her and Sam. She was leaning against his
chest, his arm around her stomach. “Have you seen Maude
anywhere? She was my ride…”

“Oh,” Anna
said, moving away from her husband and looking around. “You
know… I haven’t seen her in a while.”

“She couldn’t
possibly have… forgotten me,” Lena said, her eyebrows
drawing together.

“Hey,” a
familiar voice said just behind her shoulder. “Maude made me
promise to get you back to town safely,” Eric said, his tone
casual.

“She actually left
me?” Lena asked, turning around with shock.

“Seems that way,
baby,” he said, drawing out the last word.

“Well thank you,
but no. I will find another way back.”

“I can,” Sam
started to break in.

Anna quickly grabbed
Sam’s arm, whispering under her breath something about two
years. Sam looked down at her for a second blankly, before turning to
Lena and Eric, nodding slightly.

“No one else seems
ready to leave yet,” Anna said, her tone almost squeaky. “And
Eric promises to be on his best behavior.” She looked over at
him, an eyebrow raised. “Don’t you, Eric?”

“Oh yeah,”
Eric said, smiling at her sweetly. “Perfect angel.”

Lena rolled her eyes,
looking up at him. “Alright, fine,” she said with the
same enthusiasm as if he told her he was taking her to get a tooth
pulled. “Sam,” she said, turning back, her voice
pleasant. “I had a really great time. And Anna… it was…
enlightening,” she said carefully.

Eric extended an arm out
as if inviting her to go with him. She looked at him sideways for a
second before falling into step beside him. “Nope, this way,”
he said as they rounded the house, putting his hand on her lower
back.

She felt the pressure,
her spine straightening against the flutter she felt in her stomach.
He had to stop touching her.

“So are you
enjoying some of our small town charm?” he asked.

“Some parts more
than others,” she said, stepping out of arms-length. “Anna
is really nice,” she said, knowing it was cruel and silently
cursed herself for saying it.

“Yeah,” Eric
said, looking at her from under lowered lashes. “she is. So you
want to be dropped back at the inn?” he asked, opening the
passenger door of a black pick-up truck.

“Yeah I have a lot
of work to do,” she said, her eyes widening. Good one, Lena.
“You know… on my laptop.”

“Aren’t you
supposed to be on vacation?” Eric asked, sliding into the
driver’s seat and turning the truck over.

Lena pulled her seat
belt, feeling it get stuck. “Yeah. But… I can never
leave work at work,” she said, pulling harder at the belt.

“Yeah, I can see
that being true,” he said, his voice teasing. “Here,”
he said, leaning across the seat, reaching for the stuck seat belt.

And then her was right
there, his face lowered down eye-level with her breasts as he reached
behind her for the belt. She held her breath, looking down at the top
of his head, his hair shiny. One of his hands was planted on the seat
right next to her hip, pressing against her leg. The other was on her
other side, pulling until the belt finally released. “There,”
he said, turning his face up toward her, his cheek grazing her
breast. His face was serious for a moment, his eyes seeking hers.
“Breathe, Lena,” he said, her name like a secret on his
lips. He looked at her for another short second before clicking the
seat belt into the holder and moving abruptly away from her.

As soon as he was back in
his seat, Lena let the painful air out of her chest, feeling more
than a little frazzled. She turned away from him, watching out the
window as they slowly moved down the road. She opened the window, the
wind feeling good on her suddenly flushed face. By the time they
passed the other small farm, the silence was getting uncomfortable.
She shifted in her seat, reaching for the stereo.

“Nuh-uh, darlin’,”
Eric said, slapping her hand away. “No one touches the radio
but me.”

She looked at him, one
pale eyebrow raised expectantly.

He glanced at her for a
second then smiled, switching the radio on and turning the volume up.
Lena sank back against the seat, feeling some of the tension slip
away. She needed to get a grip. Pull herself together. She wasn’t
the kind of woman to get so worked up over some random man.

It wasn’t like she
was some starry-eyed virgin, capable of being charmed by any silver
tongued devil that crossed her path. She had had a few flings in her
time.

But, she reminded herself
silently, in those situations she had always been the one in charge.
The one to initiate, the one to lay down ground rules. She wasn’t
used to being pursued or whatever it was that Eric O’reilly was
trying to do.

“So what kind of
work do you do? Judging by the clothes, I am assuming it is in an
office.”

“What is wrong with
my clothes?” Lena looked down at herself. She was always put
together, neat. Professional.

“Just an
observation,” he said, shaking his head. “Don’t go
getting your panties in a twist.”

“You have no effect
on my panties,” she said, looking at his profile.

He glanced at her
quickly, his eyes intense. “Don’t I?”

And, damn him, he did.
But there was no way she was going to admit to that. “Nope,”
she said, thankfully seeing the inn coming into view.

Eric pulled up front,
cutting off the engine and hopping out of the car, crushing any hope
she had that he was just going to let her hop out and leave. Before
she had even unbuckled herself, Eric was there opening her door. He
reached a hand up to her.

“I can help myself
down,” she said, reaching for the door handle and lowering her
feet down onto the narrow step-up bar. The slippery underside of her
heels slipped on the metal surface and she felt a horrible sinking
feeling in her stomach, knowing she was going to fall.

“You sure about
that?” Eric asked, grabbing her and hauling her against his
chest. He held her there, her feet dangling just a few inches above
the ground.

“You can put me
down now,” she said, her voice breathless and she knew it was
from more than the fear of falling.

“Sure, I could,”
he said, but didn’t.

“And you aren’t
because…”

“Because I don’t
want to,” he said simply, smiling down at her for a second
before finally putting her back down on the ground.

“Right,” she
said, smoothing her hands down her shirt. “well… thank
you for the ride,” she said, moving onto the sidewalk, feeling
awkward.

“Anytime,” he
said, his eyes suddenly far away. “Well baby, go catch up on
work. I’ll see you around.”

And then he was gone,
taking off on foot back toward his shop. She looked at his truck for
a moment, before shaking her head and going toward the front door.

She needed to get some
kind of information to send back to EM.

Five

She ran up to her room,
slipping into a pair of flats, before making her way back down to
look around a bit. She still hadn’t seen Emily; the young man
was at the front desk, his fingers flying over the keypad of his
phone.

Walking past him, she
made her way down the hall. Past the dining room which was empty
except a server sitting at a table carefully counting out his tips.

Lena reached the door to
the staff quarters, trying the doorknob and finding it unlocked. She
felt her heartbeat whooshing in her ears, loud and disconcerting. She
wasn’t the kind of person meant to be sneaking around. The
thick threat of nausea settled in her throat, hard to swallow
through.

She stepped down the
hallway, finding a small closet full of cleaning supplies. There was
only two other doors on either side of a window.

“Can I help you?”
Emily’s voice broke in, sharp, irritated.

“Oh,” Lena
said, jumping before turning to her with a clumsy smile. “Emily.
I was looking for you. Sorry. I didn’t know where I could find
you…” Emily had her arms crossed over her chest, an
eyebrow raised as if suspicious. “I haven’t seen you all
day. I was… excited about the tour of the grounds,” she
said, hoping her voice was steady enough to be believable.

Emily eyed her
suspiciously for an agonizing moment before releasing her hands to
her side, and forcing a smile. “Of course. We can go do that
right now,” she said, leading her back into the hallway. “Devon
here,” she said, waving a hand at the young man at the desk.
“is really just decoration.”

“Yes,” he
said, finally looking up from his phone and smiling charmingly. “I
just brighten up the room, don’t you think?”

Emily smiled at him,
opening the front door and Lena fell into step beside her. “I
don’t know why he insists on working here,” she said,
filling the awkward silence. “he’s actually from one of
the richest families in town. I guess it gets him out of the house.”

Lena looked back over her
shoulder at him and he winked. She turned back to Emily, laughing.
“How old is he?”

“Oh, he’s a
baby,” she said, affectionately. It occurred to her then that
everyone in this town knew each other. Probably right from the
cradle. Like a big family. “I think he’s about twenty
now. He’s working on some kind of art project. Hence the phone
all the time. If you ever need anything, don’t feel bad
interrupting him. He’s just lost in his own world. He’s
actually happy to help.”

“I’ll keep
that in mind,” Lena said, silently wondering what it must be
like to be lost in a world that wasn’t dictated by outside
forces. Her whole life was controlled by the company she worked for.

“If you follow the
white ribbons,” Emily said, pointing to trees wrapped with
ribbons. “they will lead you through the woods and bring you
out on the other side of town. They are walking trails only. We have
separate ones for the horse trails. Come on, I’ll show you the
stables.”

Lena had never had much
of a chance to see animals outside of pet stores growing up. Living
in a city where wildlife was severely controlled, she hadn’t
ever actually seen a horse up close and personal.

“Oh wow,” she
said, stepping into the barn, smelling strongly of fresh hay.

“Yeah,” Emily
agreed, reaching into a bag hanging on the wall and offering the
closest horse a sugar cube from the palm of her hand. “there’s
nothing like a good horseback ride to clear your head. You
interested?”

“Oh,” Lena
said, looking over at the animals with a sinking feeling. “I
don’t…”

“Come on,”
Emily said, smiling encouragingly. “you only live once, right?
You can scratch this off your bucket list.”

Lena laughed. “But
it wasn’t on my bucket list.”

“So you write it on
your bucket list and then scratch it off,” Emily said, rolling
her eyes comically. “Alec,” she called off into the
stable though there didn’t appear to be anyone around.