The only way we were going to be able to work together, to get past the roadblock of the past, was if I was completely honest with her. I finally had to tell her how entwined in the memories I had of her—both good and bad—I still was.

I told her in a husky tone shaded by the past, “I was excited to show them to you. They made me feel like I used to back in the day. I loved drawing stuff for you to look at. No one else ever gave a shit about it, but you always loved it—told me to stick with it if I enjoyed it. I don’t think I would be any kind of artist today if it wasn’t for you, Salem.” I lifted an eyebrow at her as she crossed her arms over her ample chest. “Thank you.”

“Oh, Rowdy.” She shook her head. “It was all you. You were always great. It’s so sad you didn’t have an army of people to tell you that every single day when you were little.”

“No. I just had you.” I walked over so that I was directly across from her with only the counter of the kitchen between us. “I feel like you and the past have been chasing me down ever since you walked into that shop, Salem.” She didn’t answer me but I noticed a little pink work its way into her dusky cheeks. “What are you going to do if I decide to let you catch me?”

I was fast, but she was right, off the field I did tend to stumble here and there, but for the first time in a long time I felt like I just might have found my footing, and with it, I suddenly wanted to walk right up to her.

CHAPTER 6

Salem

WHAT WAS I GOING TO DO when I caught him? That was easy. Strip him bare—both physically and emotionally, and then I was never going to let him go. I didn’t think he was ready for me to be that honest, though, so I told him, “I’m going to find out why you’re running from me.” I tilted my head to side and asked him point-blank, “Are you still in love with my sister, Rowdy? I need to know that story.”

After his reaction when she called me the other day, it was something that had been on my mind and poking me under the skin endlessly. I knew he had cared deeply for Poppy, and that in her usual way my sister had let my dad’s decisions function as her own. What I didn’t know was if he was still hung up on her, and still pining away for something that had never even had a chance. His youthful infatuation following him into adulthood seemed unlikely after so much time. But if that was the case, then no matter how much I wanted him, or how badly I wanted the wonderful thing I just knew we’d have together, there was no way I was fighting memories or the ghost of my sister to have it. I had too much pride and valued myself far too much to do that. I wasn’t going to compete with his idea of first love, not when the person was very much alive and an integral part of my life.

I’d tried to pull the answers out of Poppy the other day, but she was skittish and had blown past the topic like it didn’t matter. Something was going on with her. She told me she was busy and that she couldn’t talk and hung up on me after only a few minutes of conversation. That wasn’t like her and it amped my concern for her up ten notches.

I watched Rowdy carefully as he set the papers he had in his hand on the counter and walked around to the side I was on. He didn’t stop walking until he was right in front of me and I stiffened in an automatic response when he caged me in with an arm on either side of my hips. His head dipped down a little so that we were eye to eye, and I swore I could drown in that blue ocean of his gaze forever. His blond hair was lighter than normal without all the junk he usually put in it to style it up in that pompadour he wore, and the way it fell across his forehead made him look like that little boy who’d always made me so happy in those lost years. My fingers itched to reach up and push it away. They itched to touch him in any way he would allow.

He leaned a little closer to me and I felt his breath move the bloodred hair at my temple.

“I asked Poppy to marry me. I was eighteen, had the world at me feet, and was pretty much guaranteed a shot at playing pro football. I offered her everything and she told me she considered me her brother. She looked me dead in the eye and told me no matter what I did it would never be enough because your parents wouldn’t approve because they knew where I came from. That I wasn’t the right guy for her.”

I felt his chest expand and his breath hitch as dark blue clouds shadowed his hot stare. His lips touched my skin right next to my eyebrow and I was stunned my glasses didn’t fog up from the all heat he was generating. But while I was admittedly getting turned on, I also felt like everything inside of me where my heart and hope lived had turned into stone.

Rowdy asked Poppy to marry him? That was the first I had ever heard of that and I felt like it was life changing. They were both so young. I always assumed it was just puppy love but apparently his feelings for my little sister had been much more complex than I remembered or believed them to be.

“You asked her to marry you?” I wanted to shove him away from me. I really wanted to grab my sweet little puppy and run all the way to someplace where Rowdy St. James was lost back in my memories and I didn’t have this new information hammering away inside of me.

“I did. Poppy didn’t just say no, she took everything I thought I knew about love and ripped it apart from the inside out. The pieces of my heart were so tiny when she was done with me I didn’t bother to look for them. So no, Salem. I am not still in love with Poppy. She broke me and I haven’t bothered to try and love anyone since.”

I couldn’t take it anymore. I put both of my hands on the center of his chest and shoved him away from me. I felt like I needed to escape, like his words were building a cage around all the grandiose ideas I had been following when I left Vegas.

“She never told me. We talked all the time back then, and not once did she tell me that you f**king asked her to marry her.”

I was watching the fantasy I had of showing him that there was so much more to us now that we were older disappear into smoke. I felt like he had just pulled a quarterback sneak and I was on the defense looking like an idiot while he ran the ball into the end zone. I never would have come here, never would have made myself at home if I had known just how barbed the ties were that held him anchored to the past.

I spun around to glare at him and to tell him to leave, but it got lost as I gasped in surprise because he had followed me and was once again all up in my personal space. He gripped my upper arms and hauled me up onto my toes.

“You started all of this, Salem. You don’t get to back away just because you don’t like what’s hiding in the dark once the light you’re shining hits it.”