All I Am. Nicole Helm
he need to know? But it was like a beacon. He couldn’t look away—
“It’s a bluebird.”
“Huh?”
She turned in the chair to meet his gaze. “My tattoo you’re staring at. It’s a bluebird.”
“Oh, um.” Could he be any more of an idiot? Stuttering and um-ing all over the place.
She grinned. “For what it’s worth, I don’t have any rules. So, you can look at it. You can even ask about it if you want.”
“I was trying to figure out what it was. You’ve told me now. A bluebird. Okay.”
“All right. Anything else you want to ask me?”
“Anything else?”
“You know, what I consider my biggest weakness, what’s one word that best describes me, my hobbies. How I feel about interoffice dating.”
She smiled at him. A flirty smile. While he could recognize when someone was flirting with him, it always put him on edge and he never knew how to respond.
That kind of jokey flirting might be innocent, but in his experience, it was the kind used to ridicule him if he ever responded positively.
So he crossed his arms over his chest, standing at attention minus the salute. “No.”
“Right. Well. Suit yourself.” She gave a little wave and turned to go. It was only because he saw the loaner dog kit that he even remembered why she’d come in the first place.
“Cara?”
“Yeah?”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?”
She furrowed her brow, patting her pockets.
“Sweetness.”
“Oh, right.” She slapped a palm to her forehead comically. “She’s what I came for. Not to hound you into giving me a job.”
She seemed almost embarrassed. Of course, she didn’t stutter, and she didn’t stop smiling. “Guess I got distracted,” she said easily, sauntering over to pick up the loaner kit.
Yeah, she might get embarrassed, maybe, but she certainly wasn’t a basket case like him and the every-other-day reminder would do him a world of good.
* * *
CARA DUG THROUGH the loaner kit on her passenger side floorboard, pulling out a leash and attaching it to Sweetness’s collar.
“Home, sweet home, Sweet,” she said to the white ball of fur as she maneuvered them out of the car. “Well, temporary home.” She walked the dog along the patch of grass next to her apartment building until Sweetness did her business.
Even with the dog in tow, loneliness washed over her. She hated living alone. It gave her too much time to think, live in her own head, come up short.
Boo.
But Mia had moved out and none of her friends could up and move in. Cara’s only other choice was moving home with Mom and Dad, and with Anna headed off to college in the fall, Cara would rather be alone for years.
“Come on, girl.” She climbed the stairs to her front door and balanced the bin against it as she worked to get the key into the finicky, ancient lock. It made her think about Wes dropping the bin earlier.
He didn’t limp or look as though he had injuries that continued to be painful, but he had scars and had dropped something light. So, he was injured, and it was probably permanent.
And she was the jerk crying over a failed pie interview. Ugh.
Once inside, she knelt down and unclipped Sweetness’s leash. “You’re probably hungry and thirsty, aren’t you, girl?” She gathered the bin and went to the kitchen to fill up the dog bowls.
Man, Wes had thought of everything. She didn’t know how anyone could be that organized in some things and so disorganized in others.
She flipped the tap on and began filling the first bowl with water. Above the sink she had all Grandma’s pie tins displayed. Some days it was a comfort to have pieces of Grandma right there in plain sight.
On not-so-great days, it reminded her of the hole in her life since Grandma passed away.
She ran her finger over the edge of the starburst pie tin. Regret and failure lumped together in her stomach. “Sorry I suck so bad, Grandma.”
She cringed. She didn’t need a ghost to knock her over the head to know Grandma would not approve of Cara being so down on herself.
Whereas her sisters and parents beat around the bush of her failures, pretending she could overcome it, Grandma had refused to see it. Had given Cara a lot of crap anytime she dared pity herself.
Something about that reminded Cara of Wes.
“I have a bad feeling about your daddy,” she told the dog curled up on her couch. “He’s going to cause me trouble.” Which was something she normally thrived on, but something about Wes...
The gruffness, the scars, the blushing and stuttering. The way he hadn’t pitied her or made the crying worse when she’d first arrived. Just explained Phantom was a therapy dog.
For him. The last thing she needed was to get wrapped up in a guy who needed therapy. She was barely holding on herself.
She put the now-full bowls on the tile by the door, then settled on the couch. Sweetness sniffed the bowls, then hopped up next to her.
She felt broody. About everything. And, well, brooding was not her norm. Usually she went out to drink or laugh away any brooding, but today she was tired. Tired because she’d gotten up so dang early for the market, tired because she’d imploded at her interview and tired because everyone seemed to be a couple. Mia, her friends.
She hadn’t been on more than two dates with the same guy since Kevin. Oh, that one still burned a little bit. She had no qualms about casual relationships or even casual sex, but she had some serious qualms about being the girl a guy used to get back at his girlfriend.
Now fiancée.
Grr.
Sweetness crawled into her lap, and Cara scratched behind her ears. “Are you going to be my therapy dog, girl?” Sweetness licked her chin, and she couldn’t deny the fact that she might need it.
“KNOCK, KNOCK!”
Wes tensed. Okay, he’d already been tense. He’d carried that tension around all morning, knowing Cara was going to show up today and invade.
He’d tended to the animals, worked out, showered and eaten breakfast, knowing that she would be all up in his space not just today, but three days a week, every week, for as long as she wanted or as long as he could stand it.
Her references had been mostly glowing. Cara was good at customer service. She was organized and dependable as long as she wasn’t tasked with too stressful of a project.
Those were the things he needed, and he didn’t have stressful projects because he refused to let stress into his business. The fact she interacted so well with his dogs helped. That, and you’d like to see her naked.
He snorted at his own inner monologue. Not gonna happen, buddy.
So, two weeks and a few phone calls after she’d offered herself up for the job, here she was. His assistant.
Without a response from him, Cara appeared in his office with Sweetness on a leash. A sparkly purple leash. Definitely not the one he’d packed in the loaner kit.
Then he saw the scarf.
“What the hell is that?” he demanded, pointing at the offensive swath of fabric.
Cara