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“What?”

“There’s nothing wrong with you. If that was flirting, then...it worked. Okay?” She felt fluttery and hot. “Because that was the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

“I don’t think, somehow, that most of the women in this room would agree.”

“Well. I’ve never been like most anyone in the room.”

“I appreciate that.”

“Do you? I never got the idea that you did.”

“The reason I appreciate it is because I’m not like everybody else in the room now. I used to be, though. And I’m finding the transition a little bit difficult. If you can show me the way, then maybe I won’t get lost.”

“I think you’re leading,” she said, heart thundering wildly.

She wanted to kiss him.

The thought stopped her short, like hitting a brick wall.

She wanted to kiss him because he was beautiful. Because she wanted him.

Not because he was a stranger in the woods, something tied more to fantasy than reality. She wanted to kiss him because he was Gideon. And all the reasons she’d had before for not doing it seemed like they didn’t matter. Seemed pointless.

She wanted it.

And that felt like enough.

But she wasn’t sure she was brave enough. At least not yet.

The song ended, and they went back to the bar. She felt like her heart was in her throat.

Some women came over and started talking to him, and she felt toxic, raging jealousy well up in her chest, and she hated that. Because all jealousy was a sense of heightened inadequacy, and she was well familiar with that and didn’t enjoy it in the least.

“Sorry,” said one of them. “I don’t think we’ve been introduced to your girlfriend.”

“She’s a friend. Rory Sullivan, her family is part of the Four Corners crew.”

One of the women looked interested.

“How does that work?” she asked. “I’ve aways been so curious.”

Rory cleared her throat. “Well, it works because we all run it as a collective. We have a common goal, and we pool our money and resources to help each other. It makes it so we cover any shortfalls. Makes it so that all the branches are functioning. Recently we opened the farm store...” She studied the woman closely. She still looked interested.

“We opened the farm store. And that’s bringing a lot of new revenue. It’s been a really exciting time.”

“It sounds like it,” said the woman, and she sounded like she meant it, which was incredible as far as Rory was concerned.

So much for making people think they were together, though. He’d dropped that as soon as those women came over.

And she tried not to feel acidic about it, because what was the point?

She turned away from them as one of the women put her hand on his bicep, and as she did a man approached her. He was tall, though not as tall as Gideon, muscular, though not as muscular as Gideon. Handsome, but not... Well. He wasn’t Gideon, was the thing. But he was a nice-looking man, and probably a little bit closer to her age.

“Hey,” he said. “Thought maybe you were attached, but it doesn’t seem like you are.”

“I’m not,” she said.

“Good to know. So, you’re from around here?”