Again, he told himself his attraction to her must be due to the long, cold year he’d had without female companionship. No sex, and no dates either. Not since the horrible night of Chelsea’s accident.
His family, he knew, was still worried about him, though none of them had outright said anything in recent months. They didn’t have to speak their concerns out loud when their glances spoke volumes.
Stepping inside his house, he decided that though Zara would surely be more comfortable sleeping off the booze in a bed, he didn’t want her to wake up later and worry that anything might have happened between them. It was far more likely that lightning would strike through his roof out of the bright blue sky than that they’d ever sleep together. Nonetheless, he got how iffy waking up in his bed would feel for her.
He laid her on the leather couch, propping two pillows behind her head and covering her with a blanket he’d purchased from the fiber artist in their building. Half the contents of his home had been sourced from Bar Harbor artists. He appreciated the local support he’d received from the start and was happy to give back to the maker community, especially when they were all so talented.
Zara was one of the most talented among them. Rory didn’t need glasses, but the frames she designed and manufactured sometimes made him wish he did. He had bought a handful of pairs for his cousins on the West Coast, and he’d been glad to hear that they liked them enough to pass the word on to their friends, who had subsequently also bought frames via her online sales portal.
Rory knew how hard it was to set up shop for yourself—to find the money to pay for materials, shipping, and warehouse space ninety days before your invoices were paid. In the early years, every sale counted more than your customers knew.
Keeping an eye on Zara to make sure she was doing okay, he walked into his open-plan kitchen and poured ground coffee into the machine. She’d be desperate for a cup when she woke up, and she growled at him enough on a good day for him to guess how loud her growl would be on a bad one.
Though there were hours of work waiting for him in his workshop, he mentally pushed his to-do list aside and pulled out a sketchbook. Might as well take advantage of the quiet time to get some new ideas for a bench down in black and white.
Right then, Zara’s snores ramped up. Okay, so it wasn’t exactly quiet in his house. But, even if she wasn’t someone he’d ever envisioned hanging out with, he was surprised to realize it was nice to share his home with another person. For a year, he’d kept everyone at arm’s length, until he’d had no choice but to bring the last woman on earth he’d ever thought would need his arms around her into his house.
An hour of snores turned into two. And then, abruptly, she sat up.
Her hair was sticking out on the side of her head, her cheek had an imprint of the pillow on it, and yet Rory was still struck by just how pretty she was. She was even more striking when wearing her glasses, actually. He’d noticed her beautiful features right away, but after their opening swipes at each other on her first day in the warehouse, when she’d parked in his spot and refused to move her car—and then he’d decided her expensive artisan coffee was fair game, much to her incensed chagrin—he’d done his best to ignore her looks.
“Where am I?” She squinted around the room, then at him. “And why are you here?”
CHAPTER THREE
Zara’s head spun like a retro turntable as Rory walked across the room and held out her glasses. It was a relief to put them on so that she could see more than fuzzy shapes. But while things might now be visually clear, nothing else seemed to be.
Yes, she remembered drinking most of a bottle of Prosecco. But even then, she couldn’t imagine agreeing to spend the morning chez Rory, if that was in fact where they were.
The house was gorgeous, with wood beams and dark floors and natural light spilling in from the floor-to-ceiling windows.
And wow, was that an attached lighthouse?
They were perched on the edge of the shore. The seas were calm today, but she could imagine how raw and intense it must feel to be here in the middle of a storm. It was the home of her dreams, especially when filled with his brilliantly conceived and crafted furniture.
“I couldn’t leave you snoring in the communal kitchen,” he said, finally answering her questions, “so when you wouldn’t share your address, I brought you to my house instead.” His voice sounded so loud she had to cover her ears. “Hopefully, this will help prevent a nasty hangover.” He put two aspirin, a glass of water, and a cup of coffee on the table in front of the couch.
“Too late,” she ground out, then swallowed the pills and drank every last drop of liquid.
When she was done, he pointed to his left. “The bathroom is that way if you want to…” He scanned her head to toe. “Freshen up.”
Normally, she’d come back at him with something witty and barbed, but she needed to wash the grit from her eyes and tongue first. She stood up, then when she belatedly realized her legs weren’t anywhere near close to steady, she plopped down hard on the couch again. Which made her head throb like the dickens times two.
He offered a hand to help her up, and she was about to bat it away when she realized her standard responses to Rory weren’t quite fair anymore. Not after he’d saved her from making a complete ass of herself in front of their six colleagues at the warehouse.
Clasping his hand with her own, she let him haul her to her feet and hold her steady.
“Okay?” he asked, looking genuinely concerned.
She nodded. It wasn’t lying if she was simply answering his question about how her legs were doing supporting her weight.
It was everything else that wasn’t okay. Not only that her stepsister and ex were taking the next step toward their forever—but also that she wasn’t absolutely hating Rory’s touch.
On the contrary, judging by the thrill bumps popping up over her skin, a part of her loved it.
The shock of that realization should have had her yanking her hand from his. But it was so much easier to lean on him as he led her toward the bathroom than it would have been trying to grit it out on her own. She was stubborn, but she wasn’t stupid.
Once they reached the threshold, she said, “I’ve got it from here.” Her voice sounded like she’d been swallowing sandpaper all morning.
After locking the door, she caught sight of herself in the mirror above the sink and nearly groaned aloud. She wasn’t sure which was worse—the drool that had dried on her cheek or that her hair had Medusa-fied while she’d slept.
Not that Rory would ever mistake her for a beauty queen. And not that she would want him to. But still. She had some standards, and right now she was falling far short of them.
It was utter bliss to splash cold water over her face. She put her glasses back on, then finger-combed her hair as best she could, and used some toothpaste on the tip of her finger to freshen up. With that taken care of, she took a deep breath and left the bathroom to deal with the complications of her big drunk mouth.
Rory was standing by the living room window, looking out at the ocean. It wasn’t just the house of her dreams—this view was also one of the best she’d ever seen. She could so easily imagine wild swimming in the ocean at sunrise, or beneath a full moon.