As he rounded the aisle, he knocked right into a woman. The bottle she was holding slipped from her fingers and hit the floor, shattering and spilling the contents everywhere.

“Shit! I’m so sorry.” Seth steadied her by grabbing her shoulders, glanced at the floor and the mess between them, then his gaze landed on her.

All the air rushed out of his body, like a sucker punch to the gut. Oh, he’d been hit hard in the gut before. Grasping for air. Pain radiating everywhere. One look at this woman, and he was feeling the same effects.

Long blonde hair past her shoulders—at least, that’s what he figured considering how long her ponytail was. Not the curly kind that Stacy, his ex-girlfriend, had but straight, perfect hair. It looked silky soft. He wanted to run his hands through it to see how soft it truly was.

Exquisite hazel eyes, so expressive and dynamic. Right now, they looked to be vibrating with irritation. He hadn’t meant to bump into her, but he wasn’t that sorry. He could stand here all day and drown in her amber depths.

He had green eyes. Dull, in his opinion, but on the rare occasion he wore a particular shade of green, people would comment on how it made his eyes pop and look pretty. Not that he liked being described as pretty. But her eyes…oh, her eyes were pretty.

No.

Gorgeous.

Utterly gorgeous.

Beyond gorgeous.

“You can remove your hands from my shoulders.”

Her stern tone and the harshness in her eyes snapped him out of his gawking. Shit. He was gawking and acting like a man who had never seen a woman before. Letting go of her shoulders, he pulled his best smile out, hoping to ease one out of her. Oh, he knew a smile would only enhance her beauty. He wanted to see her smile.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to run into you.”

He honestly hadn’t. His mind was everywhere these days. Trying hard to forget about his best friend and how much he wanted their friendship back but still so hurt that Evan had lied to him. Trying hard to forget how his sister Kat had been hurt and how he should’ve been able to protect her. But he’d failed. Trying hard to forget how useless he was in helping Aubrey when it seemed like Kat and Logan could help her with ease.

Yeah, his mind tended to wander a lot. That’s why he worked all the time or found different projects in his house. He needed to keep occupied with something.

She backed up, her expression still unyielding, then stepped around him. “I’ll go find someone to clean up this mess.”

He watched her walk down the aisle. Her attitude was a little odd, especially since he apologized, but hey, maybe she wasn’t a morning person. He wasn’t that much of one until he had his coffee. And he usually had two cups. One at home and one at work.

What was he doing?

He shouldn’t just be gawking and letting such perfection—beautiful perfection—walk away from him without getting her number. Instead of working himself to the bone every day, all day, he could release his frustrations in another way. A beautiful woman would be a nice distraction for once.

Damn, even from behind she was something. She had on a snug winter coat just past her hips, so he saw a hint of her ass. Her tight jeans gave him enough of a picture that she had a perfect round ass meant for his hands.

“Hey!”

Her steps slowed. She swiveled in his direction. The expression she wore displayed a bit of annoyance, and irritation still lingered in her eyes.

“Let me buy you another drink.” His hand pointed to the floor at what looked like a Frappuccino flavored drink. “To replace the one I broke.”

Then, like the sun rising for a brand-new day, a hint of a smile appeared. “Oh, you’ll be paying for that bottle you broke. But that’s it.” She pivoted around and kept walking as if she hadn’t just broken his heart.

And damn. Seth was pretty sure she did.

That was definitely a brush-off.

He was just cold-shouldered by the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. He thought about following her, but didn’t want to seem stalkerish. He had already made a fool of himself by running into her. She said she’d find someone to clean up the mess, so he walked past the spilled drink to grab his own from the cooler, and he decided it was for the best. His life at the moment was a mess. Asking a woman out should be the furthest thing from his mind.

Sure, life was back to normal after everything that happened two months ago. It appeared normal, but it was far from it. His sister was shot—with him standing right next to her. He almost watched his sister die. Some nights, he dreamt of running through the woods with her slung over his shoulder as he ran hard to get her help. Sometimes, it turned into a horrifying nightmare where he never stopped running, blood running down his chest as his sister’s life slowly withered away. Some nights, he made it to the cabin as he had in real life, but she died before he reached the cabin. He hated dreaming about it at all.

Aubrey was doing much better, her fear of the dark improving. Not one hundred percent, but better than two months ago. As far as he knew, anyway. He didn’t visit her and Logan as often as he should. Being around Logan showed him he’d never be as good a man as Logan was. Some days, he hated himself and didn’t understand why Logan didn’t shut him out of his life. He hit him. He hurt his brother. He should’ve never been forgiven for doing something so malicious. He still hadn’t forgiven himself for it. But he tried to ignore it since it appeared Logan had moved on. Because if he didn’t, Logan would get on his case about what was wrong, and he didn’t want to talk about it.

Aubrey and his brother Logan were planning their wedding for this summer. Logan was distracted with that, and so was Aubrey, which was good for her. It was better than the bad memories of her abduction.

His sister Kat was happy living with Danny, Aubrey’s brother. Danny had yet to ask her to marry him, but their relationship was solid and moving along great. He had never seen his sister as happy as she was with Danny. After being shot, she deserved happiness.

And him…

His life sucked.

He had no girlfriend, which was okay. He didn’t need one. He and Stacy weren’t meant to be. It was for the best they ended their relationship four months ago.

He had no best friend. Although Evan called two months ago—after everything went down with Evan’s half-brother Joshua—hoping to make amends. At the time, surrounded by his family, he thought, sure, why not. But when it came to actually meet Evan for drinks, he never showed. He didn’t want to forgive the asshole for the things he’d done. For the things he should’ve confessed when Aubrey was first found. Maybe Kat never would’ve been hurt if he had.

Evan never tried contacting him again. Seth was okay with that.

He worked, slept, worked, slept, and so on. Day in and day out. That’s what his life consisted of. He would occasionally pop in with his family; otherwise, they’d be at his door wondering why he was ignoring them.

No matter how many times he ruminated about how to fix his life, how to feel an ounce of happiness for once, he couldn’t find a solution.

He needed to get the gorgeous woman out of his mind. He knew meeting some random woman wasn’t the answer to his problems.

Grabbing a drink, he noticed the woman had told Greg, a nice, laidback guy who worked the gas station every morning, about the spill.

“Sorry about the mess, man. I can get it.”

Greg waved him off with a friendly grin. “Nah, I got it. Did you see that chick?” He blew out a breath and lifted his brows in amusement. “So hot.”

Yeah, Seth saw her, all right. Made a complete jackass of himself.

“I’ll be paying for the drink on the floor.” Seth looked back to where he could grab a Frappuccino drink. “I should grab her a new one. I feel bad.”

“She left. Told me about the mess and stalked out of here. She’s hot, but with a ’tude.” Obviously. He didn’t mean to knock into her and ruin her morning. He probably dodged a bullet with her.

Greg had the mess cleaned quickly and then rang up his drink and the drink that splattered all over the floor.

Seth stepped outside into the brutal cold and raced back to his truck.

He turned on the heat and rubbed his hands—trying to get his mind back on track and into work mode. He needed to try harder and not think about the past but focus on his future.

Just as he was putting his truck in drive, his phone rang.

He pulled it out of his pocket, debating for a second whether he wanted to answer Logan’s phone call. It wouldn’t be the first time he ignored one of his brother’s calls. Immature, yeah. Did he care? Well…yeah. But sometimes, he wanted to be left alone. He didn’t want people in his space, bugging him, making sure he was okay.

But he was trying to act better. He was trying to act like…a grownup. Because, although he might not admit it out loud, he had acted like a spoiled, rotten child the past few months. He needed to grow up and start acting like he was twenty-five and not sixteen. His birthday was coming up in a few weeks. He was inching closer and closer to thirty. It was way past time he started acting his age.

“Hey, Logan, what’s up?”

A heavy sigh sounded in his ear. “I need you to come down to Barry’s Garage. Right now, if you can.”

Barry’s Garage…

Evan worked there.

Why would his brother want him to go there? Was this a sort of it’s-time-to-make-up-with-Evan sort of thing? He wasn’t interested.

“Please, Seth.” Another heavy sigh sounded. “I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important.”

“Yeah, okay.” He slowly put his foot on the gas. “What’s going on? Why do I need to come?”

“I…just come right away. I don’t want to talk about it over the phone.”

Seth’s heart raced at all the possible scenarios.

The only scenario that had his heart speeding double time was…Evan was dead.

He couldn’t even say why his thoughts immediately went in that direction, but they did.

As he drove to the place his best friend had worked since he was eighteen years old, he only had one regret.

Not showing up to meet him and make amends when he had the chance.

Copyright © 2020 Amanda Siegrist.

***

To keep reading, click on your favorite retailer below.