Healed with a Kiss (Bride Mountain 3)

With the call disconnected, Alexis tried once more to focus on work. Only to end up with her face in her hands again, a low groan escaping her throat.

* * *

It was almost dark on Thursday, more than a week after Logan had left Alexis’s house, when his sister called him out on his behavior during the past nine days.

“When are you going to stop moping and do something?” Kinley demanded, glaring at him with her hands on her hips.

He straightened from the flower bed in which he’d just spread a new layer of mulch. His back ached a little from being bent over a shovel and his head hurt because he’d skipped lunch. Again. He’d worked such long hours during the past nine days that his left leg throbbed in protest. “What the hell do you mean, do something? Have you not seen all I’ve gotten done around here this week?”

“I don’t mean do something about your job,” she said with an impatient shake of her head. “You’re working yourself to a frazzle around here. But that isn’t helping, is it?”

He tossed the shovel across the top of his wheelbarrow. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I’m talking about Alexis,” Kinley shocked him by saying. “Are you just going to let her go without even trying to hang on to her?”

The silence stretched for a long time between them before he found the voice to reply. “Did she say something to you?”

“Of course not, you idiot. She’s been as closemouthed as you are about whatever has gone on between you. But I’m your sister. And along with Bonnie, I know you better than probably anyone else alive. You’ve been seeing Alexis, haven’t you?”

He wasn’t going to lie to her. “I was,” he admitted curtly. “It’s over.”

“Why?”

His first inclination was to snarl that it was none of her business. The only reason he didn’t was because he knew Kinley wouldn’t back down no matter how much he growled. So he said simply, “She’s not interested.”

“I don’t believe that. I watched the two of you together when you thought I didn’t notice. And I’ve heard her voice when she speaks of you, even though she didn’t realize she was revealing anything. She’s interested. So you must have screwed it up.”

“All I did was ask her to a party,” he snapped, indignant that his own sister automatically placed the blame on him. “How is that screwing up?”

“You must have asked her wrong.”

He ripped off his work gloves and threw them in the wheelbarrow. “You don’t understand.”

“I understand that you’re hurting,” she said more quietly, placing a hand on his arm. “And I hate seeing that.”

“I’ll get over it.”

“Do you really want to get over it? Or do you want to work it out with her?”

He exhaled slowly. “Doesn’t matter what I want. Like I said, she’s not interested.”

“Maybe she’s scared. Trust me, I know what that’s like. I was terrified to fall in love with Dan and risk being left heartbroken again.”

He thought of the night Kinley had come to his door in tears after a quarrel with Dan. His first instinct had been to find the guy who’d hurt his sister and pound him. Typical of Kinley that she yelled at him instead, when he was the one brooding.

“Maybe Alexis has been hurt before and is afraid to take another chance. You won’t know until you ask her, will you? I know it takes a lot of courage to risk being shot down again,” she added with a misty smile.

“But will you ever forgive yourself if you give up this easily?”

He pushed a grubby hand through his hair. “Don’t say anything to Alexis about any of this, will you?”

It was her turn to be indignant. “Of course not! It’s not my place to talk to her about something this personal.”

He couldn’t help but be wryly amused that she didn’t see the irony of her words. She sure didn’t mind getting into his personal business. “I’ll think about it, Kinley,” he said wearily. “But I don’t want to talk about it again, okay?”

She patted his arm once more. “I won’t bring it up again. Just know that I’m here whenever you want to talk.”

“I know. And thanks.” He leaned over to brush his lips briefly against his sister’s cheek, then turned away to put up his tools.