Fortune's Christmas Baby (Fortunes of Texas)

Watching her, he squinted, as though taking her mettle. When he nodded, she started to breathe a little easier.

“Can we go inside?”

“No!” She took a quick breath and tempered her response. “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she added more gently. “To be honest, I don’t want you in my personal space. Whatever we have to say can be said right out here.”

She glanced toward the parking lot, thinking maybe there’d be a car she didn’t recognize out there, but didn’t see one. The band traveled in a van. Last year he’d walked everywhere. Or she drove them.

“I’m sorry.” He looked her in the eye when he offered the apology.

She believed he meant it. “Accepted,” she said. And then, with an eye to getting rid of him for good this time, before she could be tempted to prolong the inevitable, she said, “Seriously, Nolan. I was upset when I tried to call you and the number was disconnected, but that was months ago. I’m really not harboring any hard feelings toward you, in spite of whatever Carmela might have insinuated.”

“I lied to you.”

She hadn’t expected the outright admission but she said, “Okay.”

“My real name isn’t Nolan Forte.”

Wow. The man was really unloading himself. Carmela must have done some number on him. When she was done chewing her roommate out for butting in someplace that wasn’t her place to butt, she’d tell her how successful she’d been. Where Nolan was concerned only.

“But then, you already knew that, didn’t you?”

If he was waiting for her to ask who he really was, he was going to be disappointed. She didn’t want to care about that.

“Look, Nolan, or whoever you are, I’ve told you, it’s fine. You’re making much more of a big deal of this than necessary. I appreciate you stopping by. I don’t feel as much like an inconsequential fling, and it’s really fine. I moved on months ago.”

He nodded, pivoted like he was about to leave and then turned back.

She would have liked to have been disappointed that it wasn’t over yet. So why did she have that one-second shot of relief?

Because maybe she did need to know the truth?

To tell her daughter someday.

Or just to find that last bit of peace within herself. Who was this man who’d managed to get past her defenses, the carefully constructed walls and rules that kept her safe out in the big bad world all alone? How had he done so? And how could she be certain that it never happened again, with anyone else?

“The real me isn’t someone you would like.”

“I’m not all that fond of the you I know.” Because he’d been a lie. But what was wrong with her? She didn’t spit mean words at people, no matter how deserving. It just wasn’t her way.

He acknowledged the hit with a bow of his head. It didn’t make her feel good.

“Look, Nolan. It’s not like you owed me anything. I just thought it was rude that you gave me a bogus number. The decent thing would have been to just let it end. Not drag it out with the illusion of possibility.” She turned to go back in. This was done.

“When I left here I was open to the possibility.”

Turning back, she stared at him. Her heart started to pound, constricting her breathing.

But it didn’t matter. “Our entire ti

me together was a lie, based on you being someone you weren’t.”

She’d known. But until he’d acknowledged that truth, there’d been hope that she was wrong. It wasn’t until that moment that she realized she’d held on to that hope all these months in some small private recess of her heart.

“I am Nolan Forte,” he said, still meeting her gaze head-on. “On as many weekends as I can manage and for two weeks over the Christmas holiday.”

Confused, she reached behind her for the doorknob, not sure she was going in, but sure that she needed something to hold on to.

“Forte is my stage name.”