Surprise flashed on her face, then she averted her eyes again.
Of course she hadn’t eaten. He stalked behind the counter and took the pizza from her. He reached for an empty box from behind her, put that piece in and then added more. ‘No doubt it’s hours since you last ate properly.’
‘You go, Gracie.’ Francesca emerged from the kitchen, a subdued look on her face when she glanced at Rafe. ‘I can handle the café.’
‘You’re sure?’ Gracie double-checked.
Of course she checked. Rafe felt even more irritated. Couldn’t Gracie put herself first for once, instead of trying to be all things to everyone?
He walked her to his car. She got into the passenger seat and he handed her the pizza box. He took a couple of deep breaths as he walked around the car to the driver’s door. He shouldn’t be this worked up, but he couldn’t shake it off. This protectiveness? Just instinct, right? Normal levels of concern for a nice person.
‘I’m sorry for interrupting Alex’s dinner,’ he said, starting the engine to get out of the village as fast as possible.
She slowly swivelled to face him, the pizza balanced precariously on her knee. ‘You thought they’d been rude to me?’
He sighed. ‘You said you were going to dinner with Alex. I saw you in the kitchen from the alley. You were alone and you looked sad and then they were there all having a nice dinner without you and, yes, I thought they’d been rude to you.’ He clenched the steering wheel as he thought about it. He sounded like some stalker. Hell, he was some stalker. But he’d been worried. And annoyed. And she still looked sad, even if she was trying not to.
Though why he felt this mad about it, why he’d chastised those strangers, why he’d insisted on ensuring she was okay... He just felt an incredibly strong need to be with her. To take care of her.
‘I wanted them to have some space. It was my choice,’ she replied with a determined smile. ‘They just wanted to spend some time together as a family. It’s nice.’
But he’d seen her loneliness, he heard it in her voice now—because she didn’t have the kind of family she wanted. She’d treated Alex as family, and for his son to have rejected her?
‘It would also have been nice for you to spend time with them,’ he pointed out with more gentleness than he was feeling. ‘You care for him like family.’
Rafe had been isolated and treated with suspicion, been looked down on, and it had hurt, and Gracie didn’t deserve that from those people. She had a kind, generous heart. Fury rose all over again at the thought of them dismissing her. He glanced at her but his rage was derailed because her expression had crumpled. He instinctively slowed the car. ‘Hey—’
‘Thank you for standing up for me,’ she muttered quietly. ‘That was nice.’
His chest tightened and he swallowed, not quite sure how to respond.
But then she smiled. ‘Your first instinct is to think the worst of everyone, isn’t it? You don’t trust anyone.’
His pulse thundered even more. ‘You heard that bit? Damn.’ He shook his head and dragged up a rueful smile. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘No, it’s okay.’ Her expression sweetened and she put her hand on his. ‘Alex would never think that I was after something from him. I don’t think his son would either.’ She looked at him with those tender eyes. ‘What made your mind even go there?’
‘My mother,’ he said bitterly, pulling in to park at the villa. ‘That’s who she was, right? The gold-digging slut who seduced septuagenarians for their megabucks.’ He looked at her. ‘All my life people have thrown that rubbish at me. I don’t want them saying anything like that to you.’
‘Rafe, they wouldn’t. They didn’t. And even if they had...you know I can take care of myself.’
‘Can you?’ Warm amusement muted his earlier annoyance. He released his seatbelt and turned to her. ‘Gracie, you’re like a marshmallow melting into a mug of chocolate to sweeten it up. You like to make a difference. You like to be needed.’ And right now her friend Alex didn’t need her. But Rafe did. He wanted to think she might need him too. Just for the moment.
She lifted a shoulder in a little shrug. ‘And what’s wrong with liking to be needed?’
‘Because you do it at the expense of your own needs. Of your own welfare.’
‘No, I—’
‘Stop, Gracie.’ He turned his hand and grasped her fingers before she could tug them away. ‘Enough of the pretence. Your whole “life’s perfect” performance. You were lonely tonight. And you were sad. You’re still sad, I can see it in your eyes. Be as honest as you always say you are.’
‘Okay, I was sad,’ she admitted quietly. ‘I saw them and they were so natural and happy together and I felt down and I excused myself from the dinner because...’
‘You didn’t want happy families in your face.’
She shrank a little in her seat. ‘It sounds so bitter and jealous.’
‘No, you’re not either of those things, but after what you’ve been through I wouldn’t blame you if you were.’ He put his arm around her. ‘So you opted to work?’
‘Francesca was run off her feet, trying to get prepared because one of the crew was late...’
‘And it’s your stress release—you work out your worry, right?’
She nodded.
‘You’re too generous,’ he added quietly. ‘You let people take advantage of you.’
‘Is that what you’re doing?’ she teased.
He released her with a sigh and got out of the car. ‘You know I am.’
‘You don’t think I’m getting anything out of this?’ She laughed lightly as she joined him. ‘I’m getting all the experience I’ve missed out on in all these years.’
‘Because you’re so ancient?’ He tried to tease her back. But there was still an ache in his chest.
He should have been relieved at her assertion that this was a win-win transaction between them but it only compounded his tension. Was this only about sex? As if he were her intimate tutor? He didn’t quite know what he was—what this was—but it was more than that. But even as he wanted that, he rejected it. That it was so easy to spend time with her made him uneasy. Yet at the same time he ached for that time to be endless.
He understood that she’d wanted companionship tonight, but she’d sought it from her old friend, not him. And when her friend had been busy, she’d opted to work. Was that because she didn’t regard him as a friend? His discomfort bubbled back. He could be one of those—better than Alex, or Francesca. Better than anyone.
His pulse thrummed. He had no freaking idea how to be a friend. He’d never trusted anyone to get close, not after the nightmare of his half-brother and then boarding school. He’d always been fighting—for respect, for success. He’d long ago given up needing or wanting real acce
ptance. The irony was now he had all that ‘success’, people craved his company. But other than in hedonistic pursuits, he had no real idea how to relate. The realisation he was incompetent at something curdled his stomach acid. He snagged her arm and led her towards the boat shed instead of the home.
‘We’re not going inside?’ Gracie asked, still holding the damn pizza box.
‘There’s a lot of light left in the day. Let’s just enjoy the sun and eat pizza.’
He needed the fresh air. He probably needed the pizza. He definitely needed to see her smile. He unlocked the boat shed and gestured for her to go in, snagging the pizza box from her as she went past.
‘This is amazing.’ She stared at the interior of the boat shed. ‘There’s stained glass in here, Rafe. Look at the detail in this window.’
Admittedly it was more like a museum than a workshop space.
‘I’ve not been in here much,’ he confessed. ‘But this is the real treasure.’ He pointed to the beautiful wooden boat. ‘She’s vintage, even older than your bike, I believe. I’m sure you’ll appreciate her.’
‘You’re right.’ She laughed lightly and bent down to inspect the mahogany hull. ‘Rosabella. She’s beautiful. Look at the craftsmanship.’
‘Shall we take her out?’ Two bites of that pizza and watching Gracie run her hand over the hull of the boat and Rafe was feeling better about everything.
‘Do you know how to drive her?’ she asked as he handed her some pizza and untied the mooring rope.
‘I’m sure I can figure it out.’
‘Move over,’ she said confidently.
He watched her study the engine instruments with undisguised interest. A second later she was checking the fuel. She knew what she was doing. And he was happy to let her take charge. He’d seen her tinkering with her bike, with the ovens; she knew machinery. And ten minutes later they were cruising across the water.
‘Okay, so when did you learn to drive a boat?’ he asked, happily finishing the last piece of pizza.