“I’m sorry I ever blamed you.”

“Don’t apologize to me,” he said. “Not for that.” He looked grim, and she knew she’d pushed the worst button she could have ever pushed.

Other men might have shouted and said there was nothing they could have done, and they would have had a right. She’d given Eli a new sin that didn’t belong to him, to add to the long list of other people’s transgressions he seemed to be trying to atone for.

He released his hold on her and turned back toward the car and she just stared at his broad back, his strong shoulders.

All the better to carry the weight of the world on them.

She moved over to him and wrapped her arms around him, resting her head against his bare skin. “Don’t carry this,” she said, kissing the deep groove beneath his shoulder blade. “Please don’t.”

He lifted his hand and covered hers with it, pressing it against his chest. “No one’s going to hurt you again,” he said. “I promise.”

Another tear trailed down her cheek. Because it was everything she’d ever wanted to hear from someone, and it terrified her how much it meant to hear from him now.

Even more terrifying was just how much the words meant, and how cold she felt in her chest when she had to acknowledge that the only person who really had the power to hurt her was him.

No matter how much she’d wanted to keep her feelings for him neutral, he’d burrowed beneath her protective layer. At some point “just sex” had become a hell of a lot more. And she had no idea how that was possible.

She’d had relationships with men, whole relationships based on more than just sex, that hadn’t been like this.

At least, she thought that was what they’d been. They’d gone on dates and chatted, and some nights they hadn’t even slept together, which proved that they had a deeper connection than just the physical. Or that’s what it was supposed to prove.

But this was supposed to be sex. Hot, sweaty, ill-advised cop-cowboy sex. Like some kind of alpha-male female fantasy on steroids. With handcuffs. On a horse.

So why hadn’t it stayed that way? Why did she feel like things were changing? How in the hell had a romp in the backseat of a patrol car turned into the most exposing, soul-baring experience of her life?

“I guess we should get back,” she said, stepping away from him, wishing that separating the feelings that she had for him from her heart was as easy as breaking contact with his skin.

“Yeah,” he said, bending down and retrieving his shirt from the backseat of the car and tugging it on.

Something had changed between them. It was good and bad. She could feel it. He was all tension now, and she couldn’t blame him. But at the same time she felt like the bond had tightened between them.

Because he was the only person who knew. The only one who knew the whole story. Who knew that she wished, more than anything, she’d had someone to protect her.

She hadn’t even let herself in on that, not really, until the moment she’d told him.

“That was fun,” she said, wiping the moisture from beneath her eyes.

“Yeah,” he said, slamming the back door shut before jerking open the front door. “Fun.”

* * *

Eli slammed the maul down on the splitter and two pieces of wood went flying onto the dirt, the physical energy doing very little to relieve the raging...whatever the hell these feelings were that were roaring through his veins.

He didn’t know what he was feeling. So he was chopping wood instead of feeling. Or at least, that was the plan. And if that didn’t work, eventually he would be exhausted enough that he would just forget he had feelings that didn’t involve his screaming muscles.

Barring that, he’d drink them away, but considering that was the way most other men in his family handled Unpleasant Things No One Wanted to Handle, he was averse. But not entirely opposed. Desperate times, et cetera.

“You have enough wood to keep all of Copper Ridge toasty through the wet season. Why are you chopping more?”

Eli turned and saw Kate standing just behind him, her hands on her hips, her weight resting on one leg. “Because,” he said, bending over and picking up one of the log halves, “I’m expecting it to be a cold year.”

“Oh, okay. Hey, have you talked to Sadie lately?”

Oh, good, that was what he needed. To talk about Sadie with his sister when he was trying to forget the woman via manual labor. In that way that he just wanted to forget about her for long enough to make himself feel comfortable again.

Enough to make himself forget the look on her face. The way she’d shivered in his arms.

Why didn’t you protect me?

He bent and picked up the other log half, scowling deeply. “I talked to her this morning. Why?”

“I wanted to tell her that I made rolls.”

“What?”

“I made rolls by myself. And they’re edible. She showed me how yesterday, so I was... Hey, how are you?”

“Fine,” he said, gritting his teeth and walking over to the wood pile to stack the pieces on top.

“You don’t seem fine,” she said, frowning. “Is this about the people coming for the barbecue next week?”

Weirdly, that bothered him a hell of a lot less than it had in the beginning. In fact, in a very strange way he was looking forward to it. Looking forward to seeing Sadie’s vision come to life. To seeing her hard work become a real, tangible thing.

He shouldn’t care. He did.

Don’t carry this.

Too damn late, Sadiepants.

“Nope,” he said. “I am fine.”

“You are growly.”

“And?”

“That’s Connor’s job. What is up?”

“Just thinking about things,” he said, putting another log on the stump. “Dad.”

“Oh,” she said, looking down.

He positioned the splitter, then lifted the maul again, bringing it down hard. “It’s that time of the year.”

“Yeah, I guess it is.” She bit her lip and looked down, then back up, her dark eyes fierce. “I don’t think about him very much.”

“You don’t?”