She heard Adam swear, and then he took her arm once more as they crossed the street. Not letting go again until they reached the sidewalk on the other side. “There’s nothing for you to fear.”
She lifted her brows. “Really? How can I be sure?”
“Because I’m telling you.”
“Like you told me how I left my son?” She set off toward the souvenir shop.
“I told you I was sorry for that.” She could hear the regret in his deep voice. “I should have figured out a way to—”
“You shouldn’t have to figure out anything! You’re just a nice guy who feels sorry for the old girlfriend with her memories chopped up like Sunday morning hash!” She earned a startled look from the young couple sitting on the bench outside the store and she yanked open the shop door, making the bell hanging over it jingle. She lowered her voice in deference to the other shoppers. “And my treating you as though you’re responsible makes me every bit as unreasonable as my mother ever was. Nobody left Linus with strangers but me. I did that. Now that I know, you don’t have to keep treating me with kid gloves.”
“I’m not all that nice.” His jaw looked tight. “But until you remember why you left the way you did, the gloves aren’t going anywhere.”
The shop was lined with aisles packed stem to stern with Durango-themed items. Jackets. Shirts. Baby clothes and dog bowls. She picked up a bowl and waved it at him. “Why am I having this conversation with you at all? You’re not the one I’ve betrayed the most.”
She caught the price tag on the ceramic bowl and quickly replaced it far more carefully than she’d removed it. “Don’t mind me,” she said in the face of Adam’s silence. “You just get the added benefit of my venting with the price of admission. Do you still wear an extra large, tall?”
“Yes.”
She bent over a display of T-shirts, looking at the sizes. “Don’t sound so terse. It’s not everyone who can claim the same size they wore ten years ago. I sure can’t.”
She crouched down and pulled a white shirt with a screen-printed mountain peak from a stack and shook it out for him to see. “Yes? No?”
“Ah...no.”
She turned the shirt so she could see the full front. She realized a puff of smoke was superimposed over the mountain outline. Beneath was scrolled “Durango High.”
She rolled her eyes, refolding the shirt and setting it back on the stack. Still on her knees—she’d realized all of the “extra” sizes were on the lowest shelves—she moved past several more stacks bearing similar marijuana themes.
“Would you rather he was the one who was here? Or are you still worried you’re afraid of him?”
At his question her fingers spasmodically closed on another shirt. “He’s where he should be. With the baby. With...Linus.”
It was more proof of her failings that she still stumbled over her baby’s name. That no matter how many times she thought it, no matter how many times she said it, Linus simply didn’t seem to fit.
She shook out another shirt—navy blue this time—and held it up for his view.
“I’ve worn worse.”
The town’s name was blocked out in bright orange across the front. She eyed the garment. Then Adam’s broad shoulders. “Looks a little small to me.”
He took the shirt from her when she stood and balled it in his fist. “It’ll be fine,” he dismissed. “There are other...people...who could be with Linus. Do you want Eric here or don’t you?”
Everything inside her screamed no! She ran her palm over the fuzzy knit of a striped scarf. “It would get you off the hook.”
His expression tightened.
“Not that you’re on any sort of hook to begin with,” she added quickly. “No matter what you say, you’re just a decent guy who got caught up in all of this. Because the world is too small sometimes.” Afraid of seeing the confirmation on his face, she dashed the scarf around her neck and looked in the mirror hanging on the end of the aisle. “Green and yellow stripes. Never were my colors.” She reached out to replace the scarf and Adam grabbed her hand.
He pulled her closer. “Just answer the damn question, Laurel. What do you want? Do you want him here instead? Yes or no?”
“No,” she whispered, too startled to lie. “I want you here.”
His shoulders seemed to relax. “All right, then. Matter closed.” He let go of her and walked up the next aisle. “Do you need anything while we’re here?”
Her knees felt wobbly. “I’m already in your debt.”
His lips tightened again. Her knack for causing that particular look was becoming an art form.
“Pajamas,” she admitted hurriedly. “Or a nightshirt. An extra tall Durango High shirt would even do.”
He was striding up the aisle, angling past a couple who were quibbling over salt and pepper shakers. She caught up to him where he’d stopped in front of a tiered rack hung with a variety of pajamas. “Choose.”
A hand-printed sign was affixed atop the rack showing the price. Even the least expensive pair cost three times what his shirt did. “I’ll pay you back. One day.”
“For God’s sake, Laurel. Just choose. My bank account can handle the excessive burden.”
He sounded like he was about at the end of his rope. She blindly pulled a hanger from the rack and pushed it at him. “There.”
He glanced at the pink and green flannel pants and hung them back on the rack. “You may not be an extra small anymore, but you’re damn sure not an extra large.” He swiped through a
