Here in my Heart

11 So whenever he returned to Chandlerville, he bunked at Travis’s apartment instead of his childhood home, where Dru had moved. He steered clear of the Dream Whip whenever she was on the clock—she now managed his family business, the best burger joint in three counties. He ignored the way she crossed the street before their paths could intersect. He’d become a stranger to a woman who’d once been like his kid sister.

A woman who at sixteen had kissed him as if being sisterly was the last thing on her mind.

Golden hair. Bright, crystalline blue eyes. Dru’s curvy, athletic body had once been all skinny arms and legs and sharp angles. As a teenager, she’d been forbidden fruit he should have steered clear of. Now, just under six feet tall and wearing a sweatshirt in her favorite pink, she seemed just about as perfect for him as a woman could be.

Except for the emotional chasm that still yawned between them.

Adding insult to injury, he’d invaded her turf. She was close to telling him to get lost. Damned if he was going to let that happen.

“You need someone strong enough to take the beating your radKIDS will dish out,” he reasoned. “You know it’s the only way to give them confidence in what they’ve learned.”

She shook her head.

If she kept at it, she was going to finish pissing him off—at himself. And then he’d have to kiss her, just to show her what his being intent on ruining her afternoon would really look like. And feel like. And taste like.

He ordered himself to behave.

“I’m a good guy, Dru.”