Free Blush by Lauren Jameson

too much of an innocent to do the things he wanted to do with her, no matter how much he craved her. And his life was too much of a shit show for a woman clearly dealing with her own issues.
    He hadn’t spoken to his family in years. He worked all the time, except for when Rae was with him, and she wasn’t someone he was willing to share.
    No, he could see no part for Maddy Stone in all of that. It was nearly painful for him to take yet another step back, unable to take his eyes off of her as she stood openmouthed at his words.
    “You drove out here to see me? But . . . the casino . . .” Maddy’s words trailed off, and Alex shook his head with wry amusement.
    That she truly had no idea of her appeal was an absolute mystery to him.
    “Did you really think it was a coincidence that I showed up at your diner?” Reaching out, unable to resist, he rubbed a thumb over her cheekbone, his expression fading from amusement to something darker. Then he stepped back yet again, putting space between them.
    To his surprise, sweet Maddy growled, showing her anger. She narrowed her eyes and stepped toward him, her hands fisted at her sides. Though he found her spunky attitude sexy as hell, he realized with a sinking heart that, if he were a halfway decent guy, he wouldn’t have come out to Paradise in the first place.
    So as she stepped away from the car, he opened the driver’s side door for her, smooth as can be, and coaxed her in with a nudge of his hand on her hip again. Leaning in, he buckled her into her seat as if she were a child, then tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear.
    He had to end it, despite the palpable heat between them. It was what a decent man would do.
    “Why?” Maddy was quick to speak, and her narrowed glance at him told him that she knew exactly what he was doing. He didn’t bother to feign ignorance.
    “There are secrets in my life that would scare you, and there are other secrets that I won’t share. These secrets mean that this isn’t going to work.” Maddy’s eyes widened as he spoke, and he forced himself to look away from the innocent stare.
    “I don’t date, Madeline.” Alex made sure that his voice was firm as he summed it up. Even if she asked for an explanation, he wasn’t going to give it.
    Telling himself that he’d get over it in no time—he barely knew the woman, after all—Alex found that he was still bitterly disappointed.
    “Goodbye, Miss Stone.” When she bit her lip, hard, before he walked away, he very nearly changed his mind.
    He couldn’t. No matter that during the entire time he’d been with Maddy that day, he hadn’t felt the least bit alone.

CHAPTER FOUR
    T he next day, when Maddy arrived home from work, there was a courier box on the ground in front of her door. Her mind immediately went to Alex . . . Well, actually, her mind had been on the man all day.
    Though there was no return address, she knew, just knew that it was from him. Perversely, she set the thing on her tiny kitchen table and glared at it periodically as she made a grilled cheese sandwich and ate it standing at the counter, a folded paper towel as her plate. Though she told herself that she would just feel worse if she opened it, she finally couldn’t take it any longer and attacked it with a kitchen knife, sawing through cardboard and packing tape.
    Some men sent flowers when they’d been an ass. Some sent chocolates. Alex Fraser sent a bottle of Mouton Rothschild, the 1943 vintage—the same ridiculously expensive wine that he’d bought Maddy the evening they met. Attached to the neck of the bottle was an envelope, cut from thick, cream-colored paper.
    The note inside said simply, “It is better this way.” It was written by hand, on stationery monogrammed with his initials.
    Of course he had monogrammed stationery. What other kind of man would send a bottle of wine like that, one that had meaning attached, no less, and a note like that to a woman he barely knew?
    More money