Free Hearts Awakened by Linda Winfree

concern shifted into an emotion she didn’t recognize. Her mouth went dry, stomach taking a slow somersaulting fall.
    He was still holding her hand and she didn’t want him to let go. Instead, she wished he’d draw her closer.
    After a long moment, he dropped her hand. “Come on, let’s get something to drink and hit the road.”

    Silence coated the trip into St. Augustine, but at least the awful tension had receded. Mark slumped in the seat. He was low, lower than Jed Stinson. Knowing she didn’t react well to sudden loud noises—he’d been at Tick’s one day when a ladder had crashed to the ground and scared her close to tears—he’d yelled at her. Wanting time to come to grips with an overload of memories wasn’t an excuse either.
    As they entered the nation’s oldest city, Tori rested her elbow on the open window, head on her hand, her eyes round as she eyed the scenery. Mark tried to see everything with her fresh insight: the mishmash of styles, Spanish-inspired homes, ornate Victorians in vivid colors, ultramodern hotels. Moss hung from massive live oaks like the bushy beards of ancient old men. Tourists in bright clothing roamed the sidewalks.
    She slowed behind a red tourist train. He tapped his fingers against his knee, a half-empty bottle of water resting on his thigh. The quiet crawled around them. He needed to break that silence, but she’d already told him she didn’t want another apology.
    “The woman at the antique mall was really nice,” she said, the suddenness of her words startling him.
    He didn’t look at her. Her voice was too bright, like she was trying hard to make things normal. “Yeah?”
    “She gave me a ton of brochures for the sites and tours here.” She patted her purse.
    “There’s a load of them.” Brilliant. She was sure to be impressed by his conversational skills.
    A light turned red ahead, slowing traffic further. In the park next to the intersection, children played on swings and rode an elaborate merry-go-round. “I bet it would take days to do everything here.”
    “Probably.”
    Sighing, she ruffled her hair. “The only thing that didn’t sound interesting was the ghost tour. Walking in the dark, waiting to be frightened to death, isn’t my idea of a good time.”
    His, either, although he could get into the idea of a nice moonlit stroll with her on the bay front. Whoa. He reined in that stray.
    Traffic crawled forward. “Do you believe in ghosts?”
    Hard not to, when he had enough of them to last a lifetime. Down here, they lay around every corner. He shrugged. “Never thought much about it.”
    “Why does this area make you tense?” The soft question jolted through him, and he straightened. Damn, this was like being in the interrogation room with Tick—a series of smooth, idle questions lulling a suspect until the deadly inquiry came out of nowhere.
    He crossed his arms over his chest. So she wanted to play twenty questions. He could do that. “When did you get a tattoo?”
    Lips parted, she stared at him. “How did you—”
    “Do you plan to take out that car full of little old ladies on vacation or would you like to hit the brakes?” He pressed the invisible brake on his side of the car. It didn’t work.
    Muttering a word he didn’t know she knew, she jerked her attention back to the road and slammed a foot on the brake pedal. The seatbelt pulled tight across his chest, and he gave into an irresistible grin. He was right; it was a tattoo.
    She eased around a curve and the Castillo de San Marco loomed on their left. She glanced at the centuries-old fort. Brushing her tangled hair back, she flexed her fingers on the steering wheel. “You didn’t answer the question.”
    Surely she didn’t think he’d fall for that. “You’re right. I didn’t.”
    Her pretty lips lifted at the corners. “Mark, come on. I’m curious.”
    That flash of red and black on her smooth skin flickered in his mind again. “So am I.”
    A horse-drawn carriage