Free Done With Love by Niecey Roy Page A

long could it possibly take to walk to the guest store? And why did I care? We weren’t here together—I’d been adamant in pointing out that fact. Maybe he’d stopped by a bar on the way back. Maybe, while I lay here agonizing over sharing a villa with him, he danced the salsa with a big-boobed heiress, not a care in the world. What the hell is wrong with you?
    For someone who wanted nothing to do with the man, I stressed over him like some teenager with a crush. I scooted to the edge of the bed and rose to my feet. This is all the more reason to stay clear of him. I couldn’t think straight around him. His reappearance in my life was just another mess to navigate through.
    I stalked to the closet and threw the doors open. Didn’t he know what his being here did to me? Didn’t he get how off the wall it was for him to be here? I didn’t hate him or anything. There’d been six years for me to get over the heartache Leo had left behind, but it didn’t change the fact there was still the unanswered question of why he’d broken up with me in the first place. The last thing he’d said to me before leaving for Iraq was ‘ I love you. ’
    Him being here brought the question up to the surface to gnaw at me. There’d been no explanation, only a letter telling me to move on because he was. Short, harsh, and to the painful point. What kind of answer is that? Not a good one, that was for sure.
    No, I didn’t hate him, but I didn’t get him either. He and I sharing a bed, even if we weren’t having sex, should bother him on some level. It didn’t seem to affect him at all, though. Like him being around again was no big deal.
    I pulled a blue cotton dress over my head as I padded through the room to step out onto the patio. I closed the door behind me and looked out to the dark ocean. The sky was a sea of endless stars and a glowing, round moon, lighting up the horizon where the ocean met a blue-black sky. With every step, my feet sank into the warm sand. The ocean lapped quietly against the shore, and I stopped just before the water caressed my toes. Music played at a soft hum from somewhere down the beach. The Big Dipper caught my attention. I held up my hand and traced the stars with my finger, and whispered, “I still can’t see the Little Dipper.”
    “You never could.”
    His voice startled me. I whipped around, my heartbeat a fierce pounding in my chest. “You startled me.”
    “Sorry. You weren’t in bed. I wasn’t sure where you’d gone.”
    Turning back around to face the ocean, I said, “Really, Leo, this place is safe. You don’t need to worry so much.” And then I added, “But…thank you for worrying.”
    I was mesmerized by the way the black waves of the ocean shimmered under the light of the moon. It wasn’t until he sat down beside me that I looked away, down to where he rested back into his arms propped in the sand. After a moment, I sat down beside him.
    “I brought you a sandwich. It’s on the coffee table.” He glanced over at me. “Turkey and sprouts.”
    “Thank you, I am a little hungry.” The sand warmed my toes; I dug them in and sat with my knees to my chest, my arms wrapped around my legs. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised you remembered what I like on my sandwich.” I smiled at him. “Since you’re a private investigator now, and all.”
    He shrugged. “I have a good memory. Dad takes the credit. Good genes, he says.”
    The smile tugging at the corners of his lips was so boyishly wicked; the butterflies went crazy in my stomach.
    “I also had them add mayo and tomato.”
    Those kinds of details were probably stored away in his memory as effortlessly as a manila envelope in a filing cabinet. How much about our past did he reminisce over? Did he think about us as much as I did of late?
    Our gazes locked together, and there was so much I wanted to ask him. So much I couldn’t get my lips to speak. Why are you really here? It has to mean something. A man didn’t