Free I Want to Hold Your Hand by Marie Force Page B

him.
    This was definitely not good. Everything in him clamored to tell her how he’d ended up at Elmer Stillman’s table in the middle of the day, but the heat of her father’s glare had him biting his tongue—literally.
    “I’m so sorry about Homer, honey,” Elmer said, covering Hannah’s hand with his much bigger one. “He was a good boy, and he lived a nice long life.”
    “Yes, he did.”
    “How’re you holding up?”
    “I’ve had better days, but it helps to think of him reuniting with Caleb.”
    “I’m sure they’re having one hell of a game of fetch up there in heaven.”
    “I hope so.” She took a delicate bite of the oversized sandwich and a sip of her soda. “I’ve decided to have a funeral for Homer the way Caleb would’ve done.”
    “That’s a fine idea,” Elmer said.
    “I spoke with Myles this morning.”
    Lincoln and Elmer both looked at Nolan meaningfully. He trained his face to show no emotion even though the mention of Myles’s name struck a note of fear around the area of his chest that housed his heart.
    “He can keep Homer until we’re ready to bury him,” Hannah continued, speaking primarily to her grandfather. “I wondered if you might be able to make me a box or something to bury him in.”
    “I’d be honored, honey. Truly.”
    “Thank you.”
    Nolan’s throat closed around the lump that settled there as her quiet strength got to him the way it always did.
    She chatted with her father and grandfather about the plans for Homer’s funeral as she finished the sandwich and soda.
    Nolan told himself it didn’t matter that she never looked his way, but it did matter. It mattered greatly. By the time she stood to leave, he was in full-on panic mode. The idea that the progress they’d made the night before might be undone by her overly involved father and grandfather was unfathomable to him. “Could I hitch a ride back to town with you, Hannah? I’ve got to get back to work.”
    She still didn’t look at him. “Um, sure. I guess.”
    Wow, this was worse than he’d thought. She was actually blaming him for the family powwow, as if he would’ve sought out the company of her father and grandfather on the same day her parents caught them sleeping together? Was she crazy? How could he fix this with her without digging a ditch for himself with Lincoln?
    “Thanks for lunch,” he said to Lincoln and Elmer as he got up from the table. “I think.”
    Lincoln gave him a pointed look that conveyed a world of expectations. “Our pleasure.”
    His mind racing with thoughts about what he should say to her and what he could say to her, Nolan followed Hannah from the house and got into the passenger seat of her SUV. “How’s the car running?” he asked when they were buckled in and on their way.
    “Fine.”
    “Hannah, listen . . . I have no idea what you’re thinking right now, but I didn’t initiate that lunch. You have to know that after your parents caught us together this morning, my goal today would’ve been to stay as far away from the men in your family as I possibly could.” Was it his imagination or did her shoulders lose some of their tension?
    “How did you end up there?”
    “Um, well, you probably ought to ask your dad about that.”
    She shot him an annoyed look. “I’m asking you .”
    “Don’t make me tell you.”
    “Man up, Nolan. You’re either loyal to me or you’re loyal to him. You can’t have it both ways.”
    Nolan let out an unmanly whimper. “I can’t? Really?”
    “ Nolan . . . ”
    “Fine! He came to the garage and basically told me to get in the car. It wasn’t like I felt I had a choice or anything. He’s your dad, and I didn’t want to do anything to screw things up with your family when things between us are . . . you know . . .”
    “What? How are things between us?”
    Apparently, Hannah came by her torture skills naturally. “New and moving in the right direction, or so I thought.”
    She killed him with her