Free Rescue My Heart by Jill Shalvis Page B

she was radiating confusion and hurt.
    His fault, of course. “Holly.”
    She pretended not to hear him. She was still wearing his hat, and she looked adorable. Adorably hot…
    Not
going there, Connelly.
    Shaking his head, he drove on, clearing his thoughts. He’d been taught how to do this in counseling for the times when his brain got caught in a nightmare loop, replaying shit he didn’t want to replay but couldn’t stop. The technique was to start low, in the toes. He wriggled them. Then moved his thoughts to the arch of his foot. Then his heel. He went on to purposely and carefully categorize his entire body and, in doing so, prevented his brain from hijacking his thoughts.
    He was at his own dick when he caught sight of Holly’s expression. Pale. Solemn.
    Unhappy.
    It was worry, he assured himself. Worry for Donald.
    And it was also because he was an asshole.
    He argued with himself for a minute, then stopped the Ranger. “Holly.”
    She was still pretending he didn’t exist, and doing a fine job of it, too, so he cupped her jaw and turned her to face him.
    Her eyes flashed at that. Yeah, she was pissed off, too, and suddenly, the interior of the Ranger felt a little tight. Especially since Milo was leaning forward, blowing doggy breath on them, waiting for Adam’s next move.
    “Down,” Adam said.
    Milo’s ears sagged, but he lay down.
    “Holly, look at me.”
    She lifted her gaze and he was immediately slammed by her beautiful blue eyes.
    “It wasn’t you,” he said, voice soft. “It was me.”
    “What?”
    “Back when I left. When I said good-bye. It wasn’t you, it was me.”
    Her eyes narrowed. “Are you seriously giving me Classic Breakup Line Number One right now?” She leaned away from him, arms crossed, body language blaring highwarnings at him. “Should I feed you your next line, or do you know it?”
    He scowled. “It wasn’t a line.”
    “Oh yes, it was. And not a very good one. Line Number Two isn’t much better. It’s ‘I wasn’t ready for a long term relationship.’”
    Adam couldn’t believe he’d been drawn into this conversation, or that he was even here. “I
wasn’t
ready for a long-term relationship.”
    “Oh my God.” She turned away.
    Milo, always extremely sensitive to tension, leaned forward and licked Adam’s ear.
    And then Holly’s. She sighed and hugged the dog.
    Swearing beneath his breath, Adam shoved the Ranger back into gear but didn’t hit the gas. He could feel his brain swelling. Probably an oncoming aneurism. “You were eighteen.”
    “Old enough.”
    “No,”
he said, disagreeing. “And I was—”
    “A good guy,” she said so firmly he knew that she believed it to the depths of her soul.
    Something inside him reacted to that, something forgotten so long ago. “A complete fuckup,” he corrected. “Did you forget why I had to leave Sunshine?” He knew she hadn’t. His wild ways had been legendary. Hell, he’d dragged her into some of them. No one would have believed that Donald Reid’s daughter, in Sunshine for the summer, would give a thug like Adam a second look.
    But she had.
    She’d sucked him into her vortex in the best possible way. And then Adam’s wild ways caught up with him one night when he and his idiot friends had gone drag racing out on Highway 89. They’d raced a lot. But on this particular night, the weather had gone to shit. Not that they’d cared. Hell, they’d been invincible.
    Thank God, Holly hadn’t been with him. He’d beencareful to keep her away from his friends. The accident, when the inevitable had happened, hadn’t involved Adam or his car. Nope, that would have been far too easy.
    The cop chasing them had slid out on the wet, slick highway, over a three-hundred-foot embankment, dying instantly.
    By the skin of his teeth, Adam had been spared legal blame by the court system. The judge had ruled the tragedy an accidental death but had firmly suggested Adam get his act together, and fast.
    On a