Free You Really Got Me by Kelly Jamieson Page A

something to do with her disappearing. When you were asking those questions.”
    He sighed. “I’m sorry, Kendall. We have to ask questions.”
    “I just want you to find her.”
    “We’re working on it.”
    She nodded.
    “You always look out for Kevin, don’t you?”
    Her insides tightened. “What do you mean?”
    The corners of his mouth quirked. “You know what I mean.”
    “Well.” She swallowed. “Of course I do. He’s my little brother. After our parents died, I had to look out for him.”
    “That’s not what I mean. Of course you had to look after him. But that’s not the same as bailing him out.”
    She frowned and lowered her chin.
    “I heard more about what happened to your parents,” he said quietly.
    “I guess the whole world knows.” Bitterness crept into her tone.
    “It wasn’t your fault. What happened.”
    She didn’t meet his eyes, said nothing.
    “Kendall.” He lifted her chin, but she kept her eyes downcast as guilt tightened her body. “You know that, don’t you? It wasn’t your fault.”
    “Yes. It was.”
    He made a low growling sound.
    “I wanted to drive,” she continued, her throat aching and constricted. “That night. I tried to get my dad to let me drive.”
    “You were just a teenager. It was not your fault.” She lifted her eyes and met his, and the empathy and lack of judgment in his eyes made her breath shudder out of her. “Have you been beating yourself up about that all these years?”
    Once again, she didn’t respond, more shame burning her. “I could have done more.”
    “Ah, Christ, Kendall. That’s a helluva burden to carry around all this time.”
    She paused, her throat closing up again. “I always wonder if I could have done more and changed what happened. I tried so hard but…it was never enough.” Her last words came out on a whisper.
    He nodded and his thumb rubbed over her bottom lip. He leaned forward and grazed his mouth over hers in a warm caress. “You’re so damn sweet. Talk to me about your parents.”
    “Why?” She tilted her head.
    “I want to understand.”
    “Understand what?” She drew back. “Is this part of your investigation?”
    He closed his eyes. “No. Of course not.” After a short pause, he said, “I want to understand you. I want to understand why you’re resisting what’s happening between us. What’s inside you.”
    “My parents don’t have anything to do with what’s happening between us,” she said.   “And I don’t want to talk about them.”
    His eyes softened and warmed, and he drew back, pulled her into his arms and settled into the corner of the couch. “Okay, then. Tell me more about wine.”
    She tried to control her breath, her racing heart, relief at not having to talk about her shameful past mingled with a curl of arousal. “Um…like what?”
    He hitched a big shoulder. “I don’t know. Tell me more about your winery. I know your father started it.”
    She relaxed a little into his embrace. “Yes. He was an incredibly talented winemaker. He hadan artistic, intuitive sense for wine. He developed some really outstanding wines that won awards and really helped make this area known for its wines. He was passionate about it…about growing the industry as well as creating fine wines.”
    “Passion.”
    “Yes.”
    “So you inherited that from him.”
    She smiled. More tension eased from her body as she talked about something she loved so much. “I suppose. But running a winery requires more than just a passion for great wine. It takes business knowledge, innovative technology and a lot of hard work. There’s the vineyard to cultivate, which takes a lot of agricultural knowledge, there’s the winemaking, which takes a lot of science and chemistry knowledge. We have to be always trying new things, experimenting. And then there’ s the business–all the government laws and licensing, marketing our wines, getting them out there, growing the business, running the tasting room. It ’s