Secrets Whispered from the Sea - Emma St. Clair Page 0,27
from my brow with my forearm. The AC guy was coming Monday morning, not a moment too soon.
Emily glanced up from the kitchen, an expression that looked a whole heck of a lot like disdain crossing her features before it was replaced with something a little more polite, and a lot more fake.
“Hello, Alec,” Emily said. “How lovely to see you again.”
My eyebrows shot up at her tone. Emily hadn’t made a secret of disliking the Commission for Renovation and Development, but I expected her to hide her feelings a little better. Especially considering we needed to get them to sign off on the plans I hadn’t even decided on yet.
“Emily.” He gave her a curt nod.
Alec, for his part, didn’t seem any more or less enthused to see Emily than he had to see me. Her caustic tone didn’t stop him from moving around the main living area, peering at things and touching all the solid surfaces. Countertops. The walls. The mantle above the fireplace. He even did small hops in a few places, as though testing out the floor.
At least he didn’t make a remark on all the stuff. It wasn’t mine, but I felt a ripple of shame nonetheless.
I turned wide eyes to Emily, who only shrugged. Grabbing one of the boxes I dropped, she began folding it into shape. She pulled duct tape from her purse—which made me like her even more—and assembled it. When I still didn’t move, she looked up and jerked her head, indicating that I should follow Alec. He had disappeared into the hallway.
“Do you, um, have any questions?”
“No.” He opened the guest room door, the one I’d refused to sleep in my first night, and walked in, looking around at the mess before opening the closet.
It wasn’t my house. It wasn’t my mess. But having Alec walk around, assessing and poking into corners made my skin prickle with nerves. It reminded me of how it felt to be the first person at the beach or pool to remove your cover-up, that vulnerability and feeling of being out of place, alone, exposed.
I didn’t realize I was standing in his way until Alec brushed past me, so close that the scent of him—strong and masculine, yet also carrying something of the sea—overwhelmed me, and the prickling on my skin turned to more of an electric hum, lifting the small hairs on my arms and at my hairline.
His eyes, the color of the Atlantic during a storm, caught and held mine as he passed. It was only a moment, but every sensation—his smell, the brush of his chest against mine, the heat of his body, the intensity of his eyes—combined into a heightened awareness that left me dizzy and unable to move.
“Sorry,” I mumbled.
Alec had already moved to the one small bathroom, and the sound of him yanking the shower curtain back made me wince. Underneath the jangle of the metal rings, I swore I heard him mutter, “I’m not.” But when he tried to exit the bathroom and I stood in his way again, the irritated sigh he gave made me think I must have imagined the words.
It was only when his hand touched the doorknob of Nana’s room that reality like the slap of cold ocean water.
“Don’t go in there!” I said, my voice like the squeak of a rusty hinge. I lurched forward, expecting Alec to ignore me and barrel through the one door that I hadn’t brought myself to open yet. “This was my Nana’s room.”
And though I wanted to fall right through the floor, tears filled my eyes. I refused to step away from the locked door. It was too soon. Nana’s bedroom was too sacred. I hadn’t been able to set foot inside. Alec and his harsh judgment definitely didn’t get to.
He stared me down for a long moment, as though teetering on the edge of a decision. I expected him to demand entrance or try to jimmy the lock, but instead, that hard, handsome face softened. Only a fraction, but I could see it. Giving me a nod that conveyed a surprising amount of understanding, Alec walked away, leaving me standing alone in the dimly lit hallway, my eyes fixed on Nana’s door. I heard him opening the last guest bedroom door, but I didn’t move until his footsteps disappeared down the short hall to the main living area.
I drew in a deep breath, not realizing that I’d been holding it. Before following Alec, I brushed my