Interesting? Why would I find it interesting?

“So do you think you can cut out for a few hours?” he asks, watching me expectantly.

I focus my gaze on the table, wondering if I should go, wondering why I debate this, and what the heck I have on my calendar that I can’t remember. God, this is weird, familiar and distant at once, and I haven’t a clue what I should do here.

I stare at his hand, so close to mine, on the table. Whoever thought it would be so uncomfortable not to touch a guy? It doesn’t feel natural this space we hold between us, spiced with the kind of talk people have who have known each other intimately. What would he do if I touched him?

His fingers cover mine and he gives me a friendly squeeze. The feel of him runs through my body with remembered sweetness.

Suddenly, nothing in my life is as important as spending the afternoon with Bobby, and for the first time in a very long time I don’t feel like a disjointed collection of uncomfortably fitting parts. I feel at ease inside myself being with Bobby.

I stop trying to access my mental calendar and smile up at Bobby. “I’ve got as much time as you need.”

Bobby chuckles and his hand slips back from me. He rises and tosses some bills on the table. “Just a few hours, Kaley. I’ll have you back before the end of the day.”

I rise from my chair and think not if I figure out fast how not to blow this.

Even sitting with an unwanted distance between us on the front bench seat of Bobby’s old truck, every part of me is connected and reacting to him. I want nothing more than to slide closer, to feel him, to taste him, but instead I sit silently smiling, drinking in the sight of him and fighting the wind from the open windows as it turns my tamed curls into—what will surely be before this drive is over—a Chia Pet.

“I can’t believe you still have Bertha,” I say, studying the aged ’60s Ford dashboard and shaking my head.

Bobby laughs. “She’s a classic, Kaley. I’m never getting rid of this truck.”

“She’s an old, gas-guzzling heap without air conditioning.”

Bobby grins in a boyishly charming way. “You’ve forgotten. We added air conditioning.”

He turns on the small orange windup fan mounted on the dash. I start to laugh and then the laughter leaves me because I remember the day we put the fan there and I am painfully aware of how much I’ve missed him.

I stare out the window. Our journey has taken us an hour out of the downtown and we’re now heading north on the 101.

“Where are you taking me?” I ask.

“Simi Valley. We’re almost there.”

“I’ve never been to Simi Valley. What’s in Simi?”

His eyes lock on me and I start to tingle. “Me. That’s what’s in Simi. It’s where I live now. Where my business is.”

For a second I’m hurt. I didn’t know he’d moved from Pacific Palisades. There was a time I knew every piece, every secret of him. I never thought he’d leave the coast and now he’s living inland. Why the change?

“How long ago did you move?”

Bobby’s eyes shift from me. He hits the turn signal to exit the freeway. “Almost two years, Kaley.”

Why, that was right after we broke up and he moved out of the beach house. And I never knew he moved away. I study the streets, fighting back unexpected tears.

“So why Simi?”

“I wanted some land. Some space.”

The farther east we drive the less suburban everything starts to look. There are now small ranches, horses, and other livestock mixed with the planned housing tracts.

“Land? For what?” I ask.

“I’m running a small not-for-profit foundation. Still in the fledgling stage.”

His answer takes me by surprise. “You are? What kind of foundation?”

His smile is very satisfied and a touch excited. “We’re almost there. This is something you’ll understand better if I show you rather than tell you.”

I take a small measure of hope from Bobby wanting me to understand this new, unknown element of his life. More than that, it sounds important to him to share this with me. I was right to take off with him today on his adventure. It’s right that I’m here. And if I’m lucky, very soon it will be right between us.

Again I am tempted, so very tempted, to take away the space between us and kiss him.

He hits the turn signal and turns down a narrow gravel road. There’s a small sign at a locked gate: Tiki’s House. What the heck is that? Bobby said he was running a foundation.

I bite my lower lip, refraining from grilling him, and watch as he stops the truck. If the guy prefers to show me, I’ll let him show me. Memories of us come tumbling back. I should have let him lead more often. I should have been willing to follow at times.

Bobby opens his door, hops from the truck and unlocks the chain across the road. He climbs back into the truck. We start to bounce down the gravel road.

I laugh. “What kind of place are you living in, Bobby?”

“It’s private. No one to disturb here. It suits my needs.”

“What needs? And why do you want privacy? Are you growing medical marijuana? Is that your new business?” I tease.

Bobby laughs and I’m relieved that he takes my comment as humor and remembers that I’m a tad sarcastic at times. I smile.

“Nothing so glamorous. I already told you that.”

“Well, you’ll certainly have privacy here. Who’d want to brave the driveway?”

He pretends to give it serious thought. “The driveway is pretty bad. Do you think that’s why I can never convince a date to come home with me?”

A date? I definitely didn’t like hearing that one. I have to force myself to maintain the teasing banter.

I playfully scrunch up my nose. “Maybe it’s your technique?”

He shakes his head. “No, can’t be that. My technique got me the hottest girl in Pacific Palisades.”

The way he’s looking at me makes me nearly cry from the joy of hearing him say that. “And it got a busy independent filmmaker here today.”

His eyes fix on me intensely. “Maybe my technique only works with you.”

I sure hope so, my heart whispers, and I can’t wait another second to touch him. I unbuckle my seat belt. Every inch of my flesh comes awake with anticipation. I start to ease into him.

He opens his door and pulls back. “Come on, I want to show you everything.”

I watch him disappear into the sunlight and a heavy sigh of disappointment pushes through me. Then I notice my surroundings: a charming blue-paint, white-trim farm house, velvet lawns, old oak trees, long rows of tiny structures and….barking?

I climb from the truck and closed the door. “What is this place?”

Bobby smiles. “Tiki’s House. My foundation.”

My eyes widen as I try to absorb my surroundings. “But why is there so much barking? What kind of foundation is this?”

“I rescue dogs. Most of them come to me by way of illegal dog fighting.”

He gestures to the sign. Dog Rescue, Rehabilitation and Sanctuary.

“Dogs?” I don’t know what to make of this. This is not on the list of what I expected Bobby to show me. “You run a dog rescue and rehabilitation foundation?”

Amusement dances in Bobby’s gorgeous green eyes. “You’re the one who told me to be less complacent. To do something meaningful with my life. To find something I wanted to do. To live my own life instead of yours. Well, this is it, Kaley. I’m living my own life instead of yours now. Doing what I love. I’m happy.”

Crap! Was I such a bitch when we were together that I actually said that? And what is he trying to tell me with that speech?

“I’m glad. I never wanted anything but you to be happy, Bobby. It looks like we’ve both found something worthwhile to do with our lives. It’s amazing what you’ve done here.”

He lowers his frame to give a gentle scratch to the fierce-looking pit bull inside a cage. “Maybe if I’d been more interesting none of the other stuff would have happened,” he says so softly I almost can’t hear him.