“What is it?”

“Soda bread. Wheaten has tons of different flavors and types, some traditional and some not. My favorite is the cinnamon raisin,” he told her, pointing to a glass display case that held the assortment.

Clare stepped around Ace to see the display better while Rory got in line. He didn’t need to see the display or even read the menu to know what he wanted, since he had come here so often over the years and tried it all.

“I think I’m going to go for the chocolate.” She nodded her head decisively as she turned back to him. He smiled at the excitement in her eyes and ordered for both of them when they got to the front.

A few minutes later, they took their servings over to an empty table a few feet away from one of the lamps on the outskirts of the crowd. He waited for Clare to try her soda bread before he started, enjoying watching her face light up at the sweet new experience.

“This is really good.” She nodded at him. “Thanks for bringing me here.”

“It’s about time you got to know your neighborhood a bit better.”

“I didn’t see you at Legends this morning. Are you still training?” Clare asked as she crossed one leg over her knee and leaned against the table, taking another bite of her treat.

“I was there for a bit, left kind of early.” The fight with his father and brother didn’t bear mentioning.

“There’s something in that story that you’re not telling me.”

“How do you know that?” He was curious, but determined to keep the truth at bay.

“Easy. You reek of booze.”

“Damn, why don’t you tell me how you really feel? I just showered, you know,” he quipped, polishing off the last of his soda bread.

“Showering only helps if you spill a drink on yourself, not if your body is ninety percent alcohol.”

“Someone thinks they know everything.” He felt annoyed, but mostly embarrassed, trying to detour the topic as best he could.

“Why do you do it?” she asked softly, after a minute of silence passed between them.

“Why do I drink?”

She nodded. He paused, thinking about it for a moment and clearing his throat.

“I don’t know. It helps me. I have a lot of pain in my leg from my last fight.” Flashes of the fight ran through his mind as he saw his knee being broken, snapping with a resounding crack as it bent in the wrong direction under his opponent’s force.

“The championship fight against Santiago?”

“Yeah, seems like everyone knows about the biggest failure of my life. Took most of a year of physical therapy to be able to walk normally, but the pain is still there.” He didn’t enjoy the topic and was just glad that she didn’t know about the prescription pills he currently held in his pocket.

Clare reached one hand across the table and slipped her fingers through his, giving him a small squeeze. He hugged his fingers tighter around hers, not letting her pull away, loving the feeling of touching her. Rory honestly couldn’t think of another time that he had ever held a girl’s hand before tonight. In fact, he recalled making fun of some of his friends who were in relationships for doing just that.

Was that what this was now? Two nights in a row with the same woman was almost a record for him. Was he in a relationship?

He wouldn’t mind it if he was.

He gazed up from their hands and saw a relaxed, yet sympathetic, smile on her face. Her green eyes shimmered in the moonlight and her pale skin was even lighter against the dark backdrop of the night. She was mesmerizing, and he couldn’t stop himself from letting her infiltrate the walls he had carefully built up around himself to keep everyone away.

“I dropped out of college; that’s my biggest failure,” she said, breaking the moment with her admission.

“Really? That’s not that big a deal—plenty of people do it.”

“It’s a big deal to me. I really wanted to be a veterinarian. I spent my entire life around animals and worked as a technician for a while, but being a vet was always the end goal.”

He squeezed her hand a bit tighter.

“You can go back—you’re still young. How old are you?”

“Twenty-four. I know I can; it just is a big thing to have to start over. I’m already barely managing starting over in a new state and a new life here,” she confessed.

“Where were you before?” He pried a little.

“California. I have a friend who owns my apartment here,” she explained. “She’s letting me rent it from her while she’s living in Manhattan and finishing up at New York University.”

“That’s where I got my master’s in business,” he commented absently. She paused, surprise and confusion on her face.

“You have a graduate degree?” She seemed stunned.

“Don’t look so surprised. I’m not some meathead jock, you know.”

“Sorry, I guess that was rude. I’m impressed.”

He just nodded, never knowing how to take a compliment.

“Of course now that just makes me feel worse about only having a high school diploma, you jerk.” Her voice dripped with sarcasm.

“That’s not what I was trying to do.”

“I know, I know. I will go back to school soon. I just need to save up some before I can—sort some stuff out, you know?” Her explanation was vague, and it made him wonder if there was more there that he didn’t know about.

“How did you pay for school before?” he asked.

“I had fewer expenses; all of my income went straight to school.”

“You lived with your parents?”

“No, my parents died in a car crash when I was seventeen. They were actually on their way home from my soccer game—I used to love to play. After that, I lived with a boyfriend…”

Her voice trailed off as Rory stood up and pulled her chair over to him, closing the space between them. His one hand was still interlocked with hers. He slipped his free hand around her waist and pressed her hand against his chest. The rest of her body was flush against him, almost sitting in his lap, warming his skin where she made contact. He saw her chest rising and falling faster than before as he let a moment pass between them without saying anything, ignoring the crowd surrounding them, just staring into her big eyes.

“Clare, I’m so sorry.” His words were soft and slow, laced with concern and sincerity.

He saw tears building over her lower eyelashes, but she batted them back quickly before pulling away.

“Don’t worry about me.” She stood up and he followed suit, as they picked up their empty plates and trashed them.

“Don’t do that, Clare,” he said after they stepped away from the crowd, heading back down the street the way they had come, Ace by their side.

“I’m not doing anything.”

“You’re shutting me out. I saw you. You stopped yourself from crying in front of me—you don’t need to do that.”

Clare gave him a small smile. Her eyes shone under the moonlight as she and Rory meandered through the neighborhood. He was barely able to concentrate on where he was stepping, because all he wanted to do was admire her beautiful eyes.

“It’s not about not letting you in, Rory. It’s about being afraid to let myself out. I’ve lived behind certain walls my whole life; I’m safe there. Something about you is trying to change that, and I don’t know why I’m letting it.” He loved her honesty and the way she admitted her fears to him, causing him to grab her hand in his again. She didn’t pull away this time, and he was glad because he wouldn’t have let her.

“You said you trusted me,” he reminded her.

“I do.” She stopped as they reached a corner underneath a streetlamp and he pulled her to him.

“Then let me behind your walls. Let me be your walls. You’re safe with me.”

He knew he couldn’t wait another day; he had tried his best to resist the urge to steal every part of her body and make it his. Gazing at her glistening green eyes, perfect small nose, and pouty rose lips, he knew he couldn’t contain himself a minute longer.