Helping Sarah

Chapter 13

Michael

I walked Sarah to the bus stop and waited with her until the bus came, though neither of us said much. Then walked down the street again with my hands in my pockets and a crack in my heart, towards the large building at the other end, just as I'd done before my day had grown unexpectedly better.

And then crashed.

I suppose I should be grateful to Cheryl, the waitress at the coffee shop, that she hadn't mentioned my real name in front of Sarah, but I still wanted to yell at her. The same thing happened every time I went there; she would flirt outrageously with me and ask me out, and she was almost as bad as Bridgette at understanding the word no.

She'd once asked me out while Bridgette had been with me. The ensuing high-pitched screeching had damaged more eardrums than mine.

But today Cheryl had made Sarah's smile vanish and her dark eyes dim, and that I couldn't forgive her.

"Where the fuck have you been?" Lisa pounced the moment I walked into her office.

"Coffee shop," I said, walking around her and into my own office on the other side of hers.

She only followed. "Michael! You've already had two cups today."

"I had tea," I told her as I fell into my chair. Then in a low voice added, "With Sarah."

"What?"

I glanced up at my PA standing in the middle of my office. "I met her in the street, down by the entrance."

Lisa's arms crossed as her eyes narrowed. "It's Friday," she said after a moment. "She'd been at her meeting with her clients?"

"Yeah." I pushed both hands through my hair. "We just bumped into each other. She was upset so I took her to the coffee shop."

Lisa stared at me for a long moment, then her arms fell and she came to sit in the chair before my desk and asked in a voice I hadn't heard since she'd had to catch me when I swayed when I stood up, "What happened?"

I'd been punched in the gut was what had happened.

If looking into Sarah's eyes that day in James' office had made my heart thump, it was nothing compared to the painful whacks it had beat when she'd told me about losing her husband.

My head started shaking. I'd been an idiot to even imagine I could come on to her, even in my stumbling, rambling way. My instincts had mislead me again. Sarah wasn't ready for that.

I'd known it wouldn't be a pretty story, how could it be with drugs involved, but I had wanted to hear it. Even if the pain in Sarah's voice, in her eyes, had made my heart squeeze too.

"Michael?"

I swallowed tightly. "She told me about your brother and what happened to him."

Lisa's mouth fell open, and the sight of my PA speechless was so rare I sat up straight. "Lisa? What's wrong?"

"Sarah told you about Andrew? How he died?"

"Yes. Why does that make you gape like a startled fish?"

It took a full minute before she replied. "Sarah doesn't talk much about Andrew. Not even with me. She's still..." She slowly shook her head. Then suddenly stilled and her eyes on me expanded to saucers, her mouth falling open again as she breathed, "She likes you."

I almost snorted. "No, she doesn't. Not like that." Sarah might trust me and feel comfortable enough with me to talk to me, but that didn't mean she was in the slightest attracted to me. Not the way I was to her. It in no way meant that she wanted what I did.

Every time I sat close beside her or held her hand, every time I managed to make her smile, she would eventually draw away from me. Like just now in the coffee shop when Cheryl had interrupted us.

"She likes you enough to talk about Andrew," Lisa argued. Then leaned closer. "Michael, this is brilliant!"

"It is?"

"Yes! You're the first guy in three years she's talked to. And now she's had coffee with you. This is exactly what Sarah needs." She all but clapped her hands for the glee in her voice. "I knew she'd like you. I should have introduced the two of you years ago."

My heart thumped at Lisa's words, she did know Sarah better than I did, until I remembered how Sarah had shied away from my touch when I'd held the door for her as we had left the coffee shop, how she had made sure to keep distance between us all the way to the bus stop.

I shook my head and fell back in the chair again. "No. Sarah would have been even less interested in me back then than she is now."

Her lips pursed as she considered. "True, but at least she's interested now."

"No, Lisa. She isn't. Not like you're imagining. It's as you said the other day, Sarah doesn't need me to try to get into her knickers. She needs a friend."

"A boyfriend."

"No. Just a friend." A sigh lifted my chest before it fell again. Sarah was clearly still hurting, clearly still missing her husband, and I couldn't compete with that. "I'll help her as I promised, with Lenny, but I won't be hitting on her or trying for anything more."

"But I'll help you win her over. I want this for Sarah. I won't even tell her you lied."

A snort escaped me. "The moment the three of us are in the same room, you'll spill the truth about how you know me within five minutes." Lisa was not a good liar, and an even worse actress. If she attempted to pretend she didn't know me, Sarah would grow suspicious before Lisa had even opened her mouth.

That my PA didn't argue spoke louder than she usual did. She grimaced instead. "I think you and Sarah can be good together."

I thought so too. I knew we could. But the tears that had shimmered in Sarah's eyes, the few that had spilled over down her cheeks, revealed her pain more clearly than any words could. She didn't need my unwanted attention to deal with on top of that.

If she had given even the slightest hint of interest in me it would have been different, I would have used that to hold firm to the hope that maybe someday. But no. It wasn't to be.