The Way to Her Heart Read Online Free PDF Page B

unusual.”
    She rolled her eyes. “Uh, yeah, to say the least. It’s short for Bernice. I was named for my grandmother. It’s only about a century out of date. I tried to go by my middle name, but it didn’t stick, so Bernie is better than nothing, I guess.”
    “And your middle name is?”
    “Lynn. Not great, but better than Bernie.”
    “Nah. Bernie suits you somehow.” He smiled at her, flashing those lethal dimples again.
    “So, what’s your middle name?”
    “Dane. It’s a family name. It’s my grandfather’s middle name. And my dad’s.” He stared at the now-decimated artichoke for a moment. “My dad died,” he admitted quietly. “So did my little brother.”
    She had figured something like that. “God. I’m so sorry.”
    “Thanks. I just figured you should know since you’re stuck with me. It kind of screwed me up. But I’m better now, sort of. I won’t mess this project up for you, I promise.”
    She could detect a hint of shine in his eyes, and her heart melted a little bit more. “I’m not worried. I’m pretty screwed up too. What happened? How did they die? I mean, if you don’t mind telling me…” She let her words fade as she realized he may not want to talk about it to a relative stranger.
    “A car wreck. A little over a year ago. They were coming home from Caleb’s soccer game. Mom was with me at my football game. They sometimes had to split up to be at our games.” He sniffed and stood to put away the dishes. “You ready? We’d better get started on our shopping.”
    He drove them to a grocery store she habitually passed on her way to Walmart. She tried not to display her utter amazement at the difference in prices as they wandered the aisles, snapping pictures on his cell phone of the items on their list. She couldn’t manage to keep up the blasé act, however, when she saw the sushi bar. There was a full-on sushi bar with a guy making all kinds of different rolls. Josh stopped to talk with the chef, asking him to demonstrate a cutting technique, which the chef seemed to enjoy. He presented them with sushi samples, which Josh wolfed down and Bernie stared at suspiciously. She’d never tasted sushi before but had heard it was raw fish. She had no intention of eating raw fish, now or ever.
    “It’s not raw.” Josh leaned in to whisper in her ear, his warm breath tickling her ear, making her shiver. Could he read her mind? “You don’t want to hurt Greg’s feelings, do you?”
    “His name is Greg?” she whispered back. The man was clearly Asian. She reached hesitantly toward the sushi slice. She was surprised to find she enjoyed the taste, for the most part. “Thanks,” she said to Greg, who nodded and smiled as he went back to creating more sushi rolls.
    Back in Josh’s truck, she scrolled through the photos on his phone of the grocery items they had just “bought.” She checked them against the list she had on her lap. She paused when she got to a photo of his girlfriend posing with her pom-poms. She’d seen them sitting together in the cafeteria and holding hands in the hall. She was gorgeous, the kind of girl who made Bernie feel frumpy and unattractive. She quickly scrolled back to the grocery items, not wanting Josh to catch her spying on him.
    “Let’s grab a bite to eat, okay? I’m starving. Do you mind?” He glanced at her quickly as he drove.
    She mentally sorted the cash in her wallet and hoped he didn’t plan to stop somewhere expensive, but feared he didn’t know how to eat cheap. “Um, sure. Yeah, that sounds good.” She would order the cheapest thing possible and claim she wasn’t hungry.
    Fifteen minutes later, he pulled the Ford F-150 into the parking lot of an obviously upscale restaurant in the Nob Hill neighborhood of Albuquerque, and Bernie’s heart sank. As he turned off the ignition, he reached over and touched her arm lightly. “Let me come around and open your door, okay? It’s important to me. My mom raised me to be a