Cinderella's Sweet-Talking Marine. Cathie Linz

outstretched hand in a high five. “Captain Ben Kozlowski,” he said to Earl. “Do you mind if I talk to Ellie here for a few minutes? It’s official business.”

      Her heart stopped. “Is it Johnny? Did they make a mistake? Is he still alive?”

      She vaguely saw Ben shake his head before the entire room telescoped and went black.

      Ben caught Ellie before she collapsed onto the floor. Sweeping her up into his arms, he followed Earl’s hurried directions to the employee’s exit and the fresh air outside. A rush of warmth hit him, rising from the pavement.

      Although it was only early March, the temperature was already in the low eighties today. The bright sunlight highlighted Ellie’s pale face. She felt so fragile as he carried her.

      Ben cursed himself for not having handled things better. But his track record in that department lately was pretty abysmal. He hadn’t been doing much right lately. He wasn’t here on any official business of the Marine Corps, he was here to honor his buddy’s dying wishes.

      Heading for his Bronco, Ben shifted her in his arms as he opened the passenger door and gently set her on the seat before reaching for the bottle of water he had nearby. Keeping one arm around her, he dabbed some water on a paper towel he ripped from a roll behind the driver’s seat. Before placing the dampened cloth on her forehead, he felt her neck to check her pulse. Her skin was so soft beneath his fingertips.

      “Get your hands off me!” She shoved him away with surprising strength and he narrowly avoided hitting the back of his head on the dashboard.

      “Take it easy,” he said in a soothing voice, holding his hands up as the guy had in the bar earlier. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

      She knew better. He’d already hurt her just by being here. And he’d angered her by showing up at her place of employment. She felt like an idiot for passing out the way she had, even if it had only been for a moment. She glared at him. She’d displayed weakness, something she hated, and it was all his fault. Reason alone to want him gone. “Since when do the Marines send someone out of uniform to do anything official? I’m not buying that story for one minute. So you’d better start talking, Captain, and you’d better start talking fast or I’ll have Earl take care of you.” Her words reflected her fury. “What kind of idiot walks into a bar and tells a woman who’s recently lost her brother what you told me?”

      “Let’s start over, shall we? My name is Ben Kozlowski. I knew your brother. He was a close buddy of mine.”

      “How close? Were you there when he died?”

      Ben nodded.

      “Then why didn’t you do something to save him?”

      His gut clenched. Her unsteady question wasn’t one he hadn’t asked himself a thousand times ever since that awful moment. He’d give anything to have changed the way things had happened.

      “I’m sorry.”

      “Sorry won’t bring him back.”

      “I realize that.”

      Her gaze turned suspicious. “You weren’t the one who shot him, were you?”

      “No, I wasn’t the one who shot him.” But he might as well have been. Not that he could tell her that. He wasn’t here to try and clear his conscience. He was here to make good on a promise. A vow.

      So Ben slammed the hatch on his own turbulent emotions, and concentrated on Ellie. She was clearly displeased with him and he couldn’t blame her. He hadn’t handled things very well so far.

      She was still pale, but she was no weak victim. There was nothing submissive about the tilt of her chin.

      He was watching her again. She felt his gaze on her. She met it head-on. She wasn’t going to back away. “Johnny wrote me about you.” She fiercely tried to keep her voice steady. She’d already made a big enough fool of herself by fainting like that. And then by spurning his apology, asking him if he’d shot her brother. She was a mess. Not like her. She had to get her act together. She hadn’t had time to eat that day. Low blood sugar, that’s why she’d passed out. She gathered her thoughts. “You weren’t at his funeral, though.”

      “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it. I was still overseas.”

      “Is that why you tracked me down? To offer your condolences?”

      “I wanted to check up on you.”

      “I appreciate the thought,” she said stiffly, clearly indicating that she didn’t really appreciate it at all. “But there’s no need.”

      “I think there’s every need. You don’t belong in a place like this.” He jerked his head toward the bar.

      “I can take care of myself.”

      “It didn’t look that way to me.”

      She tugged on the skimpy hem of her skirt before replying. “I don’t need you walking into my life and telling me what to do. What I do need is to get back to work.”

      “You just fainted!”

      “Because you scared me by saying you were here on official business about Johnny.” It was idiotic of her to think that the military had made a mistake. She’d stood by the grave site. Seen his casket lowered into the ground. But she’d had a vivid dream the night before where her brother, with that crooked grin of his, had told her that his death was a big mistake.

      “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have put it that way.”

      “Yeah, well…” She swung her long legs out the open car door, dislodging him in the process.

      Standing, he held out his hand to assist her, but she didn’t take his offer of help, preferring to do it herself.

      She was taller than he’d thought at first, the top of her head reaching to just beneath his chin. He reached out to smooth the tendrils of dark hair that had fallen across her pale face.

      “When was the last time you ate?” he demanded.

      “I’m fine,” she insisted, backing up to glare at him.

      “You’re not pregnant, are you? Is that why you fainted?”

      “No, I’m not pregnant,” she said, highly offended.

      “Look, I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on with you.”

      “What’s going on is that you are beginning to irritate me,” Ellie retorted. “What gives you the right to walk in here out of the blue and start interrogating me as if I were one of your Marines? I’m not. I’m the responsible mother of a five-year-old. I can handle anything.” She prayed that if she kept saying that often enough, she’d start believing it eventually.

      Maybe she could handle anything, but Ben knew he couldn’t. He couldn’t handle the fact that she was swaying on her feet from exhaustion, that she was clearly struggling to make ends meet. “Why do you work here? I thought John told me you were waitressing in a nice family restaurant, some sort of mom-and-pop place.”

      “I was, but it went bankrupt suddenly a few months ago. This was the only job I could get. I don’t have a college degree.” She’d left school to work, to support Perry who was getting his degree. Yet another example of how love had blinded her and made her stupid. “I didn’t want my brother worrying about me so I didn’t tell him about my new job. Which reminds me, how did you find me?”

      “I had your address. From John. You weren’t there, but a neighbor told me you worked here.” He waved his hand toward Al’s Place in a dismissive move. “Let me help you. I can give you some money until things settle down.”

      “I can’t take money from you.” What kind of woman did he think she was? “I don’t need any handouts.”

      “John would want me to help you and he’d want you to accept that help.”