She could see the outside damage. The marks on his face, the scars on his arms, the bony protrusions at all his joints, the lopsidedness to his jaw where it’d been broken and never healed right. She remembered the first time she’d seen him in the hospital. He’d been so still, his eyes closed and his face swathed in bandages. She’d gently held his fingers, the only part of him that looked like it didn’t hurt, and they’d softly squeezed back. Jamie had studied his hospital bed, so many tubes and machines.

Her mother hadn’t left his bedside since he’d been found. Her father had driven back and forth between the hospital and his job, seeing Jamie at dinnertime where he’d promise Chris would be coming home soon.

Looking at him in that hospital bed, Jamie knew it was going to be a long time before her brother truly came home.

Over those next few weeks, she lost count of the number of times she said, “Chris is doing good, and he’ll be home soon.” This was in reply to neighbors, teachers, and even strangers who somehow knew about her brother. That was probably from the TV. Chris’s story was frequently on the TV, even though the reporters never talked to him or her parents.

Her parents whispered to each other all the time. Outside his hospital room, in the car, in their bedroom. Sometimes it sounded like they were arguing in whispers. Jamie heard them mention brain damage and burns and therapy. Her mother cried a lot, not nearly as much as when Chris first went missing, but more than a mother should when her lost boy has finally come home. Jamie played silently with her Barbies, read books, watched TV, and waited for someone to tell her when her family would be back to normal.

Chris missed another year of school. Three years total. His parents had pushed for him to return when he could walk without needing to rest every ten feet, but Chris said he wasn’t ready. He was nearly fourteen and should have been starting high school with his friends. Instead, he’d avoided his friends, telling them he was too tired and telling his parents he didn’t like the way his friends stared at his scars. Eventually, they stopped coming around. When he could look at a book without getting headaches, he’d started studying. And studying. His parents had bought their first computer, and Chris took it over. After a lot of discussion, his mother had designed a path for him to get his GED. That decision seemed to alleviate some of his stress.

He’d helped Jamie with her homework, tugged on her black braids, and called her “Licorice,” like he had before he’d vanished. His own light-brown hair grew back uneven and patchy from where he’d had the surgery on his skull. He kept it buzzed short, making him look like he was from Auschwitz, not Oregon. He never gained enough weight to resemble the healthy, heavy athletic boy he’d been before. Until the day he moved out, he’d looked anorexic and pale.

Looking back, Jamie understood why her parents didn’t force Chris to go to school, but was it the wisest decision? Would he be the hermit that he is today if he’d been forced to socialize? Or would he simply have more internal scars?

She knew absolutely nothing about her brother.

Everyone had tiptoed around him. Were they simply enablers of his condition? Jamie had spent years learning about educating children and their behaviors, but suddenly it all went out the window when it came down to the emotions stirred up by her brother. Had they done right by Chris? First her parents and then her. Had she done the right thing by letting him dictate the limits of their relationship? Should she have pushed for him to give her more?

“Ouch!” Michael said, jerking them to a stop and dropping her hand.

“What?”

“You’re about to break my hand. You’ve got a grip like a nun who likes to whip with a ruler.” He cradled it like it was broken.

Jamie glanced at his hand. Sure enough, she’d caused the blood to blanch out of his palm.

“I was enjoying holding your hand, but you seemed to not be focusing on the romance of the moment.”

“Romance?”

“Yes. You and me in this quaint little town. Walking to dinner, holding hands.”

She tried not to roll her eyes. “I was thinking about Chris’s recovery and the situation with his son. Sorry, I wasn’t seeing the romance of the moment.”

Green eyes gazed deep into hers. “I liked holding your hand. I can hold your hand and still look for your brother, right?”

Jamie caught her breath and felt her heart do the tiniest flutter. That shade of green…

Who the heck was Michael Brody? Jedi knight and hand-holder?

“I like you, Jamie Jacobs. I like you a lot. And I have no problem letting you know.”

She blinked. He was so direct. It was…refreshing.

Michael was figuring out how to push her happy buttons in a fast way. Charmer or not, she was buying what he was selling. Something told her he was much deeper than the casual image he presented. She’d learned to look to the heart of people; it was part of her job. She could spot a bullshitter at ten yards. Michael was sending out true, clear signals of honesty.

“When you called me after your attack, I was ready to rip someone’s head off. The thought of you being hurt didn’t sit well with me. At all.” Sparks lit inside his eyes.

Oh my. Her heart did the flutter again. Bigger this time.

He leaned closer, running a warm hand up and down her arm. “Hungry?” His tone said nothing about food.

“Starved,” she said. “For dinner,” she clarified.

A slow smile stretched across Michael’s face, and he took a firm hold of her hand, leading her toward the diner.