He laughed, but had the crazy desire to take her camping anyway. He could take her on long bike rides, show her the beauty of the Olympics in the fall. In the winter he was sure he could show her plenty of ways to keep warm, though he did agree with her that a hot toddy at the end of the day inside in front of a roaring fireplace was better than sleeping in a tent in the snow.

“I bet you’ve just never been with the right person. I promise you, camping is something you’d love with the right guide and gear.”

She raised both eyebrows. “It always sounds nice, but then that crazy reality comes knocking, and I remember it’s sleeping on the ground in a tent with nothing but less than an inch’s worth of fabric protecting me from bears and bugs. And random snow? Hmm. Can’t wait for that.” She wrinkled her nose. “Plus I’m the kind of girl who gets third-degree sunburn even after I put on sunscreen on. Then I peel and have eight thousand more freckles as a result. It’s a horrible cross to bear.”

She sighed and blinked, the corners of her mouth struggling to stay in place and not curve upward.

He laughed. “I like freckles.” He liked her freckles. He couldn’t say he thought about them much before he’d walked into the café that first time and laid eyes on her and those bewitching spatters of ginger all over that pale skin.

She looked him up and down, putting another biscotti on his saucer when he’d finished the first one. “Easy for you to say, since you have none.”

He wanted to lick her. Lick her freckles, taste the salt of her skin, hear whatever sounds she made when aroused, and he had a feeling she made them, though selfishly, he liked to pretend she hadn’t made them in a while. His mood soured then. He hadn’t seen her with anyone since that f**k brutalized her years prior. Just thinking about her ex made him want to punch something.

“You all right? You didn’t talk about your day.” She touched his hand, her thumb sliding over a knuckle and then into the indentation between that and the next. His anger slipped away, chased by the waves of pleasure spreading from the place she’d just caressed.

“Sorry. Some stupid work thing I thought of. You’re much better to think on though.” He flashed her a smile, and she rolled her eyes.

“Don’t you have some hussy to harass?” Erin walked in with a jingle of the bells over the door. Erin was his sister-in-law and a friend. She was also about to expel nine and a half pounds of baby, and though he’d never say it out loud lest he take his life into his own hands, she looked it, around the edges anyway.

“I’ll have you know I haven’t harassed a hussy in years.” Cope pushed a stool back so she could sit down, which she did with a rusty exhalation of air.

Ella pushed a glass of juice toward Erin and dared her to come behind the counter. Erin, ever so smart, obeyed, staying seated at the coffee bar.

“You and the gorgeous Ms. Tipton here are the only hussies I harass. Anyway, you look harassed enough for a few hussies. I thought you knew what caused that state.” He waved at her belly, and she snorted.

“I do. But it’s hard to remember this part when you’re having that part. It’s the getting here that’s so fun, damn it.” Erin grinned as she eyed him. “You look good. Tan and ready for trouble. You Copeland boys are hell on a girl’s eyes, you know.”

Ella nodded and then blushed when he caught her. He raised his brows at her but was content enough to let her get away for the moment.

He’d danced around her for years, wanting her. Truth be told, he hadn’t been ready for her. Not then. He’d had no real interest in being tied to any one woman. He liked women. He liked them a lot, and he liked a lot of them. Back then he’d taken one look and had known a girl like Ella was a relationship type of woman.

And she hadn’t been ready for him, either. She’d been with someone else when he’d first started getting his inkwork done at Brody’s place, just next door. He’d been no less compelled by her, but she’d been different then. That Ella had been vivacious at times. But the light in her had slowly dimmed as the relationship she’d been in had gotten worse. As the man who was supposed to love her had ground her into nothing and finally nearly killed her.

The Ella he’d first known had begun to shine through again. Not all the time, and she’d changed in ways that would alter her forever. She was harder now, stronger, more wary. But no less beautiful to him. More so, in fact, as he watched her rise from the wreck her life had become and work her way back, never wavering. Her strength was what he admired the most.

Ella Tipton was one of the best parts of his day when he came in to the café. She was the kind of woman a man could be partners with. A woman who’d lean on him when she needed it, but not cling. A woman who’d need, but not depend. He found himself thinking about this, that this woman was all the things a man wanted in a mate. More than he’d ever considered before.

The bottom line was that Andrew Copeland was more than halfway in love with a woman he’d never even kissed. In love with a woman who didn’t even know how he felt. Then again, he probably could stand to make himself more obvious. He was so used to having women fawn all over him that he had little experience with wooing one. He could flirt like a gold medalist, but he needed to up his game when it came to making this one woman know he was interested in far more than a few nights in his bed.

This woman called to him in ways he couldn’t deny. Ella. She was something else, something worth time and attention, a woman worth forever.