by Ava Miles
“Japanese?” Paige asked, her eyes glued to the quilt in progress. “There are so many small pieces, and the way you use them… Sadie, this is like a painting.”
“That’s what I thought when I saw my first Japanese quilt,” she said, coming forward to stand next to her sister. “There’s a lot of emphasis on geometric shapes like the sun I designed, and the way they use stitching…it’s like they create threads of magic throughout the quilt. The hand piecing and sewing takes a lot of time, but I find it relaxing.”
“The stitching makes it look like a gentle breeze is flowing across the land,” Paige said.
Sadie studied the half-finished quilt. For this quilt, she was piecing the design as it came to her. So far, she had the sun and the blue sky, and yes, she’d used the classic sashiko stitch to make it seem like the wind was gently blowing.
“I’m still playing with how I want to design the land, but I know there’s going to be a waterfall leading into a small river. Lush trees. Maybe a field of flowers in the right corner.”
Her mind started to spin new ideas, and she shook herself.
“Sadie,” Paige said, grabbing both of her arms and staring at her with big eyes. “You have to submit this to a show or a museum when you’re finished.”
She ducked her chin, flushing. “I don’t know. It’s my first large-scale Japanese quilt. I’ve been making smaller ones, working on my stitching. Every stitch has to be evenly spaced and perfect, and while that appeals to my OCD nature when it comes to quilting, I don’t think I’m on that level yet.”
“I think you are,” Paige said, shaking her gently. “Sadie, you aren’t just a quilting teacher in a craft store or even someone who sells her quilts for money. You’re an artist.”
An artist? That seemed like too big of a word for her. “I’m creative, I’ll give you that.”
Paige narrowed her eyes. “You don’t see it… All right, I’m going to have Riley work on you. If there’s one thing he knows, it’s art. Maybe between the two of us, you’ll start to believe this about yourself.”
Sadie remembered Riley saying something about her being an artist, but at the time she’d thought he was just being nice—and flirting. After all, he’d only seen a few of her projects on her phone. “I know God gave me a gift.”
“But you don’t see how completely incredible it is,” Paige said. “Can I take a picture of this? I’d like to show Mark and Haley. It’s…exquisite.”
Oh, the nerves bubbling up made her want to rush forward and cover up her work in progress. “But it’s not finished. I mean—”
“Please,” Paige said. “I promise I won’t show anyone else. Well, Jess will likely insist on seeing it once Haley tells her about it. I mean, those two share everything. I’ll probably end up showing Riley too…except you could, of course…when you invite him over.”
Her sister’s wink made her face turn from merely warm to middle-of-the-summer hot. “We’re taking things slow.”
Paige rested her weight on one leg and studied her. “You too? I thought it was only Riley holding back given his past with Jess’ mom.”
The woman who’d liked secrets, didn’t want Jess, and had made Riley hate country music. She didn’t have a full picture yet, but the image she’d formed was dark. “No.”
“But I see…no wait, I don’t see. You’re head over heels about him. I can tell. Why are you so set on being slow? Because you think he needs you to be?”
“I think I need to sit down,” she said, moving toward the rocking chair she kept by the window.
“What are you afraid of? I don’t mean to be so personal, but I love you, and I love Riley to pieces. Why in the world aren’t you two going for each other like crazy?”
She pressed her hands to her hot face. “Well, I can’t just jump into bed with him. I mean, it’s not like we’re even committed, and he hasn’t told me he loves me.” Of course, she hadn’t told him either because it was early, and truth be told, she wasn’t sure it was the big L love. The little l love was pretty clear though.
“Are you a virgin?” Paige asked.
Her eyes flew to her sister’s. “What?”
“Sorry, that was really personal,” Paige said, sinking down onto the floor in front of her. “But I’m diving into the sisterhood deep end here. I hadn’t thought about it, but you’re the daughter of a preacher and you go to church. It’s totally okay with me if you are. Mark and I were each other’s firsts. We’re both really glad about that actually.”
Oh, goodness, she thought, rocking in her chair. “There was someone in college, someone I thought I’d marry…”
“I see,” Paige said, putting her hand on her knee. “And Riley?”
“He wants to, I think,” she said, rocking forward. “I mean, yes, he wants to. And I do too, but it’s not that simple. He’s not ready for something serious. He wants to take this one step at a time. Have fun together and see what happens.”
“Yes, I imagine that’s what he’s told himself,” Paige said, “but here’s the thing about Riley. Underneath all the jokes and the entertainment, he’s really sensitive. He has this huge heart, and sure he’s a guy like all the rest…but he’s also not. I have to tell you, Riley wants someone he can have fun with and be serious about. He doesn’t want to play around.”
“I didn’t think he did,” Sadie said, “but we’ve only just met and—”
“Hogwash,” Paige said. “Time doesn’t factor into love. I mean, look at us.”
Sadie waggled her eyebrow suggestively at Paige, laughing. “Us.”
“You know what I’m talking about,” her sister said. “Okay, one last sister thing. Sex between two people who care about each other is beautiful, and I figure you and Riley will know when the time is right. Mark and I waited a little longer than I would now because it’s just so awesome between us, but in retrospect, the time we chose was perfect.”
The mere thought about having sex with Riley was making Sadie lightheaded. “It’s a huge step.”
“It is,” Paige said. “As someone who was born to two people who made a terrible choice, no one knows that better than I do. But Mark also helped me learn how to trust my heart, and I know you can trust yours. I mean, Sadie, look at your heart!”
She gestured to the half-made quilt on the bed, and Sadie felt her throat close. She took a deep breath and then another.
“We’re going out Saturday, no, tomorrow,” Sadie said. “I’ll see how things go. But I hear you. Love shouldn’t be bound by a timetable.”
But should something like lovemaking be bound by commitment? She was going to have to be true to herself because it very much did for her.
Chapter 14
“‘Well, over-fast dates never turned me on,’” Riley sang on the way over to pick Sadie up.
He was listening to Prince’s “Raspberry Beret,” and he had a moment of confusion. Was that really the lyric? Had Prince said such a thing? He paused the song and called up the handy little helper on his phone. He’d named her Xena, after his favorite princess. Jess might love Rapunzel, but he liked his princesses with a little less clothing and a lot more edge. “Look up lyrics for ‘Raspberry Beret.’”
He listened as Xena recited the words, and when they reached the line of the song he’d been unsure about, he had to laugh. Boy, had he been off. Prince had sung about overcast days. Not over-fast dates.
He was clearly trying to talk himself down about tonight. His subconscious had tried to use one of his music idols to confirm that he shouldn’t rush anything. After his talk with Paige, he’d wavered back and forth between going faster and keeping it slow. A long-term relationship took time to cultivate, didn’t it? He’d even made a list of what he could do to cultivate their connection, but it hadn’t helped.
The minute he saw her, he knew what was going to happen. His mouth would dry up, his remaining brain cells would disappear, and he wouldn’t be able to form a decent sentence. And his dick? Well, it would want to take over, and
that wasn’t a good idea. Sadie was a lady. He respected her. There was no way he was going to ruin this by scaring her off.
He checked his image in the rearview mirror. He was presentable if not over-groomed. Jess had insisted on brushing his hair, and when he hadn’t been looking, she’d swooped in one of her hands and slicked on some hair product. The surprise of it had jolted a girly shriek from him. The product was Mark’s, apparently, and he’d had no choice but to allow his daughter to shape and reshape his hair to her crazy specifications.
As he left the car, he tugged on his new sport jacket, the one he’d bought online with Jess in his lap. It was a brown suede—perfect for fall, his little girl had said.
She was growing up so fast.
It seemed like he was duty-bound to keep something in his life from going too fast. No over-fast dates, he told himself as he rang the doorbell.
He imagined himself cloaked in armor, impenetrable to female wiles, impervious to beauty and sexiness.
“Holy shit,” he uttered when she opened the door. Framed in the soft light of the hallway, Sadie wore a stretchy gold dress that seemed glued to her curves, curves he’d only guessed at before. These curves were surely capable of melting a superhero’s special armor as if it were plastic. And she’d knocked it out of the park by wearing gold again. Hubba, hubba.
“Hi,” she said, smiling, her lips lush and wet in a delectable soft pink.
“Hi,” he said, gathering himself.
His nose twitched when her scent reached him—something lush and musky, like a rare flower that grows after a volcano explosion—and it felt like hot lava had landed on his skin.
“I wasn’t going to kiss you right away, but hell…”
He grabbed her to him, his intensity lifting her off her feet. She wrapped her arms around him as he held her in mid-air and kissed her senseless. He threw off his stupid immunity cloak and pressed her body into him, her curves warm and lush under his hands.
“Oh, Riley,” she said, breaking for air before diving into his mouth again. Her bottom lip, so perfect and plump, insisted he suck it softly. She moaned low and deep, and he felt the vibration all the way to his toes.
“We should probably leave,” he murmured, kissing her softly in bites now.
“No,” she whispered back, her breath hot against his mouth.
He tightened his hands, trying to commit the feel of her to memory, when her answer registered. “No?”
“No,” she said, pulling him inside by the lapels of his jacket.
In that moment, he decided he needed a sport jacket for every day of the week because the feel of her yanking on it in urgency and desire was one of the best freaking feelings in the world. Like finishing his first comic book or seeing Jess take her first steps.
He let her lead him inside, but his foot reached out and kicked the door closed behind them. His feet shuffled against hers as they continued to kiss. Lips. The line of cheek. The underside of jaw. The neck.
“I’m wild about this part of your body,” he murmured, breathing in her fragrance.
She shook her beautiful brown hair, hair exactly like his new superhero, and he touched it with his fingertips. He wanted to touch her everywhere. That little misheard jingle about over-fast dates played in his mind…
“Sadie.”
Her hands found their way inside his jacket, so curious and so hot.
“Okay, this time we really need to stop.” He was close to begging.
“Just a little more,” she whispered against his mouth like a siren.
They fell into a deep kiss, and together they shuffled forward as though they were doing a slow, sensuous two-step.
“Okay, seriously,” he said, close to declaring the medical certainty that all of the blood in his body had pooled to one place, a place they weren’t ready to talk about on the slow program.
“Riley, I’ve been thinking,” she said, tugging on his lapels again.
“You drive me out of mind when you do that.”
She tugged on them again, this time with a Cheshire cat smile on her beautiful face.
“Good,” she said with a note of glee in her voice. “Part of me wants to drive you wild. Riley, maybe we don’t need to go as slow as we thought. I’m not saying we need to have sex yet because I really do need to feel like we’re committed to each other, but perhaps we can enjoy…more than kisses. Oh crap, I’m getting embarrassed.”
Her hands left his lapels, and she turned her back on him. He leaned in and tucked her against him, his cheek seeking hers as a way to reassure her.
“No need to be embarrassed,” he said softly. “Some people go from kissing straight to sex, but there are no rules we need to follow.”
Her body settled back against him. “Riley, I really, really like you.”
When she spun around and faced him, he rocked back on his heels. Her brown eyes were luminous, the gold flecks shining, but the set of her jaw reminded him of Xena when she was on a mission.
“I mean…I might be falling in love with you,” she said, her voice full of the strength of conviction.
He searched inside himself, wanting to be equally as honest with her. In that moment, he felt like every superhero faced with a decision. He could tell her the truth or he could fade back into the darkness, hoping his prophesy that she would be better and happier without him was true. But the truth was as loud as thunder, as unavoidable as lightning marking the sky in angry fire.
“I might be falling in love with you too,” he said, touching her cheek.
“Time doesn’t seem to matter,” she said, putting her hand over his fast-beating heart.
There was that word again, and it raised the hairs on his arms.
“Paige was right. I don’t believe time has anything to do with love. Love just happens, and while I don’t know every little detail about you, I know what I feel for you, Riley Thomson.”
“Sadie.” She was making him believe in every storybook ending in the comic books.
“I have enough faith in the divine plan to believe you just might be the answer to my prayers…only they’re prayers I didn’t know I was making.” She framed his face with her hands. “I mean, I prayed for a godly man, one who would respect me, go to church with me, and pray with me before we made love. But I’ve met men like that, and they didn’t—”
“I can’t do any of that,” he said, his heart dropping to the floor. If that was what she wanted, he couldn’t give it to her. He didn’t think he could change who he was even for the woman who was stealing his heart.
“I know,” she whispered, “and it doesn’t matter. Do you know why?”
Oh, he was scared to hear the answer. He thought about turning away for a nanosecond, but he wouldn’t let fear hold him back. He wouldn’t let him separate it from her.
“Riley…you’re so much better than what I imagined.” She wrapped her arms around him. “You make me laugh. You listen to me. And most of all, you see me! Me! The drawing you gave me… Riley, no one outside my family has ever seen me like that.”
“You’re so easy to see,” he told her, holding her close. “You’re like the richest golden color palette. Your heart is in everything you do, and it’s beautiful to behold.”
“So is yours,” she said, looking up at him. “You’re a wonderful father and a great friend to Paige and Mark. Riley, I…I don’t know all the reasons you want to take it slow. I don’t know fully what happened with Jess’ mom. But I want you to let me in. I want…”
His heart was pounding in loud beats. “What do you want?”
“I want us to make a go of this and be…committed…like boyfriend/girlfriend,” she said in a fierce voice. “I’ve felt like a coward most of my life, and then my sister, Shelby, talked me into finding our daddy. I was scared, but I couldn’t let her do it alone. And in doing it, in facing it, I found a courage I’d never expected to see in myself. I found I wouldn’t break into a million pieces or blow away in tough times. I was so much stronger
than I’d ever realized.”
She looked like a goddess come to life. She awed him.
“When I decided to choose love and find Paige, I cinched it. I’m brave. I’m bold. Then there’s you…you’ve helped me see that too.”
And beautiful, he thought. “Yes, you are.”
“Riley, I’m not going to let my old ways of doing things shape how this thing between us progresses. I know Jess is the most important thing in your life, and I think that’s wonderful, but I want to be more to you than bedtime texts and Friday nights. I also don’t plan on coming between you and Jess. If anything, I’d like to celebrate her place in your life.”
He pressed his forehead to hers, unbearably moved.
“I just want to be with you,” she said.
“Me too,” he replied, tightening his hold on her. “I want us to be committed to each other too. Be a…thing. Sadie, I’ve been struggling with this, but in this moment, I can’t seem to remember why. Would you come over and spend time with me and my daughter? She’s been wanting that, and it could include a picnic or flying a kite…or playing princess. She likes to keep her options open. ”
She put her fingers to his lips. “It doesn’t matter what we do, Riley. I’ll be happy for it. Grateful for it.”
“I do need to tell you all about Jess’ mother sometime,” he whispered. “But I can’t do it right now. It’s a sad, dark tale, and I’m still ashamed of it.”
“Oh, honey,” she said, wrapping him in the most beautiful benediction. “Whatever it is, I’m here.”
He kissed her cheek. “Oh, Sadie, I know we haven’t gone out tonight yet, but what are your plans for Sunday? I know you go to church and hang out with your family…”
She was quiet for a moment. “No, I can make that.”
“We’re no longer on the slow program,” he said, allowing his fingers to caress her hip. “We’ve progressed to the committed program.”