“Thanks. I bought it for you a couple of years ago in Aspen.”
“I ski?”
“You like hot chocolate in the lodge better.” He grinned.
“How about you?”
He shrugged. “Cam and I have to go do our manly thing every winter possible. He’s getting better than me, hard as it is to admit.”
“He’s young.”
“And I’m not, is your point.” He held up a hand at her protest. “No, it’s true. I’m growing older. Slowing down.”
“You look good to me,” she said.
His gaze locked on hers. “Thank you.” The ensuing silence buzzed with all he’d like to say.
But wouldn’t. Instead, he gestured behind him. “Ready?”
Her pupils nearly swallowed the green of her irises, but she nodded and closed the door behind her.
ON THE DRIVE, Bella found herself mute in his presence, partly from anticipation, some from worry. Cam had been so excited about James’s surprise that she was unsettled. What could it be? What if she didn’t like it?
What did he expect from her, and would she respond correctly?
Then James removed one hand from the steering wheel and covered hers. “You seem worried. This is supposed to be fun.”
She summoned a smile for him. “It will be. I just—” She shook her head and glanced away.
“What?” His voice was kind. Caring.
“I don’t—” She gnawed at her lip. “I don’t want to disappoint you.”
He drew her fingers to his mouth, and the warm breath of him seeped into her skin. “This isn’t a test, Bella.” He put on the brake, then faced her, still gripping her hand. Pressed a kiss to it. “We’re both feeling our way through. There’s no right or wrong. I have as much to prove as you, maybe more.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I have to convince you that I’m worth what you’d be risking. You have the chance to begin afresh, be who and what and where you want. My task is to entice you to fall in love with me when I don’t have the benefit of a young body or a clean slate to offer you. I have baggage I can’t abandon, and you may not wish to accept any of it.”
His perspective staggered her. “James, I don’t have any money or a way to support myself. I can’t just begin a new life.”
“Of course you can. Bella, did you think I’d just abandon you, even if you didn’t want me? You’re a bright, strong, beautiful woman who would probably do just fine without me, but even if that’s your choice, you’re entitled to half of everything we own. I’ll support you until you figure out what your heart desires.” His eyes were stark with longing. “But I’m hoping you’ll decide that’s me.”
“You would do that?” Her mind was racing. “Let me choose my path?”
His expression was bleak. “I love you, Bella. I won’t force you to stay with me. I certainly won’t use money to hold you hostage.” He shifted on the seat. Started the engine and put it in Reverse.
She realized he was going to drive her to Sam’s. “Wait.” She placed one hand on his arm. “What about my surprise?”
“It was a fool’s errand.”
Somehow, she’d tainted the mood. When he’d arrived today, there had been an air of suppressed excitement about him, but it had evaporated.
“James.” When he didn’t respond, she said his name again. “James, look at me.”
His jaw was tight, his gaze shuttered.
“This is hard, isn’t it? I feel all thumbs. Unsure what to say or feel, how to act. I’m so lost, but it never occurred to me that you might be uneasy, too. You always seem so confident, and I can tell from the way the kids behave that it’s nothing new.” He was listening, she sensed, and she desperately wished they could return to the point where they were holding hands and the anticipation sizzled.
“You might not want me anymore—have you considered that? If I never remember, maybe the Bella you’d wind up with wouldn’t be the one you loved. It goes both ways. I’m not going to bind you to promises you made to another woman, one I may never be again.”
He shut off the engine. Gripped her shoulders, his gaze fierce. “I will love you until the day I die, Bella Parker.” Then his mouth seized hers, hot and rushed at first, gentling to sweet and slow and wicked.
She welcomed the chance to fall into the spell and linger.
But seconds later, he pulled away and stared into her eyes for a long time, then stroked her cheek.
And let her go. “There’s a storm on the way. We have to leave now or wait for another day.” His voice told her clearly what he wished but that the decision was hers.
Shell-shocked from the tumult erupting inside her, Bella could barely summon a coherent thought.
Except that she wasn’t yet ready to part from the complicated man beside her. “I want my surprise,” she said.
His slashing grin could have fit a buccaneer. “One surprise coming up.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
MINUTES LATER, he stopped the car again, but this time he emerged from his seat and walked around to her door, then opened it. “We have a little hike from here.”
She started to climb down, but he didn’t budge. Instead, he lifted her with impressive ease and lowered her to her feet. When she touched ground, he still didn’t move, nor did he speak. Only scoured her features for the longest time…until finally, he picked up one lock of her hair, brushed it over his lips…and retreated.
When he held out his hand for hers, she waited for her pulse to steady, but it was a losing cause. She placed her fingers in his and followed his lead. Along the path, she paid little attention to her surroundings, certain deep within that with him, she was safe. Correction: not safe—too stirred up for that—but in good hands. Protected from everything—
Except temptation.
Long legs led the way. Broad shoulders carved a path. He held branches aside, helped her over a log. His actions could have been interpreted as courtesy.
Except that around them the air swirled thick with desire.
Okay, so sue me. The man makes me hot. She had the urge to cast away all considerations but the hum within her, the crackling air between them.
He was her husband. They would be doing nothing wrong. But some inner voice spoke caution, that the barrier, once crossed, would be final.
He was a stranger, less so each day but still largely unknown.
If only she were positive she was ready.
He glanced over his shoulder. “Problem?” In his gaze, she saw hope and dread.
I won’t force you.
At some point, she had to begin believing him.
“No.” She smiled and sought to convince him.
As well as herself.
SHE WAS A HALF STEP from running away like a frightened doe, James thought as they reached the clearing. She didn’t lie worth a damn.
“Oh, look!” she said. “It’s lovely. Whose is it?”
She certainly wasn’t hard to please. The shack was barely habitable. “Ours, at least for now.”
“What do you mean?”
He faced her. “I leased it from the owner. I wanted a place for us to be alone.” He waited for her to tense.
When instead she smiled and arched one eyebrow, he knew his Bella was still alive and kicking. “Really.” She cut him a glance. “You devil.”
The phrase stole his breath. She’d called him that a thousand times. Ten thousand. When she was flirting.
He didn’t remark on it, though. From second to second, they walked a tightrope. He was tired of falling off. “Let’s go inside.” He opened the door, held it wide. “After you, madam.” He swept her a courtly bow.
She grinned and curtsied. “Why, thank you, sir.” Said as suh…honey and cream, Southern and slow. The voice of the siren he’d lost somewhere down the years.
He followed her in. She halted just inside the door. A part of him lingered, waiting for her reaction to the items that Cam had delivered.
She trail
ed her fingers over the quilt she’d pieced so long ago, and paused. That quilt—her own design, a stunning watercolor in cascading shades of blues, greens and bronzes—had topped their bed from the second year of their marriage until not long after Bella began selling real estate.
And had a decorator redo their room.
Their room. Their refuge. The spot where they’d slept and fought, played and laughed and moaned in bliss.
But she moved on without comment, and he couldn’t help feeling the disappointment. You created that, he wanted to tell her. You provided every speck of color that graced my life.
Instead, he remained silent.
She spotted the rocking chair he’d made for her. “Yours?” she asked as she stroked the wood.
“Yours.” He gestured for her to sit.
She walked around it, then spied the guitar and uttered a small gasp.
His heart kicked up.
“Sam said I might have played guitar.”
James was sick of hearing Sam said, but he smiled. “You did.”
She hesitated. “Did, not do?”
“You’ve been busy with your career.”
She frowned, then picked up the guitar and settled on the front of the rocking chair. Tentatively, she strummed across the strings.
Smiled at the sound.
James watched her, head bent as he’d so often seen it. Play, he urged silently. Play for me.
She plucked one note, then two. Tightened a string and plucked the strings in sequence.
Instinctively tuning it. Hope rose.
Then Bella began to play, hesitantly at first, but soon with confidence. A note missed here and there; still, her fingers flew. “Greensleeves,” “Let It Be,” then—
Oh, God. James faced away as Bella launched into a song she’d composed just for him. It had no lyrics, as far as he was aware, and had never been written down. As he considered how close he’d been to never hearing it again, he realized he had to get Bella to record it. She hummed the melody in that husky contralto voice of hers, and James busied himself building a fire, so she couldn’t tell how much hearing her destroyed him.
He didn’t want her to stop; he couldn’t bear it if, at the end of this devastating journey to the heart of who they were, she still viewed him as a stranger. He longed to believe that when she finished playing, she would be the Bella he’d loved for most of his life.
He was scared to death that she would not.
Please. He’d gone rusty at praying until Bella had disappeared; now it seemed that was all he did, beg for mercy and wish for grace he didn’t deserve. I’ve done her wrong, but please, please…let me have another chance.
The music stopped then.
James froze right where he was.
THE NOTES DIED AWAY, and Bella emerged slowly from the dream. A fire was glowing merrily, removing the chill. Her gaze snagged on that quilt and, shutter-quick, she caught the faintest outlines of an image.
She was sitting on the quilt, playing the song she’d just finished. Her hair kept getting in the way, and she shook it back over her shoulder.
A finger traced over her flesh, and she felt warmth behind her. A body. Skin.
James.
She hugged the guitar to her chest. “Have I—” She had to clear her throat. “Have I played this for you before, on…on that quilt?”
He stirred then. “Yes.”
“James, I—Just for a second, I thought—” Why wouldn’t he face her? “Are you all right?”
“Yeah. Sure.” He sounded anything but.
She propped the guitar against the wall and rose. Made her way to him and knelt. “James.” She placed one hand on his knee. “Tell me about the first time we made love.”
He didn’t speak for a moment, then, “You were fearless.”
“Me?”
At last, he met her eyes. “Yes.”
His expression was so serious that she changed her mind. “You don’t have to discuss it if you don’t want to.”
“You were playful and sweet and insanely sexy—” He stood abruptly. “I can’t do this.” He crossed the room. Shoved his hands in his pockets and stared outside.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I just—” He shook his head. “I hoped that maybe if you saw—” he gestured around the room “—all of this, you’d recall.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault.”
“It absolutely is.”
“No—” He kicked a chair, sent it skidding. “It’s not. I’m to blame for letting you leave. For you being where that bastard could hurt you. I’d like to kill him with my bare hands.” He slammed his fist into the door, his body rigid, his chest heaving with the power of his fury. This was a James she had not met.
She wasn’t afraid of him, though. She’d learned him that well. She went to him and wrapped her arms around his rib cage. “I’m all right, James. Shh. It’s all going to be okay, I promise.” She soothed him with words, with her tone…
With a kiss to the corner of his mouth.
Fury snapped with an audible crack, and hunger seized control. James crushed her against him, no more the hesitant suitor, the patient, grieving man. This was primal, elemental…a man claiming his mate.
Just as suddenly, he jolted away from her. “I’m sorry.”
Wheeled and strode outside.
“James—”
He made it to the edge of the clearing. He was quivering like a stallion primed to charge into battle—
Or to breed. To cover. Bella had the fleeting thought that she should be shocked or frightened.
Instead, she was electrified. Someone new assumed the place of the woman who’d felt so lost, so afraid. Perhaps she should exercise caution, wait for him to make the next move.
No. This new woman tossed her head…
And followed.
He heard her approach. “Stay where you are.” His tone was clipped. “Get your coat. We’re leaving.”
She smiled. “Make me.”
He whipped around, eyes narrowed. “What did you just say?”
“You heard me.” When his expression reflected his confusion, laced with the last traces of anger, she seized the moment. “You know what? I’m sick of being poor Bella. It’s getting on my nerves. Aren’t you tired of treating me like I’m going to shatter any second?”
“You’ve been through a lot,” he said with caution.
“I have, but I’m beginning to realize that you may have been through just as much.” When he blinked as though she’d lost her mind, she took heart. Closed the distance between them and laid her hand on his cheek. “You seem so weary. Come back inside with me,” she cajoled. “Let’s sit by the fire. You can lay your head in my lap.” She cast him a saucy smile. “Maybe you’ll decide it would be fun to make out.” She began to walk back.
He grabbed her in one step. Spun her back to him. “I’m not dead yet, sweetpea.” Then his mouth was on hers, and she wasn’t sure who moaned.
But she suspected it might be her.
Oddly free and delighted by her own daring, she danced from his grasp and raced to the house.
He caught her up and threw her over his shoulder. She giggled helplessly as he carried her inside.
Once the door was shut, he lowered her down the front of his body with exquisite slowness, pausing once or twice to apply his lips at a tender spot.
And she melted. Just…melted. “James…”
“Bella, oh, Bella,” he murmured as his lips cruised her body. “Let me have you, baby. Please, let me love you.”
“Yes,” she whispered from a throat hoarse with longing, sinking her fingers into his hair. “Oh, yes.”
He scooped her up and strode to the bed, where he laid her on the quilt as though she were made of crystal. Their hands tangled as they tore away clothes, first hers, then his.
He leaned over her, one knee beside her hip, and let his gaze range at will, his eyes laser hot. “You are the most beautif
ul woman I’ve ever seen.”
Doubt blindsided her. She wasn’t young. She didn’t really know him. She scrabbled at the covers, tried to conceal herself.
“Don’t,” he said. “Please.”
But she was painfully aware that she was naked. “I just—”
Sorrow crept over his features. Loneliness. He began to back away. “I…get it. This all feels so familiar to me, like coming home at last. But for you, it’s—I’m—” He averted his head. “A stranger.”
Bella sought to understand her whipsaw emotions. As he reached for his jeans, she grasped for his wrist. “Don’t go.”
He shook his head. “You’re not ready. It would be wrong.”
She wrapped the quilt around her torso and walked to his side. “James, look at me.”
“No.” Sharp. Pain-filled. But at last he complied. “I’m sorry. This is just so damn lonely.”
She witnessed the toll on him—love warring with loneliness, longing vying with caution, and over it all, a haze of deep unhappiness. “I wish it would happen, that click of the key in the lock. I can’t tell you how much.”
“No—don’t put that pressure on yourself. I never meant to. It was only that having you taunt me, flirt with me, was so much like when we first met.” His eyes glittered. “The girl I fell in love with the first day.” He faced her. “But I love more than that girl. I love all the women you’ve been, the wife, the mother, the lover, the gardener…” Carefully, he cupped her face in his hands and pressed a resigned kiss to her forehead. “I’ll wait, Bella. However long is required.”
She could feel him leaving her even as he stood only inches away, and something in her became more angry than frightened. So much had been stolen from them.
“No.” She lifted her head. Gripped his wrists. “I’m tired of careful. I’m sick of being at the mercy of fate.” She put her heart into her words, her expression. “You and Cele and Cam have suffered just as much, and I won’t sit by idly, not one more second, do you hear me?”
Frowning, he caressed her jaw with one finger. “What are you saying?”
“That I want you to make love with me. Not to me, you hear? With me. Maybe I don’t remember how it was, but that doesn’t mean we can’t create our own new relationship, does it?” She stood on tiptoe to reinforce her point. “Let’s take back our lives, James. Starting here. Now.”
The Way Home Page 14