by Selena Kitt
In nothing more than my nightshirt and underwear, I stood on his doorstep in the cool desert night, shaking but not from the chill. In the distance, I could hear a pack of coyotes calling to each other, and the ubiquitous chirps of crickets.
There was no light coming from under his door and as it wasn’t very late, I was concerned. As far as I knew from the nights we’d spent together, he was not one to retire early. But maybe he was tired tonight.
Well, tough shit, I’d wake him up, then. This couldn’t wait. I reached up and knocked loudly on the door, listening carefully for footsteps to approach on the other side. But there was complete silence.
I glanced at the window. The curtains had not been completely pulled to cover it so I pressed my face against it, cupping my hands to look inside. And I couldn’t see a damned thing because it was so dark.
“Adam?” I called through the window giving it a bang with my fist and then waited. Nothing.
For long moments I refused to let myself believe that he wasn’t on the other side of that door. I knocked again. Called again. My stomach twisted until it threatened nausea. Oh God—Oh God! He’d left. I gasped for breath. He’d packed up his stuff and gone even though he told Mom he wouldn’t be leaving until the morning. He’d driven away while I was in the shower. Fuck.
I had to go after him. There was no other way. I could chase him down to OC tomorrow but who knew where he’d be or how I could find him? I didn’t have his number because it was in the contacts of that damned phone I’d given back to him. I had his e-mail, but he’d just told me he was going without e-mail contact during his break from work.
I knew where he lived and could go to his house, but if he was planning a leave of absence from work, who knew where he’d be tomorrow—maybe on a plane to somewhere far away?
Tears threatened at the realization that he was gone. The tiniest of voices in the back of my head asked what if I never saw him again? What if I never heard his voice? Or felt his arms tighten around me? What if I never knew love like this ever again?
Nearly paralyzed with grief I spun and pressed my spine flat against his door, my mind racing to come up with a plan. I’d run and grab a pair of jeans and my keys. I’d get myself down the mountain tonight. He was two hours away. I’d bang on his door at one in the morning if I had to.
Shit. I struggled to breathe, tears coating my cheeks now. How could this be happening? My back slid along the door until I sat at his doorstep. I pressed my face to my knees, helpless with the loss. I’d only just managed to acknowledge that I could have these feelings—that the world would not implode if I allowed myself to love a man.
This man. This wonderful man. He was gone and I’d paid dearly for my stubbornness. This love had cost me more than three-quarters of a million dollars. It had cost me my heart.
And there was no buying it back—at any price. It belonged to him. Forever.
If he still wanted it after I’d shoved him away. Fool, Mia. Coward.
I sobbed into my hands, unable to find the strength to follow through with my plan. The will was draining out of me and threatened to leave me in a pool of misery right here on the porch of this little cabin. My shoulders shook and I was thankful that there was no one out here to hear me wailing like a baby.
And God only knows how long I would have allowed myself to sit there, a pathetic, weeping mess, if I hadn’t heard the scuff of shoes stepping across the porch, coming to a stop right beside me. I looked down at a pair of big feet in sneakers—the same ones Adam had worn when we’d gone running a couple nights before.
I froze but I kept my face covered. He didn’t move for a moment and then sank onto a knee to look into my face.
“Don’t you think you’ve done enough of that for one day?”
My breath was painful in my chest and my head bounced back against the door behind me. I looked at him through swollen eyes as, humiliatingly, I hiccupped. “I thought you left.”
He frowned. “Tomorrow. I was feeling restless tonight. Went for a little walk.”
I stared at him dumbly, unable to find the words to match this jumble of feelings inside me. They were tangled, like spiderwebs all sticky and matted inside my chest.
We stared at each other for a long, tense moment and I found that I was barely breathing. My chest would rise just enough to catch a mouthful of air before it blew back out again. His gaze intensified.
“Do you want to come in or would you rather sit out here?”
Without a word, I snuffled and struggled to my feet. Adam rose and opened the door, which, I only then realized, was unlocked. He flipped on a light and held the door for me, as if unwilling to turn his back on me for fear that I might bolt out into the night again.
And yeah, I might have been inclined in that direction, but he blocked my easy escape, so I inched into the cabin.
I threw a glance around the room, saw the stack of books on his nightstand, one opened and facedown on the bed, Segment Hiker’s Guide to the Pacific Crest Trail. My eyes darted back to where he waited, just inside the closed door.
My entire body started to shake—like an unattractive shivery kind of shake. He watched me from the doorway, attentive to my every move but standing stiffly, unmoving.
Those dark eyes gave nothing of his feelings away. He was waiting for me to do the talking. I was the one who’d been blubbering like an idiot on his porch, after all.
I still had no idea what I was going to say. I took a deep breath and asked him a question instead. “Why? Why did you come into my life and completely wreck everything I knew? I thought I was happy. I thought I didn’t need anyone…” My voice faded.
His lips turned up in a humorless smile. “I could ask you the exact same thing.”
I mopped at my cheeks with the back of my hand. “I’ve done more crying today than I have in the past ten years combined. I’m not this much of a sniveling idiot—I swear I’m not.” I put my hands over my face. “I just—I don’t know what to do.”
He paused, shifted his weight so that he leaned a sturdy shoulder against the door. “Yes, you do.”
I dropped my hands and shook my head mutely.
“Come here, Emilia.”
And I did. I walked straight into his arms. And he pulled me to him and the tears came again. He kissed my hair, his arms tightening.
My head fell against his shoulder and my arms slid around his waist. And I breathed him in, feelings of desire and belonging coursing through me. His arms felt so good around me, so solid, so real.
My voice trembled as I took a deep breath and finally spoke. “I need you,” I said. His mouth moved to my neck and he kissed me there, bolts of electricity shooting down every nerve connected with that spot. It had taken everything in me to admit it…because I’d led my entire life until that very second firmly believing that I didn’t need anyone—not a goddamn soul. That Mia Strong was an island, a fortress.
But I needed Adam Drake. I needed him as much as I needed to breathe, eat or drink. And finally my brain allowed my heart to admit it.
“I need you so much,” I repeated. “I love you.”
He took my face between his hands, holding it still. He raised his head so he could look me in the eyes. “I can’t promise that things will be perfect, Emilia. But I can promise you that I will never give this up. Because I don’t think I knew how to live before you came into my life.”
He pushed the hair back from my face but never took his eyes from mine. I sniffled, the tears still coming, and I shook in his hold. “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t so scared I could pee myself. But I’ll never deny it again. I’ve loved you for longer than I even know. I fought the good fight but I can’t fight anymore. I won’t fight it. I love you, Adam.”
And we kissed. And it was like that first time… that connection swelling between us, strengthening. In his embrace, I found comfort, closeness. And when the kiss grew more intense, presaged something more to come, I knew, too, that I was ready for that as well.
Adam nudged us toward the bed and I went with him…and whether it was to make love or to just lie beside him while we talked all night, I knew that whatever happened, it would be all right. Because this was so right.
Afterword
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About the Author
Brenna Aubrey is an author of New Adult contemporary romance stories that center on geek culture. She is also a mom, teacher, geek girl, Francophile, unabashed video game addict and eBook hoarder.
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Mia and Adam’s story continues in book #2 At Any Turn, available April 2014 and concludes in book #3, At Any Moment, available late 2014. Details forthcoming on her website and in her newsletter.
Acknowledgements
I am very grateful to a multitude of friends and family without whom this book would never have come into being: To Tessa Dare, Kate McKinley, Sabrina Darby, Leanna S., Courtney Milan, Carey Baldwin, Martha Trachtenberg, and Sarah Hansen.
Still more thank yous go out to Courtney Miller-Callihan, Tammy Falkner, H.M. Ward, Monica Murphy, Leigh Lavalle, Marie Hall, Abby Zidle, members of the OCC-RWA chapter of Romance Writers of America, the Romance Divas, and the NAAU Facebook group.
Lastly but most importantly, a huge thank you to my family. Thank you, Mom for always encouraging me to develop my talent and never give up on my dreams. To my siblings, just ’cause. To my wonderful husband, who sacrifices daily for the sake of my art. And to my two little guys who understand (mostly) that when Mommy’s upstairs with the door closed, they should tread lightly. xoxox
The First Quest
*Findelglora has logged into Dragon Epoch
*Findelglora has entered the world of Yondareth
She emerges from the city of her birth, having grown and trained and been educated by the best. With the eastern city gate at her back, Findelglora looks around her with wide-eyed wonder, anxious to take on the world and explore its many mysteries.
But every hero needs a quest to get her started.
Her eyes land on an older man bearing an expression of pure misery, his shoulders slumped in defeat. He wears the uniform of the Old Guard of the Elves, a military-style jacked spangled with glittering medallions of service and a kilt. Meeting her gaze, he straightens and gives Findelglora a halfhearted salute.
“Hello there, young one. Don’t you look bright-eyed and full of hope, ready to take on this miserable, harsh world! I wish you luck. You will be a small flicker of a flame in the prevailing darkness.”
Findelglora bows to this revered man, whom she knows was once the Captain of the Guard of the city. General SylvanWood spent his life in service to king and country. But sadly, he now passes his golden years haunting the remotest city gate, a vacant, tormented shadow of the man who once was the city’s greatest hero.
“Sir, I’m anxious to go out into the world and follow your great example. Do you have a quest for me?” she asks.
SylvanWood runs a shaking hand over his face. “If only I could have saved her. If only we could have shared our lives together.”
Findelglora grows confused. “Whom do you mean, sir? How may I help?”
SylvanWood shakes his head. “I had a love once and she was lost to me, forever. And every day in remembrance of her, I place a bouquet of daffodils at this gate, which is the last place I saw her when I kissed her goodbye. But today I’m feeling unwell and don’t know if I can make it to the meadow to pick the flowers.”
Findelglora’s heart aches to hear SylvanWood’s tale of woe. Shaking her head, she wonders what type of hero’s quest would help him. Slay a dragon? Subdue an evil wizard? She brightens and turns back to him.
“Then let me go and pick them for you so that you can honor your love today.”
SylvanWood looks skeptical. “You are young and there is opposition, even in the meadows around these walls.”
Findelglora stands tall, poking out her chest and brandishing the rusty sword she acquired before venturing out of the city’s gate. “I’m ready, sir. Today you will honor your love, like on other days, with a bouquet of daffodils!”
*Findelglora has received the quest to pick ten daffodils and return them to General SylvanWood.
*Promised reward for completion of this quest: The first piece of armor to wear on her further adventures out in the world.
Chapter One
Five weeks of torture. Two miles until it ended. I almost fell to my knees with that realization—or maybe it had more to do with not having eaten in two days. That and the fact that I’d spent the last five hundred miles crossing over the highest mountains in California and my feet were fucking killing me.
It was late afternoon—approaching dinnertime. Dinner. That sounded amazing. The last thing I’d eaten was a candy bar that I’d bummed off a fellow hiker the day before. I’d nursed that thing, bite by bite until the last nub, which I’d finished off this morning for breakfast. I could use dinner. And sleep on a nice, soft bed.
For the previous five weeks, I’d slept on the ground or in my tent hammock—whenever I could manage to find a place to hang it. But this ordeal was now almost over, thank God.
For the thousandth time, I cursed myself for being so stubborn about following through with this crazy plan. I hadn’t allowed myself to give up the idea of a long-distance hike once I’d set my mind on it. With a long sigh I again questioned my sanity. Why had I left civilization? Why had I left her behind?
Emilia and I had only spent a month and a half together as a couple. A week together at her mom’s ranch when we’d finally decided to start something real and then back at my house for five more weeks planning this crazy trip as my version of Superman’s visit to the Fortress of Solitude.
And she’d fully supported me in this—thought it was a good idea for me to get away, make the final break from work, or my mistress, as she called it. But I sure as hell hadn’t been ready to take a break from Emilia.
But I was almost there. Almost there. Those two words had become my mantra for the last sixty miles of this grueling trail.
The Happy Isles in Yosemite Valley—northern trailhead of the famous (and torturous, in my case) John Muir trail—were now only two miles ahead. The landscape had been beautiful for the first couple of hundred miles, but now I was just done with the High Sierra scenery. If I never saw another pine tree again, I wouldn’t be sad.
The Merced River roared up ahead. I felt like throwing my pack down right there, as sick as I was of the weight of the damn thing. But I tried not to think about any of that. I kept my eyes pasted on the signs for the trailhead, trudging along step by aching step.
I knew she’d be there to meet me at the trailhead. The knowledge caused me to step up my pace. I couldn’t wait to see her again, pull her into my arms…God I missed her.
Ahead, I sensed the presence of a southbound hiker so I tucked in toward the right side of the trail. I didn’t even look up. I was feeling far from the spry, sociable dude who’d set out on this hike last month. That idiot had been left behind somewhere on the grueling stretch between Mount Whitney and the Silver Pass.
The hiker
who approached me was a woman. I could tell by the sound of her gait. She shifted her position on the trail so that she was headed straight for me. I stepped back toward the center and she moved straight at me so that we nearly collided before I stopped. I looked up, about to unleash an angry string of epithets before I saw her beautiful, smiling face.
She was gorgeous. Long, dark brown hair with hints of red and large amber-brown eyes that were the exact same color as her hair. She was on the tall side for a woman and she had long, curvy legs extending from the shorts she wore. And I hadn’t laid eyes on her in five weeks. Emilia.
I heaved a sigh of relief and dropped my pack, which smacked on the ground.
“Adam?” she said with laughter in her voice. “Is that you?”
I pulled her into my arms. “Damn—you are a sight for sore eyes.” I muttered, burying my face into her sweet-smelling neck. I was pretty sure that I wasn’t so sweet-smelling, but she returned the hug. I ignored the persistent ache in my muscles and tightened my hold around her.
Her body was soft, yielding against me and pulling her into my arms felt like home. Her hair was silky on my whisker-rough face. And that peaches and vanilla smell…I could get drunk with it. I pressed my face to her neck again.
She flinched, laughing. “You look like a mountain man!”
I supposed that meant she didn’t want a kiss—with my thirty-five days’ growth of beard and hair? Well, tough shit, I was kissing her anyway.
I turned and pressed my lips to hers and she returned my kiss before pulling away with a laugh. “Your kisses tickle, now.”
I grinned. “C’mere and let me tickle you some more.” I planted a few more kisses on her before she pulled away again.
“How was your hike?”