Moments with Mason (A Red Maple Falls Novel, #3)

by Theresa Paolo

  Mason’s head snapped back to her. He shook his head refusing to believe that for even a second. “I think you and Francine were meant to find each other. It just took a while.”

  “The best things are worth waiting for. At least that’s what they say,” she said, sucking in her bottom lip before releasing it and leaving a slight shine. God, he wanted to kiss her. Pull her close and capture those beautiful lips in one fell swoop, but he had one strict rule he abided by and that was not to mix business with pleasure. He enforced it and lived by it, refusing to fall prey to those sorts of complications, but looking at that bottom lip, shiny and damn kissable, he was having a hard time remembering the rule.

  “Definitely” he said.

  “We should put these on the shelf,” Cassie said, breaking her gaze from his and jumping to her feet. She landed awkwardly, the growler slipping from her grasp. .

  It happened so fast that neither had time to react before the growler hit the ground with a resounding crack. The glass shattered, sending a storm of shards across the floor.

  Mason put his hand out to move Cassie away from the mess, but she was frozen solid. “Cassie,” he said, but she didn’t respond. He moved toward her, trying to look into her eyes, but she wasn’t in there. She was somewhere else entirely.

  Fear marred her features, distorting her pretty face and making him feel completely helpless. He didn’t want to touch her, afraid it would only make it worse. He was good at sitting back and letting people talk, but this was entirely different. This was torture—witnessing her distress and unable to do anything about it.

  “Cassie,” he said again in hopes that his voice would break through where her thoughts had taken her.

  She didn’t even blink; he stood there straddling the edge of insanity, waiting for her to find the strength within herself to fight the demons that were holding her hostage. The only thing worse was sitting in that damn waiting room when his grandfather was rushed to the emergency room. He was helpless then, and he was helpless now—a feeling he hated more than anything.

  He couldn’t just stand there any longer, so he rested a gentle hand on her shoulder. He needed to do something. Anything. “Cassie?” he said again, his voice calm, even though he felt anything but.

  Then he saw it—a quick flicker of recognition in the copper of her eyes. She was slowly coming back to him. She blinked, and the erratic beating of his heart evened out, air flowing back through his lungs.

  “Hey, you okay?” he asked when she shook her head out of it.

  Crimson shot across her cheeks, meeting at the dusting of freckles across her nose. “I am so sorry,” she said panic lacing her voice as she bent down in a hurry, grabbing for the glass.

  “Cassie, don’t. You’ll hurt yourself.”

  “I’ll pay for it, I promise. Please don’t be mad at me. I didn’t mean to. It was an accident.” She was on her knees now, using her hands to brush the broken glass into a pile. He bent down beside her, but it was too late. Red blood spurted from her finger, dripping down to her palm, but she didn’t stop cleaning. She kept swiping, ignoring the blood and the piece of glass dangling from her injured skin.

  “Stop,” he said, but like before it was as if she couldn’t hear him. “Cassie!” He grabbed her wrists, and she flinched, but it halted her panicked movements so he didn’t give it a second thought.

  Afraid she would hurt herself more, he pulled her to her feet and moved them from the glass. She only mumbled apologies over and over like a child who was afraid she’d be punished.

  Then it dawned on him all at once, like a bulb turning on and shining light onto the mystery.

  “Cassie,” he said again, but she continued to mumble apologies.

  Her eyes fixated on the mess that was now behind them.

  He let go of her wrists, taking her face in his hands. “Look at me,” he urged. “Please.”

  Her eyes met his widened and worried. He wanted to rub the tension from her shoulders, press a finger to the creases on the bridge of her nose.

  “I’m not mad,” he said.

  “I’ll clean it.” Her words were fast and frantic, and it broke his heart to know this wasn’t a quirk but caused by something that was completely out of her control.

  “Listen to me,” he said, tightening his grip on her face only a little, but counteracting it with soft strokes of his thumb across the apple of her cheek. “You listening?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  “I’m not mad.”

  “You’re not?”

  “No.”

  The fear in her eyes slowly dissipated. The ramrod tension that plagued her began to ease as she softened beneath his touch. He let one hand fall away, reaching for her injured finger.

  “Let me see.”

  There was too much blood to determine if she needed stiches. He needed to get a better look at it. Not wanting to drip any more blood on the floor, he reached for the hem of his shirt and pulled it over his head. Taking the material and wrapping it around her hand, he guided her past the bathroom and to the stairs that led to his apartment.

  ***

  Cassie had no idea where they were going. She had worked at the brewery for less than a week, but she thought Mason had shown her every nook and cranny. She assumed the stairs went to a storage room. If she wasn’t so dreadfully embarrassed about everything that occurred in the last ten minutes, she probably would have asked him.

  Instead she followed without protest, trying to keep her eyes away from his tanned skin and the muscles that rippled across his shoulders and arms. His face had reminded her of carved marble perfection, but she did not expect his body to match, too.

  He opened the door at the top of the stairs and flipped on a light switch. It took her all of a minute to realize that this place was far from a storage area. He guided her inside an apartment with a large open floor plan that had a galley kitchen in the far right corner and expansive living quarters in the center.

  An oversized Navy blue couch with an attached chaise lounge at the end—that looked far more comfortable than anything Cassie had ever sat on—rested behind an old steamer trunk that was scattered with books and magazines. The hardwood floors were light which helped balance the dark furniture.

  They bypassed the living area and went right to a door at the other end of the apartment. He brought her into a brightly lit bathroom with gray tiled floors and white walls. He moved around her, pushing down the toilet seat and motioning for her to sit.

  He went to a medicine cabinet above the sink and took out bandages and peroxide.

  “I’m okay, really,” Cassie said, hating that he was fussing over her but appreciating it at the same time. It had been so long since anyone had fussed over her. Not since Francine died. It was a novelty like going out to eat or buying the expensive shampoo—something that was so easily overlooked until it’s gone.

  “No, you’re not,” he said. “You’re bleeding.”

  “This is nothing,” she said an uncontrollable laugh coming out with the words.

  Mason stopped what he was doing and glanced down at her with dark, intense eyes. She said too much. Damn it. She wanted to forget about her past. About Dylan and the abuse she suffered at his hands, but she was beginning to realize that she’d never be able to forget it. It was a part of her now and forever. He marked her both physically and emotionally and while most of the physical scars had faded or healed, the emotional scars went too deep to ever mend.

  He’d ruined her.

  “Did someone hurt you, Cassie?” His words were so tender and sweet, filled with too much concern for a girl like her. She didn’t deserve his niceties.

  No. She mentally cursed herself. That wasn’t her speaking; that was Dylan. He had brainwashed her to think that she didn’t deserve anything. That she should’ve kissed his damn feet because she lived under his roof. It didn’t matter that she cooked, cleaned, mowed the lawn, did the laundry, and everything else to keep the house together. It was his house,
and she was earning her keep.

  God, she had been a fool, but she had been desperate. When Francine died, she had nowhere else to go, and he’d shown up like he was the answer to all her problems. She should have known better. She should have been stronger. Now she was permanently damaged goods and nobody would want her.

  “No,” she said, refusing to let Mason think that she’d be weak enough to allow someone to hurt her. She wanted him to think that she was strong and independent.

  “Then, do you want to tell me what that was all about?”

  “All what?” she said, playing dumb. If he wasn’t holding her hand she would have bolted and run far away from him and this conversation. Because even though she didn’t want him to know about her past, looking into those dark green eyes, it was hard for her to lie to him. One glance from him was like a reassuring hand on her knee, telling her it was okay, urging her to trust him.

  God, she wanted to trust him so badly, but her trust was what got her into the mess she’d been in before. She doubted Mason was anything like Dylan—she didn’t believe Mason had a bad bone in his body—but that didn’t make her any less cautious.

  She needed to rebuild her life, and she needed to do it on her own.

  Mason motioned his hand toward the door. “Downstairs. You zoned out. It was like you weren’t even there.”

  “Oh that,” she said like it was nothing. “I have low blood sugar.”

  A dark eyebrow rose incredulously. “Low blood sugar?” Now that he said it, she realized how lame of a lie it was, but she’d already dived in headfirst, and she needed to stick with it.

  “It causes me to get dizzy spells and tremble. Sometimes my skin pales. I think that’s why I dropped the growler. I feel so bad about that,” she said, using it as a segue. “What are we going to tell your sister? I’m sure she put so much time into it, and now it’s a shattered mess.”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing?”

  “Yeah, we’re not going to tell her anything. For all she knows, I sold it already.”

  “But you’re not even opened yet. She won’t believe that.”

  “One of the local brewers stopped by to check the place out and bought it then.”

  She couldn’t believe how easily he formed the lie, and it gave her pause. Maybe she couldn’t trust him. Maybe he was a liar… like her.

  “You’re going to lie to your sister just like that?”

  “It’s okay to tell little white lies every once in a while if it’s to protect someone you love.”

  She supposed he was right. It’s not like the lie would cause any harm. He was saving her the devastation of knowing one of her pieces that she put so much time and effort into was destroyed.

  But he wasn’t only protecting his sister; he was protecting her. The first time she met his sister, she wouldn’t be known as the girl who shattered her hard work.

  He dabbed a cotton ball filled with peroxide on the wound, and she winced at the contact.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, lifting her finger to his lips and blowing a cool, soothing stream of air against the sensitive skin. That single act sent goosebumps up her arm and an erotic chill down her back.

  “Better?”

  All she could manage was a nod.

  He flashed her with that devastatingly handsome half grin and continued cleaning the area.

  “Have you done it before?” she asked. “Lie I mean… to protect someone?”

  “I’m not proud of it, but yeah.”

  “Do you ever feel guilty about it?”

  He shrugged. “Sometimes.”

  “That’s good.”

  His eyebrows pulled together, arching downward toward the bridge of his nose. “Why is that?”

  “Liars never feel remorse.”

  “Do you ever feel guilty about it?”

  Of course she did. She was currently judging him based on the fact that he told lies when she blatantly told him one. Low blood sugar. What the heck was she thinking?

  “I do now. When I was younger not so much. It’s not that I was a liar just to make up stories. It was a way to survive. Some homes I lived in weren’t exactly all that great, and sometimes a lie would save me.”

  “Save you from what?” he asked as he secured the bandage around her finger.

  Those darn eyes were on her again, and she could feel the heat filling her cheeks. The truth was Dylan wasn’t the only one to harm her. Before Francine came into her life, physical pain and emotional abuse had all been part of her world.

  She had become so immune to it that she accepted it as reality. Sometimes telling a lie to avoid getting a smack across the face or getting fingernail prints into the soft flesh of her upper arm was the only weapon she had.

  The last thing she wanted was to scare him off with the truth, but she wanted to tell him the truth and let him in. She took a deep breath, giving her the strength to speak the words out loud, but before the words could come out she heard the sound of the door open and close.

  “Mace? You up here?”

  “Shit,” Mason said.

  “Who is that?”

  “My brother.”

  “Mace?”

  “I’m in here, Coop,” Mason said, letting go of her hand. She immediately felt the loss of his warmth and comfort and had to control herself from taking hold of him again.

  “Jesus. I came into the brewery and saw the glass then couldn’t find you,” he said as he appeared in the doorway. His hair was a few shades lighter and longer than Mason’s that sat haphazardly on his head, pushed back slightly by a pair of Aviator sunglasses. His eyes were a brilliant shade of blue, surrounded by the same chiseled features as his brother. He had an athletic build and stood a few inches shorter than Mason. His charm however wasn’t masked by layers of dark brute like Mason’s was. His was up front and center, and Cassie imagined it was always on display.

  “I’m fine,” Mason said. “We’re fine.”

  “We’re?” Cooper questioned, and Mason stepped aside nodding toward Cassie.

  “Oh… Oh! Am I interrupting?”

  “No.” Mason’s response was curt and clearly meant to stop any further questioning, but the wicked grin that formed on Cooper’s face told Cassie he wasn’t one to be deterred.

  “I could come back. Give you five minutes. That’s all it would take. Five minutes, right?”

  “Stop talking,” Mason said.

  He didn’t. He leaned around Mason and held out his hand. “I’m Cooper, the fun, more attractive younger brother.”

  Cassie went to shake his hand then remembered the big bandage on her finger and quickly swapped hands. It was awkward, but he didn’t seem to mind.

  “What happened here?” Cooper asked, pointing toward the big wad of gauze.

  “Cassie cut herself. I was cleaning it up.”

  “Are you sure that’s all you were doing?”

  “Okay. Out!” Mason grabbed his brother by the arm and turned him around, shoving him toward the door.

  “What?” Cooper protested with a laugh, holding his hands in the air as if he was completely innocent. “I come up here concerned about your well-being and this is how you treat me?”

  “Go pour yourself a beer, and I’ll meet you downstairs.”

  “I guess that’s as good as any apology I’m going to get.”

  Cassie giggled at the shenanigans. This was what she always wanted—people who cared enough to worry about you. To come running if they thought something was wrong or out of place. A family to nose into her business and make her want to dismiss them knowing well enough that, at the end of the day, no feelings were hurt, and it was all in good fun.

  “Sorry about that,” Mason said coming back into the bathroom.

  “It’s fine. He’s actually quite funny.”

  “I heard that,” Cooper’s voice floated from across the apartment. “I like her,” he added before the door shut.

  “He’s a pain in my ass.”

  “But
he’s your brother, and you love him anyway.”

  “God knows why.” He motioned toward the door. “I need to get down there before he drinks me out of house and home.”

  “I need to clean up that glass.” Cassie gasped, placing a hand over her mouth. “You don’t think Cooper will tell your sister about what I did, do you?”

  “He might be a pain in the ass, but he can keep a secret. You have nothing to worry about.”

  The way he said it, you have nothing to worry about had Cassie believing that he wasn’t talking about Cooper and the broken growler. There was comfort in his words, an assurance that she was safe, and while she wanted to believe him she knew deep down that as long as Dylan was alive, she was never truly safe.

  Chapter 5

  While most people would think Mason got the brewery up and running in record time, the truth of the matter was, he had been planning it for quite a long time. From sketches—he worked on at night when insomnia kicked in—to visiting all the local breweries, trying new recipes, messing up, and trying again, he had devoted a good portion of his adult life to this brewery.

  So, as he looked around the tasting room, getting ready to open the doors to the public for the very first time, he couldn’t help but feel the satisfaction of watching his brewery go from dream to reality.

  He stood at the doors, savoring the feeling and pinning it to his memory. He glanced over his shoulder, his eyes lingering on the soft curves of Cassie’s face. She had gotten there early in case he needed help with any last-minute preparations, which meant more to him than he could say.

  She placed a small bowl filled with pretzels on the bar top, her brown hair hanging in waves just below her shoulders; the bright red of her shirt pulled out her natural red highlights. He stared at her for a moment as she placed a few more bowls along the bar. She moved with an ease that showed a side of her he rarely saw—confident and comfortable. It was moments like these that she was absolutely radiant.

  She turned in his direction, her golden eyes piercing right through him, causing an uncontrollable smile to form. Her pretty lips curved at the edges when she caught his gaze.

  “You ready?” she asked, her excitement clearly evident in her tone.