by Lili Valente
At least, that’s how Lark used to be.
But now…
“Where are we going that I need to be blindfolded?” I ask, doing my best to keep my reservations out of my tone.
“We’re going wherever I want to go,” she says. “I’m in control tonight. Can you handle that, Mason? Or should I go home alone?”
I don’t say a word. I simply force a smile, turn around, and close my eyes, bending my knees a little to make it easier for her to reach my head as she ties the bandana snuggly over my face.
I’m not about to give her an excuse to go anywhere alone. I want to spend as much time with her as possible, even if I can’t see where I’m going for part of it.
“How’s that?” she asks, smoothing my hair down around the knot she’s tied. “Too tight?”
I shake my head. “Nope. It’s good.”
It isn’t good. I’m not a fan of being blindfolded, either, but it’s clearly something that matters to Lark. And if wearing a blindfold and obeying orders is what it takes to regain her trust, then I’ll do it.
With a smile, if possible.
At the very least, I won’t let on that so far I’m not enjoying a single second of “Not In Control” date night.
“Good.” She slips her hand into mine. “Let me help you to the car.”
I force myself to take slow easy breaths, ignoring the anxiety that skitters across my skin as she leads me off the patio and across the grass to her car. I can trust Lark.
Which is probably the point of all this.
Maybe she’s testing me to see how much trust I’m willing to give before she decides what she’s able to invest in return. That makes sense in a way, I guess, though I’m not sure trust is as transactional as that kind of thinking would assume it to be.
Trust is something you have to choose to give, not something you barter for.
But in any event, I choose to trust Lark. I always have, and I can’t imagine that changing any time soon.
“We’re at the door. I’m going to help you in and buckle your seat belt,” she says. “And then I’m going to drive, and I don’t want you to say another word until I give you permission. Not even when I stop the car once we get where we’re going. Okay?”
Anxiety knots in my throat again.
“Can you do that?” she presses.
I swallow hard. “Yep.”
“Great,” she says, a tremble in her voice that makes me wish I could see her face.
Is she nervous? Scared?
Second-guessing her decision to play kidnapper for the night?
I have no idea, but as I allow myself to be strapped in and wait for her to join me in the car, I hope it’s the last option. I’d be thrilled to learn this is a one-time thing.
She starts the car and pulls out of the motel parking lot, heading south, away from town and Atlanta, out into the countryside. For the first several miles, I’m able to keep track of our general location, but after twenty minutes or so, I have to admit I have no idea where she’s taking me.
I don’t even have a firm grasp on how much time has passed. I’m guessing twenty minutes, but it may have been only ten or fifteen.
With my eyesight taken away and not a sound in the car but Lark’s soft breath and the hum of the wheels on the road beneath us, time seems to stretch out forever. More than once, I’m tempted to ask where we’re going, but I sensed she was serious about following her directions.
So I hold my tongue and do my best to ignore how uneasy this is making me.
We drive on and on, the road hum becoming a grumble as Lark turns off onto a gravel road. The terrain tips up sharply, but that doesn’t help me guess where we’re going. We’ve gone hiking in the Blue Ridge Mountain foothills lots of times, but I don’t think we’ve driven far enough to reach any of our favorite spots and the park roads close at sunset, anyway, which won’t be long now.
I felt sun shining through the car windows onto my lap for the first part of the drive, but now the inside of the car is cooling down.
Cooling, cooling, and the small amount of yellow light seeping through my blindfold fades to blue…
Lark cracks the windows, letting in a breeze and the calls of night insects, and still we drive. Up, up, up, turning three more times before she finally pulls to a stop and shuts off the engine.
I sag with relief and let out a long breath.
Finally. We’re here.
Wherever here is.
Chapter 11
Mason
I’m so curious it’s all I can do to keep my tongue still in my mouth. But I haven’t kept my peace all this time to fail Lark’s test now. I thread my fingers together in my lap, bite my tongue, and sit tight as she slams out of the driver’s side and fetches something from the trunk.
I turn toward my door, expecting her to open it, but nothing happens.
After several more minutes pass, I realize she must intend to leave me in the car for a while.
I sit in silence, my ears straining for a sign of where she went. Once or twice, I think I hear footsteps and the crack of a twig underfoot, but another thirty minutes—or ten or twenty, I have no idea—passes and the night goes quiet except for the buzzing of insects and the occasional call of a night bird.
My anxiety turns to irritation, and then back to anxiety again, as the smell of campfire smoke drifts to my nose.
Someone lit a fire.
Was it Lark? Or are there other people nearby?
I fidget in my seat, dying to get out and stretch my legs, my throat aching with the effort it’s taking to stay quiet. I want to shout her name more than I can remember wanting anything in a long, long time, but I force myself to keep my damned mouth shut.
More time passes, minutes that spin around and around my heart like fishing line pulled tight, cutting off my circulation. Time bleeds on until my stomach cramps with hunger and my muscles ache from sitting still for too long and my pulse races with a mixture of nerves, fear, and anger.
I’m angry now. So angry the back of my neck breaks out in a light sweat.
What the hell is she doing? What’s the point of this? What is forcing me to sit in a car for hours going to prove?
It proves you’re a fool, that’s what it proves.
I fight the urge to punch the dashboard, or reach up and yank the blindfold from my eyes. If I’m going to be a fool for anyone, it’s Lark.
Another half hour or more passes and my rage gradually fades away, replaced by resignation. And sadness.
She isn’t coming back.
If she were, surely she would have come to get me by now. It has to be after nine o’clock. She must have decided to leave me here all night. Maybe she had a friend, or one of her sisters, come pick her up farther down the mountain. Maybe she’s safe in Bliss River right now, laughing about the prank she pulled on the man who broke her heart.
I reach across the car, feeling for the steering wheel and the ignition.
She took the keys with her. So if she is gone, then I’m truly trapped here.
Trapped with no idea where I am. Hopefully my cell will have service and I’ll be able to GPS my way back to my hotel, but I know that’s not a given. Service is notoriously spotty in the foothills.
I rub a fist across my forehead, and sigh.
What should I do? Wait here until morning and hope she comes back to get me? Start walking and hope I run into someone willing to give a hitchhiker a ride in the middle of the night?
And what if this isn’t a prank, and Lark is out there somewhere, needing my help? What if she’s lost or hurt, and that’s the reason she hasn’t come back to the car?
I don’t know what’s going on, but I know I’m not going to make it another minute like this. I reach for the door handle and pull, swinging my feet onto the ground as I wrench the blindfold from my eyes.
“Three hours,” a soft voice says, making me flinch with surprise.
I blink, waiting for my eyes to adjust. When they do, I see Lark
sitting in a lawn chair a few feet away, holding a book with a reading light clipped to the top of it in her lap.
“What the hell is going on?” I demand, standing on stiff legs as I throw the blindfold to the dirt at my feet.
We’re parked on a blanket of pine needles about fifty feet from a campsite where a fire burns. Looking around, I expect to see other campers, but we’re alone. Wherever she’s taken me, it isn’t a public campground.
“You made it three hours,” she repeats in a calm voice. “I made it thirty thousand.”
I shake my head, unable to hide my frustration. “What?”
“Four years. That’s over a thousand days, and over thirty thousand hours.” She closes her book but keeps the light on. It illuminates just enough of her face for me to see the tightness in her jaw and the emotion in her eyes.
It isn’t one I can easily place. It lives somewhere between anger and hope, in the no man’s land of emotion where people so often find themselves when relationships go wrong. It’s a hard feeling to name, but not a hard one to empathize with.
It’s the same way I felt sitting in that car—miserable and abandoned, but with a tiny voice beneath it all praying for a miracle, for Lark to come back and take the pain away.
My bunched shoulders drop away from my ears. My hands unclench at my sides. I understand now.
I should have understood all along.
“You wanted me to know how you felt.” I stare at the ground near her feet, not ready to look her in the eye.
“No, there’s no way you could know how I felt,” she says. “Three hours can’t teach you everything there is to know about thirty thousand, but I hoped it might at least give you a taste.”
I nod. “It did.”
“You were angry.”
“I was,” I whisper.
“And sad.”
“And pretty sure I’d been throw away,” I finish, a fresh wave of shame washing over me. I think of the misery I felt and multiply it times ten thousand.
That is what I did to her. I knew I’d hurt her, but it isn’t until this moment that I understand it in a visceral way.
“You can’t forgive me,” I force out.
That has to be the reason for this. Lark is trying to pierce my stubborn resolve and make me see why she can’t give me a second chance, no matter what.
And I do understand, and I can’t blame her, not even a little bit. But the loss of her, of even the hope of her, is still crushing.
“No,” she whispers, making my next breath freeze in my lungs. “I think I can. I think maybe I already have.”
Chapter 12
Mason
My head jerks up in surprise.
This time, when I meet Lark’s gaze it’s gentle, hopeful.
“You have?” I ask, my voice cracking.
“I didn’t think you’d last an hour,” she says. “But you did. And the longer I sat here watching you wait for me, the more I realized I don’t want to stay angry. Holding onto a grudge never made anyone happy, and I don’t want to be one of those bitter people who looks back on their lives and wishes I’d been brave enough to forgive the people who really mattered to me.” She presses her lips together for a moment before she continues, “You matter to me, Mason, and…I want to give this a chance.”
“You do?” My relief is so profound my hands shake with it.
“I do,” she says with a shy grin. “Still up for four more dates after a night like this?”
“I’m up for as many dates as you’ll give me,” I say, the center of my bones still unsteady. I feel like I’ve been rescued from a burning building seconds before it collapsed.
And Lark is the one who pulled me from the fire.
“Then let’s start now.” She crosses to me, slipping her hand into mine and giving it a squeeze. “I have stew and rolls warming by the fire. And there’s sweet tea and beer in the cooler if you want it.”
“I could use a beer,” I say with a laugh as she leads me toward the circle of stones and the light flickering beneath the trees. “Or three.”
“Have four,” she says, squeezing my hand again. “I’m driving. I think you’ve earned a little buzz.”
I stop at the edge of the flames, and draw her into my arms. She comes without hesitation, letting me enfold her and hold her close for a long, quiet moment. I drop my lips to the top of her head, drawing a relieved breath as I press a kiss to her hair.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
“You’re welcome.” Her arms tighten around my waist as she tilts her head back to look up at me, her skin glowing in the firelight. “Let’s never fight again, okay? Or at least not for a long, long time.”
“Why would anyone fight with an angel like you?” I ask with a grin.
Lark narrows her eyes, but her lips stretch into a smile. “Have you forgotten who you’re talking to? I’m the woman who just made you sit in a car blindfolded and sweating for three hours. I might be more devil than angel tonight.”
“Nope. You’re a good one, Lark, I don’t care what all those other people say.”
She laughs. “People don’t say a thing, Mason Stewart.”
“They don’t know you like I do.”
“Oh yeah?” She leans closer, her soft curves pressing against me, making my head spin. “So you think I’m a little devilish after all?”
My pulse beats faster. “Maybe. A little.”
“Speaking of devilish, you know what I miss?”
“What?” I murmur.
“Your truck,” she says in a low voice. “We had some good times in that truck.”
I remember those good times, every single second of them. Every time we spread out the sleeping bags in the bed of my old red Chevy, every kiss, every caress, every time she leaned back her head and sighed as my lips trailed down her throat.
“I’ll trade my car in for something with a tailgate first thing tomorrow morning,” I say, meaning every word.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” She stands on tiptoe to press a kiss to my cheek before adding in a whisper, “I do have an apartment of my own, you know. I don’t live with Mom and Dad anymore. I’m just staying over to help Aria with the baby while they’re out of town.”
“Oh, yeah?” I ask, skimming one hand up and down the length of her back.
“Yeah. Maybe you’ll get to see my new digs someday,” she says in a teasing voice as she spins out of my arms and starts around the fire. “Come on. Grab a couple of bowls from the bag by the cooler, I’m starving.”
Until a moment ago, I was starving, too. But now all I can think about is being alone with Lark in her apartment, in her bedroom…in her bed. I stand staring, imagining the firelight flickering over her bare skin, knowing she’d be so beautiful it would hurt to look at her, thinking about what part of her I’d kiss first, where my hands would—
“Mason?” she asks. “Bowls?”
I blink. “Right. Bowls.” I jerk into motion, forcing my thoughts back to food and campfires, letting my hand linger in the cooler for a few moments in hopes the ice closing around my fingers will help cool me off.
It works.
Mostly.
“So where are we?” I ask after we settle into two chairs close to the fire.
“My land. I bought it last year. I’m hoping to save up enough money to build a cabin up here in the next year or two.”
“That’s amazing.” I look around the land with new interest. “You always said you wanted to live out in the boonies.”
“Yeah, well, I can’t live here. Most of my business is in Bliss River or Atlanta, so it would be a big commute. But I’ll be able to come here on weekends and vacations.”
I nod as I dig into Lark’s homemade stew, moaning in appreciation. “Damn, this is good.”
She smiles. “It should be. I’m a professional now, you know.” She scoops up a spoonful and reaches for a roll from the paper plate on top of the cooler.
“I know. You should be proud. Starting your own busine
ss isn’t easy these days.”
“Thanks.” She lifts her eyes, meeting mine. “It was a ton of work, but it gave me something to focus on after you left.”
For the first time, she mentions me leaving without any anger or sadness or resentment in her voice. It’s simply a fact. A fact that’s in our past, leaving the future open for something more.
Something better.
Things are really different now. I can feel it. The air between us is lighter, our conversation freer, and as the night goes on, Lark doesn’t hesitate to touch my arm, lean against me, let me brush the crumbs from her lips or rest my hand on her thigh as she drives.
By the time she pulls back into the hotel parking lot, I’m feeling brave enough to reach across the car, cup her soft cheek in my hand, and—
“Wait,” she whispers, holding two fingers up between our mouths, keeping my lips from hers. “Not tonight.”
I sink back into my seat, trying not to look disappointed. “Whatever you want.”
“It’s not what I want,” she says, her hand coming to rest on my arm. “I just think it’s for the best. Once I start kissing you…”
“What?” I ask.
“I have a feeling I’m not going to want to stop,” she says in a husky voice that makes me ache in new and powerful ways.
So much for a good night’s sleep. Now I’ll be up all night, replaying that sentence in my head over and over again until I drive myself crazier with wanting her than I am already.
I swallow and reach for the door. “See you tomorrow, then.” I swing out of the car, throwing my next words over my shoulder. “I’ll pick you up at one.”
“What are we doing?” Lark leans across the gearshift to peek up at me.
“I have no idea. I just want to spend as much of tomorrow with you as possible.”