Gratitude swamped her, and she couldn’t let it. She was barely holding tears in check as it was.
But he was probably right. “Thank you.” She rose to her toes and pressed a kiss to his cheek.
He didn’t put his arms around her as part of her desperately wished he would, but he cradled her face in his hands. “Thank you. If I get the slightest sense they’re troubled, I’ll come get you, I promise.”
Oh…the tenderness in his eyes undid her. She managed a smile and slipped past him, pasting on a worry-free expression. “Girls, Jackson thinks he can sing your songs tonight. Should we let him?”
“Yeah!” Abby practically bounced on the bed. “Me first, Prince!”
Beth didn’t bounce, but she didn’t seem concerned either.
“You okay with that, Bethie?”
Her daughter nodded. “Will he read to us, too?”
“You bet I will.” He settled on the floor between their beds. “So what’s tonight’s selection?”
“You know, silly!” Abby grinned. “It’s right there!” She pointed at the book that lay on the nightstand between them.
He was right. They were fine. “Let me kiss you good night first.”
Several kisses and hugs later, she left the room, trailing her fingers across Jackson’s strong shoulder in passing.
He glanced up, and gratitude glowed in his smile.
Amazing. He was here when he badly needed to be in Seattle, caring for her children when his company was on the brink of disaster. She paused in the doorway and looked back as he climbed onto Beth’s mattress and settled Abby on his other side, both girls’ faces eager and excited.
He’d cared for Ben last night and given her the chance for some much-needed sleep, however few hours she’d managed after catching up on chores instead.
Had she known he’d be this kind of father, way back when?
Abruptly her relief vanished.
She still had to have that talk with him, but right now, if she didn’t get away, she was going to cry in front of all of them and ruin the peace that had descended.
With rapidly quickening steps, she made her way to her sun porch, Boo right behind her.
Once there, she wrapped herself in a quilt she’d made with the help of the Sweetgrass quilters and crawled into her big rocker.
And she wept. For all that was lost. For all she felt now.
For all that would vanish when her sins were revealed.
Jackson covered Beth last and clicked off the lamp, the girls’ butterfly nightlight showing him the way across their room. At the door he turned, taking in the sight of two angels sleeping, and his heart felt a powerful tug.
They could have been his.
This life could have been his.
Heart heavy, he crossed the hall to peer in on Ben.
The boy hadn’t moved an inch.
Jackson put the sat phone by Ben’s bed and scribbled a note for when the boy awakened. Call me and let your mom sleep, if you need something.
Then he descended the stairs to see what he could do for their mother. He walked the entire downstairs, but she was nowhere in evidence.
Outside, however, no lights shone in the greenhouses or the shed where she had her tiny office. He stood very still, but his heart was beating fast. Where was she? He’d heard her go downstairs.
Boo’s toenails clicked on the old, scarred wooden floors. “Hey, fella.” He scratched the dog’s head. “Where did she go?”
Boo whined, then headed for the kitchen door and into what she’d said was once her sewing room.
As if she had time to do anything like that now.
As he followed Boo through, however, he saw something he hadn’t come across in years, though commonplace in his childhood home when his mother was alive: pattern pieces pinned to fabric, lying on the open sewing machine table.
He swore. On top of everything else, she still made clothes for her family?
Boo stopped at a doorway he hadn’t noticed before, and he peered through the partially-opened door—
And saw her in an old wicker rocking chair, bundled in a quilt, only her face visible.
Still-damp trails on her cheeks. She’d cried herself to sleep.
Oh, Vee… With a lump in his throat, he bent to her. He didn’t want to wake her, but sleeping with her neck at that awkward angle wouldn’t help her misery. He spied a daybed on the opposite wall.
He should take her upstairs to her bedroom so she’d be more comfortable, but entering the sanctum she’d shared with David didn’t feel right, not without her permission.
He scooped her into his arms. She sighed and nestled into him.
He settled in the rocker with her on his lap. He wasn’t ready to let her go yet.
Or maybe ever.
So he simply held her, tucking the quilt around her more tightly, content just to be with her, to have her in his arms, relaxed at last. Untroubled…at least as long as she wasn’t awake.
He’d tried to put her at ease, but something was holding her back. Maybe their past or maybe that she would never move beyond David. Maybe he’d never have a chance with her.
But Jackson Gallagher, who had always and ever pushed and shoved and hurried to get to the next obstacle and vanquish it, who wrote kickass games because he was an ambitious and adventurous gamer, found himself surprisingly content to simply…wait.
To be patient.
If he could spend his life like this, with her cradled in his arms, her children sleeping peacefully above their heads…it could be enough, he thought. Even if the worst happened with Enigma…
No. No thinking about Enigma tonight. Ty was on the case, and so was Steph.
Tonight he would live in the here and now, where he held the woman he’d loved most of his life in his arms, and she trusted him enough to nestle in his embrace.
He studied her face, noted every line time and woe had carved…
And he loved each one. Found her more beautiful than when she was young and unmarked. He couldn’t resist trailing one finger over her eyebrow and down the line of her jaw.
The hazel eyes that he’d never been able to forget opened, their expression sleepy and untroubled. “Jackson…” she breathed.
How was he not to kiss her?
He touched his lips to hers.
She sighed. Opened her mouth to his and kissed him back, her tongue tracing the seam of his lips, her fingers sliding into his hair.
He crushed her to him, deepened the kiss.
And fell headlong into magic unlike anything he’d ever experienced, remnants of their youthful and eager obsession woven through with their sorrow and loneliness, with yearning that was caverns deep. With shimmering sunshine and the beginnings of scorching, crazy need.
She sat up. Wrapped her arms around his neck, latching onto him as though she needed him as desperately as he needed her.
His arms banded around her slim body, sealing her to him as if he’d never let her go.
He didn’t want to. Wanted never to be apart again.
“Jackson…” Her mouth cruised down his neck, her hands sliding across his shoulders. “I need you. I’ve missed you so much…”
Half-blind with the wanting of her, he rose and lifted her with him, quilt and all, his mouth fastened to her throat as he covered the steps between them and the daybed.
He laid her upon it with reverence.
Eyes dark with longing, she held out her hands to him.
He fell to his knees before her.
“No,” she protested. “Come here.”
But he was not rushing what had been years in the waiting, so he gripped her hands. “Shh, love…let me cherish you the way you deserve.”
She was not the shy girl he’d first wooed, the virgin who’d given him her body with such trust, but there was something of that moment in this one, a sense of time suspended, of a moment bigger than them both.
He cradled her shoulders in one arm while his free hand slid beneath the qu
ilt. For an instant, he simply rested his open palm between her breasts, registering the beat of her heart.
Her solemn eyes watched him, and the moment felt…holy.
His hand trembled. They’d been so young before…
He shouldn’t be this nervous. He was an experienced lover…except now, none of those other relationships felt deserving of that title. He’d had sex many times, but this…this would be making love, for the first time in seventeen years. His hand faltered as he started to caress her. His gaze met hers for permission.
He saw nerves in her, too, but he saw longing. He slid his hand beneath her shirt and clasped her slim waist, his fingertips registering her satin skin.
Veronica watched the moonlight paint his face all angles and shadows, his a rugged, boldly masculine beauty. The hot blue eyes reached out to her, exerting a pull she’d felt nowhere else.
Her stomach jittered. She’d only been with two men…
“Vee,” he said, his voice husky and fractured.
It was like the first time, in some ways, but they’d been too young and too crazed for each other to be nervous then.
She caught her lower lip in her teeth.
One long finger came up to soothe the ache, trembling slightly as he traced the contours of her mouth, over and over…around and around…
Tiny sparks lit, pulsing heat through her body. Deep into the heart of her, the core of her…down to that hidden place where only Jackson lived. He’d known her as no one else had, had rooted deep in her soul before anyone else in this house had drawn breath. He’d been her heart’s love, her every dream, her deepest, most forbidden wish…
And now he was here.
She was here.
They were alone, as they might never be again, and she wanted to seize the moment and savor its sweetness, its promise, its heat…
“Jackson…” She reached to caress his jaw but stopped abruptly. “My hands…” She curled her fingers inward. “They’re not pretty anymore,” she whispered. “They’re so rough. So worn.”
“They’re strong,” he countered, “And they’re precious to me.” He brought each one to his mouth in turn, pressing a kiss to each fingertip, each palm. “You protect your family with these hands, my brave, beautiful Vee.” He looked at her and made her believe.
She was moved to her soul. “Oh, Jackson…” She closed her eyes, and he kissed each lid.
“Everything about you is beautiful.” His voice was rough and tender, too.
They held one another and simply…breathed. In tandem, their hearts beat, one again.
And in those sweet, aching moments, she began to open to him, to feel again how it was to make love with the man who had been her first. To relish each second, to let the fires build, let the flames wall them in together.
She rose and slid onto his lap. Laid her mouth on his.
Instantly his arms gripped her. Crushed her to his body, where the heat he threw off warmed her to her depths.
Their mouths met. Clung. Opened to one another…and she fell, straight down into madness and need, into hunger and greed and unbearable longing.
He lifted her to the mattress once more and settled his tall frame beside her, but cautiously, as though she might break.
“Don’t be careful with me,” she pleaded.
His tormented eyes caught hers. “How can I not? You’re as fine as spun crystal to me.”
She had wronged him. He’d left her, but she’d hurt him worse—he just didn’t know it yet. She didn’t deserve to be treasured. “Oh, Jackson…” She began her retreat.
“Don’t,” he said roughly. “Give us this, Vee. Please. Let us have this moment. I need you so much…” She saw the torment. “Need me.” He seduced her with only the sound of his voice.
Then his talented fingers and his lips stacked the deck. “Please…let me have you.”
She was helpless in the face of his yearning. Of her own. She needed him so. Longed for this respite, this one taste of heaven before—
“Shh… Stop thinking,” he commanded, and caught her mouth with his.
He began unbuttoning her shirt, his fingers teasing and taunting, painting desire with every touch.
And she was lost, lured out into the starry night, the cliff’s edge of longing…the light-sparkled forever where only she and Jackson had ever belonged.
Jackson made love to her with everything in him. Sought to woo her with tender touches, with blazing need. Did everything and anything she desired, letting her sighs and her moans guide him.
He bared her body and his own.
Bared his heart to hers.
Ranged over her flesh with his, touching her delicately and carefully over every inch of that satin skin. With his tongue, with tender kisses, he traced the silvery white lines on her belly and treasured them as evidence of the beautiful children she’d borne, the young hearts he’d taken to his own.
He traced the crease where leg and torso met, followed it down into the fertile delta laden with the scent of her arousal, with the delicious taste of her womanhood.
She gasped as his tongue slid into the salty, juicy essence of her. When she groaned from deep in the back of her throat, he smiled against the golden curls.
Still, he savored every last inch of her until she was writhing.
Until he could take no more.
Then he propped himself above her and stared down at that face he loved above all others, poised at the core of her. “Veronica.” There had never been a name more precious. “Love.”
Her eyes filled. “Oh, Jackson…”
In that moment they lingered, their hearts open and vulnerable, the past meeting the present in the landscape of dreams.
She buried her face in his chest, and he longed to shield her from anything that could ever harm her.
But he had been her biggest danger.
Then she fastened her mouth to his throat and undulated against him.
Need roared past every thought.
But he couldn’t risk harming her more. “Vee,” he gasped as her body cradled his. “Vee, wait.”
“No—” She gripped him more tightly. Nipped at his shoulder.
He squeezed his eyes against the need to be inside her that instant. “Vee, wait. Honey, I’m safe, but do I need to protect you?”
It took time before her head fell back, her eyes cleared. “No.” She shook her head, but he could see her begin to think again. “I protect myself.”
Of course she did. How he wished she hadn’t needed to. “I haven’t been a monk, but… Vee, there’s no one…there’s never been anyone but you who ever had my heart.” He never, ever revealed himself like this, but—“I love you,” he declared. “Only you. I never stopped.”
Her eyes went bright with tears. “Oh, Jackson…”
Tell me you love me, he wanted to demand. But it would mean nothing if not given voluntarily.
So he studied the hazel eyes, soft with longing and hot with need. She caressed his face again, and her pelvis rocked toward him. She gripped his backside. “Jackson…” Another throaty moan.
From within him a smile rose. “Now?”
She growled. “Now.”
He took his time, entering her slowly despite the hunger that gripped him, the fever to be fully together again, after so very long.
It was a sweet slide straight into heaven. His own groan sounded.
He captured her mouth with his.
She welcomed him, body and soul. He could not imagine how he’d lived without her for this long. When she whimpered, he began to move, at first gently, then more fiercely as if to brand her.
She dug her nails into his back, and he fought not to be savage, but he wanted to claim her, to mark her, to make her his forever, to never, ever be apart again, not for one second.
A cry began from deep in her throat and rising.
He abandoned himself to the glory of their joining, and they fell and they soared, they drifted on the sweetness like hawks sailing h
igh on the thermals of their past and their future, their love and their need, spiraling higher and higher—
Veronica whimpered, and he slid his hand between their bodies to send her flying as he deepened the kiss. The stars flared and the sky exploded and they were lost in the universe that only they two had ever known, the bittersweet and beautiful landscape of who they’d been to each other and who they’d hoped to be—
They flew past the stars and into bright morning—
And as they fell, they fell together. One at last.
“I love you,” she murmured into his throat.
He bowed his head in gratitude. Soaked in the sweetness of coming home.
To be one with her again…after so very long…it was the dream he’d tried so hard to forget.
Had wanted so badly.
He didn’t deserve her yet.
But he would keep trying.
Jackson woke when Boo licked his shoulder. His eyes opened, and he held heaven in his arms.
Veronica lay curled within his embrace, spooned against his chest on the narrow daybed. He listened…and he lingered. He heard no sounds of children stirring.
Wait. A bump overhead. Near where Ben’s room was located.
He glanced at the woman he so did not want to leave.
But perhaps she would sleep if he took care of her children. He could see the bruises beneath her eyes, the exhaustion weighting down her delicate frame.
This was a farm. Chores needed doing. Animals wouldn’t wait.
So though his body had roused to hers again, he forced himself to uncurl carefully, to creep from the bed and cover her. To dress in haste and silence, to make his way from the room and close the door to shield her.
He made a quick pit stop and longed for coffee but feared the scent of it would wake her. He let Boo outside, then ascended the stairs.
The girls still slept.
Ben, however, was struggling to rise from the bed.
“Here. Can I help?” He gave the boy room to do for himself, to claim his dignity.
“Thanks. I’m not as steady as I’d like.”
“Pain meds,” Jackson stated. “They pumped you full. Don’t guess you’d let me carry you?”
“Got to learn sometime.” Ben glanced over. “But if you want to make sure I don’t fall on my face…”
Texas Rebel: The Gallaghers of Sweetgrass Springs Book 4 (Texas Heroes: The Gallaghers of Sweetgrass Springs) Page 18