by Jo McNally
“Hey...” He squeezed her hand. “Don’t do that. Don’t disappear. You know you’re safe with me, right?” Jillie’s head jerked in a shaky nod.
“Of course. I want to do more, but...” She chewed on her lip. “The panic attacks are so bad. What you saw on the mountain was nothing. Once it starts it’s like a rolling cascade that builds out of control... And it is not sexy. I’m sorry, Matt.”
He chuckled softly. “For what? Giving me some of the hottest kisses I can remember? Not to mention giving me the hardest erection of my life?” Her mouth twitched at that. “Tonight...hell, today...has been entirely unexpected. For both of us. It’s okay to step back and think about things.” Even if he didn’t want to. “But it is not okay to apologize for anything.”
He released her hand and started to slide away, putting some distance between them. But she stopped him, her voice low and shaky.
“Matt?”
“Yeah?”
“Just because we aren’t going further doesn’t mean...it doesn’t mean we have to stop what we were doing...”
Matt willed his heart to remain steady. Could he keep kissing her tonight without wanting more? No. But he could kiss her tonight and not do more. He was a grown man, damn it. And if she wanted to keep this up, he was happy to oblige.
His mouth found hers and they started back at the beginning. It was sweet and tender, then grew from there. There wasn’t as much raw fire as before, and that somehow made it...better. This was more controlled, more intentional. They weren’t holding back, but they were both completely committed to every movement they made. Their heads tipped at the same time. Their tongues tangled and teased together. Their breaths were slower and deeper. They leaned in at the same time, and he reached for her waist at the exact moment she moved to straddle his hips. It was a dance—one they hadn’t practiced, yet they knew every move before it happened.
Instead of imagining the end game, he let himself get lost in what was happening right now, in this very moment. Every touch. Every heartbeat. Every sigh. A random thought meandered through the back of his mind, whispering that this was very, very different. This wasn’t just a kiss. This was him falling for Jillie Coleman. Not just wanting her in the physical sense, but...wanting her in every way. Wanting to know her. Wanting to please her. Wanting to feel her wiggle in his lap the way she was doing right now, which was the sweetest and most agonizing torture. The kind of torture he’d like a lifetime of.
Whoa. He wasn’t a lifetime kind of guy. He barely knew this woman. And yet, it felt like he’d known her forever. Another word he didn’t do. What the hell was she doing to him?
Jillie lifted her head, breaking the kiss and sending him even more off balance. Her dark hair fell forward, sweeping across his skin like a hot match. She looked deep into his eyes, then frowned.
“What’s wrong?”
He kicked his doubts to the curb. He didn’t know what was happening, but that was a problem for another day. Right now he wanted his lips back on hers.
“Not a thing, babe. Not a damn thing.”
Chapter Eight
“Why are you stopping?” Robbie demanded. “Why are you being so cautious all of a sudden?”
How could Monica explain it? He didn’t know about the vision she’d had. The dream of falling, falling, falling into the unknown. For the first time in her life, Monica was afraid.
Jillie stared up at the ceiling above her bed. She’d said good-night to Matt just before midnight. She could still feel the adrenaline surging through her veins an hour later. Even if she could fall asleep, she’d relive it all again in her dreams. Which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but right now she needed to think clearly.
It was one thing to kiss Matt on the steps outside earlier. That was impulsive. Playful...until it wasn’t. She knew Matt had started that kiss in front of the fireplace to distract her from the stories she’d told him. He probably hadn’t anticipated things getting out of control any more than she had. And he’d slowed down the minute he sensed her hesitating. She smiled up at the dark ceiling. Slowing down definitely hadn’t been an easy thing for him to do. She’d felt him rock hard against her. If she’d given the nod, he’d have made love to her right there on the living room floor.
It wasn’t that she didn’t want that—every cell in her body was screaming with desire for him. He thought she’d stopped out of some sense of trauma from her childhood. There were other micro-traumas after that he hadn’t heard about yet. Years of bad decisions when it came to men. It would be smarter to not do more than kiss. Doing more would be...messy. Unwise. Foolish. Dangerous.
But damn, that man could kiss.
And for the first time in years, she wanted...more. She closed her eyes, imagining Matt’s hands on her again, but without any of those pesky clothes in the way this time. A soft sigh escaped her lips. Yeah, that was a very nice image. She could almost feel him touching her. Her hand flattened on her own stomach, and she pulled in a long, slow breath. It was good to know she could still feel like a whole woman. A desirable woman. It felt like a little piece of herself falling back into place.
She woke to the sound of shattering glass from the kitchen downstairs. Sophie leaped to her feet and stood at the top of the staircase barking loudly, her hair standing on end.
“Damn it!” Matt’s voice was gravelly and low. “Ouch...shush, dog!”
“What’s going on down there?” Jillie called out, reaching for her robe. She looked outside the glass doors to her balcony. It was still snowing, but nowhere near as heavily as last night. The pale gray light told her it was shortly after sunrise. “Are you okay?”
“Sorry. I thought I could find what I needed to start cooking without the light on, but I knocked a wineglass into the sink.” He hesitated. “Where is the light switch in here?”
Jillie could have told him, but instead she grabbed her phone. She opened the smart house app and activated the downstairs lights, then opened the blinds remotely, too. “Hang on, I’ll be right down.”
“Stay in bed, Miss Show-off. It’ll take me a while to clean up and make breakfast. Unless you have some sort of cleaning robot you can activate from up there, too.”
She slid her slippers on, debating whether she should use the app to start the robotic vacuum, but that would be mean. “My cleaning robot doesn’t like to share the kitchen.” That much was true. Jillie swore that vacuum stalked her around the house, trying to trip her up. “What are you cooking? Can you find everything?”
“Looks like you have all the ingredients for my famous sausage-and-cheese frittata.”
“Sounds delicious.” She looked down at her robe, then took it back off. No need to get too familiar. She tugged on a pair of black leggings and a long, oversize sweater Nia had sent her for Christmas last year. It was the color of hot cocoa, and indeed had an outline of a huge mug of cocoa knit onto the front, complete with marshmallows made of fluffy white wool. She slipped on a pair of black canvas flats and headed downstairs.
Sophie followed, and they both stopped at the sight of Matt in the kitchen. A shirtless Matt. My, my, my. He’d surely heard them but hadn’t turned. Instead, he was rapidly beating the eggs in a bowl. A frying pan was warming on the stove, with a pat of butter quickly melting in it. Jillie took a careful breath before trusting her voice.
“You look like you know your way around a kitchen.”
He tossed her a quick grin over his shoulder, then poured the egg mixture into the sizzling pan. “I had no choice after becoming a quasi-parent at twenty. Bryce would have been happy with fast food every day, but he was a child athlete, so I had to up my game.” He glanced down at Sophie. “She’s not growling.”
Jillie took the dog to the back door, answering over her shoulder. “She’s preoccupied with an urgent need to get outside to do her business.” She let Sophie into the fenced yard, apologizing to her for not walking h
er right away.
Matt poured the egg mixture into the sizzling pan when she came back to the kitchen, then gave her a quizzical sideways glance.
“Did you just apologize to your dog?”
She laughed as she poured fresh beans into the coffeemaker. “It would be rude not to, right?” After adding water and pressing the start switch, she turned back to him. She had to raise her voice to be heard over the coffee grinder. “You asked about her before—if she was a therapy or guard dog. She’s technically a pet. But she was trained to be a therapy dog. She washed out of that, but she’s still very intuitive. She knows when I need comfort. Or when I need her to chase trespassers.” The last few words were spoken just as the grinder stopped, as if to emphasize her tease.
“Oh, ha ha.” Matt rolled his eyes at her. “I still say she hates me.”
“She didn’t growl this morning.”
He slid a spatula along the edge of the pan to check the frittata. “She needed to pee. She was half-asleep.”
“She was wide-awake the instant you broke that glass.” Jillie pulled two plates down from the cupboard. “She’s very in tune to my feelings. When I didn’t trust you, she didn’t trust you.”
“So now you...trust me?”
She thought about it for a moment.
“I guess I do.”
“I’m glad.” He turned off the burner and stepped close, stopping right before his lips touched hers. “Is this okay?”
She nodded shyly and they kissed, only stopping when Sophie barked to come back inside.
He grimaced, turning back to the stove. “Like I said, your dog hates me.”
They talked comfortably over breakfast. About Bryce’s career. The crash on the Italian slopes in March that came perilously close to ending that career for good. The surgery to pin his femur back together. The need to take this winter away from competitive skiing so he could finish recuperating. That was why Matt bought an unknown ski lodge. To keep Bryce away from the party atmosphere of the popular ski towns.
She told him a little about her book—as much as she told anyone, which wasn’t much. It was bad luck to talk too much about a work in progress. But they talked about the Shadow series, and, after they cleared the table—and kissed again—she did something she rarely did, even with friends. She showed him her office. He seemed to approve, running his hands along the built-in bookcases and admiring her view of the forest outside the window. The snow had stopped, but there was at least a six-inch coating of heavy wet stuff out there.
“This is pretty sweet,” he said. “I’m glad you’re far enough back that you can’t see the lodge from down here.” He slid his arm around her. “I wouldn’t want to be responsible for disturbing the work of the great J.L. Cole.” He kissed the top of her head. She could get used to this just-kissing thing.
“You didn’t tell your brother about me.”
“I promised I wouldn’t. I keep my promises, Jillie.”
She relaxed against him. His chest was solid on her cheek. She didn’t need a protector, but still...it felt good to have a man like this at her side. Calm. Reliable. He hadn’t rejected her when she couldn’t give him what he’d clearly been ready for last night. But how long would he be satisfied taking things as slow as she needed?
Jillie’s phone chirped on the counter. It was an alert from the security cameras—Chuck Jenner was headed up the long driveway, clearing the snow away with the big yellow plow on the front of his truck. She’d shown the photo to Matt when a text came in. It was from Bryce. The car was out of the ditch and at some body shop outside town. Bryce would be at Jillie’s soon to pick up Matt.
He looked at Jillie, brows risen in question. “I can meet him at the lodge if you’d rather he not come up.”
“It’s fine. I doubt those shoes of yours are dry yet, and they already proved to be unreliable on snow. You’d probably fall down twenty times trying to get to the lodge.”
He snorted. “You’d love that, wouldn’t you?” He tapped a response on his phone. “I’ll have him wait for me in the car. Looks like our little interlude is ending.” They could hear the roar of the snowplow out front. His brows lowered, and he took her hand, winding his fingers through hers, like he did last night. “Jillie...I’ve enjoyed this. Spending time with you. I’d like to do it again.” He grinned. “Maybe not wrecking my car, but us. Together.”
“I’d like that, too. But I can’t promise that I’ll ever be ready...or when...”
He cupped the side of her face with his hand. “Stop worrying about what isn’t happening. Let’s just...take our time. And see what does happen. Okay?”
“Okay. How about dinner tomorrow night?”
He grinned, looking both surprised and pleased.
“Sounds good. I’ll do the cooking this time.”
“You cooked breakfast!”
“My talents extend beyond the morning. I make a mean slow cooker brisket.”
His phone chirped again. He looked so disappointed. “Bryce is here. We gotta see if those snow machines are going to do their job.” He kissed her softly. “Thanks for everything. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She watched him jog down the steps to Bryce’s Jeep, her fingers on her lips. The lips that were already missing him.
* * *
“So you’re telling me you and Jillie have basically been living somewhere between first and second base for two weeks now?” Bryce was rolling avocado paint on the wall behind the fireplace at the lodge. The wall that now separated the aprés-ski lounge from the newly outfitted kitchen.
Before Matt could answer, Asher Peyton spoke up from on top of a stepladder. He and Nate Thomas were hanging the last of the ’60s-style satellite chandeliers Nate had found for the lodge. Nate’s antiques and collectibles business was getting so busy it was starting to overtake his hardware business.
“Wow,” Asher chuckled. “Sounds like someone’s taking the long way home, if you catch my drift.”
Nate nodded in agreement as he handed Asher the cordless drill. “First base is fun and all, but to stay there for two or three weeks? With a cutie like Jillie? I admire your restraint, man.”
It was typical man-talk, razzing each other as pals did. Which was interesting, considering Matt and Bryce hadn’t been here that long. He was learning that Gallant Lake was the type of town where, once you were trusted by one, you were trusted by all. And being trusted by Jillie Coleman was the gold standard. Her girlfriends and their men had quickly embraced Matt as one of their own. And they’d all embraced the idea of getting the ski slope open as soon as possible, jumping in to help. Christmas was coming fast, and it was beginning to look possible—after him declaring originally that it would never happen—that they might have a soft opening in time for some holiday break business.
He’d always intended to keep the midcentury-modern look of the place, with the funky orange-metal fireplace hood over the big flagstone hearth. It was interior designer Amanda Randall who’d suggested he go all in to embrace the look of the 1960s. As it all came together, he had to agree. The walls were variations of harvest gold and avocado, with one long wall of windows facing Jillie’s place wallpapered in a retro wallpaper that brought it all together. Amanda had found some deep-pile shag rugs to scatter around the lounge area, and it looked like Frank Sinatra might walk around the corner any minute with a martini in hand and some glamorous starlet on his arm.
“Uh-oh,” Bryce laughed. “He’s gettin’ all uptight because we’re talking about his girl.”
He waved off the suggestion. “I’m ignoring you all. I’ve got other things to think about, like what else needs to be done to this place to get it open. But feel free to gossip among yourselves about something that’s none of your business.”
“Yup.” Asher nodded, leaning into the screwdriver to secure the light fixture. “Uptight.”
“Guys, I li
ke Jillie.”
“You like kissing Jillie...” Nate said.
“Yes, I do like kissing her.” He liked that a lot. “I also like cooking dinner with her, and talking to her, and walking the dog with her and watching movies together...” They’d spent nearly every evening together since the storm, talking and snuggling and yes, kissing. Lots of kissing. He’d promised not to push her.
“And you’re okay with that?” Asher came down off the ladder. “With going steady? I mean...I like Jillie and she’s cute as hell. But won’t you want more than that before much longer?”
“I already want more than that,” Matt confessed. “But you know what she’s dealing with. We’re taking this at her speed.”
“Has she been to the lodge yet?” Nate looked around the room. “This place is really looking great.”
“I couldn’t have done it without your help, guys. And no, Jillie hasn’t seen it. To be honest, I haven’t asked her. I’m not sure she’s ready.” She’d tried to explain the cascade effect of her phobia, how a little stress could set off a fuse that suddenly led to full-blown panic. He wanted to respect it, even if he couldn’t quite understand it. “Speaking of ready, is anyone ready for a shot of whiskey?”
The shiny new bar stretched along the far wall, parallel with the slopes outside. The thick glass shelves held bottles lined up right in front of the wide windows, which had been tinted, but you could still see straight out to the mountain. It made the area bright and open. All the fixtures were shiny chrome, in another nod to the midcentury look. He pulled out a bottle of top-shelf scotch and lined up four glasses.
Asher was the first to take a seat and accept a glass with a nod of thanks. “Nora said you’re going to have quite the martini menu. That’ll be something new for Gallant Lake.”
“Well, you already have a beer joint in the Chalet, although we’ll have some good craft beers on tap. We’re going to do a whole ’60s cocktail bar vibe, with updated twists on drinks like old fashioneds, whiskey sours and, of course, a fine selection of scotch.”