“Do you believe that?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. I’ve read reports from the officers who apprehended my father. He wasn’t living in luxury.”
“I suppose that makes more sense than the two men suddenly deciding to embark on a life of crime. Doesn’t that make you feel better?”
“No. Because they should have stayed and faced the music.”
The server arrived with the burgers. Nikki dug into hers, ravenous despite the circumstances. Some women didn’t eat when they were stressed. Nikki wasn’t one of those. She had gained twenty pounds after her father’s death and Jake’s departure. Gradually, she had come out of her funk and started taking care of herself again, but it had been a struggle.
She and Jake barely spoke while they ate. The waitress brought drink refills and the check. Eventually, plates were clean, and the awkward silence returned.
Nikki looked at her watch. “It’s been an hour,” she said bluntly. “I have to go.”
Jake frowned. “We haven’t even talked.”
She glanced around at the bustling eatery. “This place isn’t exactly private, and it’s too cold outside for a long walk. Let’s call it quits, Jake. Please. You. Me. It’s a no-go. There’s nothing left.” Her chest ached.
He was everything she wanted, but there might as well have been an ocean between them. Soon, there would be...when Jake returned to Europe.
The line of his jaw was grim. He flagged down their server one last time. Jake handed the woman the check and three one-hundred-dollar bills. “We’d like to keep the table for a bit. No interruptions, please.”
The woman stared, dazed, at the cash in her hand. “You mean no change?”
“No change. No drink refills. No nothing. Is that okay with you?”
She nodded vigorously, wonder dawning in her eyes. “Yes, sir. Cone of silence. I’ve got it.” Tentatively, she touched the sleeve of his jacket. “Thank you, mister. This will make Christmas pretty special at my house.”
When the woman disappeared, Jake shrugged out of his suit jacket and rolled up his sleeves. It was warm in the small restaurant. They were tucked in a far back corner. No one had any reason to pass by their table. Because the lunch rush had now waned, the booth next to them was empty.
The situation wasn’t ideal, but under the circumstances, it would have to do. Nikki fanned herself with a napkin, wishing she had chosen something other than wool when she got dressed that morning. She had worn the red sweater and black skirt again with more sensible shoes.
Jake must have read her unease. “I could grab us a hotel room for an hour. If privacy would make you more comfortable.”
She gaped at him. “You’d spend two hundred and fifty dollars for one hour in a hotel?”
He shrugged. “More like five hundred probably. It’s the holidays. But, yes. If you were there, I would.”
Nikki knew what would happen if she found herself in a hotel room with Jake. The chemistry she had tried so hard to deny would spark and flame. That fantasy wasn’t conducive to holding her ground. “No hotel,” she whispered. “Just say what you want to say.”
Jake stared at her. His eyes were more gold than green at the moment, and his gaze was hot and beautiful and determined. “I’m in love with you, Nikki.”
Fourteen
Jake saw his companion flinch and knew he had his work cut out for him. Nikki’s body language was guarded in the extreme. Her chin was up, and her eyes were dark with anxiety. He saw her throat work.
“No, you’re not,” she said quietly. “You’ve been under a tremendous amount of pressure, and you’re trying to make a grand gesture. It’s not necessary to placate me in order to see your daughter.”
His temper flared. “That’s not a very complimentary assessment of my character. I know my past behavior hasn’t been exemplary, Nik, but I’ve changed. Or I’m trying to,” he added, in the spirit of honesty. “I love you.”
Tears spilled from her beautiful Irish-hued eyes, rolling down her cheeks unchecked. She swiped at the dampness with the back of her hand and reached for her purse and coat. “I can’t do this.”
“Don’t leave me, Nik,” he begged, his heart like shards of glass in his chest. “Don’t be afraid of this, of us. We lost it all once before, but our time has come. You have to believe me. Things are different now.”
She didn’t slide out of the booth, but she was close to bolting.
“What makes you think so, Jake? I don’t see it.”
He swallowed hard. “I spoke to Josh this morning. Before we went to court. I told him I had changed my mind about Black Crescent. That I was prepared to take over as CEO.” Even now, his stomach churned about his decision, but he wouldn’t let Nikki misinterpret his nerves. “Josh was thrilled and supportive,” he said.
Nikki seemed less so. She gnawed her bottom lip. Her restless fingers shredded a paper napkin. “You’ll be bored with it in a month. And you’ll disappear again.”
It was his turn to flinch. “Wow,” he said, stunned at how much she could hurt him. “You’re not making this easy.”
Now she was angry. “There’s nothing easy about us, Jake.”
“I heard you say ‘I love you,’” he muttered. “That night I made love to you at your house. You thought I was asleep.”
She closed her eyes and shook her head slowly. When she looked at him again, he finally saw how much his abandonment had cost her. “It was the sex talking.”
“Don’t be flip. Not now. I heard you say it, and I was too chickenshit scared to say it back. But I’m saying it now. I love you. I’m not leaving. I’m not running away. If it takes me ten months or ten years to convince you, I’ll do it. I. Love. You.”
“Stop,” she begged, her gaze agonized.
He clenched his hand on the table as he resisted the urge to pound something. “When we ran into each other in Atlantic City five years ago, it was like being struck by lightning. You were everything I had left behind, everything I had lost. That night we spent together was incredible. But you weren’t a teenager anymore. You’d lived your life far more bravely than I had. I was knocked on my ass and swamped with so many feelings I couldn’t handle it. I’m sorry I left you, Nikki. I’ve regretted it every day since.”
Nikki put her face in her hands, her shoulders bowed. He couldn’t tell for sure, but he thought she was crying again. When she finally looked up at him, her mascara was smudged, and her eyes were still wet. “How can I believe you, Jake? I want to, but I’m afraid. Afraid you’ll smash my heart again. I don’t know how many more times it can recover.”
Slowly, he reached for his wallet. “Maybe this will convince you,” he said quietly. He opened the leather billfold and extracted a piece of paper that was ragged at the creases. It was yellow stationery with a row of pink daisies at the top. He handed it to Nikki. “Do you remember?”
She stared at the note, her eyes wide. Though the letter was upside down from Jake’s perspective, he didn’t need to read it. He had memorized the contents years ago. Nikki had slipped the plea to him at her father’s funeral.
In the days before smartphones and texting, she had written, “Take me with you to Europe...”
Her hands shook as she traced the girlish handwriting with a fingertip. “I can’t believe you kept this.”
He sat back and sighed. “I tried to throw it away a hundred times. The guilt crushed me when I looked at it. Over and over.”
“You shouldn’t have felt guilty. It was outrageous of me to ask.”
“Was it, Nikki?” He cocked his head and soaked in her grace and her courage, painfully aware of how his life might have turned out differently. “I kept this, too.” He handed her a graduation picture, wallet-size. It was Nikki, smiling at the camera, her hair vibrant, her eyes filled with joy.
“Oh, Jake.” She teared up again.
He
inhaled sharply and dropped the last of his protective cloak of secrets. “I love you, Nikki Reardon. I suspected it in Atlantic City. I think I knew it deep down the moment I came back to Falling Brook and saw you face-to-face. And heard I had a daughter. But I couldn’t accept the truth.”
“But you—”
He waved a hand, cutting her off. “I’m not finished. I’ve loved you in one way or another my whole life, Nik. Everywhere I traveled, I wanted to share new adventures with you. Sunsets and storms. People and places. You were always in the back of my mind, those big emerald eyes telling me how much you cared. I was wrong, Nicole Marie Reardon. I was a coward. I let inertia keep me on a path that led nowhere.” He reached across the table, across the miles and years of loneliness. “I love you. I adore you, in fact. I want to spend the rest of my life with you and Emma.”
And finally, at long last, the sun came out.
She smiled at him through her tears. Her fingers gripped his. “Yes,” she said, the word barely audible. “I love you, too, Jake. So much it hurts.”
They sat there for seconds. Minutes. Their gazes locked. Their hearts healing.
Finally, Nikki glanced around the restaurant, seeming dazed, noting the people going about their business. She took a sip of her watered-down drink. “If you’re still serious about that hotel thing, I’ll take you up on it.”
And just like that, his body went hard all over. Except for his heart. That organ was embarrassingly soft and filled with love for this incredible woman.
“Let’s go,” he said gruffly.
Outside the restaurant, he hailed a cab, not wanting to waste the time it would take to retrieve his car. Pulling Nikki against him in the back seat, he trembled when she laid her head on his shoulder.
He directed the driver to one of the city’s premier luxury hotels.
Nikki balked briefly when she saw the iconic facade. “We don’t have any luggage,” she whispered.
“They won’t bat an eye.”
It was true. The front desk ran Jake’s credit card and confirmed his request for a suite. The man handed over two keys.
Jake dragged Nikki with him to the small gift shop. Her face turned bright red while he bought protection.
Then they were on the elevator, streaking toward the top floor. When they were in the room, Nikki exclaimed over the view of Central Park. The light snow had dusted the tops of the trees.
Jake took her hand and went down on one knee. “Nikki, will you marry me? We’ll shop for a ring together.”
She tugged on his arm. “Yes, yes, yes,” she cried. Her eyes glowed with happiness.
He stood and scooped her up. “Is it too soon to try out the bed?”
“Honestly,” she said, with a mischievous grin, “I thought you were moving kind of slow for a well-traveled bachelor bad boy.”
He carried her into the bedroom. Though the ache in his body urged him to do everything in hyper speed, Jake knew this occasion was too important to rush. He set Nikki on her feet and started undressing her, pausing to caress her smooth skin, soft curves, lush hills and valleys.
Her body was a wonder to him. Feminine. Unbelievably arousing.
While Nikki settled herself in the sumptuous covers, he stripped in record time and joined her. “I’m sorry,” he groaned, burying his head between her breasts, feeling the ragged thump of her heart. “I’m sorry we’ve wasted so much time.”
She stroked his hair, shivering when he tasted her nipples. “We’ve learned a lot, Jake. We’ve grown up. We’ve faced battles and won. Life won’t ever tear us apart again, because we won’t allow it. Make love to me, my dearest heart. Now. Like it’s our first time. Like we have forever ahead of us.”
“We do, Nikki. We do.” He gave her his pledge and entered her slowly, stunned by the pleasure as her body welcomed his. The fit was snug, the stimulation almost unbearable. She deserved romance, but the lust he had bottled up for days and hours roared to life.
They moved together wildly, straining for dominance. It was heat and blessing, madness and perfect bliss. He took them to the peak and then slowed, tormenting them both. Trying to make it last.
Nikki arched and cried out beneath him, her fingernails scoring his shoulders. “Don’t stop,” she begged. “Don’t stop.”
He was beyond reason then, blinded by the need to find release, wrapped in the realization that their love had risen from the ashes against all odds.
The end was hot and hard and fast, draining, as close to perfection as mere mortals could get.
He held her after that, his breathing rough and jerky. Though it had been far too long since he had done so, he thanked the deity for not giving up on him.
Nikki’s body was a warm, sweet gift in his embrace. “You’re everything to me, Nik,” he muttered hoarsely. “Now and always. I love you.”
She smiled softly and reached for his hand, curling her fingers with his. “Emma and I will go wherever you go, Jake. You don’t have to run Black Crescent if you don’t want to...”
Shaking his head slowly, he exhaled. “I’m back where I belong. Here with you. And with my family and Falling Brook. I’m not leaving again.”
A tiny hesitation betrayed her last reservation. “You’re sure?”
He nuzzled her hair, letting sleep take him. “You can count on it, my love. You can count on it...”
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