“Please.” He said it softly, sincerely. Like it was really important to him. Like he wouldn’t be able to bear it if they didn’t work this out.
“Fine,” she said tightly. “I’ll meet you at the saddlery.” He just stood there, looking at her. “What?” she demanded.
“When a woman says ‘fine’ like that, a man has doubts that anything is fine in any way.”
“Your point being?”
“You’re not going to take off again, are you?”
“I said I would be there.”
“All right. I’ll see you in ten minutes, then.”
* * *
By the time Derek arrived at the shop, Amy was already there. He parked in the space next to her as she got out of her car and ran up the steps.
At the door, she stepped back and wrapped her arms around herself, like he might contaminate her if she happened to actually touch him.
He could think of a few snide remarks he might make about now. But that would get them nowhere. He kept his mouth shut as he stuck his key in the lock and stepped past the threshold to turn off the alarm and switch on the lights.
“Come on in. There’s a table and chairs in back. We can make coffee, if you want some.” He led the way through the shop to the makeshift lounge area. Once through the open door, he suggested, “Have a seat.”
She pulled out a vinyl-covered chair at the scratched-up laminate table and sat down.
He was already sticking a pod in the coffee maker. “You want some coffee?”
“Sure,” she said, her mouth pinched, as if even the thought of drinking his coffee was annoying her. “Thanks,” she added sourly.
He brewed a cup for each of them, took the seat across from her and pushed one of the mugs in her direction. “There’s sugar. And creamer.” Way back in ancient history, she liked both. He pushed the container of packets her way, too.
And then he just sat there, hardly knowing where to start. He drank the coffee he really didn’t want as he watched her add a packet of sugar and creamer to her mug and take a cautious sip.
They shouldn’t be here. Shouldn’t be doing this.
And yet, if she got up and tried to leave right now, he would do whatever he had to do to convince her to stay.
Was he messed up over this woman or what?
Stupid question with an obvious answer.
Finally, she spoke. “Okay. I’m here. What did you want to say to me?”
Damned if he knew. “I just don’t see why you’re so mad at me. You said it’s not about Myra.”
“And it’s not. It’s just...it’s everything, Derek. All these years and how much you hurt me and now it seems to me like you’re just messing with me all over again.”
Now, that was just wrong. “I’m messing with you? What are you talking about? How am I messing with you?”
“One minute you act like we’re completely over and done, the next you’re bringing a picnic, showing me around here in the saddlery, kissing me. Twice.”
He was in midsip when she mentioned those kisses, and the scornful way she spoke of them made him mad enough that he plunked his mug down hard. Hot liquid splashed on his hand. He swore under his breath as he whipped a paper towel from the roll in the center of the table and wiped up the spill. “Next you’ll be claiming you didn’t kiss me back.”
She huffed out a furious breath. “That is completely and totally not in any way the point. Yes, I kissed you back. Yes, I loved that picnic and the tour you gave me here. I loved every minute I’ve spent with you this last week.”
How did she do that? Drive him crazy one minute, and the next say something that had all his wounded fury draining right out of him. Carefully, he set the wadded ball of paper towel beside his mug. “You did?”
“Yes, I did. I even started thinking that maybe we could have a little something special together, that we could leave the past in the past and be together right now.”
“Amy, I—”
She whipped up a hand. “Wait.” And then she sat back in the chair and folded her arms hard across her middle. “Think back. What did you say when I suggested we see where this feeling between us might take us?” He would have answered. He even opened his mouth to do so, but she just rolled right on. “I’ll tell you what you said. You said that I ought to think about it. You said that you would be thinking, too. Well, you know what? I don’t believe you, Derek. I don’t think you thought about it one bit since Tuesday night. Uh-uh. More likely you’ve spent all this time purposely not thinking about it, planning on going out this weekend and finding yourself some other girl, some new girl you don’t have any baggage with.”
“That’s bull. I’m not looking for any new girl. And I did think about it—about you and me and seeing where it would take us. It’s all I thought about.” He lifted his left hand and wiggled the bandaged digits at her. “I practically cut all my fingers off thinking about it.”
“Oh, please. As if you cut yourself because you were so wrapped up in pining for me.”
“That is exactly what I did.”
For a moment, her eyes softened and her mouth relaxed. But then she snapped right back to hissy-fit mode. “You just don’t get it,” she accused.
He threw up both hands. “And you’re not listening to me.”
She fumed at him, tapping her fingers on her crossed arms. “It took me forever to accept that you were never coming after me. Took me driving all the way back here from Boulder nine years ago, daring to hope that just maybe I might get a chance to talk to you. Took me stopping in at the Ace and chatting up the bartender, who told me all about what a player you were, how it was one girl after another with you. About the cute cowgirl you’d met there at the Ace the weekend before, how you danced every dance with her and left with her at closing time, how word in town was that you were off at the Missoula Stampede with her right that very moment.”
He vaguely remembered the cowgirl in question, but a long-ago hookup wasn’t what had him sitting up straight in his chair. “Wait. Are you serious? You came back?”
She scrunched her eyes tight and let out a moan. “Yeah. I came back and you were off with some other girl and I realized I needed to accept that you had moved on and to start finding a way to move on myself.”
He pushed his chair back. “Amy...”
She glared at him as he stood. “What are we doing here? What is the point of this?”
Her words were not the least bit encouraging. But...she’d come back. She’d actually come back.
And he’d never even known.
“Amy...” He rounded the table. He just couldn’t stop himself.
When he stood by her chair, she stared up at him defiantly. “Yeah, I came back. So what? I came back and you were with another girl.”
“Amy, I didn’t know. I never had a clue...”
“Don’t do that, okay? Don’t look at me like I’m so important to you. We both know that’s just not true.”
“But you are important. Always were, always will be.”
She made a little scoffing sound. “Yeah, right.”
He needed to prove it, needed her to know that he’d missed her, too. So, he went ahead and confessed, “I tried to find you, too. I went to Boulder, Amy. Like a lovesick fool, I went to CU looking for you.”
Her eyes got wide and her pinched-up mouth went soft and full again. “You did?”
His chest felt constricted. His throat, too. “It was that first year after you left, in the early spring. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing, how to go about getting in touch with you. I tried your old cell number. Some stranger answered, said it was his number now. I was afraid to ask the Armstrongs or someone who might know how to reach you. Afraid they wouldn’t tell me. Afraid they’d tell you and you would refuse to see me. And there was zero access to social media around here at the time. I couldn’t exactly look you up on Facebook.”
She gazed at him across the table, her mouth softly parted, her eyes all dewy and so brigh
t. “But you drove to Colorado anyway, to try and find me?”
“I did, yeah. I missed you so much. I couldn’t stand it anymore. Drove all night and half the next day. It was snowing on and off, sometimes snowing hard, but I kept going. I had this idea that if you saw me, saw my face, knew how much I’d missed you, you’d maybe decide you couldn’t live without me, either.”
“But you never showed up.”
“Yeah, I did. I mean, I made it to Boulder, anyway, to the main CU campus. I parked and went in to the administration building.”
“And?”
“They wouldn’t tell me squat. Turned out they have rules about that,” he laughed, but it was a dry sound with very little humor in it. “I could’ve been a stalker or something. Hell, after driving fifteen hours in near-blizzard conditions, I probably looked like a stalker.”
“Derek.” Her eyes gleamed, wet now with unshed tears. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
He laughed again, humorless as the time before. “Pretty hard for you to know when I didn’t tell a soul.”
“What did you do then?”
“I went back to my truck and considered pulling out all the stops, paying a visit to your parents’ house.”
“You had my parents’ address?”
He shrugged. “They were easy. I found a phone book. They were listed. But school was in session and I was reasonably sure you wouldn’t be at your folks’ house. That meant I’d be dealing with your mom and dad. They’d never been my biggest fans, your dad especially, though he was polite enough that last day.”
“At the motel in Kalispell, you mean?”
He debated just going ahead and telling her the whole truth about that day. But what good would that do anyone, really? “Yeah. At the motel.”
She pushed back her chair and stood. “You’re such a bad liar.”
He put up both hands and backed up a step. “I’m not—”
“Don’t say it. I didn’t believe you the first time, so there’s no point in lying to me again.” She shook her head. “I always wondered how my dad knew to follow us from the Armstrong house. I asked him about it more than once. He always just said he’d tried dropping by the Armstrongs’ and he saw us drive away.”
“It’s ancient history, Amy.”
She wouldn’t leave it alone. “He got to you, didn’t he? He went to find you at the Circle D and then he followed you to the Armstrongs’ house and when you picked me up, he trailed both of us to Kalispell.”
Derek couldn’t believe he’d put himself in the position of defending Jack Wainwright. But at this point, she wouldn’t believe him anyway if he insisted on keeping the truth from her. They were clearing the air, after all. Letting all their sad little secrets out of the closets.
“All right. Yeah. Your dad showed up at the ranch. He was worried sick about you. And I have to say, even though I didn’t like him any more than he liked me, I knew he loved you and wanted the best for you. He was also no fool. He didn’t threaten me or talk down to me. He took hat in hand, said he knew I loved you, said that you had a bright future in front of you and why would a man who loved you want to steal that future out from under you? He said he just wanted me to think about letting you go.”
“Oh, Derek,” she cried. “Why didn’t you just tell me that you’d talked to him?”
“I thought about it, about us, about what your dad had said. I thought about it all the way from the Armstrong house to our dingy little honeymoon suite at that crappy motel. And the more I thought it over, the more certain I was that if I told you your dad had come looking for me, you’d just get mad at him. You’d dig in your heels and not admit that he was right.”
She pressed her lips together. “I’m mad at him right now. He went behind my back and he never came clean to me about what he did.”
“Amy, it’s really old news.”
“Still...”
“It’s old news and he did it because he loved you.”
“Yeah, well. Next time I see him, I’ll tell him I know the truth now and I don’t appreciate the way he lied to me.”
“That’s your call.”
“Oh, yes, it is—and we’re not finished talking about the day you drove to Colorado to try to l find me at CU. Did you go see my parents that day?” Her eyes got stormy. “Because if you did, they never said a word to me about that, either.”
“Settle down.”
“Then answer the question, please.” Her voice was clipped, tight.
“No, I didn’t go to see your parents. I chickened out and just went home.”
“Oh,” she said, her outrage fading. “I see.”
“And what did you do, after that bartender told you I was off in Missoula with some other girl?”
She scanned his face as though memorizing it. “Same as you. I chickened out and went home.”
For a few seconds that seemed to last forever and a day, they just stood there, mere inches between them, gazes locked, neither even breathing.
And then he reached out.
And she stepped forward.
His arms went around her. She rested her head against his shoulder. He gathered her closer. Never would he get enough of the perfect feel of her in his arms.
When she finally looked up, she went on tiptoe and brushed a quick kiss on his chin. “Aren’t we a pair?”
They laughed together. And he agreed, “Yeah. A matched set, no doubt about it.”
“You really cut your hand thinking about me?”
“I did.”
“Let me see.” When he held up his injured fingers, she took them and kissed the bandaged spots. “Be more careful,” she chided.
“Great advice.” Though now that he was here, alone with her, the last thing he wanted was to be careful.
“Derek, I...” Those big hazel eyes searched his face.
“Yeah?”
“I still want to be with you. I want to spend every minute I can with you until the wedding. I don’t know what will happen, really. Maybe you and I aren’t meant for forever. But you told me to think about it and I have. And the answer’s still the same. I want to be with you, to get to know you, to know the man you are now.”
He wanted that, too—to know the Amy she was now—so damn much.
Yeah, she scared the hell out of him. She could hurt him so deep if he let her get too close. She’d probably break his heart all over again.
Too bad it was too late to walk away untouched. Somehow, she’d gone and worked her way back under his skin—or maybe she’d never left.
He wanted her so bad it hurt.
“It’s only two weeks and a day till the wedding now,” she said. “I would like to spend a lot of that time with you. I would like us to commit to being exclusive till the wedding.”
She would like that? He would love it. “Exclusive, huh?”
“That’s right. Yes or no? Can you give up the other women at least for the next fifteen days?”
“Amy, let me clear this up for you once and for all. There are no other women. Yes, I’ve been one of those guys who never sticks around for breakfast the morning after, but not in the past few years. I haven’t been with anyone in a little over eight months and that was an actual relationship. Her name is Angela Bishop. She owns a diner in Kalispell.” He added, with more sarcasm than was probably called for, “We went on dates and everything.”
She scrunched up her eyebrows at him, an expression he recognized as concern for him. “What happened?”
“With Angela? Not enough. I mean, she liked me and I liked her and we had a good time together, but at a certain point we both realized it wasn’t going anywhere. We broke up. End of story. So, would you please stop assuming I’m spending all my free time chasing women?”
She gave a slow, solemn nod. “Will do. I promise. And I’m sorry to have, um, made assumptions about you.”
“You’re forgiven. Now, about the next two weeks...”
She drew her shoulders back. “I would like to be
with you.”
“Got that.”
“And to keep what we have just between the two of us. Because nobody else has to know.”
Did that bother him? Not really. Rust Creek Falls was a very small town. People looked out for each other, but they also got way too interested in each others’ activities. He could do without them all talking about him and Amy.
She went on, “It’s partly to keep everyone out of our business. I mean, it’s only two weeks and who knows what will happen? And until we know where we’re going together, there’s no reason to share what we have with the rest of the world. Also, I think it’s important to keep the focus on Eva and Luke, where it belongs right now. We’ll say we’re just friends...” Her cheeks were pink and her eyes so wide and hopeful. “I mean, for the next two weeks, we could make time for each other and not date other people. And I’m hoping there could be, um, benefits if it works out that way. That’s all I’m really asking. Would that work for you?”
He hid a grin. “I think I could manage it.”
A little snort of laughter escaped her. “Stop joking. This is serious.”
He put on his most somber expression. “Just friends, then. Friends who spend a lot of time together and don’t go out with other people. Friends with possible secret benefits?”
“Well, yeah. I mean, you think?” She folded her upper lip between her teeth and nibbled on it. The sight was equal parts innocent and sexy. He wanted to grab her and kiss her, unwrap her like the best gift ever, get going on those benefits, secret or otherwise...
But he knew her, even with all the empty years away from her. She wasn’t ready yet. And if it happened for them again—when it happened—he wanted it to be right.
“Is that too crazy?” Her voice was barely a whisper. “Am I totally on the wrong track here? Would you agree to something like that?” She stared up at him, anxious and adorable. “Derek, you have to tell me what you think.”
“I do, huh?”
“Derek!” She whipped up a hand and batted his shoulder.
He caught her fingers before she could pull them away. “Hold on a minute.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’ll show you. But first, I think you should come closer.”
A Maverick to [Re] Marry Page 8