“A party?” she asked between mouthfuls.
Jacob nodded. “A lock-in. Like Nancy used to have in the bar sometimes.”
All Carrie really remembered from Nancy’s lock-ins was being forbidden to come down from her room as a child while they went on. Still, she murmured a vague agreement all the same.
“Great!” Jacob said, obviously reading more into Carrie’s confirmation that she remembered such things than she’d actually intended. “I’ll bring my decks and play DJ. Georgia’s definitely with her mum tonight, for once, so I’m a free agent.”
“And I’ll let everyone know,” Izzie said, already reaching for the phone.
“Let everyone know what?” Moira asked, coming in from the gardens, muddy gloves in hand.
“About the party tonight, apparently,” Carrie said, with a smile. She could have stopped it if she’d wanted. But Izzie was right–they should celebrate. And why not with a party? Besides, some secret part of her whispered, with a proper party atmosphere and enough alcohol, maybe she could get up the courage to kiss Nate first.
* * * *
The bar of the Avalon Inn was, officially, rocking. Possibly literally for some of the occupants, Nate thought, looking around. Stan leaned rather heavily on the bar, even as Cyb grabbed at his arm and ordered him to come and dance. Nate wasn’t entirely up on the current top forty, and had no idea what music Jacob was playing, but he was pretty sure that Stan and Cyb couldn’t really waltz to it.
Izzie, Nate noticed, stood off by the window, watching Jacob as he worked his magic on the decks. Jacob, absorbed by the music, seemed totally unaware of the attention.
Nate sighed. At some point, someone was going to have to do something about those two. Possibly just lock them in a darkened room until Izzie had her wicked way with him and got Jacob under her thrall.
“Quite the celebration, isn’t it?” Carrie said, appearing beside him holding two glasses of white wine, one almost empty, one full. She handed him the full one. “You’ll probably need this.” Looking down at her strappy green dress, which tied between her breasts, Nate thought she was probably right. He’d only seen her in suit skirts and shirts since she’d arrived. The silky material sliding over her shoulders would take a lot more adjusting to.
“How long’s the party been going?” Nate asked, after taking a long sip of his wine. He needed to know how much catching up he had to do. And how drunk Carrie might already be.
Carrie shrugged. “A couple of hours. Your grandmother said she had to be in bed by midnight, so she wanted an early start. And everyone just sort of...joined in.”
“She’s a party animal, my gran.” Across the room, Nate could see Moira dancing with Cyb to the Rolling Stones. Obviously Jacob’s idea of classical music.
Carrie leaned against the wall beside him, her arm pressing against his and, for what must have been the hundredth time that day, Nate cursed himself for not kissing her the night before. But he’d known he wouldn’t want to stop at kissing and, even if she’d felt the same, she needed to focus on her guests. Of course, the guests were gone now...
“It’s a nice idea, though. Isn’t it?” Carrie looked up at him as she spoke, and her lips distracted him from answering for a moment. “The party, I mean.”
Nate cleared his throat, and looked back over the collection of drinking and dancing Seniors. “Great idea.” He couldn’t remember whose it had been, exactly, although it might even have been Carrie’s.
“I just wanted to do something to say thank you to them for all their help.” She bit her lower lip and Nate found he really couldn’t care less about anyone else in the room.
“I’m sure they appreciate it,” he managed, finally.
“I just hope they enjoy it.”
Nate looked out and saw Cyb and Moira dancing around Stan. “I don’t think you have to worry about that. As long as you laid on enough Campari, you should be fine.”
Carrie looked up at him again, and Nate felt his heart clunk to a stop at the look in her eyes. “Then you don’t think they’d notice if we disappeared for a little while?”
“Disappear?” The word almost choked him.
Carrie nodded. “There’s something I’ve been dying to do.” And with one last glance across the room, she grabbed his hand, surprising strength in her small grip, and dragged him through the door he’d just entered.
There weren’t many ways to interpret the fact she took him to the bridal suite, Nate thought. Carrie had giggled all the way up the stairs, something he’d never heard her do before. In fact, the Carrie he saw that evening was so totally unlike the one who had inhabited the Avalon for the last month, he didn’t know what to make of her.
She paused again in the open doorway, and Nate’s eye couldn’t help but be drawn to the huge double bed in the center of the room. This couldn’t possibly be what it appeared to be. Could it?
“There’s something I’ve wanted to do ever since I found you making this bed.” Carrie’s voice was low and too husky for a whisper. And her hand still curled around his.
Nate swallowed. Hard. “What’s that?”
Carrie gave him a wicked smile, dropped his hand and raced into the bridal suite. “Bounce on it,” she said, and leapt onto the mattress.
With a long, slow blink, Nate smiled. “That could be fun.” And considerably more comfortable than an awkward drunken seduction.
Grinning, Nate bounded up to join her, and missed seeing the pillow Carrie wielded until it was too late.
* * * *
Carrie smiled down at Nate where he lay in a pillow-felled heap on the oversized mattress. “Having fun yet?”
“You said bounce,” Nate answered, rubbing his forehead. “I think I’ve been lured here under false pretenses.”
Somewhere under the gentle hum of wine running through her veins, limbs and brain, Carrie knew leading Nate up to the inn’s most romantic room probably looked like false pretenses in itself, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Uncle Patrick had booked. Everything was going to be okay. And if she wanted to celebrate with a pillow fight, well, she was bloody well entitled. “Can’t take it, huh?”
Nate raised an eyebrow at her, then, without warning, shot out a hand and grabbed her calf, tugged her onto the mattress beside him and whacked a pillow into her middle. “Oh, I can take it.”
Carrie grabbed one of the tiny decorative pillows Cyb had scrounged up from somewhere and sewed extra ribbons on. It was too small and delicate to make any real impact, but she got some pleasure from whacking Nate on the head with it anyway.
They lay in silence for a moment, both breathing harder than Carrie thought their exertions really warranted. Perhaps she’d drunk more than she’d realized. It took surprising effort to concentrate on breathing, focus on slowing the in and out, the draw and release. But once she got the hang of it, it was really very peaceful.
“Have you fallen asleep?” Nate asked, not particularly quietly. “Because if you snore, I’m kicking you out.”
Carrie’s eyes flashed open, and she turned on her side to face him. He was clearly expecting just that response, as a lazy smile waited for her, spread across his face. “I don’t snore.”
“Are you sure?”
“Are you offering to find out?” Carrie regretted the words even as she spoke them. Nate’s smile slipped, just a bit, and the inch of space he managed to create between them just by shifting his muscles felt like miles. “I’m sorry. I didn’t...”
“You’re drunk,” Nate said, looking away.
Carrie rolled her eyes. “I’ve had one and a half glasses of wine. I was drunker last time you kissed me. And anyway, that’s not the point.”
He seemed to have relaxed a bit at her words, Carrie realized. He even managed a small smile as he asked, “Do you remember the point?”
“I was joking.” Carrie poked him in the chest to emphasize her point. “Don’t worry, I didn’t drag you up here to sully your virtue or lead you astray.”
&
nbsp; Nate shifted onto his side until he faced her, and when Carrie caught his gaze in the moonlight, she started to wonder if that wasn’t exactly why she’d brought him up there.
“So, why am I here?” Nate asked, so close now she could feel his breath on her face, warm and sweet from wine.
Downstairs, the pounding of the speakers had stopped, and Carrie could hear singing. No one would miss them any time soon, she was sure.
So she took her time, and considered her answer carefully, before finally admitting, “I’m not sure.”
Nate didn’t push her, didn’t ask more, and somehow his silence gave her the confidence to go on. “I just... I felt strange down there at the party. Not really a part of it, I suppose.”
“Peril of being the boss,” Nate suggested softly.
Carrie wrinkled her nose. “Maybe. But...I think it’s more than that.”
“You don’t think you belong here.” And, as simple as that, Nate expressed the secret fear Carrie had been trying to ignore, ever since Nancy left her the Avalon Inn.
“This is Nancy’s place. You’re all Nancy’s friends.”
“We’re your friends, too.” Nate rested his hand on her waist, his fingers long enough to almost reach around to her spine. The heat from his palm through the thin silk of her dress mesmerized her. “If you’ll have us.”
Carrie focused on the warmth spreading across her torso, and answered without over thinking, for once. “Because I’m Nancy’s granddaughter? Because I’m your boss? Or...”
“Because we like you.” Nate squeezed her waist, and the warmth spread farther. Her chest was probably flushed, Carrie realized, and gave silent thanks for the dim lighting in the room. “Because you’re trying to save our home. And we want to help you.”
Which made sense, she supposed. It was just... “This was going to be my big chance to do something by myself. To prove myself.” To Anna, to her parents. To herself.
“And even better than that, you get to do it with friends.” Nate nudged closer, just a few centimeters, but enough to bring his lips within her reach if she just bent her neck forward. “Seriously, though. This is all you. It’s your inn, your risk, your plan. Well, yours and Anna’s, anyway. We’re just...adding some details.”
But she was still relying on him, and the Seniors, and even her own family’s booking, Carrie thought. Not to mention Anna’s backing. But then Nate moved his hand up slightly, spanning her rib cage, and Carrie forgot what they were talking about for a moment. When her mind returned, she said, “I do appreciate it, you know.”
Nate raised an eyebrow. “Really? How much?”
Swallowing hard, Carrie asked, “What do you want?”
“My greenhouse,” Nate said, and somehow he’d got closer again, and she barely needed to move if she wanted to... Carrie stopped herself, and gave the tiniest nod she could manage. “And...this.” Finally, finally, Nate inched forward, and Carrie leaned in to meet him before she was even really sure it was happening.
His lips against hers felt different from her first night at the inn, she realized, even as she wondered how she could think at all. But they did; less sure, softer. Carrie’s hand snuck up to play with the hair at the nape of his neck, ensuring as she did so that he couldn’t escape without her permission.
She’d wanted to kiss Nate like this since that first night on the terrace. She wasn’t letting him go now.
But, eventually, breathing became an issue and Carrie pulled away just enough to look Nate in the eye again.
“You okay?” he asked, his voice softer even than his gray velvet eyes.
Carrie nodded. Then something awful occurred to her. “Although I can’t help thinking about the last people to lie here doing this.”
Nate’s forehead crinkled up into a frown. “Cyb?”
“As disturbing as that alone might be, it’s worse.” She pushed herself up on one elbow and leaned over him, her hair falling forward against his shirt. She could feel her nipples hard against his chest, but ignored the sensation to deliver the real clincher. “Uncle Patrick and Aunt Selena.”
Wincing, Nate levered them into a sitting position. “Not that this hasn’t been nice...”
Carrie chuckled. “Want to take it up to the attic?”
Her reward was another heart-stopping kiss.
* * * *
Carrie woke alone in her own bed the next morning, but the sound of her shower running in the en suite told her Nate hadn’t gone far. She hoped he’d figured out which handle to jiggle for hot water. She didn’t want to drive him away with bad plumbing.
Stretching out across her sheets, she wondered what, except wine, had got into her the night before. Confidence, she supposed. And relief.
Whatever it was, she wanted it again. Her body could still feel Nate against her, around her, within her. And it wasn’t going to be happy unless she could lure him back there once more.
The shower shut off, and Carrie propped herself up against the headboard, waiting for Nate to emerge. When he did, wrapped only in a towel, her body started making its desires more clearly known.
“Good morning,” Nate said, with a lazy smile. He ran a second towel across his hair and leaned against the foot of the bed, obviously waiting to see which way she was going to jump.
Carrie smiled up at him as sunnily as she knew how. “A very good morning.”
She could almost see the breath Nate left out, and wondered why, after the night before, he was so uncertain of her.
“I’ve got to get to work,” he said, retrieving his jeans from a heap on the floor. Folding clothes hadn’t been a priority on their arrival last night. “Lots to do before this dream wedding of yours. But I’ll see you later?”
Still smiling, Carrie nodded. “Sure.” Or, more accurately, most definitely later. She really wanted some more of whatever had left her in such a good mood.
Nate, unfortunately fully dressed now, paused at the side of the bed for just a moment too long before bending to kiss her sweetly. Carrie resisted the strong urge to pull him back into the bed with her. After all, there was work to do.
“Work,” Nate murmured, sounding a little dazed as he pulled away. “I’ve got to go and...do that.”
“Yes, you do,” Carrie said, letting go of his shirt. “And so do I.” She swung her legs out of bed, glad she’d pulled on her camisole and knickers at least while he was in the bathroom. Nate started to get that glazed look in his eyes again. “Don’t get too hopeful. I will be putting on clothes before heading down to reception.”
“Shame,” Nate said with a sigh, and shook his head. “Right. I’ll see you later.” And he left, presumably before his resolve could be tested any further.
Carrie laughed, and headed into her shower, hoping that the light, bright feeling she was filled with would last all day–or at least until she saw Nate again, and could get him to replicate it.
As it turned out, Carrie’s good mood only lasted as long as it took to get to reception.
“Carrie, finally.” Anna Yardley folded her newspaper and stood up from the wingback chair by the lobby window. “I thought, since I had a free morning, that I’d pop over and see how things went for your cousin’s visit.” She smiled, a sharp, tight grin. “Why don’t you show me around all your improvements?”
Chapter 8
Nate’s very good morning only started going downhill when he found his grandmother waiting outside his summerhouse, packed lunch in hand and eyebrows raised.
“Can I assume, then, that you had a nice evening?” She gave his creased and crumpled clothes a pointed look. “Only, I didn’t get a chance to talk to you at the party.”
Nate decided to try for levity. “I saw you dancing with Cyb, though. Seemed like you were having plenty of fun without me.”
Moira stared at him in the way that had always made him break down and confess to anything as a child, if she’d only just stop looking. Still, he was an adult now, and he’d done nothing wrong. He would hold his ground.<
br />
For all the good it did him. Moira, obviously realising he intended to stay silent, gave a short nod and said, “I think I shall help you in the gardens today. It’s such a beautiful day.”
Overhead, gray clouds gathered. Nate looked incredulously at his gran, but apparently she planned to stand firm, too. “That would be lovely,” he said eventually. “I’ve got to dig over the beds for the cutting gardens today. It would be nice to have some help.” Gran hated digging.
“I’m not sure how much help a frail old lady will be with that sort of work,” Moira said, and Nate manfully ignored the steel backbone and the fact that she could still out-walk him anywhere. “But I’m sure I can find something to do.”
“Lovely.” Nate hesitated. “I just need to change my clothes...” He sidestepped past her into the summerhouse, fumbling with the lock on the way in.
Moira took a seat on the bench outside his window. “Nice that you’ve been able to get out for an early morning walk before work.”
“And on such a lovely day,” Nate called back, as the sky turned darker. If she wanted to ignore where he’d really been last night, that was just fine by him. He had absolutely no desire to discuss his sex life with his grandmother, anyway.
But, he thought as he changed his shirt for one of his work polo shirts, it would be good to talk with somebody about what the hell was going on. He supposed that really he should talk to Carrie, find out what she expected from this. Was it just good company–and it had been really good company, which he also wasn’t telling his gran–or was she expecting something more? Was he, for that matter?
Was he going to be able to stay at the Avalon Inn? Or was Carrie going to think he’d only slept with her to stop her selling the gardens?
Remembering the previous evening, he swore, hopefully not loud enough for Moira to hear through the window.
Carrie had offered him anything, as a thank you, and he’d asked for a greenhouse and then a kiss. What, exactly, did that tell her about him?
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