To Win Her Back

by Mackenzie Crowne

  “Fair enough.” He dipped his chin. “Caroline thinks the two of us need to clear the air.”

  Definitely ominous. Crap. She swallowed. “Clear the air, how?”

  He crossed his arms, causing his thick biceps to strain his jacket sleeves. “You tell me. Obviously, the two of you have spoken about our…previous association. Caroline signed my contract, then told me one of the reasons she was sending you here to Barlow was so the two of us could, and I quote, tie up any personal loose ends.”

  She winced. Oh, geez, Caroline. Are you kidding me?

  Horrified, she shook her head. “You have nothing to worry about. I’ll take care of it. I’ll talk to her the moment we get back.”

  “Not good enough.” He dropped his arms and sat forward with his forearms braced on his thighs. Combined with his growled tone, the position was sufficiently intimidating. “I’m not willing to risk my career over shit that happened more than a decade ago. It ends here. Before we go back to Manhattan.”

  “I agree—”

  “What did you tell her?”

  Oh, shit. Sure, he was worried about his job, but he didn’t need to be. Caroline never would have signed him if she had any real doubts. Then again, in all the years she and Caroline had known one another, V had never expressed concern over dealings with any man. If a player or coach, or a complete stranger, for that matter, caused V grief, she had no trouble handling the problem herself. Unfortunately, Sam’s reappearance in her universe had left her too rattled to realize Caroline would see V’s reaction as an issue to be handled.

  “Relax, Sam. Caroline and I might be friends, but neither of us are the type of women who share the intimate details of our private lives.”

  “And yet, she somehow knows enough about our history she felt compelled to warn her new offensive coordinator that he’d better fix whatever he’d done to upset her friend.”

  Yikes. Was that how Caroline had put it? No wonder he was pissed. V attempted to diffuse his growing anger. “You have nothing to fix.”

  “Damned right, I don’t.”

  She grimaced at his snarled complaint. “I doubt she meant it as a warning.”

  His eyes narrowed in barely contained anger. “Then you’d be wrong. What did you tell her, V?”

  She crossed her arms. “I didn’t tell her what happened between us, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  A muscle twitched in his tightly clamped jaw, and he sat up straight. Silence hung between them for a long moment, as if he were struggling for control. Slowly, the wrinkle of his brow eased and his chest wall expanded on a deep sigh. “Maybe we should start there.”

  His quiet tone made the hair on her arms stand up. She fidgeted in the chair. “Start where? I don’t understand.”

  “I’ve never asked, and I probably should have….” She wanted to look away, but his laser-like gaze held her paralyzed. His deep voice dropped another octave. “What, exactly, did happen between us?”

  Nausea bubbled in her belly as her most desperate dream and worst nightmare collided. She’d dreamed of the chance to make things right with him. To tell him the truth and be understood. To shed the dark secret that had destroyed her dreams and reclaim the life and love she’d thrown away. She longed to beg his forgiveness and have it given. But, even if by some miracle that should happen, it wouldn’t matter.

  Baring her soul to him wasn’t an option. Not fifteen years ago, and not now. The time for truth had passed long before she’d lost her heart to him and dared to dream she could have what his love promised. Then, as with now, grabbing her chance at happiness would mean destroying her mother’s soul. How could she do that and survive?

  She couldn’t, which left her with one option. Convincing him she was the bitch he believed her to be all these years wasn’t something she could do sitting down, however. She shoved to her feet and, curling her lips into a bland smile, she cocked her head.

  “You know what happened. Considering the extent of your injury, Jake’s rising star was a much better bet to get me where I wanted to go.”

  A muscled ticked in Sam’s jaw, and she could have sworn that was hurt in his eyes. His tone, however, was pure irritation. “Yeah. That’s the way I remember it.”

  She held firm beneath his angry regard. “I admit, taking off without a word wasn’t a very kind thing to do, but really, what could I have said to make what I was about to do sound better? Bottom line? I wanted things you could no longer give me.”

  “That much is obvious.” His brows dropped over narrowed eyes, and he stood. She stiffened, but he didn’t step any closer. Instead, he crossed his arms. “And you’ve gotten many of those things.”

  Adrenaline spiked her pulse at the suspicion gleaming in his eye as if he hadn’t believed a word she said. Unsure of where he was leading her, she refused to back down. “I won’t apologize for being ambitious.”

  “I wouldn’t expect you to. I know all about ambition. Without it, I wouldn’t be standing here.”

  She lifted her hand, palm up. “Exactly, and I—”

  “But there was a time you included me in the list of things you wanted.”

  The claim hit her like a physical blow, and it took all her concentration not to flinch. Denying she’d wanted him wasn’t something she could do with any conviction and they both knew it. Running her gaze down his big body, she hid her dismay beneath pure bluster. “You’re a fine-looking man, Sam. Wanting you was never the problem.”

  “I’m glad to hear you still feel that way. That’ll make things easier.”

  The fine hair on the back of her neck prickled when he suddenly dropped his hands to his sides and stalked toward her. “Wait. What are talking about?”

  “It’s simple.” He closed the distance, and she stumbled backward. Stiff-arming him did no good. He gripped both her arms and held her in place. “You claim you walked away from me to get what you wanted. If that’s true, as far as I’m concerned, I dodged a bullet fifteen years ago. I’m perfectly happy to let that be the end of it.”

  Some of the tension eased from her clenched muscles. He may have his doubts but, thankfully, he wasn’t going to press her on them.

  “But, it appears providence has other plans.” Her tension returned tenfold as he released one of her arms to slip his hand around her waist. Calculation darkened the blue of his eyes. “Because of our past, my position with the Marauders is shaky when it shouldn’t be.” He slid his hand down her spine and tugged her against him until her breasts smashed flat against the solid muscle of his chest. “Caroline made it clear she expects us to put our personal differences behind us. What better way to convince her we have than to return to Manhattan as a couple?”

  She opened her mouth to protest, but only succeeded in aiding him as he lowered his head and crushed his mouth to hers. His tongue slid into her mouth with practiced ease. Familiar and irresistible, his woodsy scent and spicy flavor wrapped around her, seeping into her taste buds and absorbing into her skin like a well-remembered balm.

  Her knees went weak and, although she struggled to keep her feet beneath her, it was no use. She hung in his embrace, off-balance and unable to care, and curled into him as if returning home. His guttural groan was a rumbling vibration against her breasts, and she reveled in the knowledge she wasn’t alone in her madness.

  He shifted his head, taking the kiss deeper, and time retreated. Mistakes, secrets, and years of regret vanished until only pleasure and heat existed. Desperate for more, she fought her arms free to slide her hands up over his chest and neck, and plunged her fingers into the thick pelt of his hair. She was rewarded by the quick thrust of his hips and cried out at the delicious friction of his erection pressed against her lower belly and mound.

  A whimper of disappointment caught in her throat as he lifted his head suddenly. She opened her eyes and regret swiftly slid into alarm at the heated confusion in his. Lord, what were they doing? What was she doing?

  Frig
htened and completely flustered by her reaction to his unexpected kiss, she shoved at his chest, and he let her go. “Are you insane? You hate me, remember?” She stumbled back a step, forgetting about the chair behind her. Tumbling sideways, she ended up with her legs draped over one of its arms.

  His gaze lingered on the length of leg exposed by the hike of her skirt, and she yanked at the hem. He reached down and adjusted the hard-on straining the front of his jeans. “All evidence to the contrary.”

  Heat infused her cheeks as a blush spread from her chest to her face. “You have a girlfriend.”

  “Says who?”

  “Have you forgotten Patricia?”

  His brows jumped to his hairline before he cleared his throat. “Patricia was never my girlfriend. We’ve dated occasionally, but that’s all it ever was, and it’s over now.”

  Relief she couldn’t deny tangled with disgust. She sat up, straightening herself on the chair, and waved her hand. “Regardless, you can’t be serious about the two of us pretending to be a couple.”

  “Oh, but I am.” Leaning down, he propped both hands on the arms of the chair, caging her in, and smiled when she shrank away from him. “You did what you had to do to achieve your goals. Now, it’s my turn, and you’re going to help. I checked my contract and there is no anti-fraternization clause. Until the season is over, you and I are going to play the happy lovers, because I can’t do the job I was hired to do if I’m hamstrung by Caroline’s concerns over our personal relationship.”

  “She’ll never believe it. Nobody will.” Lord, Gracie would blow a gasket. And Jake? No. Sam was nuts and so was his ridiculous plan.

  The anger was gone from his eyes, but the odd light that had replaced it wasn’t something she could place. Holding her gaze, he straightened. “Then you’ll have to convince her and everyone else. You owe me, V, and that’s my price.”

  Chapter 10

  Sam knelt among the spider web of cords behind the cabinet holding TV components and unplugged the Blu-ray player. Winding the cord, he slapped one of the preprinted labels V had made around the end and tossed it into the box at his hip. He glanced toward the other side of the room, where V was nearly finished packing the last of his books.

  She hadn’t said a word in three hours, not since he’d gotten off the phone with Anita. As a friend of Kay’s, V’s mother was among those typically present at his aunt’s Christmas Eve celebration. With V in town, she’d obviously made other plans for the evening. She’d sounded as shocked as V when he suggested she arrive early for the family dinner, since her daughter would be attending with Sam and Lucy.

  No doubt Anita, along with his family and the friends attending the open house, would think he’d lost his mind, and they wouldn’t be far off. But hell, a man couldn’t be held responsible for the depraved workings of his brain when all the blood in his body had taken up residence in his cock.

  Pretend to be a couple? He rolled his eyes.

  Caroline might have opened the door to the possibility, but there had to be some other way to ensure V didn’t succeed in her plan to avoid him. Unfortunately, the moment he’d slipped his arms around her, his brain had gone blank.

  Christ. He’d forgotten what it was like to hold her. The way her curves fit against him like a puzzle piece sliding home. Forgotten her quick-fire response to his touch. And her taste…. Her vanilla-sweet flavor lingered on his tongue. He licked his lips and called himself a fool. This business would burn him alive if he weren’t careful.

  Demanding she play along with his nutty facade had to be one of the craziest ideas to ever come out of his mouth. Yet, once his raging hard-on had subsided to simple discomfort, and he’d recognized the fear in V’s eyes at the thought of facing his family, guilt wouldn’t let him back down.

  No matter what her reasons for running had been, their relationship had been no one else’s business. His failure to put his foot down with the residents of Barlow had turned what should have been a private matter between the two of them into a public lynching that never ended.

  And that was on him.

  Not once in the months he’d been falling for her had he heard an unkind word leave V’s lips. Nothing to indicate she was anything other than the sweet-but-shy girl who’d stolen his heart. Yet, he’d attributed the worst to her when she’d left, without trying very hard to find out the truth. Worse, he’d accepted the unwavering support of family and friends as if it were his due, while she had faced the animosity of those she’d considered friends without complaint.

  His mind supplied a picture of her as she’d accepted TJ’s obvious disdain earlier without comment. He knew how much his cousin’s friendship had meant to V, and yet she’d stood there and quietly taken TJ’s contempt as if she deserved it. Up until a few days ago, he would have agreed with that assessment, but something wasn’t right with this picture.

  If he hadn’t been consumed with proving to himself and others he was over her, he would have questioned her silence in the face of the town’s collective condemnation. A cold-hearted bitch who didn’t give a rat’s ass wouldn’t have taken the shit the townsfolk had dished out all these years. She would have told them to go fuck themselves and been done with it.

  Instead, V had kept silent, and the slings and arrows had continued. And she wasn’t the only one who’d been pierced by the barbs. Anita had as well. That ended today. If nothing else, their supposed reconciliation would allow him to right that wrong.

  As for him and V…. He licked his lips once more, then shoved a hand through his hair. Pulling off his ruse without ending up with blue balls would be a miracle.

  “You almost ready? TJ wasn’t kidding when she said Aunt Kay will be mad if we’re late.” He stood and stretched his back.

  V turned her head and fried him with a heated glare. “Caroline is one thing, but I don’t see what my attending your family’s Christmas party will achieve. Other than giving the entire town heartburn.”

  He fought a smile. “It’s been a long time, V. They might surprise you.”

  Her face went blank, and she held his gaze.

  “Okay, maybe not, but they aren’t going to say a word against you with me at your side. Wouldn’t you like the chance to snub a few of them?”

  She climbed to her feet and dusted her hands. “I would prefer not to see them at all while I enjoy a nice glass of wine in my hotel room. Alone.”

  Hotel room? He paused in the act of collecting his coat from the couch. “You’re not staying with Anita?”

  She shrugged and turned away, shoving the full box of books against the bookcase. “I like my space. Mom understands.”

  He picked up his coat while staring at the ramrod-stiff line of her back. “You think walking through the lobby of the Barlow Inn will be any easier than facing my family?”

  Her laugh was dry and humorless. “Like I’d step one foot inside the Barlow Inn.”

  Shoving his arm into a sleeve, he frowned. “Wait a minute. If you don’t have a room at the Barlow Inn, where are you staying?”

  “At the Marriott in Tyler.”

  “Jesus, that’s a thirty-mile drive.”

  “Which is why I’m staying there.”

  Well, shit. It wasn’t as if a room in the Barlow Inn meant she’d have to sleep with one eye open—in case the lynch mob showed up in the middle of the night—but it was close.

  Guilt jabbed him in the gut. He grunted and shrugged the coat onto his shoulders. “My aunt’s parties usually run late. Maybe you should bunk with your mother tonight.”

  V passed by him without a glance. “You may have blackmailed me into agreeing to your stupid plan, but I’m a grown woman. Where I choose to sleep is my business.”

  And that right there was why he was suddenly questioning everything he’d thought he knew. She didn’t have a problem slapping him down verbally, so why hold her punches when it came to everyone else? The contradiction didn’t make sense.

  She snatche
d her coat and purse from the coat tree, her agitation evident, and he sighed. “Wait, V.”

  She turned to meet his gaze with an arched brow.

  “Look, I know you want no part of tonight, but your attending with me isn’t just about convincing people we’ve buried the hatchet.”

  She opened her mouth, presumably to tell him where and in whom she’d like to bury said hatchet, and he held up his hand. “Yeah, I know. The best place for the blade is in my thick skull.”

  “Glad to see we’re both on the same page.”

  He squinted in warning, then nearly laughed at the satisfied twist of her lips. The girl he remembered had had a quirky sense of humor he’d found charming but, he had to admit, now that the initial shock of seeing her again had eased, he found those sharper edges of the woman she’d become more than a little intriguing. Not to mention sexy as hell.

  Shit. Quit thinking with your johnson, pal.

  He cleared his throat. “What I’m trying to say is, you haven’t been treated very well by the people of Barlow.”

  Suspicion flickered in her eyes. “Noticed that, did you?”

  “Actually, I hadn’t. Not really. Not until recently.”

  Suspicion morphed into surprise. She hid it with a careless shrug. “No biggie. What they think of me doesn’t matter.”

  He doubted that, but pointing it out would be a waste of time. Dipping his chin, he pinned her with an intent gaze. “It matters to Anita.”

  That took some of the starch out of her spine. Her shoulders sagged a bit, and she busied herself by pulling on her coat. “Nothing I can do about that now. I made my bed, as they say, or more precisely, abandoned yours.” The zipper on her coat sang as she yanked it up to her throat. When her gaze met his, her eyes were a hard crystal blue. “In this town, that’s a capital offense.”

  He fought a wince at the truth of her words and softened his tone. “It matters to me, too.”

  She stared at him in silence as several moments stretched, then her brow wrinkled in a frown. “Who are you? Because you sure as hell aren’t Sam Fitzpatrick.”