Waiting for You (A Contemporary Romance Novel)

by Abigail Strom

  He grabbed onto her shoulders. “Erin. Sweetheart. Don’t do that unless you mean it. I’m serious. Pregnant or not, you keep that up and you’re going to get more than you bargained for.”

  She sat up and straddled him, her knees on either side of his hips. His eyes were dark and hungry, and he was staring up at her like he wanted her. Like he had to have her.

  She’d never felt so sexy and powerful in her life.

  This might be her last shot at the brass ring for a while. Over the next couple of months she was going to turn into a blueberry, and she was pretty sure that becoming a single mom would kill whatever was left of her nonexistent sex life.

  So she might as well go out in style.

  She kept her eyes on his as she reached for the hem of her cotton top and pulled it slowly up and over her head.

  She tossed it on the floor, and watched the muscles in his throat jump as he swallowed. Then she reached behind her and unhooked her bra—she was wearing a 34C now—and let that slide onto the floor as well.

  He reached up to cup her with his hands. When he squeezed gently, she gasped. He brushed his thumbs across her nipples and they puckered instantly into hard, tight peaks. It felt so good she shifted against him, instinctively pressing against the bulge in his jeans.

  Jake put a hand on her waist and urged her closer, putting his mouth on one breast as he teased the other with his fingers. Then he used his teeth, biting gently, and the sudden rush of adrenaline made her writhe against him, pressing her soft, aching center against the hardness that was almost driving her crazy.

  He shifted on the couch, sitting up straighter so they were face to face and she was still straddling his lap. Then he kissed her, softly, teasing at her mouth until she tangled her tongue with his. He put his hands on her hips and pressed them close, center to center.

  When he broke the kiss, she was flushed and panting.

  Her blood was fizzing in her veins. Her body felt so charged she thought her hair must be standing up on end. He started to unbutton his shirt, but she covered his hands with hers and moved them away.

  She took over, unbuttoning his shirt slowly, feeling his heart pounding when she touched his bare chest and listening to his breath turn raspy as she moved lower. He lifted himself up so she could pull the shirt off and toss it onto the floor, and then he lay back down again.

  She unbuttoned his jeans, pulling them down his hips along with his boxers. Once they were on the floor she looked at him, at all that raw power waiting for her to make a move, and then she slipped out of her pants and underwear, reveling in the look on his face as he took her in, head to toe.

  Erin sank back down on the couch and crawled slowly up his body, her knees on either side of him. Then she hesitated. As fevered with desire as she was, this was only her second time and she wasn’t sure what to do next.

  Jake wasn’t suffering under any such handicap. He stroked his erection against her, groaning when he felt how wet she was.

  Then he guided her over him and helped her take him in, slowly, and waves of pleasure spiraled out from her center as he stretched her, filling her, until at last he was all the way home.

  Her knees tightened around his hips and she leaned forward, putting her hands flat on his chest and looking into his eyes.

  He was breathing hard, the muscles in his jaw tense. He whispered her name.

  She raised herself up and sank down, and his eyes closed. She did it again and his neck muscles corded. Then he put his hands on her hips, urging her on, and she saw sweat break out on his forehead as she moved faster.

  His eyes opened. His expression was fierce, intense, and a tremor started deep inside as the pressure began to build. She was panting now, her eyes locked with his. His hands slid up from her hips to cup her breasts and the sensation made her cry out.

  Then she cried out again, and again, surging against Jake as the explosion burst over her in dizzying waves. A moment later she heard him call out her name as he pulsed inside her.

  There was an endless moment when the world seemed to be one joyous tumult of color and light. Then she felt Jake’s hands on her hips again, guiding her off his body and pulling her down, shifting them so she was lying on her side, her head on his chest and her baby bump between them.

  Her heart was still pounding.

  He pulled the blanket off the floor and tucked it around them. And in that moment of utter contentment, of joy that seemed to pulse around her and through her, she said the words that were in her heart.

  “Jake, I love you.”

  She spoke softly, but she knew he heard her. She knew, because he froze instantly, as if his body had turned to granite.

  Oh, God.

  She waited for what felt like forever, just in case.

  But he didn’t say anything.

  She wanted to pull away from him and run upstairs. She wanted to burrow into her bed and hide under the covers, and pretend it hadn’t happened—that she’d hadn’t said those words out loud.

  She wanted to punish Jake for not saying them back to her. For not being in love with her. She wanted to kick him out of her house and tell him never to come back.

  But she didn’t do any of those things. This was her own damn fault, and she wasn’t going to punish Jake because she’d made a fool of herself again. And for the sake of what was left of her pride, she wasn’t going to let him know how much his silence devastated her.

  So she lay there for a while longer, while every drop of joy and peace drained out of her. Then she used Jake’s body for leverage as she sat up and looked at him. His face looked tense and unhappy.

  “That was amazing, but I think I’m going to head up to bed now.” She was proud of herself for sounding so calm. “You can let yourself out, right?”

  He stared at her for a minute, his eyes searching hers. Then he just nodded. “If that’s what you want.” He looked away. “I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  It seemed impossible that just minutes ago she’d felt closer to Jake than she’d ever felt to anyone in her life.

  Jake sat up so she could get off the couch more easily, and she picked up her clothes before walking naked up the stairs. She didn’t feel self-conscious at all, even though she knew he was watching her. She was too numb to feel anything.

  She’d offered Jake her heart—the one thing she’d sworn she’d never do.

  She closed her bedroom door behind her and took a deep breath. She felt bruised, as if she’d just gone twelve rounds in the boxing ring. But at least it was over now.

  And it would never happen again.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The week before Christmas, Erin heard Jake’s truck pull up when she was still in bed. When she went to the window she saw him unloading a six foot Douglas fir tree.

  She raised the sash and the rush of cold air made her shiver. “What in the world is that?” she called down to him.

  He set the tree down and grinned up at her, rugged and handsome in his sheepskin jacket.

  “It’s a basketball hoop for the baby. Never too soon to start thinking about her athletic training.”

  Erin rolled her eyes. “Ho ho ho. I wasn’t planning to have a tree this year, with everything else going on. It’s such a hassle.”

  He shook his head. “I know you said that, but you have to have a Christmas tree. I’ll set it up and decorate it and you won’t have to do a thing. You do have a stand and ornaments and all that, right?”

  She sighed. “Down in the basement somewhere. You can look around if you like.”

  “Great,” he said, picking up the tree again and disappearing from view when he reached the porch.

  Erin closed the window and went to put on a robe and slippers before going downstairs.

  She supposed she shouldn’t be surprised. When he wasn’t at the garage—and thanks to the custom motorcycle business he and Mark had just launched, his days there were getting longer—Jake seemed to spend every waking hour
hovering over her, doing things for her, and ordering her to eat better and get more rest.

  She wasn’t sure if he was overcompensating because he didn’t love her or if he was just being protective, but whatever the reason, it was starting to drive her crazy.

  Of course, there were times it could be endearing, she thought as she watched him wrestle the Christmas tree across her threshold. Which was really too bad, because her life would be a lot simpler if she could just hate him.

  They’d never talked about Thanksgiving night. The next time they saw each other, they acted like it had never happened.

  Erin had been grateful at the time that she didn’t have to revisit her humiliation. But as the weeks passed, she could feel how her unanswered words had put distance between them.

  It wasn’t like she was cutting him out of her life or anything. She was scrupulously careful to include him in all her doctor’s appointments and shopping expeditions, and they’d spent last weekend baby proofing the house together.

  But she also stiffened up a little every time he came near, especially when he put a hand on her stomach to feel the baby. She didn’t do it deliberately, but she didn’t try particularly hard to overcome it, either. Her latest lesson in the hopelessness of loving Jake Landry had cut deep, and maybe this time it had even sunk in. The more he hovered the more careful she needed to be.

  Especially because he was here every evening and most mornings, too—and all day on the weekends.

  And now here he was again, bringing her a Christmas tree.

  She went into the kitchen to make herself a pot of decaf, and by the time she came out again he had the tree up in the living room and was starting to open up her boxes of ornaments.

  “It’s way too early for this,” she groused, resenting her pregnancy caffeine ban more than usual this morning. “Also, the tree’s crooked.”

  “It is?” He glanced up at it. “Well…maybe a little.” He crouched down by the base and loosened the screws holding the trunk in place. “Which way?”

  “Um…a little to the left. A little more. No, too much. Right there, stop! That’s perfect.”

  He got to his feet and studied it. “You’re right. Thanks.”

  “I specifically told you I didn’t want a tree,” she reminded him as he went back to the ornament boxes. He found the one that held her lights and started untangling them.

  “You have to have a tree. It’s the baby’s first Christmas.”

  She sat down on the couch and wrapped both hands around her warm coffee mug. “This is not the baby’s first Christmas. That’s next year. There’s no obligation to provide Christmas this year.”

  “It’s not an obligation. It’s a natural expression of the joy of the season.”

  “I don’t feel joyful. I feel fat and uncomfortable and cranky.”

  “You’re not fat.”

  “But I’m cranky, huh?”

  “Not enough to make Santa’s naughty list,” he reassured her, finishing wrapping the lights around the tree and plugging them in.

  He stood back to admire the effect. “Time for the ornaments,” he said, unplugging the lights again and pulling a shiny red ball out of one of the boxes. “Are you sure you don’t want to help?” he asked, dangling the ball as if he were tempting her with a treat.

  She struggled up off the couch and took the ornament from him. “If it will get you out of here faster, then yes.” She hung the ball and took the next one from his outstretched hand. “Don’t you have to be at the garage today? I thought you were working on that new order.”

  “I’ve got some time,” he said, hanging an ornament himself and then handing her another one. “Besides, this is more important.”

  “Forcing me to decorate a Christmas tree is more important?”

  “Yep. Should we sing some carols?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  He grinned at her. “Come on, admit it. Aren’t you enjoying yourself just a little?”

  She took another ornament from him and slipped the hook over a branch. The fragrance of the tree was starting to fill the house. “Maybe a little,” she admitted.

  They worked in silence for a few minutes, and Erin started to feel a familiar ache in her heart—the one she felt whenever she did something with Jake that she’d dreamed of doing with a husband some day. That was the real reason she hadn’t wanted a tree this year. She didn’t need another reminder that she and Jake weren’t really a family.

  “What’s on your Christmas list this year?” she asked, just for something to say.

  Jake turned to look at her, and his eyes were serious. “Do you really want to know what I want?”

  She had a sudden feeling that she didn’t.

  “Sure,” she said, her mouth dry.

  He took the ornament she was holding and hung it on the tree. Then he took her hand, something he hadn’t done since Thanksgiving. “I want you to marry me. Will you, Erin?”

  She snatched her hand away. Tears of anger stung her eyelids, and it took an effort not to slap him across the face.

  “How dare you ask me that?”

  He stared at her. “Because I want us to be a family. Why are you acting like I just insulted you?”

  She brushed away the tears with the back of her hand. “Because you did. How can you ask me to marry you after what happened on Thanksgiving?”

  He flinched a little, but he didn’t back down. “That doesn’t have anything to do with this. Erin, we’re having a baby together. We like each other and trust each other. We have great chemistry. We—”

  “You don’t love me.”

  His jaw tightened. “Does that really matter so much? Jesus, Erin, how many men have told women they loved them and then left them high and dry? Love is just a feeling. I’m offering to make a life with you. To take care of you and our daughter. And I swear that as long as I live, I’ll never look at another woman.”

  “And you think that should be enough for me?”

  “It’s everything I have to offer.”

  She shook her head slowly. “Do you really think I could marry you, that I could love you mind and heart and body and soul, knowing you don’t feel the same? My God, it would kill me. Why can’t you see that?”

  “Erin…damn it, if I could feel that way about anyone, I’d feel that way about you.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “I just…” He took a deep breath and dragged a hand through his hair. “I think that part of me is dead. I’m offering you everything that’s left. If that’s not good enough for you, then—”

  “Tell me why.”

  “What?”

  “Tell me about the people you’ve lost. Tell me what you used to have nightmares about. When I ask how therapy is going, you say fine and change the subject. When I ask about your time overseas, you brush me off. So tell me now.”

  “Now?” He gestured towards her stomach. “Erin, you’re eight months pregnant. I’m not going to burden you with—”

  “You’d better burden me. I’m sick of you trying to protect me from everything—and especially from yourself. I’ve told you I love you. I’ve offered you my heart, and you tell me yours is dead. Well, I want to know why. Tell me about your Silver Star.”

  “Erin—”

  “Tell me.”

  ***

  Jake had never seen Erin look so fierce and determined, not even when she was a skinny thirteen year old carrying fifty pound hay bales all by herself. Her arms were folded and her eyes were snapping, and he knew the only way he could get out of this conversation was by running.

  He felt trapped, and that made him angry. “You want to know about that damn medal? Fine. We were in a fire fight in Tikrit and a group of us were in a building that collapsed. Dan and I were the only ones who weren’t hurt or killed, and we pulled the rest of the team out of there.” He swallowed. “Five dead and two wounded. Only one survived.”

  He could see the horror in Erin’s eyes, but she didn’t look
away from him. “That must have been a terrible day. But you saved that soldier’s life, Jake. And I know he wasn’t the only one. How many other lives did you save in those ten years?”

  He was silent. After a minute she said, “Tell me about Hope.”

  He could leave, he told himself. He could just walk out the door.

  But maybe if Erin heard all this, she’d see that he was broken beyond repair. That therapy could help, but could never make him whole.

  Nothing could do that.

  “Hope was a combat medic. We met when we were both stationed in Germany, between deployments. We were together six months before she went back to Afghanistan with her unit. I followed a few weeks later, but our bases were hundreds of miles apart. We hadn’t seen each other for a while when I told her I was in Kabul for a week, and she pulled some strings to come meet me for a few days. On her way there she was killed by a roadside bomb.”

  “Jake, I’m so sorry,” Erin said after a minute, her voice soft. “I can only imagine how guilty you must have felt, even though it wasn’t your—”

  “I’ve been in therapy for six months, Erin. I know it wasn’t my fault. Do you really think that makes it better?”

  She shook her head slowly. “Tell me about Dan.”

  His jaw tightened. “Dan was killed in a helicopter crash. A helicopter I should have been on. We flipped a coin to see who would go, and he won.” He rubbed a hand across his eyes. “Jesus. He won.”

  He let his hand drop. “I stepped on an IED a few months before Dan died. It should have killed me, but it never went off. The bomb disposal team couldn’t figure out why. They just said it was a lucky break. A miracle.”

  Every muscle in his body felt tense. “The nightmares started after Tikrit, but I could still handle it. After a while I stopped having them every night. But then, after Hope—” He shook his head. “I used to dream I was trying to call her, to tell her not to come. I could never get through. Sometimes I couldn’t get the number right when I tried to dial the phone. Sometimes she’d answer, but she couldn’t hear my voice.”