by Jill Shalvis
“You’d be surprised.” He pierced her with a look she couldn’t quite read. “Do you remember that night at Town Hall?”
How could she forget? “Yes.”
“The kiss. Do you remember the kiss?”
Only every living second.
“Yeah,” he said to her silence. “I thought so. Look, we both walked away that night telling ourselves that that was as far as this would go.”
“I know.” He was lying there, prone and wet, soaking up the sun, so close and yet so far, and for some reason she didn’t want to think about too hard, she needed to touch him. She ran her finger over his shoulder, down his arm.
His eyes heated. “This wasn’t going to happen again, we decided. Did something change for you?”
Good question. Beneath her finger his muscles leaped. “Well…I liked that water fight.”
“Fight? That was a massacre.”
“Yeah.” She smiled. “And it was so cathartic, I guess I’m feeling…reckless. I want to know more about you, Mac.” She was shocked, shocked to the core, to hear the words come out of her mouth and find that she meant them.
“Why?”
She understood the question. They’d both said this wasn’t going anywhere. They’d agreed, she knew that, and nothing should have changed.
Except it had. She had this new desire…a desire to know him.
Mac grimaced and caught her hand in his. “Taylor…”
One look into his wary face and she knew. He didn’t feel that same desire. Mortified, she tried to tug free. “I know, nothing has changed for you,” she said flatly, turning her head away.
“Wait—”
“No. You don’t have to explain why you don’t want me.”
His sigh conveyed volumes. “Could you look at me? Please?”
She blinked up into his intense gaze.
“No, I mean really look at me,” he said, his voice tight.
Not understanding, she ran her gaze over his body. Over his chest, his flat belly, his— “Oh,” she said faintly, catching sight of a very impressive erection straining the button fly on his jeans.
Her mouth went dry, while between her legs her body had the opposite reaction.
“I want you,” he assured her in that ragged, almost tortured voice. “I want you more than I want my next breath, but that’s all it is. Physical. That’s all it can be for me.”
“Because of your ex-wife?” She hated the needy part of herself that made her ask.
“Partly,” he admitted. “Mostly.”
It was a struggle but she managed to look like she hadn’t just been kicked in the gut. She of all people understood a true, deep, abiding love. She understood how difficult it was to love again once it was gone, and she understood why someone wouldn’t want to.
Until five seconds ago she would have said she was one of those people who wouldn’t want to. She still thought of Jeff, still loved and cherished the memories of what she’d shared with him, but damn it, he was gone, and had been for so very, very long. She was tired of being lonely, tired of being alone and desperately tired of sex that only just barely scratched an itch.
Terrifying as it was, she wanted more. “She…left you?”
“Oh, yeah.”
Her heart cracked. “And you never recovered.”
“Recovered?” He considered that for a long moment. “No. I never recovered,” he agreed, and the cracks in her heart gave, breaking into pieces because she knew, she knew what he meant.
“How long ago?”
He lifted a shoulder. “Four years.”
“Do you still l—”
“Taylor.” He rubbed his eyes. “Maybe we could talk about something else. Anything else.”
“Like…?”
“Jeff.” His eyes softened when she gasped. “Your sister mentioned him. Said he was the love of your life.” He ran a finger over her jaw.
“Was,” she repeated quietly.
“What happened?”
“We were days away from eloping, and he…um, he died. In a car accident.”
Swearing softly, he used all his fingers now, sank them into her hair line. “I’m sorry.”
Sorry because he’d asked, or sorry because he was the first man to make her remember what it was like to feel a rush of so many dizzying emotions she could hardly breathe?
“Where does this leave us, Mac?” Leaning in, she rested a hand on his chest. “I need to know.”
“It leaves us hot and achy.”
She spread her fingers wide on his chest, touching as much of him as she could. “So we’re not going to…” Her hand trailed to his belly button, and would have maybe drifted further south if he hadn’t caught it in his.
A genuinely pained groan escaped him. “Are you trying to kill me?”
“I’m trying to feel better.”
In a move that brought tears to her eyes, Mac brought her fingers to his mouth. “Touching you, kissing every inch of you, sinking into your body, that would most definitely make me feel better.”
Hearing the erotic words whispered with such sensual intent made her shudder. Yes. Yes, it would make her feel better, too.
Now, please.
“But what about after?” He stroked a finger over her shoulder. “This thing won’t just go away with one trip to the bedroom.”
“So let’s make it two,” she said recklessly.
“I’m serious.”
“It’s not like you’re moving to another planet after this job,” she said with a teasing smile that faded when he just looked at her, his eyes filled with both heat and regret. She forced a laugh past the lump in her throat, because for the first time she was making the move, putting herself on the line, and it was scary as hell, especially given she was about to be flatly rejected. “What? You’re busy already?”
“Taylor.” God, the sound of her name on his lips, in that low, gruff, tortured voice.
And she knew. He was walking away from this before they even got started. Which, damn it, is exactly what she’d wanted, too. Until right now, right this very moment. “Don’t. Don’t say it, Mac.”
“I can’t give you what you want.” His expression was a mask of torment. “I just can’t.”
“I asked you not to say it,” she tried to quip, and failed utterly. To save maybe even an ounce of pride, she sat up.
While they’d been lying there watching the clouds go by and breaking her heart all over again, the hose had turned the grass into a slip and slide zone. Her shirt was drenched, and so was her skirt. God only knew what her hair looked like.
She was a mess, inside and out, and looking down at Mac, also wet, but looking all the more magnificent for it, she felt a surge of resentment.
Temper was good, she decided, staggering to her feet and grabbing the hose again. Temper bypassed desolation and misery. Temper gave her strength. And guts.
And it was temper that had her leveling the hose on Mac once more as he lay there all comfortable and cozy with his closed off heart and gorgeous body and incredible mouth that had left her aching.
When the icy water hit his prone body, he swore and lunged for her. She whirled to run but he was faster, knocking her feet out from beneath her, catching her as she fell.
Right on her hat.
“You’re right,” he growled, squishing it flat beneath her with his weight. “That was damn cathartic.” He then tucked her body more fully beneath his, and once again she found herself right where secretly she’d wanted to be.
Under him.
His smug smile faded as he looked down into her eyes, and indeed, all of her temper faded as well. Damn him, she thought, swallowing hard when he spread his hands on either side of her face. Damn him all over again because his mouth was lowering to hers, and all on its own, her mouth rose up—
“Oh, my,” came a shocked female voice as two sandaled feet came into view. Peach toenail polish and two silver toe rings.
Suzanne.
“Hmm,” came ano
ther female voice, not shocked, wearing black combat boots.
Nicole.
“Maybe we should go away,” Suzanne whispered, presumably to Nicole.
“Definitely going away,” Nicole agreed.
And not one of the four feet moved.
With a sigh, Taylor shoved at Mac. With one last stroke of his thumb over her bottom lip, he surged to his feet, bringing her up with him.
Indeed both Suzanne and Nicole stood there, gaping, Suzanne in one of her flowery, flowing sundresses with crystals in her ears, and Nicole in a black tank and camouflage pants.
Neither of her friends said a word, just looked at them both with shock.
Not that Taylor could blame them. Dry, Mac was a most amazing specimen of a man—tall, built and hot.
Wet, he was every woman’s fantasy.
Especially hers.
Mac thrust out his hand as if he hadn’t just been sprawled over the top of their best friend. “I’m Mac.”
“Nicole,” Nicole said slowly, eyeing him very carefully as she shook his hand. “And this is Suzanne.”
Mac shook her hand, too, smiling, looking totally and completely at ease even as water ran from his hair and down his face.
“I, uh…” Taylor looked at Mac, for the first time in her life utterly at loss for words. “We were…just…”
“I think we know what you were just,” Nicole said with a straight face.
Suzanne couldn’t keep hers though, and she grinned. “You were making out. On the grass. With water. On your pretty clothes. You even squashed your hat. Oh, Taylor.” She laughed and clapped her hands together. “It’s so wonderful.”
Taylor patted her hair, and Nicole snorted. “Oh yeah,” her supposed friend said. “You’re a wreck. Your hair, your makeup, your clothes, everything.”
Mac’s lips twitched as he eyed Taylor’s friends in appreciation. “She looks good all messed up, doesn’t she?”
Nicole shot him a sideways glance. “You like her that way?”
Mac’s gaze held Taylor’s prisoner. “I think I like her this way best of all.”
Nicole looked at Taylor pointedly.
Taylor looked away, but she figured by the look on Mac’s face he’d seen the blush anyway.
He saw everything.
“You’ve done it, Taylor,” Nicole said. “You’ve found the right man for you. No fancy suit, no fancy hairdo, no fancy words… Oh yeah, I like him a lot.”
Taylor ground her back teeth together when Mac grinned. “You make him sound like a new car I’m thinking of buying.”
“Or riding,” Suzanne whispered beneath her breath, managing not to laugh when Taylor glared at her. “Sorry.”
“He’s my contractor,” Taylor said, and snatched up her squashed hat. It was destroyed. “A contractor who ruined my favorite hat.”
“Right.” Nicole lifted a brow. “And what was it exactly you two were just doing? Working really hard, right?”
Mac laughed, then wisely turned it into a cough when Taylor rounded on him.
“I’m going inside to work now,” he said.
“Good idea.” Taylor waited until he’d walked up the stairs—knowing Nicole and Suzanne were staring at his very starable butt as he went—waiting until he’d disappeared inside to round on her so-called friends.
“Oh, baby,” Suzanne whispered. “You’ve met your match.”
“He is something.” Nicole looked quite pleased.
“It didn’t take you long to be the last to cave on the singlehood vow.”
“I’m not caving!”
“You were wrapped around him tighter than Glad Wrap,” Suzanne offered ever so helpfully.
“And lip-locked,” Nicole added with a smug grin.
“So does he kiss as good as he looks?”
Taylor swore impressively, making her friends howl with laughter. “We are not together,” she said.
She was not, absolutely not, going to admit that even if she’d had a moment of weakness and wanted that very thing, Mac did not. “He’s simply here doing a job. That’s all.”
“So the kissing thing, that’s what…a side benefit?” Nicole asked.
“Don’t you have your own life?” Taylor demanded.
“Hey, you butted in on my life on a daily basis when I lived here,” Nicole protested. “And when I was falling in love with Ty—and denying it—you laughed at me every step of the way.”
“I am not falling in love with Mac.” But her heart hitched painfully. “I’m not.”
“Oh, honey.” Suzanne dropped the teasing note in her voice. “It’s all over your face, don’t you know that?”
“We’ve only just met each other.”
“When it’s the real thing,” Nicole said, also surprisingly free of mockery. “It happens like a train wreck. You see it coming but you can’t look away.”
She already knew that. Damn it, she already knew. She’d done love once, and it had been glorious.
And painful.
And yet…God help her, she might have been willing to try again.
If Mac had been willing. But she couldn’t, wouldn’t, compete with the memory of his ex-wife. “You guys are off the mark on this one.”
She had other things to think about. Such as getting the money together for the next round of renovations. “So,” she said with false cheer. “Who’s up for a trip to my storage unit to see what antique I can bear to part with this month?”
Groans met this, and Taylor smiled. Friends. If they were all she ever had, it would be enough.
She’d make it enough.
9
INSIDE, MAC LOOKED AROUND for something to get busy with. Something that would take his mind off the one incredibly sexy blonde he should never touch again. He looked at the pile of leftover two-by-fours from the framing they’d finished weeks ago. He’d asked someone to stack them, and of course no one had. Fine. He could use the distraction.
Halfway through the load of lumber, he was breathing hard but still thinking. Thinking that Taylor was driving him crazy.
From outside he heard female voices raised in laughter. He could pick out Taylor’s, of course, though he refused to look. He thought he could even smell her. He stacked the wood faster, but it didn’t help. That sensual scent she wore made him think of long, hot summer nights. Of dancing beneath shimmering moonbeams, skin to skin. Of deep, drugging kisses—
Careless, he walked too close to the stack of wood and bashed his shin on a two-by-four.
That wasted a few moments, hopping around, swearing colorfully. With renewed grimness and a very sore leg, he stacked the rest of the wood, then pulled his T-shirt away from his damp skin. Damn, today was hot as hell.
He’d just picked up a set of plans when a scream prompted him to drop them and run to the window. Just outside in the front yard, where only moments ago he’d flattened Taylor to the ground and pressed his body to hers, were the three women.
Two of them were screaming in terror, not that they were facing any danger to make them scream like that. Not unless you counted one dangerous to his mind and heart Taylor Wellington, who, with a particularly evil laugh, lifted the hose.
He was certain she had no earthly clue how she looked, hair wild, skin glowing and damp, and her smile…it wrecked him. She looked wet, and mischievous, and sexy as hell, which didn’t help his disposition any.
She leveled the hose on Suzanne and Nicole.
Within seconds the three of them were drenched, and catfighting like Mac hadn’t seen since he’d cancelled cable the year before.
Like a very weak male, he pressed closer to the window. Nicole grabbed the hose from a huffy Taylor, and he raised a brow. Suzanne went down on her butt with a squeal, and he winced. And when she got right back up with a warlike shriek, he could only shake his head.
Then Nicole tackled both Taylor and Suzanne to the grass and rolled them around in a tangle of limbs.
Mac had his nose pressed to the glass now, and he was quite certai
n he shouldn’t be hard as a rock watching them go at it.
And when they finally dropped the hose and fell to the ground laughing like goons, he had to take a deep breath. They’d gotten it out of their system.
Good, he could work now.
Then Taylor laughed at something Nicole said.
Laughed and looked…happy, Mac realized with a sudden hitch in his gut. So carelessly happy with her clothes clinging to her, her eyes bright with humor.
And nothing like the image he’d had of her when they’d first met. That bothered him, too, how much he wanted to cling to that other Taylor, because then he wouldn’t be so attracted.
There had been a time in his life when he’d wanted nothing more than a deep, abiding love. A family. He’d wanted it all, but that had passed.
Ariel had made certain of it.
Now he didn’t need that kind of a connection in his life. He didn’t need anyone.
But as if she could feel him and his conflicted thoughts, Taylor turned and looked right at him.
Gazes connected. Held.
And Mac stopped breathing.
After a long moment, she turned away, leaving him to let out a slow breath.
Nope, he didn’t need anyone. Not ever again.
MAC SPENT the next week working like a dog on the woodworking portion of the job—normally his favorite part—thinking it should dispel the feel of Taylor in his arms, the taste of her in his mouth.
Should, but didn’t. He spent every night at his kitchen table, trying not to look at the mountain of bills, drafting up the plans for his own renovation, hoping he got approval for one of the bids he had out there in order to pay for it.
By the end of the next week, he still hadn’t heard from the town council, and the stress level was rising. He went to work early on Friday, thinking a little manual labor might help.
Taylor’s car wasn’t out front, but in a town like South Village, where a parking spot was more prized than the actual car, that didn’t mean much.
But Taylor, the moneyless princess, was still very much a princess in that way. She wanted her car parked right out front, and more times than not, she actually managed it.