by Noelle Adams
“Ow!” She rubbed her head as she turned around with a frown. “A little warning would be nice.”
Ward gulped. Now she was standing up straight, so he couldn’t see her butt anymore. But he could see the rest of her body. She was wearing nothing but a little tank top with her leggings. No sign of a bra beneath it. Her breasts weren’t large, but they were firm and rounded. He could see the outline of nipples.
His skin heated and his groin pulsed even more.
Oh fuck. What was happening to him?
He forced his voice to work. “What the hell are you doing here?” He sounded way too thick.
Her frown deepened. She clearly had no idea about how he was reacting to her at the moment. “I came to bring you the leftover pastries. You weren’t here. There’s no reason to snap at me.”
He took a deep breath, trying to clear his mind. He was getting turned on, and he couldn’t stop it.
“Ward?” Em prompted when he didn’t say anything immediately. “Knightley?”
The second word snapped him out of his haze. Almost everyone called him Knightley, so he was used to that. But Em never did. She was the only person in the past several years who always called him Ward. He shook himself off and tried to sound normal. “Why were you moving that table?”
“Because this room is ridiculous. There’s no reason to cram all this stuff into one space. There’s only one place to sit.”
“I only need one place to sit.”
“Well, maybe if you had it set up better, you’d be in better shape to have company. I was trying to rearrange some stuff so you could at least use the couch.”
“I don’t want to sit on the couch.” This was a ridiculous conversation, but at least it was distracting him from the lust that was still coursing inside him.
“Someone else might want to sit on it.” Her mouth was still turned down. Her lips were full and wide and rosy. The curve of them was almost as delectable as her long neck. And her ass. And her breasts.
Ward gulped again. “And why don’t you have any clothes on?” Despite his best efforts, his gaze traveled up and down again.
“I got hot.” She shook her head as she reached over for the sweatshirt that was draped over the arm of the recliner. She pulled it on over her head. It was oversized and swallowed up her breasts, her hips, her ass. On the front was the image of a Pomeranian, like Belle, Em’s beloved dog who had died a few years ago. “And I did have clothes on. When did you turn into such a prude?”
It had nothing to do with prudishness. As far as Ward was concerned, people could wear whatever they wanted, no matter how much of their body was displayed.
But if he saw Em like that again, there was no telling what he might do.
It was safer with her covered up.
He let out a breath and tried to relax. “Sorry. You took me by surprise. Why did you feel the need to break into my place?”
“I didn’t break in.” She was frowning at him again, but it was a typical expression now. The one that was almost playfully argumentative. “You left the door open. You deserve for people to let themselves in if you’re going to leave the door wide open. And where is your phone?” Her eyes ran up and down his body, leaving him feeling almost naked. She missed almost nothing about his flushed skin, sweaty shorts and T-shirt, and messy hair.
“I left it in the bedroom.”
“You’re a mess. Who doesn’t take their phone with them when they leave the house?”
He shrugged, feeling more at ease, more natural. This was what it was supposed to feel like with Em. They teased and argued and gave advice and felt like family.
They absolutely didn’t lust after each other.
“You know how I feel about people’s overdependence on their devices. It’s good to take a break from your phone.”
“Uh-huh.”
He glanced around the room, suddenly realizing how much of his furniture Em had moved. “How long have you been here?”
“About fifteen minutes.”
“And you did all this?” The room looked better. A lot better. She’d arranged most of the antiques against the back walls to get them out of the way. Most of them were so tightly positioned that they were unusable, but he’d never used them anyway. Moving them had opened the rest of the room up. It felt like the furnishings could breathe for the first time.
“Yes. It was mostly pushing stuff around. But help me move the couch over to that wall.”
He did as she said and was amazed when it was in place. With a slight repositioning of the recliner and television, there was an actual seating group in the room.
Em was beaming as she looked around. “See how nice? Now all you need is a couple of pictures on the wall, and you’ll have a livable room.”
“It was livable before.” He was still recovering from his upsetting response to her earlier, so his voice was more of a grumble. Realizing how ungrateful he sounded, he added, “But it is a lot nicer now. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. Don’t you have any pictures?”
“Yeah. I’ve got some. They’re all stuffed into the armoire in my bedroom.”
She strode to the bedroom without invitation. There were clothes scattered around, but nothing too embarrassing, so Ward shrugged off the self-consciousness he felt at having Em in his bedroom.
His physical interest in her earlier had just been a fluke. He’d never felt that way about her before, and he wasn’t going to feel that way again.
Em had opened the doors of the antique armoire and was searching through the framed wall hangings he’d put in there when his ex-wife, Christy, had moved out.
Em pulled out a framed needlework done by a Knightley woman of the past and then another one, putting them on the bed so she could see them. “These are nice. We can use them.”
She didn’t wait for his approval. Just kept searching. She found a good landscape print and a still life photograph that she added to the others. When she pulled out a silver-framed photo, Ward immediately knew what it was.
He reached to take it from her, but he was too late.
Em stared down at the wedding photo of him and Christy.
He’d gotten married when he was twenty-one, so it was eighteen years ago now. He looked young and happy and naïve and stupid. He’d thought Christy would love him forever.
Instead, she’d fallen in love with someone else and left him without any warning.
“I’m not hanging that,” he said roughly.
Em looked over at him with a quick jerk of her head. “I know you’re not. I’m surprised you still have it.”
He shrugged, feeling awkward and emotionally uncomfortable—which wasn’t a normal feeling for him. “It felt... mean to throw it away. I spent more than ten years with her. We were... We had some good times. It was an important part of my life. Just because it ended doesn’t mean I want to erase her completely from my life.”
Em’s expression was gentler than normal. Her hazel eyes were big and soft. “I get that. You shouldn’t erase her from your life. Do you... do you...” She trailed off.
The hesitation was so unusual for her that Ward was immediately curious. “Do I what?”
“Do you still love her?”
He met her eyes and looked away quickly. This was intimate. Too intimate. It was making him feel close to Em in a way he needed to be careful about, given how he’d responded to her earlier. “No. I really don’t. It took a year or two, but I got over her.”
She nodded, and it seemed like her stance relaxed, as if she were relieved by what he’d told her. “Do you ever talk to her now?”
“Maybe once a year. Just to check in. There’s nothing tying us together like kids or property or anything, so we don’t really have much to talk about.”
“Do you miss her?”
He gave a soft huff as he processed the answer for himself. “No. Not really. Not anymore. I don’t mean to sound heartless or anything, but we fell in love when we were young, and we became differen
t people as we got older. I still think we could have made it work. People grow and change and stay together all the time. But she didn’t want to, and the man I am now is... different than the one I was then.”
“You haven’t dated much. At all. I thought maybe you were still hung up on her.”
“I’m not. I’m just not sure I’m cut out for romance anymore. I tried it and it didn’t work.” He cleared his throat. He didn’t normally talk about this sort of thing with Em. He really needed to be careful.
“Why wouldn’t it work if you try it again?” Em was being herself, but she looked far too beautiful in the dim light of the bedroom. And despite her oversized sweatshirt, he was suddenly aware of her body again. “You’re not over the hill quite yet.”
Ward curled up his lip at the teasing lilt of her voice, and he decided it was time to put an end to this conversation.
It was becoming too dangerous.
In more ways than one.
“Thanks a lot for your vote of confidence,” he said dryly. “Now if you want to put these pictures up, we need to do it now. I need a shower.”
“No argument here.” Her flash of a smile over her shoulder was alluring.
Too alluring.
His body pulsed again.
Oh shit.
He was in real trouble here.
Hopefully these feelings would go away soon.
Two
WARD WENT TO VISIT his grandmother the following Thursday evening.
She’d lived in an assisted-living facility for eight years now, and he was the only relative she had left alive. He went to see her at least three times a week.
She didn’t have anyone else.
As usual, she sat in a rocking chair by the window of her room, pretending to work a crossword puzzle but mostly just dozing and listening to a shopping network on cable.
He sat beside her, trying to think of things to say. It helped when she kept a running commentary on whatever they were selling on TV.
This evening she was more alert than normal. She told him about every kitchen gadget she’d seen advertised for the past hour, and she only dozed off once.
He was looking at his phone, waiting for her to wake up again, when she jerked slightly and said out of the blue, “When are you going to get married?”
He stiffened since these were his least favorite kinds of conversations with his grandmother. “I don’t know.”
“It’s been years since Christy left you. Stupid girl.”
“I know it’s been years. And she isn’t stupid. She just didn’t want to be married to me. It happens.” He’d had no idea Christy had been unhappy in their relationship. He still wasn’t entirely convinced she’d been miserable enough to leave him. But she’d never liked the fact that they’d had to move into the cottage after Pemberley House was converted, and then she’d found someone she wanted more than she wanted him. It was ancient history now. He was over her. She was out of his life for good. “But marriage isn’t necessarily something that happens on a prescribed timeline.”
“I don’t know why not. You never had children with Christy. If you don’t have children, the Knightley name will die out with you. You don’t want that to happen, do you?”
Being a Knightley was different than being someone else. He’d learned this when he was young. A hundred years ago, the name had meant something in the world, and the Knightleys had never admitted that the world had changed around them. They’d never acknowledged that no one cared about their name anymore. Ward knew how to handle the reproach since he’d heard it countless times before. “I’ll do my best to have a son. You know I will.”
“If you were doing your best, you’d be married again by now. You’re not as young as you used to be, but you’re still a handsome man. Surely you can find a young woman who would have you, even given your lowered position.”
His “lowered position” was the fact that he’d sold Pemberley House and now just managed the property. “I haven’t fallen in love yet.”
“This isn’t the time for romance. This is the time for doing your duty as a Knightley. What about that pretty Woodson girl?”
Ward’s eyes widened. “Em? You’re talking about Em?”
“Yes, of course. She’s attractive and has lovely manners, and your father was such good friends with her father. She visits me at least once a week, and she’s always so sweet and gracious. She’s not seeing anyone, is she?”
“No, she’s not. But she doesn’t want to get married. She’s been saying so for years. Besides, I was thirteen when she was born. She’s still like a kid to me.”
After the previous Thursday evening when he’d reacted so wrongly to Em in his cottage, he’d done well all week in thinking and acting normally with her. Whatever he’d felt then was a random onetime thing. It was a relief.
So he meant the words as he said them.
He genuinely did.
He’d always thought about Em like he would a member of his family—even after she’d grown up—and before last week it had never occurred to him to see her in any other way.
But he was hit without warning with the image of her as she’d been in his cottage last week when he’d come up on her unaware. Her leggings had hugged her long, shapely legs. Her tank top had been slightly damp and had clung to the curves of her breasts. Her cheeks had been flushed, and her hazel eyes sparking with feeling.
She’d been beautiful. A gorgeous, sexy woman. And more than that. Brimming with vibrant life.
Not the clever, spoiled girl she was supposed to be to him.
His body responded to the memory. Responded in an entirely wrong way. His pulse accelerated. His skin flushed. Blood rushed to his extremities.
Very inappropriate extremities.
He was imagining Em pressed up against him. Their lips and tongues tangled together. Those long legs wrapped around him in bed.
And, oh fuck, the throbbing of his blood was getting worse.
It was happening again.
What the hell was wrong with him?
“She’s not a child any longer,” his grandmother said primly, fortunately oblivious to his current condition. “She must be twenty-three or twenty-four by now.”
“Twenty-six,” he said, slightly hoarse.
“See? She would be a perfectly appropriate wife for you. I would love to have her as a granddaughter. No one else makes a point of visiting me the way she does. You’d have a lovely young wife, and you could do your duty by the Knightleys and have a son before I die.”
Ward didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t say anything.
He was so disturbed by the return of this inappropriate lust that all his energies were focused on forcing away the image and his body’s response to it.
He couldn’t think about Em that way.
It was as wrong as wrong could be.
He’d make sure he never did it again.
WHEN HE GOT BACK TO Pemberley House, it was dark. He was still rattled by his conversation with his grandmother, so he decided to take a jog.
He didn’t actually love jogging. He preferred to swim or ride his bike. But it was too late for either of those options, so he changed clothes and started off around the path that ran the perimeter of the property.
When he’d made it around two and a half times, he was feeling better. His mind was clear, and he’d convinced himself what had happened was only a temporary aberration.
He wasn’t that kind of man.
He wasn’t going to lust over an old family friend—one way too young for him.
He was going to forget this happened and go back to normal.
Deciding he was ready to shower and rest, he took the shortest route back to his cottage. The path led him right past the main house, and he paused when he saw that Em and her friends were sitting out on the terrace of the Berkleys’ unit.
It was Liz, Jane, Anne, and Em. The terrace was lit with the landscape lights, so he could clearly see them from where he stood in the dar
k.
They were laughing about something and drinking pink champagne. They always got together on Thursday evenings to drink champagne. They usually did it earlier than this, but one or more of them must have worked late today and they’d pushed their drinks to later.
He was glad Em had friends like that. Just like he was glad she was so popular on Instagram even though he’d never understood its appeal himself. She needed things in her life that made her happy since so many options for her were limited by her father’s dependence.
His eyes landed unerringly on Em. She was wearing a soft pink sweater and leggings with polka dots on them. She’d let her hair loose from her normal ponytail, and it was falling down her back and around her shoulders. She was smiling in that way that transformed her face like the sun edging up from the horizon. She had a long, gracefully curved neck that was oddly enchanting.
Irresistible.
Perfect for running one’s lips up and down the curve.
His eyes lingered.
His heart beat fast.
His blood started to pump again.
Oh shit.
It wasn’t going away.
It wasn’t an aberration.
He wanted Em in a way he wasn’t allowed.
He could just imagine her face if she ever found out. She’d feel betrayed. Disgusted. He could never let her know.
Maybe, if he tried very hard, he could talk himself out of it.
He wasn’t a perfect man. Christy had always complained that he was too bossy, too contained, too unwilling to make himself vulnerable. He was sure she was right.
He wasn’t perfect, but he also wasn’t a creep. He didn’t want to feel this way about Em when having her as anything but a friend was an impossibility.
Maybe he could get over it.
Maybe these feelings wouldn’t last.
THE NEXT DAY, EM WENT to a small art gallery on Main Street to talk to her friend Frank about Riot’s paintings.
She’d already mentioned Riot to him, and he’d said he’d be happy to take a look when she had enough done for him to give them a fair assessment.