“Girl scouts,” she said with an easy smile.
“No kidding.” He could see her in the uniform. Actually, he could see her in the uniform all grown up and it was hot. “I was a boy scout.”
“Really? Did you do summer camps?”
They compared notes and realized that for three years they’d camped across the lake from one another for two weeks each June.
“Small world,” Goldie said.
Jake struck a match to the kindling and it caught right away. “Nice fire, girl scout.”
“Thanks.” She stretched her hands out to capture the warmth and he wrapped his arms around her from behind.
“Still chilly?”
“I’ll be warm in a minute.”
“Hold that thought.”
He sprinted down the hall, pulled a couple of blankets out of the closet, and returned to spread one on the floor in front of the fire. “Here you go. Have a seat.” He sat and tugged her down to sit between his legs, wrapping the two of them in the other blanket. “Nothing like a little shared body heat to warm things up.”
She leaned back into him, nestling her head between his shoulder and his jaw, her hair soft and fragrant against his skin. “Mmm. This is nice,” she said.
From outside, thunder shook the cabin but Goldie didn’t even flinch. Instead she brushed her thumb over the back of his wrist as if memorizing the feel of his skin against hers. “Jake…”
“Hmm?”
“When we were in bed last night…”
“Yeah?”
“You said you’d wanted to touch me like that from the first time you ever met me?”
Her unspoken question of Why didn’t you? stretched between them.
“Baby, we both knew from the beginning we wanted different things from a relationship. I’ll never, ever forget the way I felt the first time I saw you, when I walked up to Lauren’s desk and there you were. I felt like the rug had been snatched out from under my feet. But it was clear what you were looking for, what I couldn’t give you. I didn’t think it was fair to either one of us.”
“But this weekend has been—”
“Wonderful,” he said, interrupting. “At least for me it has.”
“That’s exactly how I feel.”
He smoothed his hand over the curve of her cheek, the line of her neck. “I never believed in love at first sight,” he said, acknowledging to her at the same time what he was realizing himself. He loved her. “…before. That’s why I worked so damn hard to stay away from you.”
She turned to face him, kneeling in front of him, between his outstretched thighs, and linked her arms around his neck. “I looked at you and knew I’d never be the same again. So I went out of my way to avoid being around you.”
Relief washed through him. She felt the same way. And she’d obviously decided her commitment requirement was over the top, otherwise she wouldn’t sound so happy with the situation.
He cupped her buttocks in his hands, pulling her closer into his chest. She nuzzled at his neck and whispered, “I’m glad we couldn’t avoid one another any longer.”
“Not nearly as glad as I am,” he said, working his hands up under the sweatshirt and T-shirt she wore to stroke the smooth lines of her back. “Are you warm yet? In my opinion you’re wearing altogether too many clothes.”
Smiling, she gripped the hems of both the T-shirt and the sweatshirt and pulled them over her head in one fell swoop. Her bare breasts were in tantalizing proximity of his mouth. “Better?”
“Much—” he lazily licked one nipple and it sprang to attention “—much—” he teased his tongue against the other tip and it tightened into a hard bud as well “—better.”
“Take your shirt off,” she ordered.
He complied, the cooler air settling against his skin.
She trailed her fingers through the hair on his chest. “I love your chest,” she said as she fingered his nipples. He sucked in a harsh breath at the sensation that arrowed straight to his cock. Continuing her journey downward, she unerringly found his belt. “This is in the way. May I?”
“By all means.”
Laughing softly under her breath, she undid his belt and then the button to his jeans. She pushed him lightly to his side and then his back. He stretched out and she worked his zipper down. He loved that she was as eager to get him out of his clothes as he was to have her naked. He lifted his hips and she tugged his jeans and underwear off together. “Now that’s optimal,” she said.
“Almost,” he countered, tugging the drawstring on the pajama pants she wore until they gave way. She wiggled out of them, leaving her gloriously nude.
He held out his hand. “Come here.”
She came.
His last coherent thought as she straddled him was that he was the luckiest man alive.
GOLDIE STRETCHED LANGUIDLY, sated, her head pillowed on Jake’s chest, his leg resting intimately between hers.
“Are you warm enough?” Jake said, stroking her back, pulling the blanket over the two of them.
“Mmm. I’m perfect.” She’d never known such utter bliss. She snuggled closer to him. “That was perfect. It’s amazing how different it was making love knowing you’d changed your mind, that we weren’t on opposite sides of the fence any longer.”
His hand stilled. Even though he didn’t move, she could feel the shift in him, the tensing. An impending sense of doom descended on her. She raised onto one elbow and looked at him. She didn’t want to see what she thought she was going to see.
“Jake?”
She felt him mentally withdrawing before he rolled to his side and scrubbed his hand through is hair. “Wait a second, honey. I haven’t changed my stance. I thought you had. I never said I had.”
“You thought I had? Never. I’ve never been less than crystal clear about how I felt on the subject.”
“Me either,” he said, his jaw taking on a stubborn set.
“But you knew how I felt, how important it is to me. So I thought you must have…” She trailed off, wrapping the blanket more firmly around her, a cold settling inside her that the fire couldn’t possibly warm. She’d been naked numerous times with him but now she sat stripped emotionally, vulnerable. If he loved her, then he’d realize she needed to know he’d be there for her. The knowledge that he wouldn’t even consider it cut her to shreds. She gathered her tattered emotions about her and strove for some measure of dignity. “I guess there’s nothing left to say, is there?”
“What do you want? A proposal?”
It felt as if he’d backhanded her across the face. “Of course not. I just want the possibility of one. And with you, that’s not even a remote chance.” She hated herself, hated the neediness, but she couldn’t seem to help tacking on what she shouldn’t ask any more than she’d been able to not fall in love with him. “Is it?”
He pushed to his feet and stood naked before her. “I could lie to you. I could so easily say yes when I don’t mean it, but there’s no honor in that and it’s not fair to either one of us. And I’d rather walk away from what we have right now than watch it slowly erode into what my parents have.”
She wanted to tell him that it wouldn’t. That she wouldn’t let it. But she refused to beg him to love her. Because obviously he didn’t. She’d been a fool to fall in love with him but she refused to compound her foolishness by selling herself and what was between them short. She shrugged, striving desperately not to show how her heart was breaking. “Then I guess we’re back to square one.”
He reached for her and she stepped back out of his range. “Don’t. I think it’s better if we just…don’t.” She drew a shaky breath. “We were both right. We knew this was impossible from the first time we met. I suggest we both forget this weekend ever happened, starting right now.”
Sure, as if she could ever forget the taste of him in her mouth, the feel of him inside her.
“I agree.”
“I have my paperwork in my satchel,” she said, standing. With
the blanket wrapped around her, she headed toward the hallway. “I’ll just stay in Chad’s room until the rain has stopped and you think the creek is passable.”
“Fine.”
The rain couldn’t stop soon enough.
9
JAKE PACED THE FLOOR, silently cursing every decision he’d made in the last twenty-four hours, starting with the dumb-ass move of coming up here in the first place. If he hadn’t come, then he wouldn’t have found her in his bed. If he hadn’t found her in his bed, he could’ve continued to avoid her. If he’d continued to avoid her, he wouldn’t have made love to her and if he hadn’t made love to her, he could’ve continued to pretend he hadn’t fallen in love with her the first time he’d set eyes on her.
And now, dammit to hell, she was sequestered in Chad’s room. The idea of her in any bedroom but his left him wanting to punch something, which was crazier than hell because he wasn’t prone to either jealousy or violence.
He yanked on his jeans because he definitely looked crazier than hell pacing around the den naked as a jaybird. He resumed the therapeutic march from the fireplace to the recliners and back.
Why’d she have to be so damn stubborn? So unreasonable? Her way or the highway. He paused in his pacing… He was being equally unyielding, wasn’t he? He started back—yeah, but his logic was, well, logical, reasonable. And it wasn’t as if he hadn’t met women before who weren’t cool with his terms. The only problem was that he’d never been in love with any of them.
He heard the bedroom door open and Goldie appeared, heading toward the kitchen. Like a sucker punch to his gut, she was wearing one of Chad’s button-downs, which fit her more like a dress than a shirt. “If you needed another T-shirt, you know where my closet is.”
She shook her head without looking at him, “No. It’s…I can’t. It’s just better this way.” She pulled a bottled water out of the refrigerator. Without another word, she returned to the bedroom, closing the door firmly behind her. At least she didn’t lock it. He supposed that was something.
He opened the front door and realized the rain had stopped. Thank God. The sooner it stopped, the sooner the creek would recede and the sooner they could get the hell out—
Not only had the rain stopped, but there was an eerie quiet to the moment. The only sound was the freight train…and there was no train line nearby. He spun, running hellbent for leather, yelling her name. “Goldie, get in the bathroom. Now. Tornado.”
She stumbled out of the bedroom as he was about to fling the door open. He grabbed her, shoving her into the bathroom ahead of him. He lifted her into the tub, jumped in behind her and covered her body with his just as all the furies of hell descended on them in the form of a funnel cloud.
“IT’S OVER,” JAKE SAID, but she couldn’t quite take it in. “Baby, quit shaking. It’s over.”
He moved from where he was crouching in the tub to sit on the edge, pulling her onto his lap. His hands shook as he stroked her head, her face, her back, her arms. “Are you okay? Are you hurt? Tell me you’re okay. You’ve got to be okay. Nothing can happen to you.”
She found her voice. “I’m fine. What about you?” Blood dripped down into the tub. He was injured. “Oh, my God, you’re bleeding. Where are you hurt?”
“I don’t know. I don’t care. Are you sure you’re okay?”
The back of his right arm. His arm was bleeding. She looked around, for the first time seeing the rest of the room instead of just seeing Jake. The force of the wind had shattered the bathroom window. Obviously flying glass had caught the back of his arm. It could’ve been so much worse. She began to shake in earnest.
“What were you thinking throwing yourself on top of me like that? You could’ve been lower in the tub, more protected if you were beside me instead of on top of me.” If a bigger piece of glass had caught him in the neck… Her voice escalated. “What were you thinking?” Then she was yelling because if she didn’t yell, she thought she might cry. She could’ve lost him, forever. “What were you thinking?”
He yelled back, “That nothing could happen to you. You had to be safe.”
There was a pause, and then they were desperately kissing one another. Jake scattered kisses over her face and she did the same, reassuring herself that he was whole and fine. He would’ve died for her. He would’ve died to keep her safe. How could anything ever prove how much he cared for her more than that?
“I love you,” she said, gasping the words in between kisses.
“I couldn’t stand it if I’d lost you. We’ll get married tomorrow if you want to, but I never ever want to think of not having you with me again.”
She needed him to know. “I don’t need for you to marry me. I don’t need that anymore.”
“Oh, hell, no, you didn’t just say that. You are the most ornery, contrary woman. Those were the first words I heard out of your mouth—that you wanted a husband. Then you were ready to dump me because I wouldn’t talk long-term. And now, you’re turning me down. I’ve got news for you, Goldilocks, I’ll keep you here naked until you say yes.”
“But I always thought my greatest fear was a tornado and I just realized it isn’t. My biggest fear is losing you. I love you, regardless of the terms.”
“Well, I’ve got news for you, Ms. Dawkins, the terms are we’re getting hitched. Start thinking about a date.”
“You’re sure?”
“Never surer. There’s something about thinking you might lose the woman you love in a natural disaster that puts things in perspective for a guy.”
“Just think, if I hadn’t shown up here and you hadn’t found me in your bed, I might’ve never figured out that you were the guy who was just right for me.”
AND AS THE REST OF this tale goes, Goldie and Jake went on to build their own little cabin in the woods, which became home to them and the baby they welcomed. Goldie, Jake and Baby became known as Papa Bear, Mama Bear and Baby Bear. And they all lived happily ever after….
ISBN: 978-1-4268-5493-4
BLAZING BEDTIME STORIES, VOLUME V
Copyright © 2010 by Harlequin Books S.A.
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A PRINCE OF A GUY
Copyright © 2010 by Leslie Kelly
GOLDIE AND THE THREE BROTHERS
Copyright © 2010 by Jennifer LaBrecque
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