Make Me Yours (Men of Gold Mountain)

by Brooks, Rebecca

  He was looking at her and his cock disappearing between her lips. At her messy ponytail, her flushed cheeks, the sweaty T-shirt hanging off her shoulder…

  He was taking all of that in, and the look on his face said he had no complaints about a single inch. He threaded his fingers through her hair, gasping when she pressed him deep to her throat and swirled her tongue around the tip, making sure every thick, hard inch of him was enveloped in her warmth.

  “You’d better stop,” he gasped.

  He had to be joking. As if even an earthquake could make her pull away.

  A few more deep thrusts and he was coming into her mouth, hot and sweet and salty and so much of it—the first taste of it a surprise, and then, oh God, filling her so she was swallowing fast as he groaned, emptying himself into her until he was spent.

  She couldn’t remember the last time she’d wanted it so badly, his pleasure and hers. She stood, and he took her in his arms, holding her close until they sat again, looking out at the view.

  There was a wide space on top of the cliff for them to perch, but they stayed side by side, legs touching, hands brushing as they reached for the rest of the snacks Ryan had packed.

  He passed her the water bottle and then put his lips right where hers had just been, and it felt like the most natural thing in the world.

  She felt relaxed. Happy. Like some small part of her life was just…easy.

  And then Ryan said, not even looking at her but out at the blaze of trees and the snowy peaks in the distance behind them, “I want to meet Maya.”

  “What?” Claire said, nearly choking on a pretzel.

  “I’ve been here for days, Claire. I have meetings in Chicago about what comes after this tour, and I can’t put my manager off forever. I want to meet her.”

  Claire wanted to ask if this was how he usually swept women off their feet—telling them he could put his career on hold for a whole forty-eight or seventy-two hours or however much longer he thought he was staying, like she was supposed to fawn all over him for that teensy tiny sacrifice.

  But she knew that when it came to Ryan, music was his life. More than family, more than her. Certainly more than being a father.

  And yet he was asking for this, the one thing he cared about more than getting back to Chicago right away.

  She could have said no. But her legs felt like jelly, and her heart was too splattered from the adrenaline of her very first climb and what they’d just done to make its usual protest. And her brain… Well, wasn’t he the one who said she should trust the evidence before her, not all her preconceived ideas?

  Her evidence right now was the heat of his body; the firm, hard press of his thigh; the weight of his arm now snaking around her shoulder and drawing her to him so that all she could do was rest her cheek against his shoulder as he popped an M&M into her mouth.

  “Okay,” she finally said, hoping she wasn’t about to make the biggest mistake of her life. Or the second biggest, since nothing would ever beat running away with him in the first place.

  He shifted, and she raised her head off his shoulder so they were looking at each other. “Really?”

  “But on one condition.”

  “What?”

  She took a breath and said it. “I’m not going to tell her you’re her dad.”

  She couldn’t read the flicker that crossed Ryan’s face. Was he upset? Relieved? Or was it just a stray cloud passing over the blue, and it didn’t mean a thing?

  “We both know you’re going back to Chicago.” She said the words the same way he had. Facts were still facts, even if the heart could be tricked for a while. Gravity still existed, even if for a few moments it felt like Ryan had been holding her up in midair.

  He was entitled to lay eyes on his daughter. But not to throw her world upside-down.

  She waited for him to disagree, to tell her he wasn’t leaving or this wasn’t what she thought. But after a pause, he said, “I know I’m not father material. You don’t have to say it; I’ve looked in the mirror before. Hell, my dad—” He let out a laugh, but it wasn’t the kind that said anything was funny. It was the kind of forced sound that made Claire’s heart ache.

  She remembered the stories Ryan used to tell about his childhood. How it was always a toss-up whether things were worse when his father was around and lashing out at Ryan and his mother and siblings, or when he disappeared for weeks, even months at a time, leaving no clue as to where he’d gone or when he was going to turn up again. If he turned up at all.

  “I don’t want that for Maya,” he said. “I’m not going to be in and out of her life. I just want to see her, once, before I go home.”

  And there it was. The reminder that no matter what they’d just done in the mountains, their real lives continued all the same.

  She counted her heartbeats, wishing they could tell her what to do. “Saturday afternoon,” she said, making a split-second decision. “If the weather’s nice, we’ll go to the playground.”

  Maybe it was cruel of her to pick something so completely kid focused. But in the end, she thought it was a small mercy. He’d think Maya was cute for two seconds. Then he’d get bored, then annoyed, and he’d be glad when he got on that plane that his life was in Chicago with rock stars and all his freedom, where the only people who screamed were his fans.

  If she’d thought there was anything else going on here—that maybe he didn’t have to leave so soon, or maybe he actually wanted to stick around…

  The way he talked about Chicago made it clear that wasn’t an option. Saturday was one small favor she owed him. And then they really would be done.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Ryan thought he’d be prepared. He’d seen her photograph. And it wasn’t like he’d never encountered a five-year-old before.

  He just couldn’t exactly recall when. Or why. Or whether it had been anywhere besides the grocery store, say, the kid begging for whatever sugar crack they were into these days. He’d been a Frosted Flakes man himself.

  But Claire had made it clear that meeting Maya didn’t make Ryan a parent. And Ryan wholeheartedly agreed. Maybe some guys would suddenly want to have summers at their place, a chance to teach the kid to ride a bike, throw a ball, take her on her first driving lesson.

  But he spent half his life on tour, worked crazy hours, and considering that he’d only recently gotten the hang of taking care of himself, he wasn’t going to pretend he had the chops to add anyone else to that list.

  His life didn’t have room for a child. He’d only fuck her up the way he’d fucked things up with Claire. The way his dad had fucked him up by never being around.

  So, the point was just to see her. Once. Then he’d know she was real, she was happy, she was some tiny extension of him out doing good in the world. He could go back to Chicago feeling like he’d made some amends in his life.

  And then he could move on.

  But when he walked over to the playground from the hotel, he spotted Claire pushing Maya on a swing and had to stop in his tracks, his chest tightening as if he could actually feel his heart, that unfamiliar muscle, start to grow.

  He’d seen the photograph, but that didn’t prepare him for the real thing. She was beautiful. He took it back—there was no way any part of her was him. There was nothing in him that could be so good.

  Until her legs pumped through the air and she leaned back, tightening her fists around the chain, and he had to change his mind. That was his kid all right, complaining that Claire wasn’t pushing her high enough.

  “Hey!” he called, jogging over.

  “Hey, you,” Claire said brightly, and it was funny, this little act of pretending like they hadn’t just had sex. Twice. Plus about a billion times before that. This pretending that he was exactly who Claire told Maya he was—Ryan, the friend Claire had talked to her about, who was going to play with them today.

  Maya was shy for approximately four and a half seconds. Then Ryan said he’d push her higher than her mom could, and
that was it. She was his.

  His words may have been asking her how far she could see, and if she could fly to Canada, and what would happen if she spun all the way around on the swing—a prospect Maya seemed very into, even if he had to tell Claire to relax, it wasn’t going to happen.

  But when he looked at Claire, he hoped she could see into him and tell how much this crazy freaking moment meant to him.

  When Maya abruptly got tired of the swing, she ran over to some crazy jungle gym thing that was way better than the scraps of metal Ryan played on as a kid, his brothers beating the shit out of him and shoving his face in the dirty sand, his mom wringing her hands at how three boys could be so uncontrollable, his father shouting at them to shut their damn mouths.

  “You’re the princess,” she announced to Ryan, shoving a stick that she’d found on the ground into his hand.

  “Wait, what?”

  “Princess Ryan,” she said matter-of-factly, looking to her mom like geez what’s the matter with this guy?

  “I don’t think that I—”

  “You’re the princess, and I’m the wizard,” Maya interrupted, picking out her own stick. “We both have magic wands, but mine is more powerful because I’m a wizard, but yours is okay, too, because you have fairy dust.”

  “Oh,” Ryan said, trying to follow her logic. “Okay?”

  “Sweetheart.” Claire stepped in gently. “Maybe Ryan wants to—”

  But Ryan, grinning, was totally ready to be the best goddamn princess this playground had ever seen.

  “Who’s your mom going to be?” he asked.

  Maya didn’t skip a beat. “T. rex.”

  “Like the dinosaur?”

  Maya looked at him like he was seriously stupid and then spat out a dozen facts about theropods he’d never known—since prior to being schooled by a five-year-old waving a stick at him, he’d never even heard the word theropod, never mind knowing it was some kind of dinosaur classification. Or something. It was kind of hard to follow when Maya was talking so fast.

  “She’s really into dinosaurs,” Claire stage-whispered, curling her fingers into claws and pretending to stalk after Maya with big, lumbering steps as Maya shrieked and ran away, waving her “wand.”

  It was official. Claire was the best fucking parent since the dawn of time. Ryan got up and chased after them, trying to act princessy, although Maya was quick to inform him he was doing it wrong. His wand needed more sparks. “Also,” she added. “You run too slow.”

  They chased each other all over the playground, hiding behind trees, climbing the jungle gym, hiding in what Maya termed the tower but was really just a platform where she said the T. rex couldn’t reach them. Ryan, for one, was glad for the break. It was clear he needed to add more cardio to his climbing routine.

  “How about some ice cream?” he said, once the wizard and the T. rex had reached some sort of magic truce and the princess’s services were no longer needed.

  Maya lit up like a thousand-watt bulb. They walked down the street to a small ice cream place, Maya chattering away the whole time.

  “Anything you want,” Ryan said.

  “Careful there,” Claire said. “Don’t make promises you’ll wind up regretting.”

  “Anything your mom says you can have,” he amended.

  “I want that one,” Maya said, pointing to a new flavor the store was giving out free samples of.

  “Sorry, pumpkin,” Claire said. “That one’s called peanut butter bomb.”

  Maya pouted until Claire steered her to the other flavors.

  “You can pick any other flavor that doesn’t have nuts in it.”

  “She’s allergic?” It felt silly that he was so surprised. But it had started to feel like he knew her…until he was slammed by another example of how much he’d missed.

  “I always have to be on my toes,” Claire said. “It’s easy not to keep anything in the house, but out in the world…” She gestured around the store. “You’d think I’d worry about sharp knives and, I don’t know, kidnapping or something. But really, it’s whether there’s a trace of peanut flour hiding somewhere.”

  She explained something about facilities and equipment and allergen washing and reading the fine print, but all Ryan heard was more evidence that he was so not cut out to be a parent. How had Claire even figured all of this out?

  She must have seen the look on his face because she said, “Relax. You don’t have to worry about it.”

  But the reminder that he wasn’t really part of Maya’s life hardly made him feel better.

  She touched his arm. “I just mean that you get used to it.” She paused. “Actually, that’s a lie. It makes me worry a thousand percent more. And you know my normal state of worry isn’t exactly at sea level to begin with.” She laughed at herself when he didn’t disagree. “But she’s okay. Really. And I never go anywhere without an EpiPen.” She patted her purse. “Anyway, we’re here for ice cream. So, bug.” She turned to Maya. “What’ll it be?”

  She finally decided on peppermint stick, while Claire went for chocolate fudge brownie. Him? Chocolate chip cookie dough, every time. And he was definitely paying, no matter how hard Claire argued.

  They decided to eat outside on a park bench to enjoy the last of the day’s sun. “You’re my favorite of all of Mom’s friends,” Maya declared as swung her legs back and forth and licked her ice cream cone.

  Now, this is interesting, Ryan thought.

  “Does your mom have a lot of friends?” he asked.

  “Yeah. But not as many as me.”

  Ryan glanced at Claire. It was clear they were both trying not to crack up, Claire biting on her plastic spoon to keep from laughing.

  “And not a lot of them are boys,” Maya went on, and a piece of ice cream cone nearly lodged in Ryan’s throat.

  “Um. That’s okay.”

  He shot Claire a look, eyebrow raised. So, Claire didn’t have men in her life… Or she wasn’t bringing them around to meet Maya. Either way, he couldn’t deny that the information from the little snitch sitting next to him made him happy.

  “I don’t mean that I don’t like Mom’s friends,” Maya said with a careful diplomacy that had to have been a hundred percent Claire’s influence—Ryan didn’t have that nice a bone in his whole body. “Mack’s the best because she makes me hot chocolate and puts in extra marshmallows when she thinks nobody’s looking.” She flashed Ryan a grin like she was sharing a very big secret. “But even Connor and Austin don’t play magic with me. Grownups are busy.”

  She said that last line like she’d been told it a few dozen times before.

  “Well, I got time, kiddo,” Ryan said, even as he sensed Claire shooting him a look. Don’t go there, it warned.

  But how could he not?

  He understood, suddenly, why his father must have made so many promises he couldn’t keep. It was impossible not to get swept up in the moment. For just a few seconds, he honestly thought what he said could be true.

  But Claire was right. Even she must barely have the time she wanted to spend with Maya. There must have been so many things she missed out on, things she wanted to do but couldn’t because she was juggling it all by herself.

  Underneath his long-sleeved shirt, he felt his tattoos prickle as though he’d just gotten inked. If he and Claire had stayed together and raised this baby, it could have been like this all the time. The three of them, together.

  But he couldn’t picture it. Maya didn’t belong in their tiny basement apartment in New York, screaming her head off as Claire ran to her waitressing job, doubling up on extra shifts, collapsing in exhaustion at the end of each day.

  And Ryan? He imagined himself plucking at the guitar, trying to make the chords come. But he knew that wasn’t really what he’d have been doing. He knew he would have been drinking, barely present, not helping anyone. Certainly not being a father, or a husband, or even a very good musician. Not being much more than a waste of space.

  Claire had s
een all that, and she’d been right to walk away. She’d been right to give Maya this life. It was so weird, these fucking feelings. How one second he could be grateful and happy, leaning over to brush the dark hair from Maya’s cheek so the ice cream didn’t get in the strands.

  And the next second he could feel his heart breaking, that she was his girl. His daughter. And her life was better precisely because he wasn’t in it.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Claire laid down on her couch and closed her eyes. She’d finally gotten a hyped-up, sugar-addled, excited little wizard to bed, and she was pretty close to nodding off herself when she heard her phone vibrate next to her.

  She reached for it sleepily, having no idea how to describe her day if it was friends texting for updates.

  But it was from Ryan. And it was only one word.

  Damn.

  She sat up. Was that a good damn, or a bad one? She wrote back a single question mark.

  Did that go okay? he asked in response.

  She smiled. It had been clear he was nervous when he’d first arrived at the park, and it tickled her to know he cared so much about what Maya thought of him. Gutted by a five-year-old. She would never have guessed.

  You got into princess character, bought her ice cream, and listened to every fact about T. rex known to humankind, she typed quickly. She loves you.

  She pressed send before she could think about what she’d just typed. Maya, love, and Ryan weren’t words that belonged together in the same sentence.

  But all he did was send back a smiley face. Typical Ryan—a response that was no response at all.

  She’s asleep now? he asked.

  Finally.

  And the other beautiful woman I got to see today?

  Also exhausted, she wrote back. Which was true, even if it didn’t explain why her heart had suddenly kicked up so fast at that word. Beautiful.

  She waited for him to say good night, some sweet last line telling her to sleep well. Wasn’t it late? Hadn’t she just told him she was tired? When was he going back to Chicago, anyway?