Need You Now (Love in Unknown)

by Lunsford, Taylor M.

  “Do you want a ride or not?” he asked with exaggerated patience.

  Mel shook her head, still stifling snickers. Through all of the pain and confusion that had been between them at the end, she’d forgotten how much he could make her laugh. If she wasn’t careful, he’d make her forget why she needed to stay mad at him. “No thanks. I’m fine, really. You and your golf cart go on back to City Hall. The walk will do me good. No offense, Mr. Mayor, but it would take a lot to get me in that contraption.”

  Feeling better than she had a few minutes ago, Mel began the walk back to Carr’s Cakes. Hopefully Micah wouldn’t object to a little help. A whirring noise behind her drew her attention. As Caine’s golf cart zipped past, she succumbed to another laughing fit. The arrogant, self-important Caine she’d known would never in a million years have lowered himself to drive around in that thing. Looking down at her feet, she began to come to terms with the fact that he’d probably changed a bit more than she was willing to admit. This new Caine was going to make it hard for her to ignore him. She just hoped she could stay strong.

  #

  Caine couldn’t believe he was doing this. After she turned down his ride this morning, he doubted Mel really wanted to see him, but he had to see her. Despite her laughter, he’d seen how shaken she was by the break-in. Every summer he came home from school, he’d rarely seen Mel because she was always at the clinic, helping Doc Booth and Anna. It was her second home; a safe place where she could practice medicine. Someone had violated her sanctuary. Anger boiled inside of him at the thought. Things like this happened in larger towns, but Unknown’s crime rate was negligible. A few petty crimes and DUI’s. They might have had a homicide case twenty years ago. Stuff like this should happen here.

  Going out and catching the bad guy’s was his brother’s job. So Caine had spent the day in his office, restless with the need to somehow fix this for Mel. He counted it a victory that he managed to last until after dinner before showing up on her doorstep. He’d even gone to the store to get a special gift for her. Taking a deep breath, he knocked on the aged door of the apartment over the bakery.

  Mel pulled the door open and he had to smile. Every time he’d seen her since her return to town, she’d looked perfectly put together, hair sleek and clothes fashionable. Not tonight. With her hair pulled up in a messy ponytail, she wore a pair of light blue cotton pajama shorts and a white camisole that peeped out from under a thin gray sweater. God, she looked gorgeous. It never stopped surprising him how beautiful she’d grown in the last ten years. She’d always been pretty in a sweet, innocent sort of way, but wow.

  “Caine. What are you doing here?” She tugged the sweater tighter around her, obscuring his view. It didn’t matter how much she tried to hide, though, because he knew her body, even if the woman in front of him was a mystery.

  “I wanted to check up on you. I know today was a little rough and I was— I was worried.” There was no other way to put it. He and Mel had never minced words with each other. Why start now?

  Mel closed her eyes for a second before opening them again. “That’s really sweet of you, Caine, but I’m fine. You really don’t need to worry about me.”

  Caine braced one hand on the doorframe. “I’ve always worried about you, Mel. Ever since we were little and you insisted you could do everything that Micah, Gage, and I could. You were so little and breakable. I remembered that today.”

  Not waiting for her to invite him in, he pushed past her. All the years he’d known the Carrs, he’d never been up here before. It’d always been rented out. The apartment was cozy. Warm yellow walls, thick blue carpet. A big overstuffed couch and club chair took up most of the living room. The same old tube TV she’d had in college sat on a low table against one wall. Pictures of her family served as the only artwork. He saw a small kitchen off to one side. A low bar with wooden barstools served as the dining table.

  “It’s not the Maddox mansion, but it’s home.” Mel’s voice held a defensive note. Though she rarely vocalized it, she’d always been wary when it came to his family’s money. Ethan and Emma Carr raised their children to value hard, honest work and his parents looked down on the concept.

  “It’s great, Mel. I’m just surprised it feels so homey when you’ve only been here a few weeks.” He smiled, trying to lighten the mood. “I see you still insist on having every single book you ever owned with you.”

  She shrugged. “Books are one thing that never let me down.”

  Ouch. He picked up a well-worn copy of Persuasion from the end table. Unless he was mistaken, it was the same copy he’d bought her in a rare moment of thoughtfulness one rainy afternoon not long after they started sleeping together. “How many times have you read this thing? A million?”

  “Only a few thousand.” She snatched it away from him, a blush flaming in her creamy cheeks. “What are you doing here? And what’s in that bag?”

  Caine looked down at the paper bag from Jackson’s Grocery. “I thought you might need some comfort food, so I stopped at Jackson’s and got this for you.”

  Mel narrowed her eyes and stepped just close enough to take the bag from him. Cautiously, she opened it, looking inside as if she expected to see a bomb or have a spider jump out at her. “Ice cream?”

  “Not just any ice cream. Strawberry cheesecake ice cream.” Specifically, Ben and Jerry’s Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream. HIs ace in the hole.

  Mel’s eyes narrowed, then her shoulders slumped a little. She met his gaze and for a second, all of the years faded away, just as they had that morning when he’d hugged her. Heat and light sparked between them, the air so charged it almost hurt for him to breathe. “You remembered,” she whispered.

  It stung a little that she thought he would forget, but he knew she had every reason to think he hadn’t paid attention back then. “My ice cream deliveries were the only way I could see you some days. You were always so busy with classes, but I knew you’d stop working if I brought you ice cream.”

  Mel’s spine stiffened and her expression shuttered. “I appreciate the gesture, but why are you doing this, Caine? And don’t try to sell me some bullshit story about being concerned for my welfare because it’s your duty as mayor.”

  He leaned against the back of the chair, crossing his arms. He could lie. Say that Gage asked him to stop by or that Doc sent him. But he’d never been able to lie to her. Not successfully, anyway. “Come on, Mel. We’re both adults. Highly intelligent, mature individuals who don’t play games with each other. I didn’t want us to be over, remember? I care about you. I’ve never stopped. And a big part of caring about someone is being concerned when they’ve had a shitty day.”

  “I’m fine. Honestly.” She bit her lip. Her tell. She was holding something back. “Look, I appreciate the ice cream and the concern. But if you’re trying to convince me we should be together again, don’t. I told you I’m trying to start a new life.”

  Caine shook his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. He tried to think of a more infuriating woman, but he came up with nothing. No one got to him as much as she did. “I understand that, Mel. I really do. I just wish we could start over. Be friends again. Like Anne and Captain Wentworth.”

  Not waiting for her response, Caine pressed a kiss to her forehead and left. Let her stew on that for a while. He knew she would. For all of her scientific practicality, his Melody was a sucker for her books.

  #

  “You really didn’t have to do this,” Mel said as she swept up yet another pile of glass. Two days after the break-in, she and Gage were finally cleaning up the wreckage. She thanked God all the floors in the clinic were wood. It made their job easier. Anna was in Doc’s office re-filing papers while Sandra scrubbed down the exam rooms upstairs. With any luck, they’d be able to reopen their doors tomorrow and she could get back to convincing everyone in town she was perfectly capable of running the clinic in Doc’s place.

  Gage pulled a hammer out of his tool belt. Along with being police chie
f, he was also pretty darn handy with home repairs, thanks to her dad. The boys spent one memorable summer month building a tree house under Ethan Carr’s strict supervision. “But I really did. It’s the law.”

  “The law?” Mel raised an eyebrow, leaning down to scoop the glass into a dust pan.

  “Yup. Best Friend Law Code, Paragraph E, Sub-section Twelve. Best friend must assist other best friend whenever really bad shit happens to them.” He readjusted the door of one of the cabinets in the storage closet. “Besides, you seriously suck at fixing things.”

  “You might be right there.” Brushing a stray piece of hair back toward her ponytail, Mel continued to sweep. She sucked at fixing a lot of things, like her own freaking heart. She was supposed to be moving forward with her life, damn it. Not being thrown into a tailspin by her past with Caine.

  “What’d my brother do?”

  Mel blinked over at him. It took a second for her to realize she’d said that last bit out loud. “Did you tell him to come by and check on me the other night after the break-in?”

  Gage scratched his head and wiped sweat off his forehead. Spring was taking a break today with a heat wave. The air conditioner had suffered enough damage that they’d opted not to turn it on until the inspector gave it a once over. “No, Mel-bell, I didn’t. But I’m not all that surprised that he did.”

  “Why? Has he said something to you?” God, she sounded like a tenth grader asking for gossip in the hallway between classes. But she needed to know what Caine was thinking so she could figure out the best plan to get him out of her head once and for all.

  She watched Gage hesitate, the war between good brother and good friend going on in his head. “He might have said a few things.”

  Mel rolled her eyes and huffed. She knew that tone. That was the mysterious, guarded tone that had infuriated her to no end as kids. “What kind of things? Things about him wanting to mess with my head and drive me crazy?”

  “Depends on your interpretation. He’s never come right out and said it, but I know my brother still cares about you. A lot.” Gage bent down, picking up new boxes of gauze to store in the cabinet he’d repaired.

  “No, he doesn’t. He…” Mel searched for a plausible explanation. “He likes the idea of me. I was his rebellion and now that he’s settled into the life your parents planned for him, he wants to revisit the time in his life when he did what he wanted and never had to think about anyone else’s feelings.”

  Gage laughed. “You really believe that bullshit you’re slinging? Because I don’t. I know my brother, Mel. I saw his face when I told him you were back. It’s more than just nostalgia. Don’t try to convince me you’re apathetic toward him, either.”

  Biting her lip, Mel looked away. She picked up a few boxes of band-aids. Gage didn’t know the whole story of what happened that summer she ended things with Caine. All he knew was that his brother had betrayed her trust and she’d switched schools to avoid him. “He’s in my past, Gage. And I want him to stay there.” She did. She really did…

  “I remember a time when you would have killed to go on a date with my brother. You used to follow him around with those big Bambi eyes even when you were a kid, doing stupid stunts with us to get him to notice you.” Of course he remembered. That’s how they’d grown so close. Caine and Micah would devise some scheme and they’d convince her or Gage to be the guinea pigs. Gage usually took the brunt of the stupider ideas, since they all knew her father would kill them if she was seriously hurt.

  “I was what, eight? I’m twenty-eight now. That was just a schoolgirl crush.” One that turned into a hot, crazy, exhilarating college fling that had ultimately broken her heart. Which was exactly why she didn’t want to be within ten feet of Caine Maddox.

  Rubbing the back of his neck, Gage propped a hip against the counter and watched her work. “Aside from the whole ex-boyfriend thing, Caine was your friend first. Why not give him a chance to at least get that back? You can never have too many friends.”

  The sullen look she gave him ended that train of conversation. For the moment, anyway. She knew Gage wouldn’t leave it alone for long. Neither would her stupid brain, apparently. No matter how hard she worked, thoughts of Caine kept popping in.

  Damn him and his sneaky little comment about Persuasion.

  It had taken her a month and several heavy make-out sessions to convince him to read the book in the first place. He knew the reason she loved it. She’d read a lot of books multiple times, but that one drew her in because it was a story of the power of love and forgiveness. Of true love finding its way back after eight years apart and miles of society. As a teenager, she’d loved the story because it gave her hope. Hope for her and Caine, if she were going to be completely honest. When he bought the book for her, she’d treasured that copy. It was her last connection to the man she’d been enchanted with her whole life.

  Damn him.

  The tug of war continued even as she let herself into her apartment after dinner with Gage that night. Mocking her, Persuasion lay on the end table, exactly where Caine left it the two nights ago. Muffling a sound of frustration, Mel went into the bedroom and flopped onto the cozy quilt. She wanted to crawl under it and bury herself away from the world. Instead, she pulled out her cellphone.

  He answered on the first ring. “Hello?”

  The deep baritone voice never ceased to send little tingles down her traitorous spine. She hated that he could still do this to her. “Hi. It’s me. Mel.”

  “I know who you are, Mel. I’d recognize your voice anywhere.” Caine’s warm voice had her eyes drifting closed as she settled into the bed. She remembered letting that voice lull her to sleep after a bout of quick, passionate sex. She’d known he’d be gone in the morning, but she always felt secure in his arms. Apparently, old habits didn’t want to die.

  “That was a low blow, you know.”

  A rumble of a chuckle filled her ear. “The Persuasion comment. Yeah, maybe. But I’m guessing it worked since you’re calling me less than forty-eight hours later.”

  She didn’t speak for several moments, biting her tongue, fighting the words with every breath. Her instincts said to run, but her heart said to tell him.

  “This is not me agreeing to go out with you or anything.” She wanted that perfectly clear up front. Better for everyone that way. No false hopes or pressure.

  “Then what is this?” There was no easy confidence in his voice anymore. Wariness, maybe, which she understood.

  She took a deep breath, then let it out slowly before replying. “I guess this is me apologizing for being such a bitch last night. You were just being…You were just being you. You’ve always been the kind of guy who wants to take care of everybody and fix everything. I guess I forgot that. Which was stupid of me, because that was one of my favorite things about being your friend. And I really just wanted to say I’m sorry. For last night.”

  She was sorry for a lot of things that had happened between them, but she didn’t intend to tell him that. This call was just about the previous night.

  “I think you get a pass for last night. It’s a bit difficult seeing a place that’s so special to you wrecked like it was. How’d the clean-up go today?”

  Mel chuckled and groaned, flipping onto her back to stare up at the ceiling. “Anybody ever told you that you’re too nice? Clean-up went really well. Although my muscles have already begun to lodge a protest. I’m not really used to that much cleaning.”

  “What, you fancy doctor types don’t pick up after yourselves? Poor Anna.” Caine was actually teasing her. Teasing her the way he’d used to. It felt…nice. And unsettling.

  “Yeah.” She didn’t say anything for a little while, instead studying the gentle rotation of the fan. “Look, Gage hinted that you want us to be more than friends.”

  He sighed. “And I know that you’re not ready for that. I screwed up and you don’t trust me. I get that. So, quit biting your lip and tell me what’s going on.”

  She
quickly released her top lip. “I want us to try to be friends. If we can. I mean, if you want to. I just—“

  “Breathe, Mel.” Caine’s words were barely more than a whisper. “You always tend to ramble when you’re nervous. I think we can manage friends. In fact, I’d really like that. It’s been difficult since I came back to town.”

  Difficult. She almost laughed at that. “People not rushing to be BFFs with the mayor?”

  “The mayor part hasn’t been the problem. It’s the lawyer part. Most of the cases I handle are for local businesses, but I take on some civil cases. Eventually, you’ve got half the town annoyed with you. You and Micah coming back to town is one of the best things to happen to me in a long time.”

  They talked for a few more minutes, making idle conversation. When she hung up, Mel didn’t move for a long while, fingers rubbing absent circles over the patches of the quilt. Things felt a little more right in her world for the first time in years. If she thought too much about that fact, she’d run scared as hell. Right now, she’d just be happy to have her friend back.

  Chapter 5

  Caine drove through Town Square in his golf cart, feeling more than a little ridiculous. Jemma Hartsfield and her minions stopped in to see him today. They made no bones about reminding him that the mayor should use the kind gift he’d been given by the town. They hadn’t seen him in it lately. Easier to drive the stupid thing for a little while than listen to them nag him constantly.

  “Are you the mayor or the circus ringmaster?”

  He slowed to a stop and turned to see the man who’d called out to him. Micah Carr had just come out of the bakery, a little boy in one hand, a red Rangers backpack in the other. The boy looked exactly like his father had when they’d met so long ago, all boney limbs and dark brown curls. “Bite me, Carr. Nice to see you. Cutting out early? Must be nice.”