“Let go.” He whispered the words into her ear.
She shook her head, denying what he wanted, what they both wanted. But he wouldn’t be denied. He kept touching her, stroking her, kissing her neck, nibbling on her collarbone. He knew that she was close. Close but still fighting.
He turned her around, so that she was facing him, and captured her mouth with his own. He kissed her, hard and deep, and slipped his hand between her legs again. He swallowed her shocked gasps and blissful moans as he drove her harder and faster toward the edge, until he felt her tense and shudder and finally…release.
She trembled and sagged against him, burying her face in his shirt. He held her close, gently sliding his hand up and down her back and feeling just a little bit smug as he waited for her breathing to even out again.
“Well.” She cleared her throat. “That was a new experience for me.”
He tipped her chin up and brushed his lips against hers again. “A good one, I hope.”
She sighed. “Oh. Yeah.”
Though his own body was still aching with arousal, he managed to grin at the lazy satisfaction in her tone. “Imagine what we might accomplish if we ever found ourselves near a bed,” he mused.
She pulled away from him, just a little, but the slight withdrawal was enough to make him realize he should have kept that tantalizing thought inside his head. Ashley had made it clear that she didn’t want to get involved with him and what had just happened obviously hadn’t changed her mind in that regard.
“As…interesting…as this was, it was a mistake,” she told him. “And one I’m not going to compound by sleeping with you.”
“It didn’t feel like a mistake when you were trembling in my arms. It felt incredible. And right.”
“Cam—”
Whatever she was going to say, he didn’t want to hear it, so he opened the door and stepped back into the main corridor of the haunted house, where the noise and the dark made conversation impossible.
Because her knees were still shaking and her head was still spinning, Ashley took the hand Cam offered to her and followed him into the darkness. She knew they should talk about what had just happened, but she honestly didn’t know what to say, how to explain her own outrageously reckless behavior.
She wondered if her conversation with Paige had lessened her inhibitions, or if Cam’s kisses had short-circuited her usually rational brain. There had to be some kind of explanation for what she’d just allowed to happen in a public place. The fact that they’d been behind a closed door and completely in the dark failed to lessen the shock she felt with respect to her own actions.
The intensity of her release was unlike anything she’d ever known. Or maybe it was the illicitness of the situation that had intensified the experience. Or maybe it was just that it had been far too long since she’d let herself go so completely.
And yet, her body still ached and yearned, wanting more.
Wanting Cam.
There, she’d admitted it. At least to herself. She wanted Cam Turcotte as much now as she’d wanted him when she was in high school. But she was an adult now, a grown woman, not an idealistic girl. A woman who had experienced love and heartbreak and who wasn’t prepared to walk down that path again.
Paige had been right about the fact that Ashley didn’t have sex for fun, and that was why she couldn’t succumb to the desire that was coursing through her body. She didn’t dare. Because she knew she would never be able to share her body with Cam without letting him into her heart, and she absolutely was not going to fall in love with him again.
No, she had plans for her life, and Cam Turcotte didn’t fit anywhere in those plans.
He didn’t say anything more as he led her across the still-crowded parking lot to his car. It obviously wasn’t as late as she’d thought, but she was more than ready to head home, to say good-night and goodbye to Cam and crawl into bed alone.
Liar.
She scowled at the mocking voice inside her head.
Okay, so what she really wanted was to drag Cam into the house with her and jump him. Because while her body was still humming with pleasure, she didn’t feel completely fulfilled. She wanted him inside of her, moving with her, stoking the long-dormant fire that was suddenly roaring through her body.
I’m not having sex with you, she’d said, and she’d meant those words when she said them. Now, however, she wasn’t feeling quite so adamant. Or maybe she was just feeling a little guilty that he had taken care of her needs and she’d done nothing for him.
Of course, he hadn’t asked for or demanded anything from her. He never had. The first time they’d ever made love had been on her initiative and, even then, even when he’d had more enthusiasm than finesse, he’d tried to ensure she got some pleasure out of the experience.
While sex had never been an earth-shattering experience for her as a teenager, she’d loved Cam wholeheartedly and unashamedly and she’d enjoyed the closeness of being with him. It was a long time after he left before she’d dated anyone else, and longer still before she’d been willing to open up her heart again. But she’d never loved anyone else with the same unrestrained passion; she’d never loved anyone else as much as she’d loved Cam.
And that was precisely why getting involved with him again was a very bad idea.
He pulled into her driveway and cut the engine.
She wanted to protest that he didn’t need to walk her to the door, but she knew he wouldn’t listen. And maybe she needed to say good-night to him on the doorstep, to prove to herself that she was capable of sending him away even when she wanted to drag him inside.
He came around to her side and walked beside her up to the porch.
“You forgot to leave a light on,” he noted.
“I do it all the time,” she admitted, sliding her key into the lock. “Unless it’s dark when I leave, I don’t think about it.”
“Then you should have sensor lights that come on automatically when you move in front of them.”
She pushed the door open and hit the switch on the inside wall, spilling light onto the porch. “I’m a big girl, and this is a safe neighborhood.”
“You’re a single woman living alone. There’s no harm in being cautious.”
“I am cautious,” she told him, then proved it by slipping inside before she could renege on her promise to herself that she wasn’t going to invite him to come in.
“Lock the door,” she heard him call from the other side.
She slid the deadbolt into place, and watched through the sidelight as he walked back to his car and drove away.
Cam slept like hell.
Or maybe it was more accurate to say that he didn’t sleep at all. And when he finally caught a glimpse of the sun beginning to peek over the horizon, he gave up even pretending.
It was his own fault, he knew that. Just as he knew that he could take care of the ache in his body easily enough. But he also knew that any satisfaction would be both temporary and superficial. He wanted more than a physical release—he wanted Ashley. He wanted her naked body beneath him, her soft breasts pressed against his chest, her long legs wrapped around his hips—
He shoved the image out of his mind as he pushed back the tangled covers.
He needed a shower. A very cold shower.
And then he needed a plan.
Because he knew better than to think he’d made any progress with Ashley last night. Sure, it might have seemed like they were on the same wavelength while they were in the haunted house, but he knew that she would do some serious backtracking in the light of day. Hell, she’d started backtracking even before they got in his car to drive home.
He firmly believed that the sizzling sexual attraction between them was proof that the chemistry had never died, but he knew that she still needed some convincing.
He turned off the shower and yanked a towel from the bar. It was early yet, but he would grab a cup of coffee on the way to his parents’ house to pick up Maddie—maybe get
there in time for some of his mother’s buttermilk pancakes—then take his daughter to her ballet class and, afterward, for a quick trip to the hardware store.
Ashley was working at the computer late Saturday morning when the doorbell rang. She was tempted to ignore the summons. She wasn’t expecting any company and, as a result of having gotten very little sleep the night before, she wasn’t in the mood to chat with anyone selling anything.
But the bell rang again, as if whoever was on the other side knew she was home, so she finally pushed away from the desk.
Peeking through the sidelight and finding Cam on her porch only made her more wary. After what had happened between them the night before, she needed some time to figure out how to deal with him, and how to deal with her own mixed-up feelings.
How the heck was she supposed to carry on a conversation with the man who had taken her to heights of pleasure she hadn’t experienced in a very long time? Especially when her hormones were already revving in anticipation of a return trip.
She wanted to pretend that last night had never happened, but the heat in his eyes as they slowly skimmed over every inch of her body made that impossible.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I need access to your electrical panel.”
She lifted a brow. “That’s one I haven’t heard before.”
He grinned. “It’s not a secret male code, just a precaution to ensure that I don’t get electrocuted while installing your new lights.”
“I don’t need new lights. And I thought you were a doctor, not a handyman.”
“Actually, I’m a doctor who happens to be very handy,” he told her. “And I picked up some motion sensor lights for you at the hardware store this morning.”
“I don’t mean to sound ungrateful,” she said, all too aware that was precisely how she sounded, “but I didn’t ask you to pick up any lights for me.”
“I didn’t do it for you, I did it for me.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “How does putting up new lights for me benefit you?”
“It will ensure I worry less about you coming home after dark.”
“There’s no reason for you to worry,” she insisted.
“I’m sure that’s true, but I’ll worry, anyway. So letting me put up these lights would be doing me a big favor.”
“That is the most ridiculous argument I’ve ever heard.”
“But creative.”
Her lips curved. “I’ll give you that.”
“So—” he prompted. “Your electrical panel?”
“It’s in the basement.” She stepped away from the door so that he could enter.
“Was I interrupting something?” he asked, gesturing to the computer desk and the pile of notes she’d printed.
“Just lesson planning. We’re studying the growth cycle of the pumpkin this week in preparation for Halloween at the end of the month, and I was hoping to find some kind of art project that would reinforce the lesson for the kids.”
“Don’t you just teach the same stuff year after year?”
“I have to cover the same basic curriculum,” she admitted, leading him down into the basement. “But I like to implement some new projects or approach the topics from different angles to keep the subjects fresh and interesting.”
“I assume that’s fresh and interesting for you, since you don’t have the same group of kids for more than one year.”
She smiled. “Yes, it’s for me. I don’t ever want to become one of those teachers who bores her students.”
“I don’t think there’s any danger of that,” Cam told her. “Maddie is always talking about school and she’s always enthusiastic.”
“Where is Maddie today?” she asked.
“She went back to my mom’s after her ballet class. Whenever it comes to a choice between the hardware store with Daddy or the toy store with Grandma, she abandons me without a backward glance.”
Ashley smiled as she gestured to the electrical panel. “Everything’s labeled, so it shouldn’t be too difficult to find the breakers you need to shut off.”
He opened the panel, scanned the tags, flipped some switches.
“That’s it?”
“For now,” he said, closing the panel door. “They’ll need to be turned back on again when I’m done.”
She nodded and followed him back up the stairs.
It didn’t take long for Cam to install the lights. At least, it seemed to Ashley that not very much time had passed before he was back at the door to turn the breaker on again. She was making herself a sandwich and though she still thought it was smart to keep her distance from Cam, it seemed impolite not to offer him some lunch in exchange for the lights.
But if she felt awkward inviting him to stay for a sandwich, it was nothing compared to the discomfort she felt when he picked up the clinic brochure she’d inadvertently left on the counter.
She was dishing up potato salad alongside the sandwiches when she saw him reach for the pamphlet, the bold letters practically jumping off of the front: PINEHURST ASSISTED REPRODUCTION CLINIC
Cam looked at the cover, where the date and time of an appointment were noted, then at Ashley. She’d told him about the endometriosis and her participation in the clinical trial, so he didn’t understand why she would have an appointment at PARC. Unless—
“Are you pregnant?” he asked her.
Her cheeks flushed and she snatched the pamphlet from his hand. “No.”
He hadn’t realized he was holding his breath in anticipation of her response until the air whooshed out of his lungs again.
Not pregnant.
That was good, because pregnant was definitely more of a complication than he was ready to handle at the beginning of a relationship—assuming that he and Ashley were at the beginning stages of a relationship. But if she wasn’t pregnant—
“Then why do you have an appointment at PARC?”
“I’m keeping my options open.”
“Options,” he echoed, still uncomprehending.
“I want to have a baby, a family,” she said, as if that should have been obvious. “I thought I was on track with Trevor, but obviously that train got derailed. Now I’m looking at some alternatives.”
“Don’t you think this…alternative…is a little extreme? You’re only twenty-nine—”
“And I have endometriosis,” she reminded him. “Before I started the drug trial, my specialist recommended radical surgery.”
“A complete hysterectomy,” he guessed.
She nodded, tears filling her eyes. For a woman who loved children as much as Ashley, that course of action would be devastating.
“Is the Fedentropin helping?” he asked her.
“It’s bought me time, but it’s not a cure.”
Which he knew, of course. After she’d first mentioned the drug to him, he’d done some research. Because the drug was still in the trial phase, a lot of information was restricted, but he had learned that the medication was targeted specifically at women for whom more traditional treatments—usually birth control pills—were unsuccessful.
“But having a baby without a father—”
“Don’t lecture me on the difficulties of being a single parent,” she warned him.
“I wasn’t going to lecture,” he denied. “I was just going to suggest that you reconsider all of your options before you pursue artificial methods of conception.”
“I have considered all of my options and I’m not rushing into anything. I’m only going to the clinic to get the information I need before making any final decision.” She nudged his plate closer. “Now eat.”
“You’re always so gracious when we sit down at a table together.”
“Must be your innate charm that brings out the best in me.”
He picked up his fork and speared a chunk of potato. Ashley took a bite of her sandwich, clearly signaling that the conversation was at an end.
But Cam couldn’t stop thinking abou
t what she’d revealed. He wasn’t surprised that she wanted a child, but he did wonder how far she was willing to go to get what she wanted—and if she was considering that another one of her options might be to find a ready-made family in need of a mother.
He munched on his sandwich and wondered if he’d completely misread the situation with her. Had he made a mistake in believing that he and Ashley were rekindling their romance? Was it possible that she didn’t have any interest in a relationship with him and only wanted to be a mother to a little girl who desperately needed one?
It would be the irony of all ironies. The woman he’d married didn’t want to have anything to do with her child, and now he was halfway in love with a woman who might only want to be with him because of his daughter.
Chapter Nine
Ashley always looked forward to Sunday brunch with her sister and her cousin. For the past several years, they’d met once a month at Michelynne’s Café in the village to eat and chat and have what they fondly referred to as their girl time. Ashley had worried, after Megan and Gage got married, that her sister might start to skip out on their ritual gathering, but she was pleased that the tradition continued to endure.
Sometimes they celebrated, sometimes they commiserated, but always they supported one another unconditionally. So when Ashley announced that her appointment at the clinic hadn’t gone quite as she’d hoped, that the doctor she’d met with had insisted she wait six months before pursuing intrauterine insemination, she was surprised by their responses.
“Six months doesn’t seem unreasonable,” Paige said.
“Six months is half a year—and two-thirds the term of a normal pregnancy,” Ashley felt compelled to point out.
“But you’re young,” Megan said.
“I’m almost thirty,” she said, and the knowledge of that birthday on the horizon taunted her. She’d had a plan for her life, and she’d expected to be a wife and a mother long before now.
The Pregnancy Plan Page 10