Harlequin Romance September 2021 Box Set

by Andrea Bolter

  She liked the man. More than avocado on toast. More than any man she’d ever known. She liked his smile, his laugh. She liked his self-awareness, his arrogance, his self-containment, his focus. She liked the way he looked at her, the way he kissed her, the way he never baulked whenever she was accidentally vulnerable.

  What she didn’t like was that, despite all that, he had the ability to hurt her without meaning to, or wanting to, just like the rest of them.

  Either way she couldn’t sit around waiting for him to come back. It was driving her nuts.

  Padding down the stairs, she found Pie sitting at the front door, his little nose twitching as he stared at the patch of sunshine slicing through the mail slot. Turned out she wasn’t the only one waiting for Ben to return.

  Her heart—unguarded, unprepared—gave a twitch. Then a thump. And didn’t quite go back to the same spot it had been before.

  Muttering under her breath about toughening up, for Pete’s sake, about keeping a clear head and staying the course, she shucked her feet into a pair of sandals, instructed both dogs to stay put, and headed out of the door.

  Across the road, Misty was sitting on her stoop, blowing bubbles, as if that might bring in custom. Misty lifted her chin in greeting. “You guys disappeared like old smoke last night. Was sure I wouldn’t see either of you for days.”

  “Funny. On that note, you seen Ben, by any chance?”

  “Why?”

  “He just... He went out in a bit of a hurry. And I want to make sure he isn’t...lost, or something.”

  “Lost? A man that huge can’t get lost.” Misty stopped, mid bubble blow, her eyes dancing over Nora’s face. “Why did he leave in a bit of a hurry?”

  “Ah... He’s starting the clean-up of Clancy’s stuff today. I’m helping.”

  “He’s down with that?”

  “Me helping?”

  “Going through Clancy’s stuff.”

  “I...hadn’t asked.” Nora remembered again the look on his face just before he’d left, and her heart squeezed in her chest. “It can’t be fun, for anyone, but I truly believe this whole process will be good for him. Cathartic.”

  “Don’t know about that. Some people like to reminisce. Others like to burn the past to the ground. You know what’s truly cathartic? Those glowing cheeks of yours, the lopsided stride, the hickey on your neck.”

  Nora’s hand went straight to the spot on her neck that Ben particularly liked to nibble.

  Then Misty’s eyes narrowed. “Looks like the man knows how to lead. Are you letting him do that? Or are you spreading your sunshine all over the place and hoping he’ll do as he’s told?”

  Nora blinked. Gawped. Struggled to find an apt response.

  Misty shook her head. “You’re a smart cookie, Nora, and ridiculously compassionate. But you’re a nuffy when it comes to the big stuff.”

  Nora crossed her arms. Then uncrossed them, not wanting to appear defensive. Or feel that way, to be honest. “What big stuff?”

  “Ben Hawthorne is a big, important guy. He sorts out multinational conglomerates, business empires, small countries. He did not come all the way over here to sort out his grandmother’s dress closet.”

  Misty waited, as if Nora might suddenly click her fingers and say, I get it. But she did not. Could not. Would not. Forcing Misty to shout, “Honey bun, the man came home for you.”

  Nora waited for the bluster and fluster of outrage to come over her. Instead, Misty’s words uncurled beneath her defences, like a cat waking up and stretching after a long, luxurious nap in the sun.

  “So take care,” said Misty, “and give the man some credit, that’s all I’m saying. Drinks tomorrow?”

  Nora gave her a thumbs up before she turned and walked back towards home. Clancy’s home. Ben’s home. Not hers. She’d been a tenant, but now was merely a guest, at the mercy of Ben’s pleasure. His choice, his decision, his lead.

  Add the feelings she was feeling for the guy, feelings swirling through her, bumping into one another, making her feel hot, and flustered and nauseous, and she hadn’t realised how little control she had over the whole situation until that moment.

  Misty might have been right about some things, but she was wrong about the sunshine. Nora had thought she was deep in Sunshine Mode, but she’d been skirting the edges, letting Ben’s ease, and strength, drag her towards the centre.

  If she was going to get through the next couple of weeks in one piece, it was time to ramp things up.

  * * *

  Ben walked for hours, past new stores and old pubs, in search of air, space, and perspective. Or, at a pinch, a teleportation device that could take him back to London, a month or two before, when his life had been logical and straightforward and steady.

  Before Clancy had died. Before he’d ever heard of The Girl Upstairs.

  Hell, maybe he’d go back further, a couple of years even, to before he’d found Clancy reading the letter over the empty fire grate in the sitting room. The letter telling her that Ben’s birth mother had died.

  Ben’s birth mother who, as it had turned out, had also been Clancy’s daughter.

  Aida.

  Aida, who’d left Ben on Clancy’s doorstep when he was five years old. Aida, whom Clancy had told if she walked away she’d never be allowed to return. Aida, who’d been living in the world, for twenty-something years, without Ben’s knowledge.

  All of which he’d only discovered a week after Aida had died.

  Clancy had lied to him. Outright. For years. Calling him her “adopted grandson”, which, she’d later argued, was mostly true. The grandmother part, not the adopted part. As if that justified what she’d done.

  She’d taken from him the chance to meet his mother. Even when he was a grown man, she’d kept it from him. She’d been so stubborn and sure of herself.

  By the time Ben finished walking, the sun had begun to set and the early evening chill started to cut through his clothes. The streetlamps created pools of golden light up and down the block and the house—his grandmother’s house—looked down at him, all but daring him to make a decision already.

  Sell me. Rent me. Move in. Give me away. Burn me to the ground. Walk away and never look back.

  The only decision Ben made was to go inside, as Nora would be there, and that was as far as he could think.

  Music played softly from Clancy’s old radio in the kitchen. The dogs lay splayed out on a blanket in the entrance—the little one’s tail wagged as it saw him, the big one snored through.

  Nora sat curled up on the big, soft couch in the sitting room; a blanket wrapped about her shoulders, a book in her lap. The fire flickering behind the grate sent long shadows about the room, making her skin look warm to the touch.

  Even at this distance he could feel her in the air. As if she mucked with his perspective on a cellular level. Despite his assurances, to her and himself, there was no way he was getting out of this thing unscathed. The only part of the story left untold was whether it would be his doing, or hers.

  He must have made a sound as she spun on the chair and looked up, those big blue eyes of hers luminous in the low light, and shadowed with worry. For him. The guy people came to when they were in trouble. It was a hell of a thing.

  “Hey,” she said, her voice soft, rough from under-use. Then she closed her book gently, using her finger as a bookmark. “Want a cuppa?”

  “No. Thank you. I’m good. I grabbed something when I was out.”

  She uncurled her legs, as if to make room for him. He moved into the room, for the first time in over two years. And he sat. The ancient springs tilted them both towards the centre. Towards one another.

  Smiling still, all sweetness and light, she held up her book. “Jane Eyre.”

  “Ah.”

  “Have you read it?”

  “I have, actually. A
long time ago. Rite of passage, growing up here. All a bit dramatic for my taste.”

  Nora laughed, the sound simplifying everything and creating a quickening inside him, all at once. “I know, right? But Clancy adored it. Was it the drama, or the house, or was there a tragic love affair in her past; a Rochester of her own?”

  He was aware Nora was making conversation in order to alleviate whatever tension had sent him running in the first place, but she had no idea she’d just stumbled over the exact reason he’d wanted to be anywhere but here.

  Clancy. Love. Affairs. Family. The lies binding them together.

  Nora moved, the blanket dropping away to reveal a loose T-shirt hanging off one shoulder. He knew how fast he could lose himself in that soft warmth of her neck. How it would make all of the noise in his head disappear.

  Wanting her because he wanted her was biology. Using her to block out the ghosts in his head was an ass move. He sat forward instead, letting his head fall into his hands.

  “Dammit,” she said, her voice velvet soft, a little edgy. “I was trying so hard not to push. But it’s what I do. You don’t have to tell me anything. Or do any of the things I suggest. I have thick skin, Ben, so please, don’t be afraid to tell me to shut up. Or back off. Or leave.”

  “Don’t,” Ben said, the word busting out of him.

  “Don’t...ask?”

  “Don’t leave. Not yet.”

  He heard Nora’s sharp intake of breath beside him, before she eventually whispered, “I’m right here.”

  Then she reached out, her hand landing on his knee, in nothing but comfort. But the scent of her, the warmth, the sincerity, the complexity, knocked about the empty spaces inside him. Begging to be let in. To fill him up. To help him forget.

  He clenched his jaw hard enough he heard a crack.

  “If you’re keen on sticking with the strong, silent thing,” she said, “more power to you. You wear it well. But the best thing about me is that I’m nothing to you. A firefly flittering past in the night. Whatever you tell me goes with me. If that helps at all.”

  Ben lifted his head from the cage of his hands and turned her way.

  She was so still. So calm. Her focus, complete. The power of it, of her, when she wasn’t putting on a show, when she was simply being, was staggering. And she had no idea.

  “You are not nothing, Nora.”

  Her recoil was infinitesimal, but he felt it. “I’m sorry?”

  “You, Nora Letterman, are not nothing.”

  Her eyes sparked with defiance. “That’s not what I meant. Of course, I’m not nothing. I’m amazing! What I meant to say was, in the grand scheme of things, I’m unimportant to you.”

  Ben slowly sat up straight. “I’m not sure where you’re getting your news, Nora, but you are not nothing, and you are not unimportant to me. If you were, you would not be sitting here, beside me, in Clancy’s house, with your hand on my knee.”

  She pulled her hand away as if burnt.

  He caught it; brought it back to his side of the couch. Cupped both of his larger hands around hers. Felt her fingers curl into his palm.

  She shook her head, but didn’t pull away. “Everything’s coming out wrong. My point is, none of this is meant to be about me. This, me being here, sticking around, this is all about you. Helping you.”

  For a long fraught moment her eyes remained stuck on his. He felt as if he were falling into her, till he could feel all of her parts—the fire and smarts and savvy and insecurity, the sensitivity and the blinders, the damage and the heart.

  Eventually, she said, “I’m sorry, but I’m struggling here. You won’t tell me what happened between you and Clancy, but you want me to trust that you’re a good guy in all this, even though Clancy is...was one of the loves of my life. You want to stay, to help, but now you don’t want that? What is it you want from me, Ben?”

  “Nora, just give me a minute.”

  After a moment, Nora gently tugged her hand free and tucked it back, safe, into the folds of her blanket and said, “Okay.”

  Ben coughed out a humourless laugh. He didn’t do this—talk, share, self-examine. But somehow this complicated creature had unravelled him without even trying. Forced him to think about things he’d kept locked up for years. Clancy, his mother, his loss, on both counts. Till the ropes that held him together felt frayed, and untethered, unrecognisable.

  He had to let some of it out or he’d explode. Could he tell her about Clancy? About the falling out, or the feeling he had as to why Clancy had taken on a tenant for the first time in her life, his suspicion that she’d known she was sick a long time before she let on?

  No. It would break Nora’s heart. And he knew her enough to know there was a very good chance she’d shoot the messenger. Perhaps he could lead her there, gently. Help her figure it out on her own. It wasn’t a lie. He was protecting her.

  And if that wasn’t the most ironic moment of his entire life, he wasn’t sure what was.

  He glanced across, found the fire playing over her hair, her face, her eyes, like a rainbow caused by sunlight slicing through a crystal. Her eyes were bright, restive. If he felt laid bare, it was clear she did too.

  He held her gaze as he said, “It’s been a rough few weeks.”

  “Yep.”

  “But through it all, you’ve been the lighthouse in the storm. A warm voice at the end of some bitterly cold days. The cream in my coffee.”

  She swallowed. “And there I was thinking I was a pain in your ass.”

  “That too.” A smile settled on his mouth. She did that. It was a gift. He bumped her knee with his, then left it there. “If you really want to help me, Nora, I don’t need advice, or a nudge, or to be pushed. I can do what needs to be done. If you really want to help, all I need is for you to be you.”

  She pressed her knee more fully against his, and said, “That might just be the most spectacularly lovely thing anyone has ever said to me.” Her brow furrowed before smoothing. “And that’s not me being cute, or sassy, or...whatever. I mean it.”

  He smiled.

  She smiled.

  Then her blanket slipped again, tugging her top with it so he got an eyeful of warm creamy shoulder, a whole lot of décolletage and the truth colouring what else he wanted from her twisted all over again.

  Ben pressed his hands to his knees and stood. “With that,” he said on the back of an old-man groan, “I’m going to head to bed early tonight. I am officially dead on my feet.”

  Nora wrapped the blanket tighter around herself as she stood, her bare feet curling into the rug, the glowing embers creating dips and shadows on her lovely face. “Sure. Good plan. Smart. I’ll head up too. Alone. To my room. Keep the place quiet for you. Goodnight, Ben.”

  “Goodnight, Nora.”

  With that she ducked out of the room, her voice calling softly for the dogs to follow. Which they did, the little one giving Ben a forlorn glance, almost as if it was disappointed in him for not following as well.

  I hear ya, buddy, he thought. Then he trudged down the hall to his old room, running both hands over his face as if trying to make the skin fit.

  He nudged off his shoes, tugged his jumper over the back of his head, ready to fall on top of the bed and sleep for a year. Then, when he turned on the bedside lamp, he saw a book on the side table.

  A copy of Jane Eyre, sporting a Post-it note reading, Read me! with a little picture of Alice in Wonderland sketched into the corner.

  He recognised it instantly as Clancy’s copy. The spine faded, pages all but falling apart. He opened the book to find it soft, well-read, dog-eared, with notes in the margin, in Clancy’s tiny handwriting; exclamation marks, smiley faces, sighs. A big circle around the first mention of Thornfield Hall.

  He could picture the book on side tables, in Clancy’s gnarled hands, face down on the hall table. Could
feel Clancy’s love for high drama, for romance, for her friends, for this house, and for him, as patent as if she were right beside him.

  With no plan in mind, Ben headed back out into the hall and through the kitchen to find Nora at the bottom of the stairs, the blanket still wrapped around her shoulders. One foot was on the floor, the other crooked, as if she was heading down and not up.

  Her eyes were huge, luminous in the low light as she whispered, “The book.”

  Ben held it up.

  Her sweet face fell. “Of course, I put it there before you said all you said about not wanting my brand of help.” She let her hovering foot fall to the floor beside the other one. “But I still feel like a goose. I’m so sorry.”

  Ben took another step her way. “You have nothing to apologise for.”

  “I’m pushy.”

  “You’re wonderful. And I’m a cranky bastard. And you’re wonderful.”

  Her mouth fell open in a half-smile. “You might have mentioned that already.”

  “Bears mentioning twice.”

  Her throat worked. Her eyes were dark and beguiling. A tug of war being fought behind their depths. When they caught on his, they captured him whole.

  “Ben, can I...?” She took a step his way, her hand trailing over the wallpaper. “Can I ask you something? Just one small thing. Something Misty said today—”

  “What’s that?”

  “Actually, forget it.”

  Ben ambled several slow steps closer, his blood hastening in his veins at the way she watched him. His breaths deepening as he neared. “Nora, not all that many minutes ago I heard myself call you the cream in my coffee like some spotty seventeen-year-old writing bad song lyrics in his bedroom. There is nothing you can say that will top that.”

  She laughed, the sound husky and raw. “Don’t be so sure. Misty suggested today that the reason you’ve yet to do any of the things I thought you came here to do is that you didn’t come back here for Clancy’s sake. That you actually came back here for me.”

  Her eyes fluttered, full of tenderness and doubt. The readiness to be shot down. The complete lack of faith in her own drawing power.