All I Ever Wanted

by Marilyn Brant, Caisey Quinn, Rhonda Helms

  No, not just sexual. I raked my hand through my hair then rubbed the back of my neck. Dammit, where was she?

  Man, that crushed look in her eyes when I’d told her… And then she’d given me her hugest smile anyway, congratulated me… Yup, I was the world’s biggest, stupidest asshole.

  That was no way to treat a friend.

  No way to treat Maya.

  I’d hurt her. With my bluntness, with my hot-and-cold approach. I was somehow drawn to her now but unable to do anything about it. I was leaving, for God’s sake. This wasn’t the time to start exploring a new relationship.

  Much less with someone I valued so much as a friend.

  Frustration tightened my chest. I groaned and headed toward the row of coats. I reached to grab hers when I saw her come back through the door.

  “Maya,” I said.

  She stopped, turned. There was a stiffness in her limbs now that hadn’t been there before as she made her way to me, and her cheeks were bright pink from the cold. “Hey, Oliver.” The earlier easy warmth, the seductive yet innocent flashes in her eyes were long gone. Killed by me and my stupidity.

  I clenched my jaw. “I was just coming to find you.”

  “I needed some air. Sorry.” Her voice was light and breezy. It sounded right. She even gave me her trademark wide smile. So why did my chest get tighter? “I’m going to get some punch. Want some?”

  Something in my heart cracked at the strange vibration of awkwardness between us. But it was better this way. I nodded, an attempt to keep the conversation light. She nodded in return and headed to the table.

  We can do this, I told myself. Hang out and talk like we always have.

  Except…everything had changed. Maya loved me, desired me, and knowing that had shifted things in my head and heart. Hell, and now I was having my own strange feelings. Just thinking about dancing with her, the soft intakes of breath she’d sucked in whenever her breasts had rubbed my chest. The curve of her smile. How the way she’d looked up at me made me feel like no one else in this whole damn town mattered except me.

  My body coiled with a slam of intense need. It was crazy, probably beyond stupid, but I wanted to just have one kiss.

  With slow breaths, I reminded myself that no way was I going to ruin a true friendship just to explore this startling attraction toward her then leave in a few months. Friends didn’t do that to each other. Maya meant too much to me.

  I saw a couple of guys give her the side eye as she filled two cups for us, and a vein on the side of my head began to throb. Then one out-of-towner who had to be a few years older than me sidled up to her and started talking. His hand dropped casually to his side when he leaned toward her, and he brushed his palm on her lower back.

  I took a step toward them.

  “Hey, man,” Craig said, jumping right in my way. He dug a flask out of his back pocket and waved it in my face. “Just refilled this. Let’s go somewhere else.”

  “Good idea,” I said as I snatched the flask from his hand.

  “What the hell?” he protested.

  “I’ll get this back to you tomorrow.” I grabbed a crumpled twenty from my pocket and thrust it in his empty hand. “Go buy some more, dude.” I strode toward Maya and butted right in between her and the guy. “Hey, let’s get out of here. Wanna go for a walk?”

  She peeked at the flask in my hand then shrugged. “Um, sure, okay.”

  The guy huffed, but I ignored him.

  She and I donned our coats then shuffled outside. I poured booze into our drinks, and we walked for a few minutes in silence. Maya maintained a bit of distance from me; I was surprised by how much it stung. I took a sip of the concoction and blanched as I coughed hard.

  “This shit is nasty,” I said.

  “Yeah, Craig has crappy taste in alcohol,” she agreed with a slight chuckle after taking her own drink.

  We headed toward the center of town. There weren’t a lot of people milling around, since most were either at home or partying it up in the barn. Lights twinkled from the trees and the storefronts.

  “So,” she finally said in a light tone. “Paris, huh? What brought this on?”

  I took a larger drink, which burned a path down my throat into my gut. About the only good thing was it warmed me up so the cold wasn’t quite as painful. “It’s been a secret hope of mine for a long time.” Our footsteps were quiet and in rhythm as we walked along the sidewalk. The golden lights bounced off Maya’s curls. I forced my gaze back to the town. “I love working at the bakery, but I want to learn more. Regular college wasn’t right for me. But this…this is what I want to do.”

  “The town is going to miss you a lot when you go,” she said evenly.

  Her tone was steady, no trace of the deep flare of hurt I’d seen in her eyes earlier. Something about that made me feel even worse—not for her, but for myself. Because it was becoming all too clear that she was erecting a wall around herself, closing off to me in a measure of self-protection. She was already beginning the process of pulling away, even if she didn’t fully realize it.

  And how crazy was it that I was so in tune with her as to recognize it? What exactly did that mean?

  “Can I ask you a question?” I asked.

  “Sure.” She took a deep swig from her cup, gave a funny little shudder, and then sighed.

  I grabbed her arm and tucked her out of the wind, into a small alcove in front of the darkened barber shop. I stared down into those endless eyes, drawn by a glint of light catching off their rich color. I didn’t want those eyes to stop being so open to me. Selfish, yes. But true. “What is it about this town that you love so much?”

  Yes, I liked Abbott Springs. My family had lived here my whole life. But there were so many things beyond it that I wanted to see.

  She drew in a slow breath then exhaled. Reached her free hand up and fiddled with a curl. Her head tilted to the side in thought. I could tell by the slight swerve in her body, the fumbling in her fingers that she was buzzed. “I know it seems ridiculous to be so attached to a place. But there’s something so amazing about feeling like you belong. Like when you walk down the street, there are people genuinely happy to see you. That you make a difference in someone’s life, even if it’s just doing something small for them.” She paused, and her eyes flickered with a shadow of feeling. “Not everyone has that. Not everyone feels like they belong.”

  I nodded—that was certainly true enough.

  Maya tightened her jaw and looked dead into my eyes. “Everything I love most in this world is in this town, Oliver.” Her voice hitched, and she swallowed. “How could I ever want to leave it?”

  The air locked in my chest. My head rushed and buzzed with the hum of a thousand words battering at my brain. It was one thing to have your sister tell you how someone felt about you. Another thing to have the woman herself looking up at you, practically admitting those feelings.

  Maya blinked, ripped her gaze from mine, and gave an awkward laugh, a dark flush stealing across her cheeks. “Oh, God,” she said on a broken sigh. “I…I can’t believe I just…”

  Before I even realized what I was doing, I dropped my nearly empty cup and captured Maya’s face in my hands then pressed my closed mouth against hers. I felt her stiffen in shock for a brief moment, her cup plopping to the ground near mine, then sigh and melt into me like butter simmering in a hot skillet. She opened her mouth and drew me in, and I savored Maya for the first time.

  Her scent, her taste drugged me instantly. Beyond the spices of the alcohol lay something deeper, something feminine that made me ache for more. I wound my fingers in her hair, tilted her head, deepened the kiss. Our tongues swirled, and she slipped a hand along my throat, her fingers brushing my thrumming pulse.

  My whole body throbbed, and the zipper of my jeans pressed painfully tight against my crotch. I strengthened my grip in her hair to keep from reaching down and stroking those gorgeous breasts. Blood flooded to every limb, surged and throbbed in my torso.

&n
bsp; Her hands clenched my shoulders, fingers dug into the muscles. I pressed her against the brick and ran my mouth along the tender flesh right under her jaw.

  “Oh God,” she breathed, arched, rubbed against me.

  My hand reached under her coat, stroked her belly. She gripped the back of my hair and pressed my mouth closer to her skin.

  I was overwhelmed, my body burning like nothing I’d ever felt before. Maya was setting me on fire. Her body ground against mine, and she exhaled a sharp breath then reached a hand down to give one small, tentative stroke down the side of my hip. Her hand curled around my ass and forced me even closer.

  It took everything I had to not beg for her to release me from the jeans.

  “I want you, Oliver.” Her words were so raw, so husky as she panted in my ear. I could smell the light huffs of alcohol as her words stirred my hair.

  I closed my eyes and felt myself grow impossibly hard. Every single cell in my body vibrated with need for her. “I want you too,” I managed to say. Couldn’t even explain what was happening between us, why I was throbbing so hard in a way I never had before. But in this moment I wanted to lay her down on a bed, strip her naked, and slide my tongue across her body. Make her come.

  Her head tilted back, and I realized my fingers had wound in her curls and tightened even more. But she didn’t complain, merely gasped and revealed her slender column of neck. I relaxed my fingers a touch but pressed a kiss there. Felt the mad flutter right beneath her skin.

  “You should come home with me,” she said in a thick voice, and I almost went off in my jeans right there.

  Everything in me screamed at me to say yes. But I was buzzed, and I knew for sure she was too. This wasn’t something we should do in this state.

  It was so hard to pull back and look her in the eye. “I want to. But…I don’t think it’s the right decision right now.”

  She sighed then nodded, straightened her back. Ran her hands through those tuggable curls. “Sorry. I just…I got caught up and—”

  “No.” I stopped her speech with a finger over her mouth. Stroked the soft skin. Leaned down and kissed her lips, just one last time. My shaft was so raging hard that it was painful now, and I throbbed with unsatisfied need. Oh God, this was going to suck. I sighed. “Don’t apologize. Please.”

  She stared at me for a long, long moment. Those walls she’d put up earlier were down again. Her mouth was swollen and red from kissing me, her hair mussed. Eyes glazed and hooded with desire. She trembled just a bit, though I wasn’t sure if it was from the weather or from what had just happened.

  Seeing her blatant arousal, all mine for the taking, I was slammed with the urge to strip her naked and take her, feel her wrapped around me. I forced myself to focus on the cold air around us instead.

  “Okay,” she finally whispered. “I won’t apologize then.” She closed her eyes and chuckled. “I am feeling the alcohol a bit.”

  “Let me walk you home.” Of course, I was going to whether she liked it or not.

  She gave a short nod, straightening her clothes, then reached down and picked up our forgotten cups. When she stood, she swayed. “Whoa,” she said with a bigger laugh this time. “Maybe I’m a little more drunk than I thought. I’m not used to drinking this much.”

  I kept Maya close as I walked her home. It was still bitter cold out. But my chest cracked and thawed during our stroll, despite my better senses. Walking with her, watching as she pointed out her favorite Winterfest displays, seeing the happiness in her eyes just felt…right.

  When we finally got to her house, Maya spun around slowly and gave me a wide smile. She pressed her back to the door. Her lips parted and she ran her tongue along the center of her upper lip. “Thank you for walking me home. I had a great time.”

  She unlocked her door, gave me a crooked smile that tightened my throat, then quietly went inside.

  It took all of my inner strength to turn around and walk home. Because every single cell in my body screamed at me to rip the door open and follow Maya’s curvy ass inside.

  Maya

  On Sunday afternoon, the Skate Shack was filled with people gnawing on pastries and chugging hot drinks. Sami handed out hot chocolate, giving polite smiles to customers. I marched right over to her and gave her the stink eye.

  “Ahem,” I said as I thrust out a mittened hand. “I do believe I would like to have a satanically decadent cocoa, please.”

  Sami cracked a slip of a real smile. “Hey, Maya.” She handed me one of her delicious concoctions, steam pouring from the top of the Styrofoam cup.

  I sipped, sighed in bliss. Thankfully, after the drinks I’d had last night, I wasn’t suffering from a bad hangover. I’d had the smarts to chug a large cup of water and pop aspirin before conking out in bed. So I was able to fully enjoy today.

  Not to mention the fact that, on the inside, I was still in gleeful shock over the kiss. I’d fallen asleep dreaming about Oliver. Dreaming about what could happen today. Hope was a fragile, living thing in my heart.

  “You have a real gift, you know,” I declared to Sami after another sip. “This is the best hot chocolate ever. I crave it every winter.”

  Her gaze drifted over my shoulder, and her smile fell just a touch.

  “Hey, what’s wrong?” I asked, flooded with sudden concern. Sami seemed totally off. Had this whole weekend, as a matter of fact. “You owe me a conversation, lady. Remember? I let you off the hook before.”

  She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I know, and I appreciate your patience.” Her lips pursed, and she squinted at me. “Hey, did I see you and my brother dancing last night in the barn?”

  “You’re not going to change the topic on me again,” I warned.

  “And you’re a good enough friend to not push me until I’m ready to talk,” she replied in a smooth voice.

  “Damn you.” It was killing me to see her like this, so…torn up for some reason, but I didn’t want to alienate her. She seemed tense and tired. I wished I could help.

  “I know.” Another small smile—but genuine. “You two did look awfully close, though.”

  Part of me was dying to confess everything to her, tell her about that sizzling kiss he’d laid on me. It had blown me away. Even now, I could still feel his lips burning across my mouth, my jaw, my neck.

  “Did you just…shiver?” Sami’s eyebrows shot clear up as she stared at me. “You got out of the friend zone last night, didn’t you.”

  I nodded, unable to fight the grin on my face. “He kissed me.”

  “Whoa,” she whispered, the tension in her eyes breaking for a moment. She gave me a brief smile. “Okay. Crud. I have to take care of this crowd right now, but we will be talking later. About everything, I promise.”

  “I’m holding you to it, Sami.” I’d corner her at the toast on the bridge tonight. Make her spill her guts. The peppermint schnapps-laced cocoa would probably help, too.

  I walked away so she could concentrate on work and headed outside to the ice rink. Snow sparkled in big piles along the sides of the frozen lake, and parents and kids donned skates and made their way to the pristine ice. One of my absolute favorite parts of Winterfest was slipping on my ice skates and spinning around the ice. I wasn’t a brilliant skater by any means, but at least I could stand up and move forward.

  I got my skates on. Stood. Stretched. Stepped on the ice. A kid whooshed right by me and I lost my balance for a second and swayed.

  Then I pushed myself off and started skating.

  Wind whipped and snapped at my face, tore at my hat, and tried to sneak under the wrap of my scarf. But it felt good, being plunged into the cold like this. There was a rush I always got on the ice rink, one I couldn’t seem to get any other way. Okay, that was a total lie now—kissing Oliver had been a rush unlike any other.

  Would he be here today? I wasn’t sure what to do now. At the dance, I’d written everything with him off as a dead end. And then he’d taken my face in his hands and blown m
e away with that kiss.

  I stretched my arms out and skated faster, caught up in the glory of feeling. Oliver would probably be here. He was every year. And he hadn’t apologized for what had happened. Which meant he didn’t regret it.

  Which meant it could happen again.

  On my second lap, I saw him, standing with one of his small male cousins, both in skates. The boy was bundled from head to toe in winter gear, but it looked like Jessie, who was fun and super cute. Oliver had on faded jeans that hugged his legs and a thick black coat. His dark hair was mussed by the breeze and his eyes were bright and smiling. They made their way onto the rink.

  My heart thundered, roared in my ears, and I struggled to stay calm. I could feel my cheeks burning. Play it cool, I ordered myself. Jumping his bones in the middle of a family-friendly event was a little desperate, even for me.

  I slowed down and got behind them, then said, “Hey, Jessie!”

  He wobbled on his feet, holding Oliver’s hand so tight I thought he might rip it off. He peeked over his shoulder, his dark eyes beaming. “Hey, Maya! I’m skating!”

  “Hello, Maya,” Oliver rumbled in that low, sexy tone that made me clench.

  “Hi.” My response was breathless.

  I sucked in a breath of cold air and grabbed Jessie’s free hand. We skated together in a slow-moving line while Jessie got his bearings. Oliver looked like he’d been born in a pair of skates and glided with little effort.

  “Having fun?” Oliver asked me.

  I nodded. “Nice of you to bring him out to skate.”

  “Guess I’m just a nice guy,” he quipped with a wink.

  Not that nice, I wanted to say, but I was afraid he might take it the wrong way. I scrabbled for something safe and nonsexual to talk about. “Um. Did you…sleep okay?”

  I wanted to smack my forehead. Oh, goodie. Let’s just go right to the sexual thing, dumbass.

  His grin widened. “Like a rock. You?”

  “Can we go faster?” Jessie interrupted, tugging on both of our hands. “This slow speed is boring.”