“I want to meet him,” she said decisively, jutting out her chin and giving Gavin a challenging gaze. If he wanted her away from his family, why had he brought her here?
His smile grew more genuine. “Okay.” He turned to his mom. “Do you want me to order dinner from the lodge?”
Mama’s smile was covering her entire face now. “No, I’ll make something. Six?”
“Sure. If that works for Kari?” Gavin was now giving her the challenging look.
“That’s perfect. I already agreed to ice skating, dinner, and a movie at your house tonight, remember?”
Gavin’s already dark skin grew a shade darker. His eyes burned through her in a smoldering gaze that she’d never experienced in person. She’d written about it plenty, though, and she could hardly wait for that movie at his house. If the stars aligned, Austin would be too invested to notice as she sidled in close and gave Gavin all the hints to snuggle with her.
“You guys are all talking funny,” Austin broke in. “Let’s see which skates fit.”
Kari focused on the skates and ignored the trembling feeling growing within her. Gavin was scared of commitment, she could easily read that, but he’d brought her to meet Mama and they were spending the rest of the day together. She could hardly wait to see how things progressed. She’d failed last night, but by tonight, she was going to succeed in kissing that handsome man.
Chapter Eight
Gavin couldn’t believe the barriers Kari was pushing past. Mama hadn’t seen him with a woman since Janielle. She’d taken it in stride, as always. She even seemed to approve. Mama was a gentle guiding influence for all of them, but she didn’t tell him what to do. She’d counseled him to put Janielle and her memory behind him and move on with his life, but he thought she understood why that would be hard for him to do. Austin didn’t look like Janielle, for which he was grateful, but his son did little things that reminded him of her.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t let Janielle go; it was that he couldn’t forget the mistake he’d made. He hated himself for losing control. At least he had no worries that he’d taken advantage of Janielle; she’d purposefully pushed past all his barriers that night. Then, the day she’d secretively deserted him and left Lonepeak Valley, she’d admitted to him that she’d planned to rope him into marrying her because she thought he had a good shot at the NFL. From what he understood, she’d gotten a better offer. Mama hadn’t shared all the details of how she’d rescued Austin, and he’d never asked. He hadn’t wanted the fact that he almost lost his son to boil and fester so he’d put it in a box and focused on being the best dad/brother he could be.
He pushed all of that away as Austin bounced up the trail in front of them, singing some song about being on top of the world, and Kari walked at his side. She stared around wonderingly. “It’s so beautiful. Do you ever get used to how beautiful it is?”
He gave her a sidelong glance and said truthfully, “No.” Would a man ever get accustomed to having such beauty as Kari’s in his life? He hoped it would never get old, just like this amazing spot where he’d spent most of his life. It was rugged and beautiful and a big part of him. Would there ever be a world where someone like Kari could be part of him? Whew. He needed to slow down.
She stopped oohing and ahhing for a second and turned to him. “This is a nosy question to ask, but how young was your mom when she had you?”
Gavin lifted an eyebrow. “Let me think. I turn twenty-nine in a few weeks, and she’s fifty-five. So … twenty-six?”
“Fifty-five? She looks fabulous.” Her mouth pursed and she focused on Austin, who was jumping and smacking snow off of pine boughs. “She was forty-five when she had Austin?”
Gavin’s heart slammed against his chest. Once again, Kari was far too perceptive. “I didn’t tell you?” He couldn’t remember it really coming up. He’d been so shaken when she’d said they were father and son, but he hadn’t finished the made-up story.
Five months had passed and Janielle had disappeared before he’d finally admitted to himself he was never going to find her on his own, and he’d gone to his parents, telling them the entire story. Mama had somehow tracked her down and brought Austin back. The first day he saw his two-week-old son had been the best day of his life. He immediately gave up any ideas of leaving for college. Missing his chance at the NFL never mattered to him after that.
“Austin’s adopted,” he said to Kari.
She stopped walking. When Gavin pushed out a breath and turned to her, the look in her blue eyes was raw shock. “No way is Austin adopted. He looks exactly like you.”
Gavin’s pulse was racing. How did he respond? His siblings had all accepted Austin immediately when Mama returned from Texas. Of course they believed Austin was adopted; Mama hadn’t been pregnant, and they were all younger than Gavin, so as teenagers they were basically focused on their own lives. Everybody in town had always believed it also, except for the one friend in whom Janielle had confided that she was expecting before she ditched Gavin and Lonepeak Valley. Miraculously, her friend hadn’t shared their secret; she’d left for college shortly after graduation and rarely returned.
“Crazy, huh?” he said in an unstable voice.
Kari was staring at him as if she knew, but how could she?
“What’re you two doing?” Austin called. “Ice is a melting.” He laughed at his own joke. The ice wouldn’t melt until late April or early May, as high as this lake was in elevation.
Kari thankfully started walking again. Gavin fell into step beside her. “Does he know?” she asked in a low voice, tilting her chin toward Austin, who had started back up the trail as soon as they’d picked up their pace again.
“Know?” Gavin longed to tell Austin he was his son, but how did you break that to a kid? He and Mama had discussed bringing it up soon, while Austin was still an easygoing, adorable kid. What if he hit a rough teenage patch? He needed to know before hormones came into play. Gavin couldn’t imagine Austin ever being anything but the happy kid he was, but he knew teenage years could be hard. Ella had been so moody as a teenager that they’d all threatened to move to the lodge to get away from her at one point or another.
“That he’s adopted.”
Gavin breathed easier. “No.” He felt prompted to elaborate: “We’re going to tell him. We need to pretty soon, I think. He’s old enough to understand but not old enough to throw a teenage fit.” He said these words quietly, though Austin wasn’t paying them any attention.
Kari looked at him. “You’re pretty impressive, Gavin Strong.”
Those weren’t the words he’d expected to hear from her right now, but her praise made something expand in his chest, as if he was suddenly capable of more love than just what he had for his family.
“You’re not only a successful business owner and a nice guy; you’re raising your brother as if he were your own.” She paused, and his heart raced again. “Is that because your dad’s not doing well?”
Gavin nodded quickly, grasping at the out she’d given him. “Yeah. Papa’s accident happened the winter before we adopted Austin.” That was another reason he’d waited so long to tell his parents, as they’d had plenty to deal with that year. “I was actually planning to go away to Texas A&M to play football, but I stayed to help Mama run the lodge, take care of Papa, and be there for all of my younger brothers and sisters.”
“Everyone else has moved on but you and Austin?”
“Yeah, but they’re pretty good to come back.” It was on the tip of his tongue to ask her to come back too. After she left on Monday, would she ever return? Maybe he could talk her into coming back in the summer, give her more fodder for setting books here in a different season. What he really wanted was to ask her to come back in two weeks for the weddings and their family reunion. Introducing her to Mama had gone well, and he suddenly wanted the rest of the family to meet her. They’d love her. The more important question was, Would she come back for the experience and the writing material, or come bac
k for him? He didn’t dare ask.
Kari thought Gavin was even more impressive than she’d told him. “A nice guy” didn’t begin to cover how great he was, and she felt like she was just scratching the surface. Why did she have to live fourteen hours away by car? It was a pretty short plane ride and then a couple of hours in the rental car to get here, but it wasn’t as if he was asking her to stay, or to come back after she left. Good heavens, they were barely getting to know each other, but she was already invested in him and little Austin.
The lake was incredibly beautiful, with the sun sparkling off the ice and snow and the green pine trees and bare aspen trees surrounding it. She could see trails going farther up the mountain, probably made by snowshoes. The trail they’d walked on to get here had been so packed down they hadn’t needed snowshoes, but she could imagine she’d sink to her waist if she tried to venture out into the trees.
Lacing up her skates on the edge of the lake, she pushed to her feet, shuffled onto the ice, and slipped as her feet shot right out from under her.
“Whoa,” Gavin grunted as he caught her before she fell.
Kari’s breath rushed out as his arm encircled her waist and she was staring up into his handsome face.
“You all right?” His voice was husky and low, sending a thrill through her. Yep, this was why women swooned in some burly, handsome guy’s arms.
“Good catch,” she got out.
He only gave her his partial smile, but it still made her knees weak. He lifted her onto her skates, but she was wobbly. She couldn’t blame it on the slick ice or her lack of experience on skates. It all had to do with the man holding her against his side.
“Okay, let’s start out slow.” His arm remained around her as he guided her forward. His skates made easy movements on the ice. She struggled to keep hers underneath her and stay upright.
Austin whooshed by. “Keep up!” he called to them.
“Funny,” Gavin muttered. He glanced down at her. “I kind of like going slow.”
Kari swallowed hard. Was he talking about ice skating or relationships? She wouldn’t have minded rushing things with Gavin, but slow would ensure a lasting connection. “I don’t mind it either.”
Gavin’s full smile lit up, and the air whooshed out of her. They were smiling like fools at each other.
Austin whipped by again. He flipped around and skated backward. The kid was a natural on the ice, as she’d already witnessed at his hockey game. “Don’t just pull her, Gav. You gotta teach her.”
Gavin rolled his eyes. “We just want to skate slow for a minute.”
“No way.” Austin slowed down and extended his gloved hands to Kari.
Kari couldn’t refuse him, not with those deep brown puppy-dog eyes looking up at her. She stretched her hands out as Gavin released her waist. She felt the loss of his touch immediately, but she focused on Austin’s instructions as he skated backward and coached her. Gavin stayed close, giving her encouragement, but it wasn’t nearly as fun as skating together had been. She loved being with Austin, but her mind was scheming ways to get Gavin alone.
Tonight, she would somehow finagle a kiss out of that man. She had plenty of experience in orchestrating kisses. If only Gavin would respond like one of her heroes. That said, she knew the danger of getting too heavy-handed with her characters. She could mess up the whole plot or theme doing that. She frowned. Would she mess up her and Gavin if she tricked him into a kiss? She prayed he wanted that connection and furthering of their relationship every bit as much as she did.
Chapter Nine
Gavin thought dinner went well with his parents; they both had a lot of fun talking with Kari. Not that anyone could resist Kari’s appeal. He’d tried, and he’d failed miserably.
Of course, his dad teased her, but that was to be expected and she took it well. Austin was in heaven, getting attention from all of the adults, as usual. He sat close to Mama during dinner and told her all about their ice skating and how he trained Kari to be an “expert.”
“Two more days and I’ll have her playing hockey,” Austin bragged.
Everyone laughed at that.
As dinner finished, Gavin could see that Papa was tiring, and judging by the faint lines around Mama’s eyes, she’d noticed too. The doctors couldn’t pin anything specific on Papa’s health besides the fact that it was deteriorating. Probably the lack of movement and the toll it took on one’s body to suffer and then live with an injury like he had. They always fought bed sores, UTIs, and worries with his lungs and muscles but lately it seemed worse.
“We’d better let these fine folks go home so we can go to bed,” Papa said, winking at Mama.
Mama laughed, and they all stood.
“We’ll do the dishes while you get Papa settled,” Gavin said in an undertone to Mama.
“No. You leave them tonight.”
“We have to do the dishes. It’s the least we can do for that delicious dinner,” Kari said. She gave Mama a hug and bent down and kissed Papa on his cheek.
Papa grinned up at Gavin and said, “She’s something special.”
Gavin agreed. He hadn’t even kissed her, and she was leaving soon, but he wanted Kari Love in his life. She was special enough to break through his walls, and that was saying something. Could he really date her? What would that look like? He worried that he was too messed up to make a relationship work, but he wanted to try.
Austin helped with cleanup, chattering a mile a minute about school and all the girls who had crushes on him and how those crazy girls couldn’t comprehend that he didn’t have girlfriends his age. This last line was said in exasperation.
Kari was loading the dishwasher, but she straightened up and asked him, “Why don’t you have girlfriends your age?”
Austin shrugged. “That would be kind of weird. I don’t really want a smoochy girl. I just like to tease, like Papa teases everybody. It’s not like I’m going to marry any of them.”
Gavin had never heard Austin admit that his girlfriends were just a tease. “Who are you going to marry?” he asked.
Austin lifted his hands. “My wife is still in heaven.”
“What?” Kari asked.
“Yeah. She hasn’t even been borned yet.” Austin started sweeping the kitchen and dining area as if he hadn’t said anything out of line.
Gavin couldn’t help but laugh. “So you’re after all these older women, but when you get married, you want a woman … eleven or twelve years younger than you?”
“Of course. I don’t want some old lady.”
Kari laughed and shrugged her shoulders at Gavin. “Makes sense.”
Gavin ruffled Austin’s hair as he passed. “Not really, but he’s cute.”
Austin winked up at him. “Yes, I am.”
Kari had thoroughly enjoyed the ice skating, the dinner, and the movie with Austin and Gavin. Austin had sat between them during the movie, ruining her plan of easing into Gavin’s side, but she couldn’t begrudge the little guy. The movie was something about the Avengers, and she didn’t pay much attention to it; she was too in tune with every little cue she was getting from Gavin. She wanted to ask him why he gave indicators that he was into her, yet he seemed reluctant, almost scared. Would he take her back to her room tonight and kiss her? Her anticipation ramped up as the movie ended, but then she realized he wasn’t just going to leave Austin here alone.
Gavin stood and offered Kari a hand up. She took his hand and savored the feel of his strong fingers around hers.
Austin stayed on the couch. “Can I go read with Mama tonight?” he asked.
Gavin’s eyebrows rose, and the anticipation in Kari tripled. Were they going to get the alone time she’d been hoping for? Austin was such a miracle worker.
“Let me see.” Gavin pulled out his phone and pushed a couple of buttons, walking away to talk to his mom.
Austin stood and gave her a quick hug. He fit perfectly in her arms, a little man who needed her. That was crazy thinking, though. His mama was
loving, and from what Kari could tell, he was surrounded by family who loved him. Yet it seemed like there was a spot in his heart reserved for her.
He pulled back and said, “I know I’m just a kid, but I notice stuff. If you want to be smoochy with my best bro, you don’t want me hanging around watching.” He gave an exaggerated wink, one eye closing fully, the other squinting.
Kari laughed. This little boy was her favorite person in the world right now. She lowered her voice and said, “Do you think he wants to get smoochy with me?”
Austin pumped his eyebrows. “If you’re lucky.”
Kari nodded. She would have to be more than lucky to have Gavin Strong be interested in her.
Gavin turned back to them, and the warm look in his brown eyes said she might be very, very lucky. “Mama said sure,” he said.
“Yes!” Austin pumped a fist and waved. “Well, see ya.” He ran for the laundry room. Kari could hear him grabbing some things, and then he slammed the door leading into the garage and was gone.
Gavin looked a little apprehensive, the last thing she wanted to see. “I guess he’s gone, then.”
“Guess so.”
Gavin looked around, as if not sure what they were supposed to do now that they were alone.
“Thanks for such a fun day,” she said, feeling stupid and lame. Maybe he didn’t want to be alone with her after all. Maybe Austin’s scheming was for naught. Gavin had almost kissed her earlier in the pool, and they’d had all kinds of tension arcing between them. If she were writing this scene, she’d say something like … “Well, maybe I should go.” She gasped internally. No, not that. What was she doing? If one of her characters had said something so blatantly stupid, she’d write them out of their own story. I should go? What a fail on her part.
Gavin’s dark eyes looked conflicted. She waited, praying he’d rescue this scene and give a heroic line like, In what world would I let someone like you go? Then he could storm across the room, gather her in his arms, and kiss her senseless. She moistened her bottom lip, waiting, praying.
The Strong Family Romance Collection Page 68