Always Conall (Bitterroot #2) (19 page)

“I’ve got a lot to make up for,” he said quietly, looking down and shuffling his feet.

“Just be the daddy she needs you to be.”

Conall looked back to me for a minute, his eyes becoming dark with emotion. “I’ll do you one better, Sage. I plan to be the man you both need me to be.”

My breath caught in my throat as he stepped closer and studied me for a long moment, his thick lashes settling low as his eyes dropped to my lips. As his face slowly lowered to mine, I felt pulled towards him, drawn by some sweet invisible thread.

“Daddy, look!” Mattie’s squeal broke the trance that held us. I quickly looked down, inhaling deeply, and my bangs brushed against his jaw, catching ever-so-slightly in the scruff that had grown over the last day or so. A tingle spread throughout my body as I looked over at Mattie tumbling around in the grass with the little border collie pups.

“You’re being paged,” I mumbled and stepped away, slipping through the split rail fence to head towards Mattie and the dogs.

Conall

I watched her walk towards the house, kicking myself a little. I scared her. I could tell. And that was the last thing I wanted to do. But this friends shit was killing me.

Every minute I spent with her was making it harder and harder to keep her at arms’ length. I was trying to rise above my base instinct. My desire to make her love me as much as I already loved her. As much as I always did, even if I’d been too scared to admit it.

So I was
really
trying. For Sage. For Mattie. I was doing everything I could to push that part of me aside. We’d been doing surprisingly well with these inane, platonic conversations. Even though, with every word she said, I was thinking about her mouth in entirely different ways.

I could still taste her lips from the other night. I could still feel her soft little body in my arms and hear her soft sighs ricocheting around in my head. I was trying to stay afloat, but sinking like a chunk of granite. My body ached every time I stood beside her with the force of my restraint. I wanted to touch her. To throw my arm around her shoulder, just for
some
contact. To run my fingers along that beautiful ass of hers, pressing her against me until she sighed with a phenomenal little whimper against my neck. Until she was panting with want and losing her own resolve.

Until I was buried deep inside her with her body pulsing around me.
Until her heartbeat mirrored my own. Until we shared the air around us, so close and intimate. So… perfectly.

But, I reigned in all that furious need. The images that were driving me insane and giving me the worst case of blue balls I’d ever had.

But, to be totally honest, that discomfort was nothing next to the tremendous ache in my heart.

Sage

Jacob had gone in the house to get some iced tea, and we were sitting under the shade of a big silver-leaf poplar to escape the heat of the sun. Conall was reclining back and watching Mattie run through the yard with the puppies, a huge smile on his face, when one of the puppies came bounding up onto his lap just as he was about to take a sip of the tea. The little border collie hit the glass just right, dousing his shirt with the icy, cold beverage.

“Oh shit, that’s cold,” Conall gasped as he jumped up. In a second, he
’d undone the buttons of his denim shirt and pulled it off.

And I froze.

Solid.

Fuck
.

His chest glistened in the sunlight where droplets of tea cascaded down the muscles. I’d seen him and felt him and tasted him. And here, in the middle of the day with my daughter innocently giggling off to the side, I damn near exploded wanting to do it all over again. He used the wet fabric to soak up some of the tea that dripped from his face as he laughed. Mattie was literally cackling, holding her little tummy, until Conall lifted her high into the air and pressed his cold wet cheeks against hers.

“Noooo,” she giggled. “Daddy, you’re all wet and cold!” She squealed and wiggled until he set her down, then he looked over at me.

I hadn’t moved. My jaw snapped shut and I closed my eyes tightly as I took a deep breath to calm my raging pulse.

Fuck
.

This daydreaming about him had to stop. Things were going so well. Mediation was progressing, even if he was trying to give me too much. I really couldn’t start thinking this way again. It would just mean trouble and fights, and Mattie would be the one that would suffer the most.

As I opened my eyes once again, I saw Conall eyeing me. A glimpse of fiery need flared in his expression as he shook out the wet shirt before him and spread it along the fence to dry. The ache that I was already pushing back surged through me again, and I turned away to focus on Mattie who had become fascinated by a ladybug that was crawling up the hollyhocks alongside the house.

The next half-hour or so was almost painful. I felt faint and could barely breathe until Conall finally put his shirt back on. Like he wasn’t already fucking sexy enough without being bare-chested in the hot sun, but,
fuck me
, then he had to go and make my mouth water like that.

I did everything I could to not look at him. I focused on Mattie. I focused on the puppies she was playing with. I focused on the flowers and the trees and the distant mountain peaks that still retained a scant amount of snow at the very tops. But I kept finding myself mesmerized by the sight of Conall walking around in jeans, the waistband of his boxer briefs peeking out, and no shirt. By the time his shirt had finally dried some and he pulled it back on, I was about to combust.

As if he wasn’t already causing the lust in me to swell and fester, he began pulling at my heart strings, too.

It started with Mattie… taking after me.

“Shit,” her innocent little voice groused under her breath as she dropped a piece of cookie on the ground and watched dismally when one of the puppies swiped it away.

“
Mattie,” Conall gasped, “watch your mouth.”

Even though I couldn’t help but smile at the fatherly tone of his voice, I expected Mattie to become upset for getting reprimanded by Conall. That was like being scolded by Santa Claus, the Easter bunny, and Twilight Sparkle all in one fell swoop. Just for a second, a faint frown appeared on her face, as though she was rolling his words around in her little mind. I was on the verge of backing Conall up, of getting on her case a bit for swearing (even though she
totally
learned it from me). But Mattie suddenly grinned broadly at Conall and leaped into his arms. Hugging him tightly, she whispered with a fierce little voice.

“
I love you, Daddy.”

Conall
’s eyes clenched tightly shut, and he wrapped her tiny frame in his thickly muscled arms.

“
I love you, too, kiddo,” he hoarsely said, his voice thick with emotion.

And just like that, I fell head over heels in love with Conall all over again.

Sage

The sun was beginning to dip low on the horizon. The wind had held smoke from the far-away fires at bay, and clouds streaked gold and pink across the sky. As we pulled up in front of my building, I unbuckled my seatbelt. “I’ll go unlock the door and come back for Mattie,” I offered.

“You get the door. I’ll get Mattie,” Conall replied with a warm smile.

“Conall, you don’t have to—”

“Yeah, Sage, I do,” he said, placing his hand on my arm. The touch almost burned my bare skin. It held me still, frozen by the feel of his warm fingertips. “I’m her dad. It’s one of the gazillion things dads do, carrying their little girls into the house. Let me take a little responsibility.” He dropped his eyes for a moment, the looked at me again and spoke, his voice rough with emotion. “It’s not just your load anymore. You’re not alone in all this.”

I swallowed hard and nodded, then quickly climbed out of the truck to unlock the door.

With our zonked-out girl tucked up against his chest, her sleepy face resting on his broad shoulder, Conall followed me up the short flight of stairs to the first floor. Then into my apartment where he took Mattie into her room. I hung my purse and Mattie’s backpack on hooks by the front door and quickly followed him, pulling down Mattie’s blankets so he could lay her down. She incoherently mumbled a little as I reached down to pull off her Fatboy boots. She was probably miffed at their removal, even in her sleep, but Conall handed her the stuffed Twilight Sparkle he’d bought her and she sighed, wrapping her arms around it and snuggling into her pillow.

For a second, he looked down at her, brushing a few errant strands of hair from her round little cheek, then he leaned over and kissed her forehead tenderly. The gesture sent a wave of longing through me.
A desire to have this…
always
. Forever. Every night. In spite of the fucking paralyzing fear of abandonment that left a lump in my throat.

I quickly rose and quietly left the room in an effort to ease the ache, walking into the kitchen to pour a small glass of wine. The cool, fruity taste eased the discomfort in my throat, and I closed my eyes to allow the yearning to fade away. When I opened them, Conall was standing in the doorway watching me. For a few minutes, the quiet of the room crashed down around us.

“I should get back out to the ranch,” Conall finally murmured.

I swallowed hard.
Friends
, I reminded myself and nodded slowly.

“
Well, thank you, for today,” I said softly, following him to the front door to my apartment. “It was really…wonderful seeing her so happy.”

He
stood in the doorway and smiled down at me. “Anytime,” he murmured. “I’m really glad you came.”

He paused for a moment, his gaze catching mine for a long moment and reaching deeper inside me. I thought for a second that he might touch me
.

I
wanted
him to touch me. I knew I shouldn’t, but I ached for him to kiss me.

“
Friends,” I whispered shakily, more to myself than to him. “We’re friends.”

His eyes had focused on my lips, but, with those words, flicked back up to study my gaze. He shook his head a touch, then jerked his body straight.
“Right… friends,” he murmured. Giving me one last look, he turned to cross the threshold.

I leaned against the doorjamb as he took a few steps,
then looked back at me. “‘Nite,” he said.