Carolina Dreaming: A Dare Island Novel (12 page)

After he’d checked on Dani, after he’d stripped off his jacket to wrap her in, he’d actually tried to revive the son of a bitch until the sheriff arrived.

“I screwed up,” he said.

“You made a mistake. Everybody makes mistakes. You shouldn’t be judged your entire life because of one error in judgment.”

He stared at her. She was serious. She actually believed him. Believed in him.

Her earnest expression faltered. “Unless that’s what you think. Unless you believe that everybody gets what they deserve. You know, a woman works in a bar, wears the wrong clothes, marries the wrong guy, she should accept the consequences.”

“Hell, no,” he growled. “Dani wasn’t asking to be raped. It was four on one.”

“I wasn’t talking about Dani,” Jane said.

Understanding burst in his brain, her words smacking him upside the head like a two-by-four.
Everybody gets what
they deserve. A woman marries the wrong guy, she should accept the consequences.

She had a restraining order against her ex. He knew what that meant. He
knew
, and the knowledge made him sick, in his heart and in his gut.

He wanted to tear apart the man who had hurt her, to strike out at anybody who thought they had a right to judge her.

Slowly, he uncurled his fists. He couldn’t fix this problem by beating on it. “There are mistakes, and then there’s just bad luck. The guy you married . . . Did you love him?”

“I was nineteen,” Jane said. “But yes, I did. Which makes me an idiot.”

“Nope, it makes you nineteen.” The age of wishful thinking, of believing you were invulnerable. The age of most of the recruits who came to Parris Island hoping to belong to the brotherhood or save the world from terrorism or escape shit at home. “It means you went into it for the right reasons. He turns out to be a shit, that’s on him. You’ve got nothing to be ashamed of. You did what you did out of love.”

“So did you.”

He shook his head. “It wasn’t like that. I didn’t love Dani. I barely knew her.”

“That makes what you did even more special. You chose to put yourself at risk, to lay down your life, for a stranger.”

She made it sound almost religious. Which was a laugh. If there was a God, He hadn’t paid much attention to the child Gabe. Now that he was an adult, Gabe figured he was returning the favor.

“I just reacted,” he said. “It’s my training.”

Jane’s eyes shone. “It’s you. You’re a good man. You did the right thing for the right reasons when you had nothing to gain.”

Ah, Jesus. He stared at her, shaken. In all his life, no woman had ever looked at him that way, like he was . . .
a good man
. No woman had ever said that to him before.

He swallowed the lump in his throat. “Nothing to gain and nothing to show for it.”

“That woman you saved, Dani . . . She wouldn’t agree with you. I’m sure she appreciates what you did.”

He looked down at his hands again. “She wouldn’t testify,” he said, real low.

“What?” Jane asked, like she hadn’t heard him correctly.

He cleared his throat. “She wouldn’t testify against them. That’s why the DA was able to get so many continuances.”

“Was she from around there?”

“Dani? Yeah.”

“Maybe she felt trapped,” Jane suggested. “She could have been afraid. She has to stay in that community. She has to live with whatever decisions she made. That doesn’t mean she wanted what happened to her or that she isn’t grateful to you for stopping it.” Jane reached out and took his hand, wrapping her small, scarred, capable fingers around his big, rough ones.

“You saved her,” she said with a little squeeze. “And one day, she may look back on that, and it will give her the courage to save herself.”

She might as well have squeezed his heart. Except that his heart was swelling too large for his body, pressing against his ribcage. He couldn’t breathe, all of the room in his chest taken up by his rapidly expanding heart.

It slayed him that after all Jane had been through she was still so stubbornly hopeful, so determined to see the best in everybody. Including him. It made him want to be that guy that she imagined, to live in her world. “Not every woman’s as brave as you are.”

“I’m not brave.”

“You saved yourself. You changed your life.” The way Dani wouldn’t. The way his mother hadn’t. He admired her so much. “You left your ex.”

Her eyes flickered. “No, I didn’t.”

He didn’t want to hear it. “You got a divorce. You got a restraining order.”

“Only after Travis left us.”

His too-big heart was pounding in his chest, flooding his
brain with blood, making it hard to think. He struggled to understand. She didn’t leave him?

Her chin raised. “Go ahead. Ask the question.”

“What question?”

“The one everybody asks. Why did I stay?”

“I know why you stayed.”

“Because I was afraid,” Jane said. “Afraid of what he would do, afraid of what people would say, afraid of being abandoned. Trapped, like Dani.” She smiled sadly. “So, you see, I’m not really brave at all.”

His chest was tight.
Maybe she felt trapped
, Jane had said about Dani, but she could have been talking about Gabe’s mother. She could have been talking about
herself
.

He cleared his throat. “Because you thought you could make things better. Because you thought that was on you, to fix things. To fix him. You made the choices you felt you had to make back then.”

“It didn’t feel like a choice,” she whispered.

“You can’t judge yourself by what happened when you got knocked down,” he said. “What matters is what you do when you get back up again. You’re amazing.”

She looked at him with those wide gray eyes, a funny little smile curving her lips. He wanted to kiss her so much. “Do you ever listen to yourself?” she asked.

“What?” he demanded defensively.

“You can’t define yourself by who you were when you were down. What matters is what you make of yourself when you get back up again.”

He frowned, confused. “That’s what I just said.”

She folded her arms. “You should have a little faith in yourself. Luke believes in you. Sam trusts you.”

“Yeah? What about you?” He met her eyes, challenge in his own. “Do you trust me, Jane?”

*   *   *

J
ANE
’
S
GAZE
LOCKED
with his. Her heart swelled like a soap bubble in her chest, fragile and shiny.

Gabe stood in the slanting sunlight like a wall, casting a long shadow. His broad shoulders braced against an invisible burden, his work-hardened hands were loose and open at his sides. She was snared by the contrasts of him, the long hair the color of burnt caramel, the dark beard already shadowing his jaw, his easy smile and intense eyes.

Her type, she’d thought, before she knew any better.

But he was stronger than Travis. Tougher. Rougher, too.

Life had beaten him up and knocked him down, but it had not broken him. She admired the way he played the hand he’d been dealt. No complaints. No excuses. He was patient with Aidan. He was kind to his dog. He hadn’t provoked a fight with her father or walked away.

It was just too bad that being around him made her quiver like a bowl of pastry cream.

She wanted to trust him. But living with Travis had slowly eroded her faith in her own judgment.

Could she risk her hard-won independence on another mistake?

“Everybody deserves a second chance,” she said, struggling to breathe. “Even . . .”

“Somebody like me?” he finished dryly.

Her heart thudded. “I was going to say someone like me.”

The air thickened like honey. The sun had sunk to the level of the trees. A faint breeze came off the sea. A nervous chill chased up her arms. She shivered, wondering what he’d do if she burrowed against him to borrow his heat.

“Careful.” His voice deepened. “I’m the guy your dad warned you about, remember?”

Jane licked her lips. Even knowing it would be a mistake, she wanted to surrender to the attraction pulsing between them. To give in. To let go. To believe. “You don’t scare me.”

“Yeah?” He moved closer, and the air around her warmed by at least ten degrees. Didn’t stop the goose bumps, though. “Maybe I should,” he murmured.

He lowered his head without touching her, giving her enough time and space to stop him.

If she wanted to.

If she didn’t stop him . . . Nerves jumped in her stomach. Well, she would deserve everything she got.

He was so close, his breath brushing her lips. Heat radiated from his body. He smelled delicious, like salt and sun and testosterone. She wanted to lick him, the crease of his neck, the hard curve of his shoulder. All over. His mouth hovered over hers, tempting her to take a bite. If she raised on her toes . . . If she leaned in, just a little . . .

She didn’t move, her heart pounding in longing and panic. She’d told the truth. She wasn’t afraid of him, exactly. But she was terrified of making another mistake.

He cupped the back of her head, his fingers sinking into the hair beneath her braid, his calluses delicately abrading her scalp. She jerked once and was still, absorbing his touch.

He brushed his lips against the corner of her mouth, over her hot cheek to the vulnerable hollow below her ear. She closed her eyes, embarrassed by the frantic beat of her pulse. He nuzzled her earlobe. Took it and bit, very gently. Her mouth opened on a short, shocked gasp of excitement.

He kissed her, his mouth taking hers, nudging for entrance, sliding inside, tasting her with slow, devastating restraint. She was softening in ways she barely remembered, clenching in places she’d almost forgotten.

He teased her to play, a nibble of her lips, a flicker of his tongue, a promise of pressure, a hint of heat.

He was so hot.

He made her hot, too. She was burning up inside, all her air gone, her fear evaporating in flames. She kissed him back, running her hands up his arms—his biceps flexed under her palms—to cling to his shoulders. He felt so good, solid and warm. She sagged, giddy with lust and lack of oxygen, weak with relief. After everything, she could still want this. Want him. Still respond like a normal woman with a normal woman’s desire.

How long since she’d been kissed like this? Wanted like
this? He caught at her lips, stroking her open, licking into her mouth, until she was melting in his arms, her thoughts dissolving, her knees wobbly. She pressed closer, flattening her breasts against his chest, trying to get close, closer, feeding on the taste of him, dark and addictive as coffee.

His hands slid under the hem of her T-shirt, rough against the bare skin of her back. She was exquisitely aware of his fingers, stroking up her spine, of his body, muscled and solid against her smaller, softer one. She wrapped her arms around him as if she were drowning, rolling her hips against the thick ridge of his erection, rocking them both.

He made a deep sound low in his throat and gripped her waist.

Yes
. The word washed through her brain, surged through her body. She was floating in warmth, carried away on a tide of sensation.
Do it.

A small, cognizant part of her, standing above the flood, recognized she did not want the choice. If he swept her off her feet, then whatever happened—the responsibility, the blame, the possibility of mistake—wasn’t hers alone.

His fingers pressed tight, warm, electric. He pulled her against his hard, aroused body, the friction shocking all her secreted nerve endings to life. She felt the charge deep inside before he eased her hips away, breaking their connection.

She stared up at him, bereft of contact. Of comfort.

Gabe’s face was taut, his breath escaping in short, rough pants.

“Why don’t I scare you?” he said. “You scare the hell out of me.”

*   *   *

J
ANE
STARED
UP
at Gabe, her pupils dark and dazed, so far gone he couldn’t be sure his words had penetrated.

He could have her now. The realization seized him, shook him like a dog with a bone. They didn’t need a bed. Hell, they wouldn’t even have to get undressed.

Jane’s mouth curved in a small, provocative smile. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

She was teasing him. He fought the urge to grin at her like a fool. But he liked that so much, that she would tease him after he’d just kissed her brains out. He liked the sly humor that lurked beneath her calm surface, the quiet strength under her pinup girl looks. He liked everything about her.

God, he was so fucked. Not fucked, he amended quickly. Not going to be fucked.

“I think it’s kind of flattering,” she added. Her smile faded a little in the face of his continued, stupefied silence. “Not that I want to scare you.”

Right.

“I have to get back to work,” he said.