Desire After Dark: A Gansett Island Novel (24 page)

“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?”

“Every minute. Every single second of it.”

Erin had been referring to her discomfort over her mom knowing they were sleeping together. She suspected he meant something else altogether, and his comment brought back the giddy, breathless feeling she had experienced so often with him.

“I need to buy a toothbrush,”
she said when they reached the hotel lobby. They went into the store, where she got a toothbrush, a hairbrush and a couple of bottles of water.

Being in the elevator with him at her side took her right back to the urgency of their earlier encounter, making her tingle with anticipation for an entire night with him. She was trying not to think about him leaving again in the morning. That
was hours from now, and she’d deal with that when she had to.

As they walked, she was careful to step properly around the art-deco design on the hotel rug that made it difficult to keep to her rituals.

“I was thinking about something on the way here earlier that I wanted to run by you,” he said when they were in their room.

“What’s that?”

“You were saying how your OCD
and fear of flying are about feeling anxious when you don’t have control of a situation. What if I taught you how to fly? Then maybe you wouldn’t feel out of control when you’re on a plane.”

Erin removed her coat, hung it over the back of the desk chair and turned to him. “You want to teach
me
how to
fly
?”

“If you’d like to learn. I was joking about being an instructor last night,
but I really am a qualified flight instructor, and I’d love to teach you, if you think it would help.”

“I’ve never considered that possibility.”

“Well, think about it, and let me know.” He slid his arms around her waist and looked down at her, a sexy grin making his eyes glow with mischief. “I’ve got some more errands to do. You want to help me out with that?”

She smiled up
at him. “I’d love to.”

E
rin cried
the next morning when it came time for him to leave. She wasn’t proud of the waterworks, but she couldn’t seem to help it.

“You’re killing me,” he whispered as he held her close to him. He was fully dressed and smelled delicious after a shower and a shave. She was still naked in
bed, disheveled and distressed after a night she wouldn’t ever forget.

“I’m worried about you flying. You didn’t get much sleep.”

“I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”

“That’s like asking me not to breathe.”

Cupping her face, he kissed her. “I’ll see you soon.”

He said what she needed to hear, but they both knew it would be a while before they saw each other
again. His schedule would be hectic when he went back to work, and there’d be no more sweet, sexy stolen nights for quite some time.

“Let me know when you get home?”

“You’ll be the first to know.” He wrapped her up in his strong arms and held her for a long moment.

Erin clung to him, breathing in the subtle scent of his cologne, committing it to memory.

“We’re going
to figure this out. I promise you that.”

“I’m not usually such a crybaby.”

“It’s okay,” he said, kissing away a tear. “It makes me feel hopeful that you might like me as much as I like you.”

“I do.”

Smiling, he kissed her again before he released her, leaving her bereft without the heat of his body pressed up against hers. He was headed for the door when he turned back
to kiss her one more time, lingering long enough to draw more tears. “This time, I’ve really got to go.”

“This time, I’ve really got to let you.”

“Something this great? It has to work out. Don’t worry, okay?”

“I’ll try not to.”

When the door clicked shut behind him, Erin fell back against the pillows and gave in to a good cry. This was crazy! She was a mature woman
crying over a
man
! But he wasn’t just any man, and he’d swung into town unexpectedly and rocked her world in more ways than one.

“I seem to have fallen completely and absolutely in love with you at some point in the last four months
.
”

Why didn’t I tell him that I’ve fallen, too? I should’ve told him
. Erin covered her face with her hands, desperately trying to regain her equilibrium.
After a long pity party, she got up, showered and left the room where they’d created so many precious memories.

Her heart ached that day and every day that followed as she went through the motions of supporting her parents and writing her column whenever she could steal a quiet moment.

Despite frequent texts, calls and FaceTime chats with Slim, she couldn’t seem to shake the malaise
that began that morning in the hotel room and stayed with her over the next week, prompting her mom to ask more than once what was wrong.

She couldn’t say, exactly. But for some reason, she felt like she was fighting against a rip current, trying to figure out where she belonged now that her life had been irreparably altered by a handsome, sexy, wonderful man who wanted everything from
her.

Could she do it? Could she hand over her heart to him and hope that nothing would ever happen to crush her again the way she’d been crushed once before? In a middle-of-the-night moment of clarity more than a week after she’d last seen him, Erin finally understood why she couldn’t shake the disquiet.

It was because she was on the verge of possibly taking the biggest risk she’d
taken since losing her brother, and the fear of the many ways it could go wrong had her paralyzed with indecision. She didn’t have the slightest doubt that Slim was sincere in his feelings and his intentions. He was a good and honorable man who would treat her like a queen. He wasn’t the problem. She was.

Could she turn over control of her heart, her life, her love to someone who had the
power to devastate her? What if something happened to him, too? How would she ever endure that kind of loss a second time? Wouldn’t it be easier—and safer—to stay single and unencumbered, to never risk more than she could afford to lose?

These were the questions that kept her awake at night as she tried to find the courage she would need to take the enormous step he was asking her to make.
The woman she’d once been, before life and tragedy changed her, would’ve been all in. She would’ve run to Slim with her arms and heart wide open to the possibilities. She would’ve embraced the joy and given no thought whatsoever to the fear of what
might
happen.

Post-9/11 Erin had learned to be wary, cautious and obsessive about the safety of those she loved. Would her obsessiveness smother
a man like Slim, who was used to doing his own thing without anyone to answer to?

She went through her days and nights exhausted and overwhelmed by the debate that raged within her as she supported her parents, talked to Slim and texted with her Gansett friends, who checked in regularly as she tried to figure out her next move.

Her dad had been released from the hospital three days
after Slim’s visit and was receiving at-home physical and occupational therapy as he continued to recover quickly.

“There’s really no need for you to stick around here if you’ve got better things to do,” Tom said to her over breakfast on a Friday morning, ten days after Slim went home to Florida.

“I don’t mind staying awhile longer to keep you guys company.”

“Or you could
get on a plane tonight and go see the guy you’re thinking about constantly.”

Erin stared at her dad, her mouth agape from his unusually blunt statement.

“Are you denying that you’re thinking constantly about him?”

She tried not to squirm under his intense stare. “No.”

Tom struggled to butter his own toast, but Erin knew he wanted to do it himself, so she refrained from
helping him. “You ought to do something about that.”

“I agree, honey,” Mary Beth said. “You haven’t been yourself since he left, and we just want you to be happy. He makes you happy.”

Yes, he certainly did. He made her happier than she’d ever dreamed of being, and she wanted nothing more than to grab on to that feeling with both hands and never let it go. But what if…
No. No. No
. She simply couldn’t bear the merry-go-round of thoughts her brain was torturing her with any longer. She was about to snap from the unending debate.

The doorbell rang, giving her a temporary reprieve. “I’ll get it.” She opened the front door to a FedEx delivery guy who handed over a letter-size package and asked her to sign for it.

“Have a good day,” he said.

“Thanks, you,
too.” Her heart took a happy leap when she saw Slim’s name on the return address portion of the label and his address in West Palm Beach. It was the first time she’d seen his masculine handwriting. She tore into the envelope that had a big lump in the middle of it that turned out to be a CD case. The envelope also contained a white sheet of paper and a second sealed envelope.

The note said:
Dear Erin, listen to the song on the CD and then open the other envelope. Love, Slim
.

“Who was at the door, honey?” Mary Beth called from the kitchen.

“FedEx for me. I’ll be right back.” She ran into her dad’s study and fumbled her way through putting the CD into the drive on his computer. Erin recognized the song immediately—it was the hit single “Please” by the young winner of
The Voice
, Sawyer Fredericks. She’d loved watching him perform on the show and adored the song that had all new meaning to her in light of the man who’d asked her to listen to it, especially because he knew she loved it.

She wept as she listened to the song that perfectly summed up their current situation and her yearning for him. And then she opened the second envelope.

You did it
once; you can do it again; and no one is ever afraid to fly in first class; it’s a rule. There's nothing I'd love more; than to have you in Anguilla with me; for my buddy’s wedding; PLEASE come; and make me the happiest guy; who ever lived.

Erin laughed and cried as she read his sweet note and found a first-class ticket from Philadelphia to Anguilla for next Thursday in the envelope. The
words, the song, the semicolons, the ticket, the plea… All of it added up to make the decision she’d been wrestling with seem rather foolish in light of what she felt for him.

When her phone chimed with a text, she pulled it from her pocket, not surprised to see it was from him. Of course he’d been tracking the package and knew exactly when it had been delivered.

Well...

You ruined it with the semicolons. ;-)

The semicolon is for unfinished thoughts; we are unfinished; I thought it fitting in this one instance; I promise to never insult you with a ; again if you come finish what we started…

You’re amazing. Thank you for this.

You know the part where Sawyer says he’s down on his knees? That’s me right now. Oh, and where he says he was born to
kiss your mouth? That’s me, too.

You’ve got me in tears. Was that your goal?

Is that a yes?!?!!!! Note enthusiastic use of exclamation marks!!!

Laughing, she held her phone in her hand, staring down at the screen, hovering on the verge of putting her fears behind her and grabbing on to what she wanted more than she’d wanted anything in fifteen long, torturous years.

She texted one word:
Yes
. And just that simply, the cloud of disquiet lifted, and the giddy, breathless anticipation came rushing back. How would she
survive
until Thursday?

O
wen invited his mom
, Charlie, Katie and Shane to their place for a dinner he and Laura prepared together. He’d taken a couple of days to process what his father had told him, and was ready now to share it with
his mom and Katie to begin with and then his other siblings.

While Laura changed Holden into pajamas, he stirred the marinara they’d made from scratch. The activity had helped to keep him busy and focused on the meal rather than what he had to tell his guests.

Laura held Holden’s hand as he toddled from his bedroom to the kitchen.

“Look at my big boy walking like a grown man,”
Owen said, scooping him up to places kisses on his neck that resulted in the belly laugh they loved so much.

“Dadadada.”

Owen closed his eyes and breathed in the sweet baby scent of the boy he adored, determined to take this last step to put the past behind him so he could focus entirely on the family he and Laura were creating together.

“I need to get him down before they
arrive, or he’ll never go to bed,” Laura said.

Holden had spent the afternoon with Uncle Shane and Aunt Katie and was rubbing at his eyes with tight little fists.

“I’ll take him in.” Any day now, she would have to stop picking up Holden until after the babies were born. Owen settled him in the crib with his blanket, which Holden immediately kicked off. Laughing, Owen covered him
again, and Holden kicked it off. “Mommy, someone is misbehaving.”

“Holden, is Daddy being naughty?”

“Gagagaga Dadada.”

“I knew it.” Laura resettled him, turned on the mobile that took his attention off the blanket and swept her fingers through the baby’s downy hair one more time before leaving him to sleep.

“Mommy is good at that,” Owen whispered outside the bedroom
door.

“Daddy is good at winding him up at bedtime, which won’t be quite so funny when there’re three of them.”

Owen waggled his brows at her. “Daddy loves when Mommy chastises him.”

Smiling up at him, Laura cupped his cheek and caressed him with her thumb. “You seem good.”

“I feel good, ready to get this over with and start packing for the trip.”

“I’ll be right
there with you if it gets hard.”

“That’s the only thing that’s gotten me through this latest crisis.” He dropped his forehead to rest against hers. “You’ve got to be so tired of my family issues by now.”

“Not at all. It’s a small price to pay to get to be married to you.”

“Thank you, baby.”

A soft knock on the door indicated their guests had arrived.

“Ready?”
she asked.

“Let’s do it.” He went to admit his mom, Charlie, Katie and Shane, who spoke in whispers because they knew Holden had just gone to bed and would put up a fuss if he heard them. They stayed quiet through dinner, after which Laura checked on Holden and said it was safe to speak normally.

“Thank you for the lovely dinner,” Sarah said, refilling her wineglass. She had a serenity
about her these days that was hard to miss, and Owen couldn’t wait to let her know that she’d soon be free to marry the man she loved.

“You’re welcome.” He glanced at Laura, who reached for his hand and gave it a subtle squeeze under the table, fortifying him to take the next step. “So there was a reason other than dinner that I wanted to get together tonight.”

“Well,” Katie said,
“we know you’re not going to tell us you’re pregnant.”

Their laughter diffused the last of Owen’s nerves. “Very funny. Actually, I wanted to tell you I heard from Dad.”

Stunned silence greeted his statement. Owen went on to tell them about the remarkable conversation he’d had with Mark. As he spoke, Sarah raised her hand to her heart, and Charlie put his arm around her. Katie stared
bleakly at the far wall while Shane moved his chair closer to hers. Such was the Mark Lawry effect on his family members.

“He’s full of shit,” Katie said fiercely. “He realized he’s all alone in the world, and this is what he’s doing about it.”

“I don’t think so, sis,” Owen said, knowing his opinion would matter to her and the others. “I think it’s the truth. If you could’ve heard
him… He was different than he’s ever been with me. Still gruff and domineering, but contrite, too. And what he said about me and the boys getting help if we ever feel that way toward our wives and children… It felt like genuine parental concern to me.”

Katie crossed her arms, her face set in a mulish expression that told Owen she might not come around right away. That was okay. It had taken
him a couple of days to wrap his mind around it. He turned his attention to his mother, who seemed as stunned as Owen had felt upon hearing his father’s story.