Falling for the Guy Next Door (20 page)

He opened his
mouth and she waited, her pulse hiccupping in hope. His mouth
closed and he stood there, happy to watch her walk away. She’d
poured her heart out and it hadn’t been enough. He couldn’t even
talk to her, give her a decent explanation.

“You know
what, Jack? Maybe you were right all along,” she blasted over her
shoulder as she turned to barrel over the hedge. “Maybe I do
deserve better than you.”

Jack knew he’d
made many mistakes in his life, but he’d never once doubted the way
he lived that life. Now he prowled the house with a restless energy
that was powered on doubt.

Megan deserved
much, much better than him.

He’d always
said that.

Always
believed that.

But to have
her say it, to have her believe it, was a lightening bolt that
pierced to his soul. It burnt raw, throbbed an ache across his
chest, and illuminated too many of the shadowed corners he’d always
taken refuge in.

He loved her.
Where Megan was concerned, every little thing mattered a thousand
times more. And that scared the shit out of him.

He wasn’t a
seven-year-old boy anymore, frozen stiff beneath the covers, afraid
to get out of a bed he’d never wanted to be in the first place. He
wasn’t the boy who’d watched Aunt Mary storm out of the house,
who’d watched his uncle disappear before his eyes until the man who
finally emerged bore little resemblance to the man who’d swung him
high and tickled him into a mass of screaming delight.

But the
reaction was still instinctive, a reflex that was as much a part of
him as his limbs. He didn’t belong in other people’s perfect lives.
He was a visitor afraid to outstay his welcome.

He’d never
given it much thought, never had a reason to until now. And now he
couldn’t hide anymore.

Megan gave so
fully of herself. She risked all in the most unselfish manner he’d
ever come across. She loved him even as he said goodbye.

She’d spent
the last two years teaching him how safe it was to stay, but he’d
been too busy darting from shadow to shadow to learn. Somehow he’d
convinced himself that he was the strong one, leaving so he
wouldn’t hurt her, isolating his heart to protect hers, standing
alone so she could find happiness. But it was her courage that had
finally cast light on his stubborn hell.

It wasn’t the
staying that ended up hurting people; it was the leaving. He’d
never forgiven his parents for leaving him. And Frank, he’d lost
his wife and a brother. Both had consumed the man.

If he left
now, Jack knew with absolute certainty, the void in his heart would
be permanent.

Megan refused
to cry. Her feet pounded the forest floor as she pushed herself to
the limit. The pain in her heart was staggering, but the breaths
straining her lungs and the blood accelerating through her veins
was the proof she needed to cling to.

Hearts didn’t
physically break.

Her jogging
speeded up into a sprint, all the way to the end of the bluff ridge
and halfway back, until her muscles shook and threatened to
collapse. Panting, clutching the stitch in her side, she limped the
last stretch home.

Jack was
sitting on the top step of her porch.

His head came
up, watching her straggled approach.

She stopped
dead, closed her eyes, and wondered if she had another lap in her.
The gap between her and the porch, between her and Jack, seemed
infinitely longer than the path through the forest.

“You do
deserve better than me,” came his gruff voice. “But if you allow
me, I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to correct that.”

She blinked
her eyes open to see him coming down the steps.

“I thought the
best way to love you was to leave.” His gaze caressed her as his
slow strides brought him closer and closer, until they were
standing toe to toe. “I have no excuse. I was a stubborn idiot,
hiding in the past and too afraid to offer a fraction of what you
gave me. In my own screwed-up manner, Megan, I loved you. I do love
you with all my heart.”

Megan’s pulse
stuttered with each word he spoke. In that moment, she acknowledged
the truth. She’d always known he loved her. She’d never needed the
words, she’d never needed him to stay. It had been there in his
every glance, in his touch, in his grin, in the confidences and
laughter they’d shared, in every day they breathed the same air no
matter how many continents separated them.

But she
finally had the answer she’d been looking for. “Love isn’t enough,
Jack.” She glanced up into his eyes. “I need more. I can’t love
this way.”

“You once told
me that I always come back.”

“You denied
it.”

“I proved
myself wrong.” His knuckles grazed beneath her chin. “You have my
all. Every day, every minute, I will love you and I will always be
here for you. If you’ll have me.”

She’d been
willing to leap over the cliff when Jack had offered her nothing,
and here he was, offering her everything. Her heart didn’t stand a
chance. She went up onto her toes and brushed her lips over his. “I
love you with all my heart.”

His mouth
claimed hers in a possessive kiss that lasted until they were
starved for air. When he came up, his gaze was filled with love and
a grin scrambled the contours of his jaw. “Even after everything
I’ve done?” he asked softly, gently teasing, but the sincerity of
that question lurked in the depth of his eyes.

“Because of
everything you’ve done,” she said. “People are flawed, but you’ve
always turned my flaws on their head and made me feel better about
them. Love is flawed, but I want to make all those mistakes with
you. I want to thrill in the disappointments, because I know you’ll
be there for the successes. It doesn’t have to make sense, Jack.”
She wrapped her arms around him, pressing her cheek to his chest.
She inhaled his scent and, as his arms came around her, she knew
this was where she belonged and that she was here to stay. “That
would be downright boring.”

“Like
engineering the perfect shot?”

A smile formed
low in her stomach and pushed through to her lips, warming a
delicious path as it went. “Precisely, although I still think Bunny
Island should have been the exception.”

“I love you,”
he murmured. “This, right here, right now, is the perfect shot I’ve
been waiting for my entire life.”

She strained
back from his chest to look into his eyes and she knew her heart
was safe. That he’d never leave her was a certainty grafted to her
bones and anything else, everything else, they’d deal with
together.