Icing on the Cake (Close to Home) (23 page)

“Explain.” And fast, before his heart pounded its way out of his chest.

“She just texted Nia from a rest stop near Peterborough. Asked if we could swing by her apartment, grab the stuff that didn’t fit in her car and store it in our basement.”

“For how long?”

“She didn’t say. Sorry, man.”

“Yeah. Me too. Hey, I’ll call you later about that beer.”

“Anytime,” Conn said. “I’m always here for you.”

Unlike the woman he’d fallen for. She was hundreds of kilometers away—and still running.

*

Twenty-nine years old and living with her parents. Again. Sara rolled to her back and stared at the white clouds painted on the pale-blue ceiling. She’d been eleven when they painted them, and obsessed with all things afterlife. Heaven, reincarnation, ghosts, alternate dimensions…she’d spent hours discussing the possibilities with her therapist and the old church pastor. Not with the Chambers family though.

She hadn’t wanted them to know the depths of her desperation. How much she yearned to connect with her real parents after their deaths. Peter and Meredith were always so good to her—kind, loving and accepting. Even when she didn’t speak to them for days, sometimes weeks, at a time, they’d only ever had open arms and hearts for her.

They’d knocked on her door one morning and suggested a makeover for her room. Anything she wanted, whatever might make the space more peaceful. Easier to sleep in. Apparently they’d had open ears too. They’d heard her listening to the songs her dad used to sing despite her constantly closed door. Through the small house’s walls, they’d heard her sobbing, night after night for almost a year.

At that point, she had never talked to them directly about missing her parents. The therapist and pastor hadn’t betrayed her confidence. But Peter and Meredith had known anyway.

They’d spent that weekend painting the room the sky blue she’d chosen. Then they’d added the clouds she wanted. Nobody had said it out loud, but they’d all known Sara wanted to create a piece of heaven. So they’d worked together to make it happen.

That’s how this family—her family—operated. Together. There for each other. Without judgment. Always.

So when she’d walked through the door a week ago, without prior notice, bags in hand, they’d hugged her and carried on with their day. No questions asked. Her mom had gone to work her shift at St. Francis Memorial, and her dad had resumed weeding and watering the vegetable garden. Without exchanging a word on the subject, they’d welcomed her home. For as long as she needed to stay.

Part of her wanted to stay forever. That was new. As much as she’d grown to love her second family, she’d always had an underlying itch to get away. From this house, this town. Despite Curtis’ opinion that clichés exist because they work, the “time heals all wounds” one was a big, fat lie.

She didn’t cry herself to sleep anymore. Didn’t fantasize about visiting her parents on another plane of existence as she had for years after their deaths. But the wounds had never fully healed.

Nineteen years later, she still saw their faces when she came up here. At the park, the market, even here at the house, where they’d all spent time together before the fire. For some reason, things felt different this go-round.
She
felt different. Calmer when she thought about the past. Less squirrely when one of the old ghosts popped into her head.

It was the new ghosts giving her grief now. Okay—ghost, singular. One with piercing eyes, the world’s best smile and a host of wicked-hot tattoos. A man she hadn’t wanted to get close to, yet couldn’t stay away from. Somebody she couldn’t stop thinking about.

Her cell phone chimed on the side table. She stretched and snagged it, her heart picking up several beats per minute in the process.

A text message from Nia.
Good morning. I miss you. Come back soon.

No mention of Curtis. A quick scroll through her apps revealed no missed texts, calls or emails from him either. Same as every other time she’d checked since bolting in the middle of the night.

This is how she’d wanted it. A clean break. A big hunk of geography to prevent him from coming after her. Only, in truth—the kind she hated to admit, even to herself—she’d hoped he would. Shitty realization to make after she’d put five hundred kilometers between them and had no financial means or logical reason to go back. But hey, she’d been fucking up the good stuff in her life since she was ten years old, so what else was new?

She sighed while tapping a reply to her sister. The phone made its
voop
noise as the text flew through cyberspace.

She stared at the bubble on her side of the screen.
Miss you too.
A second-rate message to match the others she’d sent this week. She’d have to get used to digging deeper if she went through with her plan.

Also, Nia deserved to hear what she had to say, not read it in a text message. Sara took a deep breath and hit the call button. This heart-to-heart crap was going to make her sister’s day.

“Hello?” Nia answered, her voice so properly polite, she could have been answering the phone at the restaurant she managed.

“Dude, one of these days you should splurge on call display.”

“Would you call me more if I did?”

“Probably not.”

“Gee, thanks. Think I’ll save the monthly fees, then.”

Sara propped against the headboard so she could look out at the water while talking. The water had always been one of her refuges from the dark memories. “You might not want me to call after what I’m about to tell you.”

“Not true and you know it.”

Yeah, she did. No matter what she’d done or how horribly she’d behaved in her many attempts to push Nia away, her sister had always been there for her, ready to give Sara a fresh start. That’s what she needed most right now—the biggest fresh start of her adult life.

Starting now, with full disclosure. “The health club I was working at was actually a massage parlor—and I’m not talking about the kind where registered massage therapists have diplomas on their office walls.”

“Oh my god, Sara. That’s…”

“Gross and embarrassing?”

“Yes. But as horrible as this sounds, also a bit fascinating. I’ve always wondered what those places are really like. I mean, I can only imagine what some of the um, customers, must be like.”

Sara shivered recalling some of the specimens that’d slithered through Lucky’s. “Trust me, you don’t want to imagine some of what I’ve seen. And heard.”

“Eww… How do you fake it with men like that? Oh my god, you didn’t catch some nasty disease there, did you?”

The questions had Sara springing to her feet, rubbing her arms to get rid of the crawly sensation. “I worked the reception desk, not the clients!”

“I wouldn’t have loved you any less if you’d done the other.”

She dropped onto the bed, staring up at the faux clouds once again. “I know.”

“Did Curtis find out, is that why you broke up?”

“He did, and it was an ugly scene, but that’s not why I left. And I don’t think you can call it a breakup since we were never officially a couple.”

“Right, okay. You were living with him, you voluntarily went to a
funeral
to support him, and oh—he told you he loves you. Of course you weren’t a couple. I mean, duh. Who in their right mind would think that? Pardon my blondeness.”

“I call to share my emotions and you come back with a bunch of sarcasm? What the hell is this, some alternate reality where everything is opposite?”

Nia’s giggle filled her ear. “It’s kind of fun being you.”

“Well, it’s weird being you. I want to be the snarky bitch again. All this
feelings
crap is killing me. Seriously, how do you live like this?”

“By letting people in,” Nia said softly. “You’re off to a good start with Curtis. He’s not perfect, but he’s a good man.”

“Yeah, well… I doubt he’s interested in going another round in my emotional meat grinder.”

“You’ll never know unless you try.”

“Now you sound like Mom did on mystery-meal nights. And you remember how most of those ended.”

“Oh my god, you’re right. Forget I said it.”

Together, they dissolved into a fit of laughing and reminiscing. The past wasn’t all bad, even with the mystery meals that combined leftovers that should never be mixed.

The thing that scared Sara now was the future.

“He could’ve died the other night.” She made the comment out of the blue, but Nia didn’t miss a beat answering it.

“He could have. It could happen tomorrow. Or next year. Or not until he’s ninety-seven years old. It’s going to happen, no matter who you’re with. That’s the risk of letting people in, of loving them.”

“Dude, this is not your most uplifting speech ever.”

Her sister’s gentle laugh came through the phone’s speaker. The closest possible thing to a sisterly hug, given the distance separating them. “I’m never going to understand what you went through. I can only tell you that loving somebody is worth the risk of losing them.”

“You’re actually pretty smart for a blonde.”

“Welcome back, snarky bitch. Now get your butt down here.”

“Or what?”

“Or I’m going to hang up with you, call Mom, and tell her how much you’ve missed her mystery meals. Guess what’ll be for dinner tonight?”

“Jerk.”

“I learned from the best,” Nia said. “So you’re coming back?”

Time to commit.
Really
commit. And for once, she wanted to, even though it meant asking for and accepting help. Giving people the power to break what remained of her fractured heart by willingly and truly letting them in. “I’m coming back. And thanks. Especially for not gloating about this emotional crap.”

“Oh, don’t thank me for that. I cut you some slack because this was your first time, but you’re not off the hook. Once you get settled here, we’re having a girly-girls’ night. One with deep, meaningful conversation, a chick flick, and enough red wine to make us weepy. I may even make you submit to having your nails painted pink again. Think of it as initiation.”

Trying to get a rise, was she? Not this time. “I’ve been told I look gorgeous in pink. And I heard
The Notebook
is pretty good.”

“Oh my god, that’s it. I’m buying the wine and cuing up the DVD right now. Pack the damn car. Immediately.”

“I’m on it. See you soon.” The itch to get out of here roared to life. Only this time, she wasn’t running away.

*

Maybe she should have waited in her car. Sara could barely feel her butt after sitting on the floor outside Curtis’ unit for over an hour. Also, every time she heard a noise—any noise—her heart practically shot up her throat and out her dry mouth. His shift ended almost an hour ago and the station was a ten-minute drive. He should be home by now.

Unless he’d stopped somewhere after work. A bar for a drink. A woman’s apartment for a fuck. Worse—he might’ve picked up a woman at a bar, and the two of them would tumble out of the elevator together any minute.

If so, she’d handle it. Not gracefully, but she’d handle it.

Instead of the elevator, the stairwell door opened. She sprang to her feet as Curtis emerged—solo—and the door closed quietly behind him. The twenty-odd feet between them could have been zero when their eyes met and locked, because the intensity of his stare had her buzzing as if he’d touched her all over.

She’d thought about him all week. He’d been in her head while her hand was between her legs at night—remembering the way his fingers trailed sparks across her skin. The tingly sensation when he sifted through her hair. The magic his tongue worked when it took her to the height of ecstasy—repeatedly. The heady combination of power and submission she got from sucking his cock. How she didn’t just feel full when he fucked her, she felt whole. And that feeling extended beyond the bedroom.

“Hey,” he said as he stopped in front of her. He’d donned his unreadable expression. The one he’d had the first time their eyes met in the church. And every other time she’d pushed him too far. “Everything okay?”

“Not really.”

He nodded and his gaze dropped to the area below her waist. “How do you feel about it?”

She followed his line of vision to her hands, wrapped tightly over her abdomen. Shit, he thought she’d landed on his doorstep because he’d knocked her up a week ago. And instead of grimacing or looking at her as if she were the scourge of the earth, he wanted to know how
she
felt about it. After all her bullshit, he still cared about her, at least a little. Better than not at all.

“I’m on the Pill.” She spoke softly while removing her arms from her belly. “I didn’t come here to drop daddyhood in your lap.”

His mask slipped briefly. Long enough to give her a glimpse of raw emotion in his eyes. Not the relief she expected to see. The opposite, in fact. But that couldn’t be right…could it?

“Do you want kids?”

He crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at her. “You’re asking me this now why?”

“Because of my new shoes.”

His eyes narrowed and he leaned in, sniffing the air around her head. “Are you under the influence, troublemaker?”

“I’m high on life, dude.”

A deep laugh rumbled from his deliciously sexy mouth. The sound echoed in the quiet corridor but Curtis didn’t seem to care. His duffel bag hit the floor with a resounding thud, and alpha male that he was, he backed her up against the wall. “I’m counting that one.”

“Good. You should. Because you were right—I am falling in love with you. Okay, I may already have fallen.”

One of his cocky grins slid into place. “I knew it.”

“I’m not happy about it.”

“Yeah, I kinda got that when you took off.”

Back to serious territory. Not her favorite place to be, but she owed him the visit. “I had to leave.” She placed her palms on his warm, hard chest. “But then I had to come back.”

He braced an arm above her head. Toyed with a piece of her hair while searching her face with his incredible eyes. He didn’t ask for an explanation. Just waited. The day they met, he’d told her he wasn’t a patient man. True, in terms of going after what he wanted. Totally false otherwise. In both cases, he was exactly what she needed.