Stick in the Mud Meets Spontaneity (Meet Your Match, book 3) (17 page)

And boy was he complying. His mouth moved right along with hers, and she responded, clinging to him with refreshing, open honesty, holding nothing back.

Maybe that was the difference. Samantha had never held anything back. There was no patiently waiting for her to open up. No need to gradually gain her trust. With her, you didn’t need to earn it. She gave it willingly. All Colton had to do was keep it.

“I see you skipped dinner and went straight to dessert,” a deep voice intruded.

Colton sprang back and met the unwavering gaze of Samantha’s father. Oh boy. Nothing like making a great second impression.

Samantha recovered first. She smoothed her fingers down her apron and cleared her throat. “Hey, Dad. I thought you were helping Kevin with his sprinklers.”

“All fixed.” He held up two muddy palms to show that he had, indeed, been working in the dirt. “They’re running right now if you two need to, uh… cool off.”

Colton felt the sudden urge to scratch his neck. Samantha, on the other hand, laughed.

“Oh, stop it, Dad,” she said. “I guarantee you kissed your fair share of ladies back in the day.”

“I might have, but good luck proving it. I never got caught.”

“Maybe not kissing,” quipped Samantha. “But Mom’s not going to be happy when she sees that.” She gestured to a trail of muddy footprints her father had left behind.

He looked down at his feet and quickly removed his shoes. “Tell you what,” he said. “I’ll keep this little… episode between the three of us if you clean that up for me.”

“Only if you throw in that bag of Peachie-Os.”

Her father pointed a finger at her. “Don’t push it. It’s not easy to get contraband inside this house.”

“Fine.” She waved a hand at him. “Go get cleaned up, and I’ll mop the floor. Again.”

He started up the stairs then paused, looking from Colton to his daughter. “No more shenanigans while I’m gone. Got it?”

“Yes, sir,” answered Colton.

“We promise to wait until you get back,” said Samantha.

Colton tried to hold back his chuckle while her father rolled his eyes and muttered something about how she got her cheekiness from her mother.

As soon as he disappeared, Samantha pointed her finger at Colton and attempted to imitate her father. “No more shenanigans.”

“Why didn’t you tell me your dad was across the street and could walk in on us any second?”

“Because then you wouldn’t have kissed me.” She reached around him to grab the box of pasta off the counter. “And I wanted you to kiss me.”

“I still would have kissed you. Just… not until later.”

She smiled and rose up to her tiptoes, giving him a light peck on the lips. “Now’s always better. But I’ll take later too.”

His lips tingling, Colton had to fight the temptation to grab her waist and pull her back into his arms. He felt an undoing of all the years he’d worked so hard to learn patience. One kiss, and he’d hopped on board the Right Here, Right Now wagon.

“Just so you know…” She paused by the sink, the uncertainty back in her eyes. “I made a promise to my mom a long time ago that kissing is as far as I’ll go before I say ‘I do.’” She hesitated, twisting a dishrag around her fingers. “I just… wanted you to know up front because a few guys I dated weren’t too happy with me when it came out later.”

Colton studied her for a moment, wondering how anyone could not be happy with Samantha. She had some sort of inner brightness that lightened everything around her and everyone who came in contact with her. The sun could go down, the lights could go out, but darkness didn’t exist near Samantha.

With his hands in his pockets, he moved forward and pressed a soft kiss to her cheek. “Then they were jerks,” he whispered.

The uncertainty disappeared and light filled her eyes. “They
were
jerks.”

She had never looked more kissable, and Colton would have caved to temptation if he didn’t hear footsteps coming from the floor above. He forced his feet to take a few steps back and dragged his gaze to the bag of groceries. “We should probably get those pies made before the ice cream completely liquefies.”

“Oh, right.”

They spent the next hour making grasshopper pies, grilling chicken, chopping vegetables, cooking a creamy sauce, boiling pasta noodles, tossing a salad, slathering butter and spices on French bread, and finding any excuse to touch, sidle up next to each other, steal a few quick pecks.

At some point, her father trotted back down the stairs, freshly showered, and added more butter to the bread. The Mackies showed up next, with two excited little girls who couldn’t wait to tell Samantha and Colton all about the movie they’d seen. Then came the Granthams, followed close behind by Sam’s mom.

The bread came out of the oven, all toasted and glistening with butter, and Sam declared, “Let’s eat!”

Right away, Colton felt comfortable. He managed to win over the twins by tossing them in the air. They giggled and smiled and wiped gooey fingers all over his shirt, but he didn’t care. As he told Emma after her fifth apology: Shirts wash, people wash, and not-so-little babies wash. It’s all good.

The kickball game started, and Samantha managed to talk her way out of getting tagged out on first.

Colton rolled his eyes from the pitching mound and called to Kevin, who was manning first, “You’re seriously going to let her use the twins as an excuse for taking her time getting to first?”

“What can I say?” Kevin shrugged. “They’re adorable kids. Anyone would be distracted by them.”

“She’s playing you, man.”

He tipped his baseball cap at Samantha and said, “Well played.”

Samantha grinned in a triumphant way, remaining on first base, and Colton shook his head. The woman had everyone wrapped around her finger.

Eventually, Colton slid into home plate and came away with a nice grass stain up the side of his jeans. But when Kajsa and Adi tackled him because they’d just won the game, it made it all worth it. When it came time for everyone to head home, they hugged him goodbye like he was already part of the family, and as Colton watched them leave, he realized that the only place he’d felt more at home was at home.

Samantha closed the front door and collapsed against it, eyeing him up and down. “I’m not sure we’re in the best condition to go country dancing. What do you say we snuggle in the hammock instead?”

There was only one problem. “How will your parents feel about that?” Colton asked, nodding in the direction of the kitchen where her parents were still cleaning up.

“Let’s go see.” She grabbed his hand and pulled him down the hall.

Colton dragged his feet, thinking he didn’t feel that “at home” yet.

“We’re going outside to snuggle in the hammock,” Samantha announced.

Her parents looked up from rinsing and loading the dishes. “Thanks for dinner,” said Mrs. Kinsey. “It was really great. And Colton, that grasshopper pie was yummy.”

“I concur,” said Mr. Kinsey. “We’ll have to make that more often.”

Mrs. Kinsey gave his arm a pat. “Sorry, honey, but after tonight it’s back to green beans and spinach for you. Tonight, I made an exception because Sam and Colton cooked.”

“I think it’s okay to make exceptions a little more often.”

“Not until…”

Samantha took the opportunity to pull Colton toward the back door. He followed, thinking,
Wow, that was easy.

“Hey,” Mr. Kinsey’s voice called out the moment Samantha slid the door open. “No shenanigans,” he was pointing again, looking directly at Colton.

“No, sir.”

“Have a good night you two,” Mrs. Kinsey called.

Samantha led him to the oversized hammock, and Colton rolled into it, opening his arm to her. She snuggled up beside him, resting her head on his chest. Her hair still smelled like lemons, and Colton combed his fingers through the soft mass of curls.

“I’m really glad you came today,” Samantha said.

“Me too.” Colton wondered what it would be like to spend every day with Samantha. Train horses with her watching from the fence, ride with her, cook with her, clean with her, and end every day like this, with her curled against him.

He could get used to a life like that.

“I’m going to miss you,” she murmured, sounding like she was going to fall asleep any moment.

Miss me?
Colton frowned. “Are you going somewhere?”

“Yes, I’m…” The sleepiness left her voice, and she lifted her head, looking him in the eyes. “You don’t know.”

“Know what?”

Her eyes clouded with a mixture of worry and surprise. “My job—the one that doesn’t start until the end of summer.” A pause. “It’s in New York.”

Colton felt like someone had jabbed needles into his lungs, draining them of air. New York? She was leaving? For good? His fingers stilled in her hair. “I didn’t know.”

“Kajsa didn’t tell you.” It was more of a statement than a question.

“I’m pretty sure I would have remembered if she had.” Colton pulled his arm out from under her and swung around into a seated position, making Samantha pull her knees to her chest. His feet scuffed against the stamped concrete, and he stared at the dark crevices of the patterns, seeing a map of the US with New York on one side and Colorado closer to the other.

Samantha grabbed his arm. “I’m so sorry. Kajsa has told you everything else. I just assumed that—”

“I didn’t know,” he repeated, not knowing what else to say. It was the truth. He had no idea that Samantha would be packing her bags for a cross country move in only two short months. He’d assumed the graphic design job was here or at the very least, Denver. That was a doable commute. But New York? Not so much.

No good thing comes in a hurry,
the thought returned to his mind like a rude I-told-you-so, sticking out its tongue and making a face.

Colton felt a stab of regret. Why had he asked her out? And why the heck had he kissed her? He should have kept things between them as friends and let them eventually gravitate toward acquaintances and then distant acquaintances, which is what would have happened if he hadn’t jumped the gun.

If only he’d known. If only Kajsa had clued him in on that tiny detail. Actually, why hadn’t Samantha? All along, she’d known. She’d flirted, gone out with him, and kissed him back. She’d made him feel like a future could exist between them. Why?

And then Colton remembered her stupid bucket list and a large lump lodged in his throat. “I’m your summer fling, aren’t I?”

“What? No.” Her fingers tightened around his arm. “Colton, I—”

He pulled his arm free and stood, turning around to look down at her. “Samantha, if I’d known you were moving to New York in August, I wouldn’t have asked you out or even flirted with you. I told you before, and I’ll tell you again. I don’t do flings.” His jaw tightened. “At least I didn’t before now.”

The light was still on inside, so Colton headed for the side of the house. Behind him, Samantha’s footsteps followed.

“Colton, wait. It isn’t like that. Can we please talk about this?”

He paused with his hand on the latch and looked over his shoulder. “Say we keep dating. Is New York negotiable?”

From the look on her face, Colton knew her answer before she said it. “I can’t turn down this job. I just can’t. It’s too—”

“Congratulations,” he cut her off. “You just crossed another item off your bucket list.” Then he shoved the gate open, strode to his truck, jumped inside, and didn’t look back as he took off down the road. He’d been wrong about darkness not existing around Samantha. Right now, his world had never felt so black.

Sam lay in the hammock alone, watching the few stars that could be seen. Sleeping beneath the stars wasn’t supposed to feel like this. It was supposed to be peaceful, adventurous, romantic. Not… blah. How she hated feeling blah.

At least I didn’t get too far down the Colton road before turning back.

At least…

Sam couldn’t think anymore. She rolled to her unburned side and curled into a ball, trying not to think about Colton or the way it had felt to be kissed and held by him. The way it had felt to watch him walk away. Over the past few years, she’d kissed her fair share of guys, but none of them, no matter how good or practiced they were, came close to getting into her soul the way Colton had so easily done.

But now he was gone, and Sam felt bereft, like something valuable and precious had been taken from her grasp—something that never belonged to her in the first place.

Why couldn’t her job start tomorrow? Why couldn’t she pack her bags, hop on a plane, and leave all this aching blahness behind? She’d once thought a summer without Kajsa and Adi would be bad, but that was nothing compared to the oppressive feeling that dimmed everything, including the stars.

The truth was, Samantha didn’t want to pack her bags or hop on a plane anytime soon. Nor did she want to go back in time and undo the past couple of weeks. She wanted to continue forward down the Colton road and keep seeing those glimpses of a possible life that took her breath away. A life that made her believe in The List.

Up until now, Sam had thought Colton’s arrival in her life was bad timing. But maybe it wasn’t. Maybe it was a sign that New York shouldn’t be a detour on her way back to Colorado Springs. Maybe it was a road that shouldn’t be travelled at all.