All the Way (28 page)

Layla walked outside the next morning to a vast blue sheet of sky and the sound of Harley pipes ripping through the heavy air; muggy air that belied
the clear expanse, forewarning a storm.

She walked along the flagstone path toward the driveway as if floating on a cloud. Physically, she felt incredible, her blood singing through her veins. Between her legs sat a comfortable soreness she wouldn’t trade for anything. Inside her, deep down, peace settled like a long lost friend.
One that had deserted her so long ago. It was liberating but frightening. She faintly dreaded to invite it in, as though it would sprout wings and take off if she opened her heart too wide.

True to his word, Blake had woken her in the middle of the night with fervent kisses. Amidst shadows silvered with moonbeams they’d made love again. And again that morning, as the pale sunlight of early dawn had drifted into their room in peaches and pinks, glistening over the sheen of their bodies.

Abruptly she stopped short on the path. The air in her lungs paused when she saw Blake in a halo of sunshine. Maybe it was the way his body turned toward her before he met her eyes as if he sensed her approach, as though they were connected by an instinctive force neither could explain. Or the way he looked at her when their gazes locked across thick heat waves strengthened by their sizzling awareness of each other.

He waved her over. Then he shut off the motor, slid the kickstand back down as she approached, and stood straddling the leather seat. “I was just checking to see that we’ve got enough gas to last us awhile. Also making sure the bike’s still running okay. Put it through a hell of a run yesterday.”

“Yes, I guess we did. You and I have been through a lot in the past few days.”

Reaching out an index finger, he stroked her cheek and smiled. “Wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

Her responding smile was quiet, secret. But under the burning weight of his stare—deep green and filled with an emotion that for some reason her eyes couldn’t meet for very long—she blinked and changed the subject to one that had plagued her thoughts since she’d left his embrace and stepped into the shower that morning. “Do you think we’ll be able to make up the time we’ve lost?”

Blake sobered. “I think we’ve still got a good chance of getting to Rob before trouble beats us to him, but we’ve got to ride hard. We’re almost a day behind.”

“I know.” Layla stared at the motorcycle. She suspected they’d be forced to spend more hours on the bike today than the past two days combined. Surprisingly, her stomach didn’t tighten with horror at the idea. It seemed she’d finally dealt with that part of her past. She shrugged lightly and attempted a bright smile. “It won’t be so bad.”

Blake cupped her cheek. “Pretty brave, all things considered.”

“Blake, being with you last night, for the first time, I…” Her features pulled with effort when she struggled to finish the sentiment, uncertain how to put such profound emotions into words in the light of day with their bodies clothed and separated.

His thumb drifted across her cheek and brushed her lips to silence her. “Shh. I know, baby. I know.”

He leaned forward, slid his arm around her waist, and pulled her to him for a lingering kiss. Memories from the night before flashed through her mind, heating her blood. The kiss deepened, his tongue making slow, sultry laps inside her mouth.

Layla tried to pull away, to concentrate on devoting every spare second toward the effort of reaching her brother. Those best efforts were burned away by the electric passion gathering between them like a storm building, beyond their control.

It seemed last night had only been an introduction to the realms of passion they could achieve, not the culmination she’d expected. There had been no closure afterward, no lasting satiety.

She craved him. More than she ever had before.

Their bodies seemed eager to explore every level of fulfillment they could achieve. And all the layers in between. One night hadn’t been enough. Not nearly.

Then his phone rang.

Like an alarm tearing them away from a dream, it invaded their erotic reverie with discordant tones. He dropped kisses to her lips in between his words. “I should get that.”

“Yes,” she nodded breathlessly, even though their lips still clung together.

More kisses. “Yeah.”

When she felt his fingers slide up into her hair, she knew the interruption was reality knocking. She pushed against him. “Blake. Answer your phone.”

“Right.” One last kiss, then he complied. He checked the caller ID before he answered. A big grin lit up his face. “What’s up, ugly?”

Layla stared at him strangely.
Some greeting
.

Extracting himself from the motorcycle, he paced while he talked animatedly with whoever was on the phone. He seemed to be engineering an alternate plan.

“Fate must have owed us a favor.” He ended the call and grinned. “Seems my brother is driving to Sturgis this year, stuck with carting the band equipment and his bike. It’s all in a trailer rigged up to one of our Desanto Landscaping trucks. He’s an hour away. He’ll be going slower than we were with that load, so we probably won’t get there until tomorrow morning. And with three in the cab it might be a little cramped, but other than that, we’ve just hitched ourselves a ride to Sturgis.”

Layla flew into his arms and gripped him with a huge hug. “Thank you. Thank you! I could kiss your brother.”

“Yeah, well, I’m sure he’d appreciate that—but I wouldn’t.”

“Can I kiss you instead?”

He sighed.
“It’s tough, taking one for the team. But I think I can suffer through a kiss from the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met.”

She warned, “Careful, flattery will get you everywhere.”

“Mmm…one place comes to mind,” he said against her lips, as his hands cupped her bottom and pulled her tight against him.

“You were just there last night—twice—and again this morning!”

“I’ve wanted you for a whole year. Longer if you count how many years I waited for you to come into my life. We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”

“I like how you see the bright side in every situation,” she said with a smile, before his lips seized hers.

*

“You two had a quickie before you met up with me, didn’t you?” Tanner asked Blake from the driver’s side of the cab in the truck belonging to Desanto, Inc.

They’d been on the road for four hours.

“Can you blame me?” Blake asked with a smug smile. Both their gazes fell to the woman asleep between them, her head on Blake’s lap, her rear end against Tanner’s side.

“You suck.”

Blake’s grin broadened. “Thank you.”

Tanner dropped his mock scowl and grinned back before returning his attention to the road.
“Good to see you happy again, man.
I thought you’d never leave that funk you’ve been in for the past year.” He nudged Layla with his hip. “Don’t suppose it has anything to do with this one?”

“Lucky guess.”

“I like what I’m seeing. Is it the real deal this time?”

Blake focused an unseeing stare on the road ahead. He offered a nod.

“I figured. So why don’t you come out and say it? You’re going to marry this girl.”

Blake looked out the passenger window.

“Don’t want to jinx it, do you?”

“I lost her once,” Blake said low. Unconsciously, he wrapped his hand around her arm, his thumb stroking her soft skin. “It won’t happen again.”

Tanner noticed the protective gesture. For a few minutes they listened to the silence inside the cab, punctuated by the rhythmic slap of windshield wipers.

Thank the motorcycle gods for Tanner, Blake thought. Would’ve been a long, miserable ride to Sturgis in this rain. They couldn’t have afforded more lag time.

Finally Tanner broke the silence. “I remember the rainy afternoon I got in from Phoenix. You and I were on the porch talking, not two minutes, when that jackass cop came tearing down the street. Thirty seconds later, Layla whipped by going the opposite direction.”

Blake went still, looked at his brother. Then nodded.

Tanner went on. “I handed you the keys to my bike, no questions asked.”

“I followed her.” Blake picked up the story, his voice distant as he recalled the day in vivid, painful detail. “To the nearby park beside the Shaker Lakes. She pulled her car under a row of pines. It started raining. The downpour made it hard to see inside the car, but she was hunched over, face in her hands. I wanted to kill Johnson.”

“You have more self-control than me, bro.”

“No, I just didn’t want to leave her. Whatever Johnson did really tore her up. I parked the bike a little bit away. I had hoped she’d see me. So she’d finally believe that I’d be there for her when everything fell apart. She didn’t have to be alone…”

“She didn’t see you, though.”

Blake shook his head and sighed heavily. “No. So I rode up beside her car, went up to the window. I felt bad I startled her. I just…” He ran a hand down his face. “I just wanted her to know I was there for her. If she wanted to talk. Or not say anything at all and just let me hold her in the rain while she fell apart. But I think she was too proud to let me see her like that. She took off before I could do anything else except shout to her that she could come by. Anytime.”

“You came back soaked to the bone. I tried to close the door, but you said to leave it open, just in case she came by, in case she needed you. Does she know about all the times you left that door open for her?”

Blake shook his head. “We’ve talked about a lot of things. That isn’t one of them. It’s been a packed forty-eight hours.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet,” Tanner snorted.

“We ran into trouble.” Blake leveled a look across the seat at his brother. “By the name of Jack Johnson.”

Tanner did a double-take. “Where’s this information been in the last four hours?”

Nodding at Layla, sleeping between them, he said, “I didn’t want to rehash it in front of her. She’s been through enough.”

Since Layla was sound asleep, Blake took the opportunity to fill Tanner in on what was going on with Rob, Jack, and the latest development between himself and Layla.

Tanner was instantly on board, volunteering to help find Rob. Jack was fair game for him, too, since Tanner had sworn the same revenge as Blake for the death of their parents at the hands of Johnson’s negligence.

“I want to bust that son-of-a-bitch.”
Tanner pounded a fist against the steering wheel. He stretched and cracked the fingers of his left hand, then shook it out. His hands were stiff from white-knuckling it the whole way.

Blake knew Tanner hated driving any vehicle with doors long distances. He preferred the control a motorcycle offered, along with the instant escape option in the event of a collision.
Their parents had been trapped in the car by seatbelts and crushed metal.

Trapped was not a sensation Tanner handled well.

He asked Blake, “Do you have any evidence he’s stalking her? That might help our case, to show the courts he’s about as stable as a two-legged chair.”

“Nothing concrete so far, except for what I told you about Officer Munson’s involvement. And why are you still driving? Next stop, pull over. I’ll take the wheel.”

“I’ll be okay for a while yet. Though I’d be fine with that trade—I’ve never said no to a hot chick’s head in my lap.”

“Don’t make me reach across this seat and put the smack-down on your ass.”

“You’re too easy.” Tanner looked pleased with himself, having discovered something new to hassle Blake about. He cracked all ten knuckles, shook them out and draped one arm over Layla’s thigh like an armrest.

“I wasn’t kidding.” Blake looked pointedly at the spot where his brother was casually leaning on Layla.

“Hey, if this is my future sister-in-law, then I’ll treat her like a sister. That means being comfortable enough to sit next to her without worrying you’ll take something out of context. It’s not like I’m going to bang her.”

“You’re damn right.” Blake completed the sentence through clenched teeth.

Tanner exhaled and didn’t budge. “You know, that’s another thing. You want to hang on to her this time, you need to relax and get over that jealousy thing. I saw what it did to you this entire year. It ate you up, man. Every time something made you think of Layla being with that cop, you tortured yourself. Why?”

“I’m an idiot.”

“No shit, Sherlock. So quit it. It’s going to ruin what you’ve got, if you let the past interfere where it’s got no business being.”

“I thought I was the philosopher in the family.”

“I just call it like I see it. You’re the one who has to make the change.”

Yeah, he knew that. Easier said than done.
Blake gazed down at Layla. “The more you care, the more you’ve got to lose.”

“Then don’t give her a reason to duck out. That’s all I’m saying.”