Always My Hero (18 page)

“Ryan ... need you.” Her hips straining to meet him, she gripped his ass with fingers like claws, pulling him against her.

“Uh uh. I refuse to rush this. I’ve waited far too long for this moment.”

Their eyes met and his searing gaze heated her blood, prickled her skin.

“My Bree, my perfect Bree.”

He’d said the same thing to her that night, so long ago now. She’d trusted him with her heart. She’d trusted him with her body. Staring into his eyes as he’d accepted her innocence, so gently. And refusing to give in to his own pleasure until he’d ensured she had hers.

Ryan had ruined her for other men. Really, who could measure up? And so she had remained celibate all this time. Thirteen long, frustrating years. But he was here, now, and her patience was at a breaking point.

Screw the candles waiting in the bedroom to be lit. Screw the rose petals she’d scattered across the top of the comforter. Screw the fact that he hadn’t even discovered the thong that matched the bra, now damp with his saliva. She needed him now. Here.

“Baby, please.” Her breathy plea ended on a harsh gasp as his roaming hands had lowered her zipper, his fingers dipping inside to stroke her over-sensitized folds.

Trying to wiggle out of her jeans, Bree yanked Ryan’s shirt off over his head and threw it. The muffled clink of glass against wood gave them both pause and had him sitting up quickly.

“Fuck. I’m sorry. I’ll clean it up.”

“Later,” she growled, using the fact that he’d sat up to her advantage, and yanking his jeans and underwear down to his knees. “Kick ’em off.”

The look in his eyes was equal parts shock and pure lust. Clearly unwilling to mess with this woman on a mission, Ryan did as she said, scrambling through a pocket in his jeans for a condom before he kicked them over the side of the couch. He helped her discard everything on him from the waist down.

“I didn’t intend to do this out here, on the couch, Bree.” He tried to take her hand, as though he meant to lead her into the bedroom but she slapped his away.

“Now!” Boldly, she held out a hand for the condom, praying she looked like a wanton temptress and not a fumbling idiot as she sheathed him as quickly as possible

Spreading her legs wide, she offered him a saucy grin as she wrapped a hand around his swollen cock and guided it to her entrance. His eyes darkened. She felt him expand in her palm. They’d take it slow the next time. Or the time after that.

The intense look on his face was the only warning she had before he’d grabbed her wrists in one hand, raised them above her head and drove straight to the hilt. He knew she needed no time to adjust to his presence, his hips already grinding hard.

This wasn’t sweet, tentative teenage sex. This was adult sex. And Bree decided very quickly that she enjoyed adult sex more. A lot more. Lifting herself off the couch, she strained to draw him in as far as she could. A knowing smirk on his face and barely a pause in his momentum, Ryan swept a large palm behind her thigh and draped her leg over his shoulder. What was this?

“Holy hell on a popsicle stick!” The hoarse scream was ripped out of her throat as this new angle took her to heights she’d never dreamed possible. She knew her eyeballs were now rolling back in their sockets. So deep! So blissfully, deliciously deep.

Ryan’s chuckle was low, his smug grin stretching his mouth wide. “Honey, we need to work on your dirty talk.”

The man could tease her as much as he liked as long as he kept this up. Right there. Yes. That spot. That was the spot.

They were slick with sweat, something Bree didn’t remember from their first time, and that had been in the sticky heat of late August. Then again, she did not remember working quite so hard for an orgasm back then, either. She hadn’t known any better. But now she did. And the new Bree went after what she wanted, with gusto!

With a throaty cry, she came in shuddering waves, hanging on to Ryan for dear life. He was right behind her on this ride, neck muscles suddenly going rigid as he let loose a rumbling groan that magnified her own orgasm vibrating through her own body.

Tangled on the couch, they panted and sighed, sweated and laughed. She felt wicked and she couldn’t wait until they did it all over again.

“
That
was not like I remembered it.” Ryan sounded exhausted but just as happy as she felt. “I don’t know what you did with sweet, little Bree, but this new you ... Hell, you’re gonna kill me.”

“Ah, but what a way to go, huh?” Devilishly, she licked his salty nipple, reveling in the strangled moan that caught in his throat.

“I think my shirt got soaked in wine.”

“Good thing you live right next door.”

They were quiet for a moment and Bree thought Ryan had drifted off. His voice tickled her ear when he spoke, as she had her head pressed to his chest.

“Let’s not wait so long before the next time we make love, okay?”

Well, if he really meant it. Bree decided to show him she was ready for the next time right now.

• • •

Word got around fast in a small town. Ryan’s mom had come in, presumably to help him set up the displays of seed packets and the various supplies. But he knew she’d heard about Haley staying with him and Wesley. She wouldn’t come out and ask. She’d wait for him to offer up the information on his own.

“Your father wants to come in for a bit soon. Not to run things, of course. He just wants to see his store again, know that everything is being taken care of.” Anne kept her eyes focused on the seed packets she was sorting by variety.

“Dad? Wow. Do you think he can handle that? I don’t want him to have any kind of setback.”

It had been a couple of weeks and Ryan had yet to hear back from the real estate agent with any offers for the store. He’d hoped to use this time to try and put some distance between his parents and the store, just in case. Except that his mother had started dropping by more and more often. And now his dad wanted to visit? They were going to make things a lot harder when the time finally came.

“So, ignoring the Prada-wearing elephant in the room, how are things with you and Bree?”

Better than he could have ever imagined. Ryan felt his cheeks heat as he thought back to the night before. He’d wished like hell that he didn’t have to leave, that he could have stayed with her wrapped in his arms all night long. Oh, to be able to wake up next to her each morning. To have Bree’s face be the last thing he saw before drifting off to sleep each night. But that would mean staying in Scallop Shores. A weighty life decision that had been knocking around in his brain for the last week or so.

“Will you stay?” His mother continued her line of questioning and Ryan tried not to snap at her for climbing inside his head. It was downright spooky.

“If we end up selling the store, what would I do for work? I’d need a job.”

“Do we need to sell the store? I know it isn’t your dream job, sweetheart. But could you see yourself running it ... for your dad?” Ah, the classic guilt trip. There wasn’t a mother alive who couldn’t pull it off flawlessly.

Well, two could play at that game.

“So, you’d see your only son settle for a job he was only doing to keep his father’s dream alive in order to keep your family close by?” He batted his lashes, the picture of innocence.

“You learned from the best.” She pursed her lips, like she was trying hard not to smile, but Ryan could see the crinkles deepen in the corners of her eyes.

“It’s not like I couldn’t picture it, Mom. If it meant being around you and Dad ... and Bree. The past is the past and I was an idiot for staying away so long. If the folks in town want to remember me as some kind of hero, that’s their prerogative. I don’t have to agree with it, but I don’t have to hide from it either.”

“There is another option.” His mother’s voice was barely above a mumble and she spoke slowly, deliberately.

“Why do I get the feeling this isn’t a position that would utilize my accounting skills?”

Ryan finished putting together the cardboard display he was working on and turned to study his mother. What was she plotting now?

“Coach Danvers is retiring this June. They are looking for someone to replace him as the high school gym teacher ... and football coach. I was talking to him over at Dade’s the other day and he said if you were to apply, he’d see what he could do to help you get the job.”

Ryan started to scoff it off. He didn’t have the required classes. Except that he kind of did. When he had been planning his course load for the first couple of years of college, his advisor had insisted he figure out a practical backup course of study. At the time he’d thought it a hoot to consider being a gym teacher. If he wasn’t drafted, then he could still immerse himself in all things sports. Sure, he’d have to get his teaching credentials, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t at least ask about the position.

After his injury, when he’d turned his back on his love of football and sports, he had switched majors and gone into business, with a focus on accounting. Surprised at how satisfying balancing numbers was to him, he’d never looked back.

A high school gym teacher. And the chance to coach his old team. For the first time since his career-ending, stupid-ass fall in the dorm showers, Ryan was able to contemplate a future that incorporated his first love. The familiar burn of shame and embarrassment was noticeably absent.

“And what happens if we can’t sell the hardware store?” He plucked the box of seed packets from his mother’s arms and began to stuff the pockets of the cardboard display.

“Then we hire someone to run it.”

Not the most practical solution, from a cost standpoint, but doable. If they could find a college kid, someone looking for minimum wage to apply toward their tuition and rent on a crappy apartment. It wouldn’t be cost effective to hire on anyone with a family to support. Would they have to offer medical and dental? He’d look into it. And the sooner he found someone, the sooner he could work on his own qualifications for the teaching position.

“Will she try to mess things up for the two of you, do you think?”

Ryan stuffed the last package of pumpkin seeds into the display, trying to catch up on this new thread. They had been discussing hiring someone to run the hardware store. Then she’d thrown in a question about Haley, out of the blue.

Haley!

“That’s perfect! Mom, you’re a genius. She needs a job. We need her out of our hair. If we give her the store to run, she can get her own place that much sooner and I can have my life back. I’m not sure how long she plans to stay in town, but this will do for the time being.”

“Now Ryan, I have never trusted that woman. What makes you think she won’t skim off the till?”

“I’ll be doing the books. I’ll catch on quick. And she knows better than to steal from me. She’s desperate, but she’s not that desperate.” He frowned, hoping like hell that his last statement wasn’t going to come back to bite him in the ass.

“I just never understood—” His mother let her words trail off.

“Go ahead, lay it on me. You never understood why I married her? You never understood what I saw in her?”

“No, I was going to say that I never understood why you didn’t end up with Bree in the first place.”

Whoa. “Why would you say that?”

“Oh, sweetheart, it was plain to anyone who saw the two of you that you were in love.” Anne placed her hand on her son’s shoulder, patting lightly.

“We hid it.” He rolled his eyes. “Okay, we thought we’d hidden it. We didn’t want to hurt Haley. I’d been dating her for two years. In high school terms, that was a freaking lifetime.”

Ryan thought back to all those times sitting at his parents’ kitchen table. The stolen glances, the way one or the other of them would accidentally brush an arm or a leg up against the other. When he was with Bree, they were in their own little bubble. It was so easy to pretend the rest of the world didn’t exist—and, therefore, that nobody else could see just how they felt about one another.

“You would have done Haley a favor if you’d told her the truth.” Her voice was sad but matter-of-fact.

“But then
you
wouldn’t have Wes.” Take that!

“No, but I might have a whole passel of grandchildren to love and spoil, and a daughter-in-law I could truly admire.”

A child with Bree. How perfect that would be. Deep in his own thoughts, Ryan gathered the empty boxes and started for the back room to toss them aside until later. The jingle of the bell above the door had him spinning on his heel.

“Hullo, Ryan! And Anne, perfect. I have some amazing news and it’s good that you’re both here for it.” Toby Horace, the real estate agent, burst into the store, all smiles and waving arms.

“Can I get you a cup of coffee, Toby?” Always the gracious hostess, Anne was halfway to the office to fix it before he called her back.

“I’m afraid I have to be on the other side of town very shortly. But I wanted to stop by and tell you that you got an offer. My client understands your situation and has offered to buy the hardware store outright. You wouldn’t even need to liquidate your merchandise. He plans to keep the store here, as is. Every town needs its hardware store, right?”

That did make things easier, but it seemed too good to be true. Mr. Horace handed him a piece of paper, detailing the offer made by this stranger from out-of-town. Shaking his head, he gave it a quick scan, blinking when he got to the numbers listed clearly in bold print. It wasn’t anywhere near what they were asking. It was more. A lot more. Holy shit. His fingers so shaky they were flapping the paper around, he shoved it toward his mother.

Anne let out the first expletive Ryan had ever heard her utter. And that was saying a lot, given all the damage he’d caused around the house growing up. Her lips trembled and her eyes were filling with tears.

It would set them up for life. No worries. Ryan saw that as a very good thing. But it would mean letting go of a piece of family history, something that had been part of the Pettridges for four generations. For the first time since he’d come back to Scallop Shores, the enormity of what they’d be letting go finally set in.