A Fair to Remember (5 page)

“Because,” she went on, “I’m afraid I made you think I didn’t like that kiss. But I was just scared. I didn’t want it to come between us. You were my best friend, after all.”

Jake couldn’t take his eyes off her mouth, remembering all the sleepless nights in Afghanistan, thinking about those lips. “Well, if it’s really bothering you, you could make it up to me right now.”

She blinked. “You mean… kiss you…
here
? No. That would be a bad idea.”

“Or”—he drew little circles on her ribs with his thumbs—“you could just live with that wretched guilt the rest of your life. Knowing you broke a young boy’s heart.”

“I did not. You turned out just fine.”

“No,” he said, all the tease leaking out of his words. “Really.”

“Jake—”

“I’m not saying it wasn’t complicated back then. I’ll give you that. But getting over you wasn’t the easiest thing I’ve ever done.”

She blinked at him. Twice. “But… you
did
… get over me.”

He took the fifth on that one. “You gonna kiss me or not?”

“An apology kiss, right?”

“Right.”

She moved closer, resting her hands on his shoulders in tacit surrender. “Okay.” She approached with caution, her gaze on his grin.

He bridged the gap, brushing his mouth against hers. Softly. Testing.

He pulled away and he smiled.

“Oh,” she said, sounding disappointed. “That was nice.”

“No. That was just me trying to locate you in the dark.”

She chuckled. “I’m right he—”

His mouth was hot against hers before she could finish. It bore no resemblance to the last one. This kiss had nothing to do with best friends or even apologies.

A surprised sound escaped her before she relaxed, allowing him to pull her flush against his chest. She tasted good, so sweet, and she parted her lips to welcome his tongue against the hungry slide of hers.

He deepened the kiss, holding her face between his hands and pushing his fingers into her wet hair. It was a long-time-coming sort of kiss, the kind that, in imagining, had kept him awake long into the night in the middle of the desert. Her lips were as soft as he remembered. And her kiss held all the promise that teenaged one had contained. What had been an ember in his gut earlier, now exploded into a full-fledged fire that burned through him, hot and heavy straight down to his groin. He slanted his mouth against hers first one way, then the other, and he nearly lost control right there, but then they dipped underwater for a few seconds, locked together in the embrace. They rolled, then he kicked them to the surface and swung her above him. She lifted her head and broke the kiss, gasping for air.

The moon had slid out from behind a cloud and he could see her, almost clear as day as they bobbed in the water together. She looked surprised. Stunned as he was. Even if he
could
remember the last woman he’d kissed, which he couldn’t right now, this one ejected all others from his memory.

She tensed up in his arms and backed away from him.

“Oh!” she breathed.

Kicking backward, she did a small spin in the water, as if she’d lost her direction back to shore.

“I shouldn’t have done that. See what a couple of beers will do?” She started toward the rocks.

He stopped her, pulling her toward him, wrapping his arms around her. “Liv, wait.”

She shook her head. “I can’t even apology-kiss you without screwing it up.”

“You didn’t screw anything up.”

“Of
course
it screws everything up. For so many reasons. Not the least of which is I wouldn’t want to hurt you. Of all people.”

“Hurt me? How? I liked it.”

“Because I can’t… I won’t…” She swallowed hard, treading in place. “Why’d you come back here, Jake? Was it just to keep the promise?”

He frowned.
That felt like a trick question.
“Tonight? Yeah. Why’d you come looking for me at Grey’s? You could’ve just let it go. Just left it alone.”

“What?
No
, never. I
wanted
to see you.” Her hands were on his shoulders. “I guess I thought, stupidly, we could pick up where we left off. As best friends. But we’re not kids anymore. This… what just happened—”

“Happened because we both wanted it to,” he finished. “At least,
I
did. And it felt like you did, too.”

She clearly couldn’t deny it either. “I did like it. But, Jake, the promise we made—to be each other’s fallback person—to marry each other if we were still single? It was silly and naïve and—”

“We were kids. We had no idea what was waiting for us out there. But none of that matters now. Life… it’s complicated. But what just happened? That’s simple.”

She shoved her hair off her face. “No.
No
. Kissing is a gateway drug. Seriously, I’ve sworn off men.”

“Men, in general or me specifically?”

Her thumbs were absently rubbing back and forth against his skin. Maybe she’d forgotten she was touching him. Maybe she was too busy thinking up reasons why they shouldn’t take this any further. But to him, it just said she was as confused as he was right now.

She looked away, sliding her hand across the moon’s reflection on the water. “Meaning—I-I’m never going to marry again.”

He stared at her for a long heartbeat, but getting past the wall she’d constructed around herself was like digging in sand. The more he uncovered, the more she disappeared.

“Look, I get it. You’ve been hurt. That bastard turned you inside out. You’ve had a rough patch. But that won’t last forever.”

“You really… you don’t know me anymore. Can’t we just be friends like we were? It was so much easier then.”

“Is that really how you remember it?”

“You
don’t
?”

What he remembered were a hundred sleepless nights thinking about her. Wanting her. Certain he’d screw it all up. And in the end, he had, by default.

“Okay, so lemme just get this straight. You’ve given up on men, banned marriage, and you don’t want me to kiss you anymore.”

She blinked. “Don’t put words in my mouth.”

Same Olivia. Confounding as ever. “And who said anything about marriage? I was just hoping you’d give me a hand with my uncle, Deke. I’ve gotta go up and see him tomorrow. You know, he’s old and not very steady anymore.”
A white lie, but a harmless one.

“Deke. You mean the eccentric one who never comes down off the mountain?”

“That’s the one. I could use some company on the ride up.”

She ducked her mouth under the water for a moment, considering, then said, “Tomorrow?
Hmm
. I’ll have to check my schedule. As friends?”

He gave her a non-committal shrug as Monday whined from the riverbank and lapped at the water’s edge.

She smiled in the dark. “Okay. But first I need your help. With a horse. My place? Eight a.m.? Unless you’re too busy.”

“Not too busy. But can we talk about this more later? I’ve lost all feeling in my toes.”

She laughed and ducked underwater, swimming toward shore. They’d drifted a ways down from where they started.

When Olivia surfaced, she turned back to him and taunted, “All that desert time’s made you a little thin-blooded, hasn’t it, Lassen?”

Maybe it had. But mostly, all that desert time had shown him what was really important and, maybe even more, what he wanted out of this life.

And she was climbing onto a rock three feet away.

She might have been his best friend once, but they’d been kids. And he hadn’t survived a war and all the losses that came with it to give up on her as easily as she thought he would.

Hoo-ah!

“W
hat’s Jake like
now?” Olivia’s mother, Jaycee Canaday, handed Olivia a cup of coffee and joined her on the porch settee at the front of the sprawling log cabin style ranch house as the sun was coming up the next morning. The swing creaked as they set it in motion.

Olivia rolled her eyes. “How did you hear already? Did Eve call you the minute she dropped me off at Grey’s?”

“Of course, she did. Like a good daughter.” A smile played on Jaycee mouth. Her long, once dark hair was salt and pepper grey now, and at fifty, the few lines that had appeared around her eyes and mouth only made her seem more attractive, not less. She hoped, someday, she’d look half as good as her mom did when she reached her age.

“Is he as you remember him?”

“He’s almost nothing like the Jake I used to know.” Not the way his strong arms fit around her, or the way he’d kissed her and they’d fallen under water together until they’d both nearly run out of air, or his way of saying things that made her question everything she knew about herself. “He’s a man now, not the boy who left. Taller, bigger… and… so handsome, in a very… ex-soldier-y kind of way.”

“I
see
.” Jaycee said, her eyes saying much more.

“But don’t get all excited. Nothing’s going to come of it.”

Jaycee sipped her coffee and tucked her feet under her. “Why’s that?”

Olivia’s lips still tingled with the memory of that river kiss. “We’re just friends. Old friends.”

“Sometimes, old friends make the best lovers. Just look at Reed and me.”

Her stepfather, Reed Canaday, had been a widower with two young daughters and a very successful career as a civil attorney when he and Jaycee met. After divorcing Olivia’s father, Landon—who had, emotionally at least, left them long before that—when Olivia was eight, Jaycee was hired by Reed Canaday as a legal secretary, despite her lack of training. She’d scrambled hard to catch up, but it took only three years before the budding office friendship between them turned into the amazing romance that had now lasted over eighteen years.

“You’re the exception to the rule, Mom. Believe me, happily-ever-after is nothing but a myth for most of us.”

Jaycee tucked her arm around her daughter. “My darling girl, if you gauge the rest of your life by your marriage to Kyle, or mine to your father, then you’ll be setting the bar too low.”

Was she? Despite Landon Stembridge’s problems, his alcoholism, his spotty career as a cowboy and bronc rider, Jaycee had never badmouthed him to Olivia. Nor would she now.

But Olivia had always taken her father’s alcoholism personally. As a rejection. As if she wasn’t worth the trouble of loving. Never mind that Jaycee had loved her like crazy or that Reed had treated her like his own, adopting her after her father’s death.

Becoming a Canaday should have mended what was torn inside her but it hadn’t. Not really. If Jaycee had a psychologist handy, they would probably point out that Olivia had never stopped loving her dad, despite his problems and, as a result, had always been a fixer. She had, after all, married Kyle, a man ten years older than her, who had more than his share of issues that needed repair. But if the past twelve years had taught her nothing else, it was that any fixing she required must be done by her and her alone.

Apparently, she was still a work in progress.

“I’m trying not to set the bar at all,” she said. “I’m not ready. Maybe I’ll never be.”

“Like you’re not ready to get back on a horse again after the accident?”

Olivia slid a dark look at her mother.

Jaycee sipped her coffee. “What’s stopping you? What are you waiting for Olivia?”

And she knew Jaycee wasn’t just talking about the horse. What
was
she waiting for? A horse that denied its nature? A man without issues, who didn’t demand a commitment? Kyle had been like a magician who could appear one way to the world, yet be someone entirely different with her. In the beginning, his mood swings, his anger, would catch her by surprise, and she would blame herself. It was her clumsiness, or she didn’t look the way he’d expected, or perform the way he wanted her to. She’d often thought if she could just get it right, all of his anger and wanting to control her would go away. But eventually—too late, really—she’d realized nothing would make things right between them. More importantly, nothing could be fixed by staying.

And here she was. Free at last.

And not free at all.

Olivia stared out over the Canaday land. Thirty acres. A gentleman’s ranch in the shadow of the Absarokas. The hay pastures, alongside the ones where horses grazed, were tall, nearly ready for mowing. The yard was a riot of color, with its banks of roses and green lawn. She loved her mother’s garden even though she, herself, had a brown thumb, which seemed true of her love life, as well.

“I suppose,” she said, “it’s clear to all of you that I have terrible judgment when it comes to men.”

“Olivia, we all make mistakes,” Jaycee reminded her.

“No. I can’t read them until it’s too late, until I’ve allowed myself to be bamboozled. I’m just not cut out for marriage.”

Jaycee sighed. “Instead of doubting yourself, why not tell yourself you’ll make a
great
choice next time? See how
that
goes?”

Olivia grinned at her mom and patted her hand. “Gee whiz, Mom, I wish
I’d
thought of that.”

Jaycee laughed. “Okay, maybe it’s oversimplifying things. But maybe not. I just think if you keep looking behind you, you might miss what’s right in front of you.”

Jake was right in front of her. Like a giant, flashing road sign—
Danger Ahead!
Because, she already sensed—no, knew—there were problems, possibly some PTSD, if what she’d witnessed at the bar was any example. He’d spent twelve years at war, for heaven’s sake, who wouldn’t have issues? The old her would have been drawn like a magnet to a man with issues. But the
new
her knew better. Falling for Jake Lassen might be like walking directly onto the tracks as a train was coming.

Then again… it was Jake.

“At any rate, you can’t hide out here for the rest of your life either. You have to find yourself.
Become
yourself again.”

Olivia jerked a look at her mom. “Is this just your gentle way of saying you’re kicking me out?”

Jaycee shook her head. “
No
. We love having you here, safe, under our roof and away from…
him
. I missed you more than you can imagine. But just remember. It’s a landing spot, not a hiding place.”