Blueprints: A Novel (29 page)

Now what? He had taken his time making his first move. She wondered if he had anything planned for tonight. She assumed he would be taking her back to his place, a doddering A-frame several towns over that he was rebuilding and would sell for a profit when it was done. In the meanwhile, he had a grill on the back lawn and plenty of grass.

Last time, he’d done a mixed grill, steak for him, chicken for her. She liked the idea of trout. But the physical stuff? Not so sure about that. She had shaved for the sake of a sleeveless blouse, not Dean, and if she slathered on more body cream than usual, it was to counter motorcycle wind. She had also worn a bra, which on a warm night she might have foregone, but the blouse definitely looked better with lift.

Waiting on the front steps, she was restless. Master soothed her by rubbing one ear and then the other back and forth against her leg. She loved this cat, loved
all
her cats. They didn’t care if her breasts sagged, her neck wasn’t smooth, or her hand had an age spot.

Master’s purr grew louder.

No, not Master. Dean’s Harley.

Lifting the cat, she put him in the house, checked to make sure her phone was in a pocket, and locked up. She was midway down the front walk when the big machine arrived with its helmeted driver on board. His jacket was black, his belt wide, his jeans faded, his boots old. He silenced the bike, kicked down the stand, and climbed off. Setting his helmet on the handlebar, he came at her with a spare one, along with a jacket from the saddlebag.

She felt an alarming excitement, so much so that she might have turned and run if he hadn’t already reached her. “The jacket’s lightweight,” he said, “but you need leather on your arms.” He rolled the helmet on her front to back, pulled the strap tight, and, with a large hand spread, jiggled it to make sure it was snug. With the face shield still raised, he brought his eyes level with hers. “You okay in there?”

She was terrified, and not of the bike, not even of how tough and male Dean looked with his dark hair mussed from the helmet and his hazel eyes direct. What terrified her was the buzz in her own body. Again she thought about turning and running, but it was really too late for that now.

“This smells new,” she said of the helmet.

“It is. I got red to go with your hair.” She might have said red could easily clash with auburn, if he hadn’t already been holding the jacket open like a gentleman, then zipping it before she could do it herself. The jacket was snug, bringing his fingers straight up her torso, but they didn’t stray, just did their job and left.

Taunting, yes—but sweet, too. He made her feel like he was taking care of her, and, given that the weight of the world was on her shoulders, being taken care of was nice. He lowered her face shield, then turned and, after putting on his own helmet, straddled the bike. When he extended a hand, she took it and swung her leg over the back.

Too old? She’d be
damned
if she was that. She knew the moves, knew to put her Chucks on the foot pegs and her hands on his hips, knew to lean into corners with him and use her thighs to hold her in place. True to his word, he didn’t speed—at least not until they passed through the center of Williston and hit open road, and even then she wasn’t bothered. His body protected her from the force of the wind, and the Harley was surprisingly smooth. Imagining that the weight on her shoulders was lighter for the sheer unreality of the moment, she let him do his thing—until she realized that they were headed in the wrong direction.

She tapped him on the shoulder. He slowed fractionally and tipped his head.

“Where are we going?” she yelled.

“My house,” came the muffled reply, followed by a resurgence of speed, and all at once she knew
exactly
where they were going, because there was only one house that Dean owned in the boonies.

Sure enough, he turned off the main road onto a side road, then again onto a rutted drive, and here the Harley wasn’t so smooth. By the time it stopped, he had gone up a steep incline, and she was holding the back of his belt for dear life.

Riding on a rush of adrenaline and relief, she climbed off and removed the helmet. Her hair spilled free, its band God knew where, but she was too gripped by the house to care. It had the bones of a Victorian, but where her own spoke of age and charm, this one reeked of the dead. She had thought it spooky when he had first brought her here, and nothing she saw now changed her mind. This late in the day, with the sun low in the west, the house was all shadowed angles and peeling paint.

Dean traded her helmet for a bottle of wine. Taking two grocery bags from the Harley’s trunk, he showed her up the side steps. He had gutted the kitchen, which was some improvement from the graveyard of broken-down appliances that had taken up space here before. In their place against the wall was a cluster of tools. A large worktable sat in the middle of the room. He set the bottle and bags there, then clicked on a single bare blub.

Wondering how he was going to pull off grilled trout, she folded her arms. Yes, she felt smug, because the how of it was not her worry. She was a guest. Since she was against this purchase, nothing here was her fault. She had zero responsibility.

Seeming off-balanced by her docility, Dean said in a tentative voice, “The grill’s outside. And a table and lanterns.”

She nodded.

He added quickly, “Just so you know, I had a geologic analysis done to pinpoint where to dig the new well to avoid rust, and the zoning board is granting an exemption from conservation land use. Rollers are coming next week to level the road.” He frowned, tapped his forehead.

“Carpenter ants,” she cued.

He straightened a finger. “Right. There were two nests. We destroyed them and treated everything nearby. I’ve already replaced the infected wood.”

“Well, then,” she said lightly, “you’re all set.”

He remained visibly wary. “You’re still mad I bought it.”

She had to laugh. “I’m actually not.” She had seen enough gutted kitchens to be able to picture this one rebuilt, though she wasn’t telling him that. Nor was she telling him that he was adorable when he was nervous, or that she felt removed from the world here. “I’m just tired and hungry and wondering if you’re seriously going to be able to produce an edible meal.”

That quickly, he grinned. “Just watch.”

*   *   *

He was true to his word here, too. While she alternately explored a lean-to that held firewood and old farm tools, wandered to the edge of the woods to listen to the
yiiiip-yip-yip
of a coyote, and returned to sit backward at the picnic table and watch Dean work, he decanted wine, made a salad, and warmed French bread on the upper shelf of a grill while the trout cooked below.

She offered to help, but he refused, even when it came to serving the food. And she was tired enough, greedy enough for care, caught up enough in a time and place that was far from reality, to let him do whatever his little heart desired.

That included cleaning up afterward, although, given the lack of a kitchen sink, the sum of the task was stuffing paper goods and plastic wineglasses in a trash bag. The air had cooled by then, and it was dark, the crescent moon a hazy smile that left the job of lighting to the lanterns’ pale glow. When she heard the coyotes again, she limited her wandering to an outcropping of rocks that she had earlier skirted. Easily climbing them now, she sat facing the woods and listened. The coyotes called again, though from a distance. From an even greater distance came the drone of an airplane. Looking up, she spotted its lights against a wavering backdrop of stars. A rustle came from the woods and, farther off, the trickle of a brook that, if Dean’s home inspector was correct, had overflowed its banks and flooded the house during more than one spring storm.

Thinking to shout a reminder to Dean that he would need a good drainage system
and
sump pumps, she turned to face the house. The lanterns softened its edges, but with a turret still higher than she was, it loomed dark against a darker sky. She chafed her arms, as much against the cooling air as the gloom. Spooky was putting it mildly, and that was before a large figure blotted out the lanterns and approached.

Climbing the rock, Dean settled behind her with his legs flanking hers and his hands on his thighs, arms brushing hers. She tried to transfer fear of ghosts to fear of a hungry male. But she couldn’t fear Dean. Not with the way he was taking care of her, now shielding her from coyotes that were probably no threat, but who knew? Certainly not with the way he smelled of wood smoke or the warmth he brought. With so much of her life in flux, Dean was solid and physical and
there
. The real world was not.

“So, what do you think?” he asked quietly.

Like the moment, her reply was hushed. “Of the house? I think it’s a big job, but it’s yours, and if you want to do it, you should. I also think that what I think doesn’t matter, since you’ve already committed to it. And,” she added, layering her hands on his with a squeeze, then leaving them there because her fingers were cold and his were not, “I’m guessing you approached Jamie before you ever put money down.”

He chuckled. “I did. She roughed out some sketches for me to work from.” He turned his hands to surround hers. “Cold?”

“Good now. She didn’t tell me.”

“I told her not to. I didn’t want you riled up. I figured I’d wait until I addressed some of your issues.”

She angled sideways to look at him. “It shouldn’t matter what I think.”

He pushed her hair back with his chin. “It does.”

“Why?”

“Because I trust your judgment.”

“That’s very sweet.”

“It’s very true.”

His thumbs had been moving on her hands, sharing warmth as his eyes did now. Such a small movement, but oddly intimate, and Caroline didn’t fight it. With the rest of her life treading water on the other side of town, she was here, with trout in her stomach, wine in her blood, and a growing curiosity.

She had barely faced forward when he circled her waist and pulled her close. Her breath caught.

“So?” he asked.

“So?” she managed. He was definitely aroused, and while the ramifications of that were clear, her curiosity kept growing.

“Do I have your approval?”

“For what?” She couldn’t think straight. His forearms were inches—
inches
—from the underside of her breasts.

“Buying this place?”

“You have it,” she whispered and forced herself to breathe into sound. “Grudgingly. I still wouldn’t want to be alone here in the dark.”

“No.” He put his mouth to her ear. “I heard voices at three this morning.”

She squeezed his thighs in punishment. “You’re making that up.”

“I am not.”

“Why were you here at three in the morning?”

“I’ve been sleeping here.”

Bracing her hands, she looked back in surprise. “On
what
?”

“A bed.”

“
Where
?”

“Uh, the bedroom?” he suggested, amused.

She hadn’t gone upstairs this day. Last time had been bad enough. Now, though, the idea of a bed in an otherworldly room lent itself to certain imagery.

He smiled. “Makes you think, doesn’t it.” Taking her head, he faced it forward and drew her back again. This time, his hands went to her shoulders, massaging in circles.

“What were the voices?” she asked, feeling those fingers dip under the edge of her blouse.

“I assume they were ghosts.” With another round, then another, his fingers went deeper.

“And that doesn’t make you nervous?”

His mouth touched her ear. “When was the last time you heard of a ghost doing anything violent?”

Caroline had no answer for that, and when his fingers grazed the top of her breasts and she arched to meet them, she had no answers at all—not for why this was happening now and with Dean, or for why her body craved things that two weeks ago she wouldn’t have dreamed of, certainly not for who had just moaned like that.

Closing her eyes, she focused on sensation. A distant corner of her mind knew what he was doing. It was called foreplay, and it was exquisitely arousing. The anticipation of having Dean’s hands—
Dean’s
hands—on her breasts was stoking a startling heat.

“Tell me what you like,” he said in a hoarse voice.

“I can’t,” she wailed with barely a breath.

“I want it to be right.”

“What you’re doing is right.”

“What about this?” When he went all the way to her nipple, she cried out. He snatched his hand away. Laughing, she caught it and, feeling like a wild thing, pressed it to her while she scrambled not-so-gracefully around to straddle his lap.

“Now do it,” she breathed against his mouth, and while she looped her arms around his neck, he explored her breasts, her belly, even the notch between her legs. And she touched him,
touched
that erection, which was all the more impressive in her hands. The fact that she wasn’t embarrassed was as stunning as everything else. She didn’t know this creature she had suddenly become, which was as liberating a fact as the distance from home, the wine, the dark, and Dean’s obvious need.

But the creature was real. The fire inside her was real. No nineteen-year-old virgin, she knew exactly what she wanted, and with that realization, something snapped. Suddenly, she had no patience. She needed more, needed it all.

“I want you in a bed,” Dean gasped and in seconds managed to get them down from the rock. Holding her fast to his side, he crossed the grass in rapid strides and half-ran into the house and up the stairs. Ghosts? Caroline couldn’t
begin
to think of ghosts with the way he was touching her, removing clothes, laying her on the bed and following her down. He took care to make sure she was ready, but she didn’t need his fingers there to tell her. She felt the wetness. And she wasn’t embarrassed. This was what being a woman was about. Besides, she needed him too much to be embarrassed. The creature she was—the one
he
had created—was hungry for everything she had pretty much forgotten.