Home Sweet Home (17 page)

“Any excuse to have you over,” she muttered right on cue.

He had managed to keep his hands off of her until now. But now that it was just the two of them, alone in his dining room, after she’d made the choice to stay another night with him, he was done controlling himself.

Scooting his chair closer to hers, he reached over and slid a lock of her hair around his index finger. “Jealous?”

She pulled away. “No.”

“Liar.” He stood up. “I need to go kiss Madison good night.”

“And then I’d really appreciate it if you drove me home.”

Nate knew better than to respond, knew she was itching for an argument, to have a concrete reason to have to leave. He simply stacked their plates and took them into the kitchen on his way to Madison’s room.

But before he headed down the hall, he looked back into the dining room. Andi was still sitting in her seat, the lock of hair he’d wound around his finger, wound around hers now.

A surge of pure male satisfaction rode him. He liked that his touch, even the barest, lightest one, could make her lose her place, could stop her cold for at least a few seconds.

Tonight he planned to make her forget everything.

Everything but how perfectly they fit together.

F
ull of nervous energy, Andi cleaned off the table, loaded the dishwasher, and washed the dishes. When the countertops were so clean she could practically see her reflection in them, she walked back over to the couch and sat down next to her knitting.

How could her grandmother have possibly thought she had the knitting skills to finish this sweater? She hadn’t even known what Fair Isle was until she’d looked it up with Madison.

And yet, Andi couldn’t stand the thought of letting her grandmother down. Helping out at the store for a few days was one thing. Tackling this sweater, she could already see, was another thing entirely. Andi knew how to run a business, but dealing with multiple strands of yarn while trying to knit them into an intricate pattern…well, that was going to take some serious concentration.

Normally, Andi thought as she picked up the needles and pattern and tried to make sense of them again, she was a master of concentration. But when Nate was around, her thoughts ended up fluttering around like little lost butterflies.

She looked down, realized she was clenching the needles and yarn tightly in her hands. He had gently accused her of not telling the truth earlier about being jealous of the women who swarmed around him. He was right. She wasn’t normally a liar. It was just that these feelings were confusing.

As soon as he finished putting Madison to bed, Andi needed to head back to her own bed, too. If she were smart, she would get out of his house right now, swim across the cold lake if she had to, before she did something stupid again. Before she made another—bigger—mistake by giving into feelings that couldn’t possibly make rational sense.

But she couldn’t leave without at least saying thank you for dinner and good night, could she?

The train of her thoughts was too dangerous for her to keep following them. This impossible sweater on her lap, for all its difficulty, was much safer.

Carol had marked where she’d left off on the pattern in the hospital, and Andi forced herself to begin there, to take one stitch and then another.

She couldn’t let herself look any further than one stitch ahead. She couldn’t let herself worry about getting to the end. She couldn’t worry about making sure the sweater turned out perfectly. Because if she did any of those things, she might as well save herself time and frustration by stuffing the yarn, needles, and pattern into the garbage can right now.

“Seeing you with those needles makes me realize how much you look like your grandmother.”

Nate’s warm voice caressed her spine, made her skin tingle all over.

How long had he been standing there by the door, staring at her with those dark eyes? She’d been so focused on the pattern, on trying to pull in the correct strands of yarn, that she hadn’t realized he’d come in.

His large hands were hooked into the pockets of his jeans, and a small shiver ran through her, a shiver filled with the foolish anticipation of having those hands on her again.

And that dark, sinful gaze shining with love for her as she came apart in his arms.

“Your eyes must be playing tricks on you,” she finally replied. “I don’t look anything like them.”

“Do you really not see it, Andi?”

“My mother and grandmother are so small and feminine,” Andi found herself saying. “They’ve always been able to make the most beautiful things with their hands. Not just with yarn, but with paint and fabric. I’ve never fit in with them, you know.”

She loved her grandmother, her mother, but she’d always felt a world apart from them.

“They’re so soft. They bake and sew and cook.”

Not only did Evelyn and Carol have curves she never got, but they’d always chosen to live happily on a small scale, whereas she’d never stopped shooting for big. For bigger. Just like her father.

“You have your grandmother’s eyes.” Nate knelt down in front of her, his knuckles brushing against her cheekbone. “Only yours are in sharper focus. Brighter.” He brushed the pad of his thumb across her lower lip. “You have the same mouth as your mother, only your lips are plumper.” He slid his thumb down to her chin. “But this chin is all your own, sweetheart. So stubborn.” He brought his mouth closer to hers. “So sweet.”

A lump had formed in her throat at everything he saw, all the things no one else ever had. “You know just what to say,” she whispered against his mouth. “And just how to say it.”

“No, sweetheart, I don’t.”

She lifted her eyes to his in surprise.

“If I did, I’d know what to say to get you to stay for more than one night at a time. For more than a week or two before heading back to the city.”

The air grew still between them, the tension riding high at his words, at their barely banked desire for each other, at the control she was constantly trying to put over it.

She knew she had to pull away, walk away from this. From him. She needed to do it right now. She should have done it last night, when they were in front of her house and she could have gone up to sleep in her cold, empty bed.

Andi couldn’t lie to herself and call this a hometown fling. Not when being with Nate was so much more than that. It was why she’d stayed away from him for so long. Because she’d known that if she ever let her defenses down, he’d be right there, stealing even more of her heart than he already had.

But hadn’t she been strong for years? Hadn’t it eaten through her soul to be that strong for so long? She’d spent so long worrying about complications. Couldn’t she have one more night with Nate? One final night where he was hers and she was his?

She’d have to be strong again soon, she knew that, but with her grandmother in the hospital, with her career suddenly having more to do with yarn than Fortune 100 business development, with Nate’s eyes seeing things no one else ever had, as her fingers curled with tension into the sweater in her lap, suddenly all she could think was,
One stitch at a time. No looking forward. No worrying about making it to the end.

And that was when she finally said, “I’m here now.”

For one more night.

A second later, Nate’s arms were around her rib cage and beneath her knees, and he was lifting her off the couch, her knitting sliding off her lap onto the cushions.

“I don’t want to waste one more second with you, Andi,” he said, and then he was making good on his words by kissing her as he took her back to his bedroom.

Once inside, he pushed the door shut with his shoulder, then turned them so that her back was to the door. As she slid down his body, back to her feet, every inch of contact caused a slow burn across her body.

“I swore I was going to do this slow,” he said as he pulled her shirt off, along with her bra. “I told myself I was going to have some control this time.”

But Andi was sick to death of control.

“Please,” she whispered as she helped him slide off her jeans and panties. “Love me, Nate. Just love me.”

His dark eyes dilated to black, and then her hands were tugging at his pants, at his boxers and T-shirt, and it was the most natural thing in the world for him to put his hands on her bottom and say, “Wrap your legs around me,” and for her to trust that he would hold her.

To trust that he wouldn’t let her fall, no matter what.

And then he was pushing into her and she was pushing back, wanting all of him. She buried her head in the crook of his shoulder as he filled her so completely that her breath left her lungs in a whoosh.

She lifted her head, had to look at him, had to say, “Nate.”

He held her body still around his, his arms strong. Steady.

“I love you, sweetheart.”

That was all it took for the dam to break. She’d never felt so wild, so strong, so good. She could feel her inner muscles squeezing him as she got closer, so close to that sweet spot where nothing mattered but how good he made her feel, where there was no past, no future.

Only a stunningly beautiful present.

And then he was moving them to his bed and his mouth was moving across her forehead with slow little kisses. She breathed him in as he ran kisses down across her temple, down over her cheekbones, her closed eyelids, the tip of her nose.

With each sweet press of his lips against her skin, she felt herself coming back alive, inch by sensual inch. His body was a wonder, his shoulders and arms corded and rippling with muscles, his chest broad, his abs defined by the deep shadows between them, all of it tapering down to slim hips.

“I can’t believe I’m here. With you. How do you do this to me? How do make me feel so much?”

His low chuckle was full of sensuality. Full of such deep desire—and love—that she didn’t know how to take it all in.

“Sweet, Andi. You’re so sweet.”

No one but Nate had ever called her sweet. As far as she knew, no one had ever thought it.

A heartbeat later everything stopped, her breath, her heart, her thoughts as she came apart beneath him. And then he was calling out her name, holding her hips completely still as he exploded into her.

She couldn’t open her eyes, couldn’t move a muscle. Not when she was still reeling from the passion between them. But then she felt him shift as he brushed a lock of damp hair away from her face.

“I’ve never known anyone as beautiful as you.”

And she had never felt as beautiful as she did when she was in his arms. But before she could find the breath to say the words aloud, sleep came at her like a runaway freight train.

Andi was only barely aware of his words of love, of his lifting her and sliding her beneath the covers, warm and safe against his body before she fell asleep.

A
ndi woke up alone in Nate’s bed. At 2 a.m., the room was dark and all she could hear was the slow push of waves on the shore outside his bedroom window.

The bed felt empty. Way too empty.

Where was Nate? And why had he left the bedroom in the middle of the night?

Slipping out of his bed, she wrapped his robe around her naked body. Making sure to keep her footfalls quiet so that she wouldn’t wake Madison, Andi went down the stairs and looked into the kitchen and living room. They were both empty, and she was frowning when she heard the creak of a chair out on the porch.

She pushed open the front door, and the cold fall air hit her as she stepped outside.

“Nate?”

He looked surprised to see her and then glad, so glad that her heartbeat kicked into double-time.

“Come here, sweetheart.”

He pulled her onto his lap, covering them with a nearby blanket.

No one had ever held her like this, no one but Nate. He settled her more firmly onto his lap, and it was the most natural thing in the world for her to lay her head against his shoulder. Even in only a long-sleeved T-shirt and jeans on the cold porch, he was warm.

Sitting on the porch with Nate, curled up safe and warm in his arms, looking out at the fall moon, felt like a home she’d only thought existed in fairy tales.

She wanted to sink into it, wanted to let herself believe that she really was home. She wanted to pretend that he could make her dinner every night and she could teach Madison to knit on the couch, and then later, when the sun fell and the moon rose, she could lose herself in Nate’s kisses, his heat.

And yet, even as he pulled her closer, she knew she couldn’t let herself get used to this feeling.

Emerald Lake wasn’t home for her, no matter how good being with Nate was.

She lifted her head from his chest and her heart squeezed at his tormented expression. 

“Why did you leave the bed, Nate?”

He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”

And then his mouth was on hers, demanding and giving all at the same time, and for a few long moments, she wasn’t able to do anything but submit to his need—and her own.

It took every last ounce of self-control to pull away.

“It matters, Nate,” she said softly. “Talk to me. Please. You wouldn’t be out here if something wasn’t wrong. Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I’d rather tell you what’s right. You’re here, Andi. Have I told you how much I love having you here?”

She smiled at his words, even though she knew he was stalling. “You weren’t sleeping?”

He shifted beneath her, and she could feel his discomfort at her question. “No.” He looked out at the lake, anywhere but her.

“Why?”

A muscle jumped in his jaw. “Old demons, Andi. That’s all they are.”

She reached a hand up to his face, soothed the tight muscle, wishing she could take his pain away. She knew she should leave him alone, that she wasn’t going to be here for much longer, but the pain she felt vibrating through him wouldn’t let her go.

“Is it us?”

“No. I told you our breakup was behind us, and I meant it.”

She knew what it had to be, then. “It’s your parents, isn’t it? You have nightmares about what happened to them, don’t you? About what happened to you?”

His thigh muscles were so tight beneath her hips she was almost afraid to move.

“Andi.”

Her name was a warning, and her chest squeezed as she realized just what deep pain he must be in, deep enough that he was afraid to share it with her.

Had he shared his lingering grief, his suffering, with anyone? But she already knew the answer, because he’d even hidden it from her, and would have kept hiding it if she hadn’t spent the night.

Thanking god that she was actually here for once when he needed her, Andi wrapped her arms around him. Because for all her fears about being with him, despite the fact that she knew forever was never going to be theirs, she still wanted so badly to give him comfort, to smother his demons with love until they couldn’t live and breathe inside of him anymore.

Hugging Nate was like hugging a brick wall, but she didn’t let go, couldn’t let go of him.

Over and over he’d been there for her, had helped her and her family, and if holding him here in the dark was her only option, it was what she would do.

And then suddenly, there was a little give beneath her hips and his arms weren’t so stiff anymore. Slowly she felt him soften beneath her hug.

“I still dream about it, Andi. Walking into the trailer and seeing my dad there. The trailer was quiet, too damn quiet, and I knew something was wrong before I even opened the door.”

Andi didn’t loosen her hold on him, not even at the stark pain in his voice, so at odds with the beautiful sound of the waves lapping at the lakeshore in front of his porch.

“I knew he was taking my mom’s death hard. I knew he was having a hell of a time trying to take care of a newborn. I knew he was drinking more than he usually did. But I didn’t know he could ever do something like that.”

Andi could feel Nate’s heartbeat racing against her chest, could feel him tense up again. She wanted to tell him he didn’t have to say anything else, that he didn’t need to relive it all for her, but she couldn’t get the words out. Because something told her that it was, strangely, just the opposite.

Nate needed to finally talk, and she could feel him opening up word by word, sentence by sentence. It meant more to her than anything ever had before that he trusted her with his pain.

“There was blood everywhere. So red and thick it looked like someone had broken a ketchup bottle all over the floor, the walls, the couch, with bits and chunks of something. I threw up, Andi. Right there in the middle of it all, I threw up.”

Oh god.

She’d thought she knew the story, but she hadn’t been inside his trailer that weekend—and he hadn’t ever gone into the details of what he’d seen. She hadn’t been brave enough to ask for details, either.

She shivered at the awful picture and pulled herself in closer to him. She could tell by the rigidness of his body beneath hers that he was lost in his memories of that night he’d found his father.

“Nate, I’m so sorry.” Andi couldn’t stop her tears from falling. “You were so young. You never should have had to see something like that.” He never should have had to live through it, either.

His eyes were on her, but she didn’t think he saw her. Instead she knew he was seeing his old trailer, bloody from his father’s suicide.

“I don’t even know how I got to Madison, how I made it through that mess to her crib. But she was crying. And from that moment on, I vowed to do whatever it took to take care of her. Anything.”

Madison was why he had stayed at Emerald Lake. Not just because he loved the town. Not just because he felt he owed the people here a lifelong debt for helping him when he needed it most.

It was all for Madison.

Although Andi had left Emerald Lake as soon as she could, she understood why he wanted to raise his sister in this small town. Emerald Lake was a place where people took care of each other, where Dorothy watched over Madison as a grandmother would have, where Andi’s own mother and grandmother showed their love with yarn and hugs and cookies.

Nate wasn’t just a good man. He was a magnificent man. And she would never ask him to choose her over the welfare of his sister. It didn’t matter what she felt for him. She would never ask him to leave Emerald Lake. It didn’t matter that her heart was going to break a hundred times over when she left without him at her side. She would never again question his decision to stay here.

Tonight all that mattered was finding a way to help him heal, to clear away the darkness from his soul so that he could sleep at night, so that lingering pain didn’t hide behind his smile, pulling him down when he deserved to soar.

“Who knows what you’ve just told me about what you saw, about how bad it really was?”

“The police chief. The paramedics. They kept it quiet. People knew my father shot himself, but none of them dared ask me to paint them a picture.”

“So you’ve never seen a therapist to talk about your nightmares or a—”

He cut her off. “No.”

“You just picked up the pieces and moved on?”

She felt him tense again. “I did what I had to do.”

“But I saw how angry you were, Nate. That first weekend when I came back from college after you called to tell me what happened, you were so angry.”

“I told you, Andi, I’m not upset with you anymore.”

“No, Nate, even before we had our blow up you were angry. And how could you not be? If your father had given one single thought to the kind of life he was leaving his kids to deal with, then you wouldn’t have had to—”

His hands came around her waist fast and hard, lifting her off of his lap so that he could stand up and leave.

Deep, heavy regret pulled at her, made her wish she could have kept her mouth shut. For so long, she’d been a master at holding everything inside.

The one time she let her real thoughts and feelings loose, look what happened. She hurt the very person she never wanted to hurt again.

“I’m sorry, Nate. I shouldn’t have said it like that.”

But instead of leaving, he said, “How could I have been angry with my father, Andi? He was depressed. He couldn’t control what he did.”

Andi had a big decision to make. She could give in and stop talking about his father and maybe salvage some of the night. Or she could risk whatever was left of their confusing relationship and push him all the way to where he needed to go.

But the truth was, there wasn’t any decision to make.

If helping Nate meant risking everything—even the love she didn’t know how to return—that was what she had do.

It was what she
wanted
to do.

Tonight, out on his porch, she saw all the shades of the boy she’d known, the man she was discovering. Nate Duncan wasn’t just an incredibly great guy that she’d adored as a girl. He wasn’t just a protector of his little sister. He wasn’t just mayor of a town that he deeply cared for. He wasn’t just sexy, wasn’t just funny, wasn’t just loving, wasn’t just a man who made her heart race every time he was near.

He was also a man who had been working like crazy every minute of his life to contain a deep well of anger and sadness and pain.

Going to where he stood staring out at the lake, she was shaking as she pressed herself against his hard muscles.

“You were such a great son, but you had already been dealing with your father’s depression for years. Isn’t it one thing to be empathetic with someone who’s got problems and another thing entirely when they take an action that’s guaranteed to hurt you? With everyone else you can be Mr. Hero, swooping in to save your sister and the town, but even though you really are a hero, it doesn’t mean you can’t take some time to deal with your own demons. So that you can finally move on.”

She rested her cheek in the center of his broad back, felt his heart beating strong and fast.

“You can pretend with everyone else, Nate, but you don’t have to pretend with me. You’ve always taken care of everyone around you. You’ve looked so strong for so many years. But has anyone ever taken care of you the way you need?”

“The town was there for me, Andi. Henry from the general store used to send over packages from out of the blue—pipes would be delivered just in time to fix bathroom plumbing, paint cans would show up right when the front porch was peeling through. He even gave me new windows after a tree limb broke through during a nasty storm, telling me it was part of an order that his guys had screwed up for someone else and what were they going to do with one window. Catherine would babysit. Your mom was constantly dropping off food.”

Yes, she could see that so many people had helped him with the details.

But had anyone been there to heal his heart?

She should have been there.

He’d said the past was behind him, that he wasn’t angry with her anymore, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t still angry with herself.

Andi knew she couldn’t turn back the clock, couldn’t redo what was already done. But she was here now with a few precious hours before the sun rose to try and heal the man who didn’t deserve to still be hurting.

As Nate slowly resurfaced from the darkness, he realized Andi was soft and warm against his back.

Out there on the porch, it felt like she was trying to break though his armor. Armor he had barely acknowledged he’d covered himself with for the past ten years.

Everyone had long ago assumed he was over his parents’ death. No one knew he continued to have nightmares about finding his father dead on the carpet.

Nate turned around to come face-to-face with the woman he loved. He needed to take her into his arms to find his balance.

Even though she’d just sent him careening.

Hadn’t he known all along that it would come to this, that letting Andi in, even part of the way, meant she wouldn’t stop until she’d yanked off every last layer of armor?

This armor had gotten him through the worst moments of his life. When she’d been nowhere to be found.

But the armor was heavy.

And he was sick of wearing it.

Faith.

He had faith in Andi. Faith that her caring about him this much tonight meant that she wouldn’t just be here for him tonight…but that despite having told him she wasn’t going to stay, in the end she just might choose to stay forever this time.

Without saying another word, he picked her up and opened the front door without letting her go.

“Nate?”

He didn’t speak as he walked through the house with her, didn’t say a word until they were back in his bedroom. “Thank you for helping, sweetheart.”

“But I didn’t—”

“Yes”—he cut off her soft protest with a soft kiss—“you did.”

And it was amazing just how much lighter he felt, that just giving voice to his nightmares could erase so much of the junk that had been eroding his soul for so long.