Yours to Hold: Ribbon Ridge Book Two (18 page)

Her muscles clenched around him, squeezing his cock. He tightened as his orgasm burst upon him. He’d seen it coming, but he hadn’t been prepared for the intensity. He gripped the headboard and buried his other hand in her hair, pulling at her soft curls as if they could keep him from flying away into blackness.

Her fingers dug into his backside as she rotated her pelvis against him. When they finally stilled, he let go of the bed and sank down beside her on the pillows, withdrawing from her.

She curled onto her side to face him and threw her leg over his hip. “Don’t go.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” He kissed her forehead. “I’m going to find something to cook in your kitchen, and we’re going to tidy it up so I can make you dinner.”

“Okay.”

He’d almost expected an argument, but he realized she didn’t necessarily want her house this way. Maybe she just didn’t know where to begin.

She kissed him on the mouth, her tongue meeting his for a soft, subtle dance that rekindled his desire.

“Careful,” he said against her lips, “or you’re going to have to let me spend the night so we can have a repeat performance.”

She deepened the kiss and caressed his chest. “Don’t go,” she said again, looking into his eyes.

There was trust here, he realized. A foundation for something he’d never had before, something he’d never wanted. What
did
he want? Her. This
belonging
. This feeling of being needed. He’d never fallen in love but imagined it might feel like this. He really didn’t know, and right now he didn’t want to overanalyze it. He just wanted to enjoy it.

He brushed her wild hair back from her face. “I won’t go until you tell me to.”

M
AGGIE LOOKED AROUND
her somewhat tidy kitchen. Kyle had just left, but his imprint was everywhere. They’d worked past midnight to put everything away and get the counters and table completely empty of clutter. Then they’d gone back upstairs, where he’d made love to her again, more slowly and thoroughly—if that were possible. She felt utterly satisfied and content.

Because they’d been up so late, he’d had to leave in a bit of a hurry this morning so he could get to work, but not before he’d come back inside with the flowers he’d forgotten to give her last night.

She smiled at them, the only thing on her now-clean kitchen table. They were in a pitcher because she had no idea which box in the garage held the cheap vases that had come with all of the apology flowers Mark had sent her. Even the thought of her ex didn’t dampen her mood.

What did that mean? Was she falling for Kyle? Yeah, probably. It felt a little like when she’d fallen for Mark, but not quite. There was something deeper that came from how Kyle had reacted last night. He’d shown up and simply taken charge—not in a controlling way like Mark would have done, but in a way that made them partners. He didn’t do things for her or instruct her; he asked her, helped her, followed her lead.

Whatever was going on, she had to think they were past being friends with benefits. She’d shared things with him she’d never told anyone, and he’d opened himself up to her about his gambling—something she was certain he’d never done with anyone else. Rather than guess about all of this, she wanted to talk to him. They’d demonstrated their ability to be honest and open with each other, and they could do the same with regard to this burgeoning relationship.

Still, Alex hovered at the back of her mind. When she’d mentioned him last night, Kyle’s expression had flattened. He’d been completely engaged in her, and then for a moment, he’d engaged in his own grief or whatever he’d been feeling. She didn’t fault him for it, as she understood that Alex was a part of who they were as a couple—
if
they were a couple. He’d brought them together, and if they couldn’t find a way for the Archers to forgive her, he’d drive them apart, too.

She glanced at the clock and vaguely remembered that she should’ve been with a patient right now but that they’d canceled today’s appointments. Pouring a cup of coffee, she exhaled in relief. What about Monday? And Tuesday? The calm she’d felt all night and all morning began to unravel as she thought about work.

Her Xanax was still upstairs in the bathroom. She hadn’t taken any since she’d seen Amy, but she also hadn’t disposed of it like she said she would.

She ought to see if Amy could fit her in sooner. She didn’t know if she wanted to return to work without talking to her therapist first. The irony of that wasn’t lost on her—she needed therapy in order to provide therapy.

She called Amy’s office and moved her appointment up to next week. The receptionist had heard about what happened—it was such a small community—and offered her apologies. Maggie ended the call and then padded to the downstairs bedroom she used as an office. In reality, it was a box-filled area with a desk. They’d put her laptop in there for now, but she took it back to the kitchen with her since the desk was still unusable at this point. Kyle would be back this weekend to help her attack the other rooms, and for the first time, the notion didn’t fill her with anxiety.

When she was situated at the kitchen table, she pulled up her e-mail and sent a note to her boss asking for the next week off. Her finger hovered over the track pad for a moment before she clicked send. She didn’t think he would have a problem with it, but what was she going to do when it came time to go back? She might’ve overcome her anxiety about cleaning her house, but now her angst seemed to be centered around returning to work.

Don’t think about that right now, Maggie. You don’t have to deal with it today
.

Her e-mail alert sounded, and she glanced down at the screen. It was from the computer forensics specialist. She read through it quickly. He apologized for contacting her instead of Kyle, but he’d misplaced Kyle’s information. Maggie wasn’t surprised—the guy was young and definitely what you’d call a computer geek. Organization didn’t seem to be his strong suit, but he’d been incredibly knowledgeable about his field.

Her stomach clenched as she read further. He’d attached deleted e-mails that he’d found in the computer’s cache. E-mails that contained the names of the drugs. E-mails from someone named Natalie Frobish.

Dread curled through her. She opened the attachments, and as she read through them, her horror magnified.
Natalie.

Alex had bought the drugs from the woman Maggie had seen kissing Kyle the other night. And from the tone of the e-mails, she’d been the one he’d had a crush on. She couldn’t tell if they’d had an actual relationship of any kind, but she was certainly flirty in her responses.

Maggie stared at the screen. Not only had this woman provided Alex with the drugs he’d used to kill himself, she’d profited from it. There were no amounts listed, but the wording was such that it was clear he was compensating her.

How would Kyle take this? To have the culprit be not only someone he knew, but someone his entire family trusted would be devastating.

Maggie would be there for him, just like he’d been there for her. They’d figure it out together.

Chapter Thirteen

“T
HERE SHE IS
!” Sara dashed toward Mom as she and Dad walked toward them down the dirt track. Dad had just picked her up from the airport and brought her directly to The Alex, where Kyle, Sara, Derek, and Dylan had convened for a meeting minus Tori, who was in San Francisco.

Kyle couldn’t keep from smiling as he watched Sara give Mom a giant hug. They walked the rest of the way hand in hand, their blonde heads bent together. Sara hadn’t gone more than a week without seeing Mom in their entire lives, so the past few months without her had been an adjustment, especially since Sara’s sensory processing disorder sort of depended on Mom’s support and regulation—or at least it had. Sara had matured into a very capable and independent woman. That didn’t make their reunion any less sweet to watch.

“Hi, Mom.” Kyle moved forward and wrapped her into a tight hug, sweeping her feet just off the ground.

Mom laughed. “Kyle, put me down!” Her blue eyes sparkled as he set her down.

He didn’t remember the last time he’d seen her look so happy, or at least not look sad or pensive. But then, he hadn’t spent much time with her the past few years before Alex had died. Regret spiraled through him and threatened to darken the moment. He shrugged it away. “Welcome home.”

Derek came up to hug her next, which drove Kyle to separate himself from them. He purposefully tuned out whatever they said.

When he looked back a few moments later, Mom had moved on to Dylan, who’d been lurking in the background. “And here’s the young man who’s stolen my Sara’s heart,” Mom said with a wide grin. “Well done.”

Dylan nodded his head, looking somewhat mortified. Families were not his forte, but Kyle smiled at his discomfort. If he was going to marry Sara—and Kyle was pretty certain he would—he was going to have to get used to this and more.

“Come on and give me a hug!” Mom demanded, prompting Sara to laugh.

Dylan had no choice but to hug their mother, and Kyle caught the hint of a smile teasing his mouth.

“How was your trip?” Sara asked as they broke apart.

“Great. I’m tired, of course, but it was good.”

Kyle tried to get a sense of how things were between Mom and Dad, but it was impossible to tell. Dad was over studying the cottage with interest. He hadn’t been up here in a while, and it looked completely different from his last visit.

Mom turned and surveyed the cottage. “I can’t believe how wonderful this looks! Except for the landscaping.” Her nose scrunched up. “What’s going on? Why hasn’t anything been started?”

“Long story,” Derek said. “We’re working on it—that’s why we’re meeting here.”

“Don’t suppose someone will give me a tour?” Dad asked from over near the open door. He appeared to be going inside regardless.

“Sure,” Dylan said, jogging over to join him. His phone rang at that moment, prompting him to pull it from his back pocket and glance at the screen. “I have to take this—it’s about the plants.” He glanced back at Kyle and the others. “Can one of you take him?”

Derek started toward the door. “I will.”

Alone with Sara and Mom, Kyle turned to their mother. “You look fantastic, Mom. France agrees with you.”

“Thank you. I feel good.”

“How was your ride back from the airport with Dad?” Sara asked the question with casual nonchalance, but Kyle knew she was as worried about them as he was—more so, probably.

“It was good.” Absolutely worthless answer, but Kyle wouldn’t press. Mom touched their cheeks simultaneously. “I’ve missed you. Kyle, I’m so glad you’re here. And you both look so happy. I understand why she does.” She winked at Sara. “But what’s your excuse, Kyle? Things are going well here?”

“Well enough.” He looked happy? He didn’t think he looked any different. “Same old, same old.”

“Meaning he still hasn’t made up with Dad or Derek,” Sara said.

Mom’s eyes narrowed slightly as she looked up at him. “That makes the spark in your eye extra curious.”

The spark in his eye? Shit. He blinked as if he could somehow make it go away.

Sara leaned closer to Mom and stage-whispered, “He has a secret girlfriend.”

Holy fucking hell.
What had Dylan told her?

Kyle speared her with a what-the-fuck glare. “Who told you that?”

Sara lifted her chin. “Not you, clearly. Dylan met her the other day. Come on, it’s no big deal.”

“I beg to differ with you, dear,” Mom said, her gaze softening as she looked at Kyle. “I don’t know that your brother has ever had a girlfriend, secret or otherwise.”

Kyle wanted to shoot Dylan. Right after he disemboweled him. “Sure I have.”

“That must’ve been in Florida then and couldn’t have been too serious if you didn’t mention her.”

“Okay, no serious girlfriends.” But Maggie wasn’t a serious girlfriend. Hell, she wasn’t even a
girlfriend
. Was she?

“Who is she?” Sara asked.

Couldn’t this conversation just
die
? Or maybe a small asteroid could drop into the valley below—something,
anything
to divert attention from him. “Just a friend.”

Dylan came back over to join them after finishing his call, and Kyle threw him the nastiest thanks-a-lot-bro stare he could manage. In response, Dylan just blinked at him before saying, “So the plants and sod are arriving Monday morning. Too bad we have no plan for them.”

“Why not?” Mom asked.

Relief at the change in topic drove the tension from Kyle’s shoulders. “The landscaper we hired flaked. Won’t return calls.”

“Can’t you just show up at their place of business?”

“He doesn’t have one,” Sara said. “He works out of his house, and it’s in Salem. He came highly recommended, but for some reason he fell off the planet.”

“Had you paid him?”

“Just a deposit, but I’m working on getting it back.” Dylan’s eyes had turned a glacial green-gray. This topic pissed him off like no other. “In the meantime, we have to figure things out. We need to till the ground and take out the blackberries and other bushes this weekend. You still up for that, Kyle?”

“Definitely.” And he’d begun to think he just might have an answer to their landscaping problem . . .

Dad and Derek emerged from the cottage. “This looks terrific,” Dad said. “Really, I’m so impressed, especially that this all came from you, Kitten.” Dad smiled at Sara.

She blushed. “Not all from me. Just my idea. Without Tori’s design and Dylan and his crew, this would still be a boring ranch.”

Dad put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a squeeze. “The idea is everything. Without that, none of the rest happens.”

“Sounds like a quote for the bottom of my e-mail signature,” Derek cracked.

Dad chuckled, and Kyle wished he could make jokes like that and get the same response. Would the tension between them ever dissipate? His neck prickled—he knew what he needed to do to make that happen. The question was could he do it?

Maybe
.

Wow. That was the first time his answer hadn’t been
absolutely fucking not
.

It seemed as though Maggie’s therapy was working. He inwardly cringed. Is that how he thought of her? As his therapist? Hadn’t he just been considering whether she might be his girlfriend?

“Ready to go?” Dad asked Mom. Had his tone wearied, or was that Kyle’s imagination?

“Yes,” Mom replied, also sounding a bit strained. “As much as I’d like to hear how you’re going to resolve the landscaping issue, I’m too tired. See you all later?”

“How about tomorrow?” Sara asked. “I bet you’re going to sleep the rest of the day.”

Mom smiled before pressing a kiss to her cheek. “You’re probably right. Tomorrow then.”

Mom and Dad took off down the track toward the parking lot. If anyone noticed that there was plenty of space between them as they walked, no one said anything. It was, in fact, eerily quiet for a long moment as they all watched them depart.

“So,” Dylan said, breaking the silence. “About this landscaping problem . . . Derek, I just got a call from the nursery. The order the shithead placed a few weeks back is going to be delivered Monday.”

“We couldn’t cancel it?” Derek asked.

“Why would we do that?” Sara stared at him as if he’d grown two heads. “We need the plants and grass—look at this place. It’s horrible.”

Derek crossed his arms over his chest, exhaling. “True. What are we going to do with all of it? Do we know what’s coming?”

“They e-mailed me a list, so we at least know that much. And I have equipment rented for the weekend so we can till, remove shrubs, etcetera. We’re going to need all hands on deck though.”

Kyle spoke before he really thought things through. “I think I have a solution to our design and implementation problem.”

Three gazes swung toward him, two curious, one very skeptical.

Kyle ignored the skeptical one—Derek. “I recently made the acquaintance of a landscape designer.” That title was stretching things, but if Maggie’s yard was any indication of her skill, she’d be able to transform this place into a gorgeous setting by next Saturday. Plus, he’d seen the light in her eyes when she’d talked about the space last weekend. She’d love to do this—provided she had time. Shit, she had a job, for Christ’s sake. But no, all they needed was her design. Dylan and his crew—hell, even Kyle and whomever else they could find—would do the grunt work.

“You just happened to meet a landscape designer recently?” Derek sounded as dubious as he looked.

“It’s more of a hobby for her, but she’ll do a great job. Just trust me on this.”

Derek narrowed his eyes at him and opened his mouth, but then snapped it shut. “Fine.”

Kyle gave in to the anger that Derek’s doubt had sparked. “If you have something to say, say it.”

Derek’s expression changed so that he looked less pissed and more . . . resolute. “Don’t screw it up.” He turned and stalked off.

“Thanks for the vote of confidence!” Kyle called after him before muttering, “Jerk.”

Sara’s soft touch on his arm soothed him. “You could go after him.”

“Not now, Sara.” His voice sounded sharper than he’d intended.

“Hey, don’t be a dick,” Dylan said.

“That’s nice coming from the dick who told my sister I had a secret girlfriend. What the hell, dude?”

Dylan didn’t back down. “I didn’t say that. I said I’d met a friend of yours who happened to be a girl. If Sara decided she was a secret girlfriend, that’s her interpretation.”

She socked Dylan in the arm. “Hey, you said they looked like they might’ve been messing around.”

This was not a conversation he wanted to have in front of his sister. Kyle scrubbed at his scalp as if he could rid his brain of this entire topic. “Never mind. You guys trust me to fix this landscape thing, right?”

“Of course,” Sara said. “Who is this person?” A light fired behind her eyes. “Wait, is it the same woman? The secret-not-girlfriend?”

“For heaven’s sake, she’s not secret or a girlfriend. She’s a friend I met recently, and her thumb’s the greenest I’ve seen.”

Sara fidgeted with the bracelet she was wearing—one of her favorite sensory items. “Are you going to tell us how you met her and how you know what color her thumb is?”

“No.” He knew he was coming off like a jerk, but he didn’t care. He didn’t want to talk about Maggie right now, particularly when he had to figure out how to keep her identity secret while having her do the landscape design. Was that even possible?
No.
He was such an asshole.

“I gotta go,” he said, already turning. “I’ll see you back here tomorrow morning.”

“Can’t wait to meet her!” Sara called behind him.

M
AGGIE STOOD BACK
and surveyed her living room. Wow, she could actually
live
in it. The couch was clean and even had pillows on it, and she’d hooked the television up. There were no pictures on the walls, but she didn’t have many of those anyway. Kyle could help her with them later.

Would that be before or after she told him about Natalie Frobish? She dreaded the discussion but knew it had to happen. She just hoped he wouldn’t spin out of control. News like this was tough on everyone, but for someone who dealt with addiction and compulsion, it could be catastrophic.

Her phone rang, and she braced herself when she saw it was her mother. She’d already ignored two of her phone calls and decided she’d better pick up this time. “Hi, Mom.”

“Magnolia!” Uh-oh, she sounded excited, and not in a good way. “I called you at the clinic earlier, and they said there’d been an attack or something yesterday. Are you all right?”

“It wasn’t an attack. One of my patients brought a gun and tried to kill himself. I’m fine, Mom.”
Mostly.
She’d done a good job all afternoon of keeping the darkness from taking over her mind and driving her to the Xanax bottle.

“I can’t imagine that’s possible. You’re an emotional person, my tender little flower bud. Maybe now you’ll rethink this ridiculous career.”

“It’s not ridiculous, Mom.” It was a lot of things—stressful, depressing, frustrating—but not that.

“It’s not for you.” She sighed into the phone. “You internalize everything, Magnolia. Treating mentally ill patients is only going to make
you
crazy.”

The truth of her words battered at Maggie’s tender—yes, tender—emotions. She didn’t want to have this conversation. Not today. And maybe never. She heard a car and looked out the window to see Kyle parking in the driveway. “Mom, I need to go.”

“You always do.” She sounded miffed. “I’ll keep badgering you about this.”

Maggie knew she would. “Which ‘this’ are you referring to? My job? My ‘tender’ sensibilities?”

“All of it.”

“Can’t wait. Talk to you later, Mom.” She ended the call and opened the door to let Kyle in.

He greeted her with a wide smile and a lingering kiss, sweeping her into his arms as he came inside.

The irritation of the phone call washed away in his embrace. She wrapped her arms around his neck and held on, loving the feel of him against her.

When he pulled his head up from hers, he surveyed the living room behind her. “Wow, you’ve been busy today. Looks great.”