Disappointment made his steps heavy and tightened the muscles at the back of his neck. Saturday night and she’d gone off without him.
Not that he had any real claim on her Saturdays. She had a right to time with her family and he needed not to start acting like a jealous fool.
“Where’d she go?” He tried to sound casual about it, like it didn’t matter all that much to him where his wife had run off to.
But it did matter. He wanted Aislinn and he’d gotten his hopes up and now those hopes had soured.
Soured hopes brought Judy to mind. They’d always been out of sync with each other, him and Judy. He’d been such an idiot, just accepting her word for it when she’d said she had a yearning to live in the country, paying no attention to the other signals she was giving off.
After the divorce, he’d told Martin that he didn’t understand women and marriage wasn’t for him.
Martin had laughed. You’ve got “born to be married” written all over you, son. You just need to hook up with the right woman and you’ll be fine.
In her wispy little voice Erma said, “Valentine Bay.”
“What?”
“Aislinn went to Valentine Bay. Check your cell phone.”
“Uh. Yeah. Cell phone. Got it.”
He went upstairs to look for the damn thing and found it on his dresser, deader than a hammer. It still wouldn’t work when he plugged it in. So he left it to charge a little and jumped in the shower.
Five minutes later, dripping wet with a towel hooked around his hips, he padded back to the bedroom. The phone was working by then.
Aislinn had sent him a text. He instantly felt better about everything, that she’d thought of him, thought to touch base with him when she was going out.
Having dinner with Harper and Hailey at the beach cottage. Afterward, we’re going to the Sea Breeze. Did I tell you Keely’s mom bought it and fixed it up?
She had. And he knew the Sea Breeze. The bar was a Valentine Bay landmark.
The good part came next.
We should be there around eight. Come meet us. I’ll buy you a drink.
Chapter Eight
At the Sea Breeze, the small parking lot was full, the place all lit up. Rock music blared from inside.
Jax had to drive a couple of blocks up Ocean Road and take a side street to find a parking place. When he got back to the bar, the parking lot was still packed and the music was still loud.
Inside, there were potted palms and café tables. One of those roll-up doors spanned the wall facing the ocean. The door was open. More tables and chairs, all of them taken, filled a patio under the cloudy, darkening sky. There was a lull in the music. For a second or two, he thought he could hear the waves lapping the beach out there beyond the reach of the lights.
“Jaxon!” It was Grace. She stood behind the long bar topped in a mosaic of sea-colored glass tiles. He elbowed his way over there. “You made it.” Aislinn’s sister beamed at him. “She’s over there, in the corner.”
He turned and looked where Grace pointed. Aislinn had already spotted him. She waved, a big smile on her beautiful face, like she was really glad to see him. He’d never been all that hot to get out and party on a Saturday night. But right at that moment, with his eyes locked on Aislinn’s across the room, he was ready for some fun.
He turned back to Grace and shouted to be heard over the band playing ’80s hard rock. “A beer for me, whatever’s on tap.” He glanced over his shoulder. Aislinn was still grinning at him. With her sat Hailey, Harper, their brother Matt and some other guy Jax had never seen before. Jax added to his order. “And a round for the table, whatever they’re drinking.”
Grace started setting up the drinks. “Go on, have a seat. I’ll get Ginny to bring the drinks over.”
He worked his way through the sea of tables. Aislinn stood when he got close and held out her hand. He took it and she pulled him around behind her sisters and into the chair next to hers.
“You came!” She looked so pleased that he had.
He saw his chance and he seized it, putting his arm across her shoulders, drawing her close, brushing a kiss across those perfect lips and breathing in the sweet and spicy scent of her skin.
She didn’t pull away. In fact, she smiled so soft and sweet against his mouth.
“Love.” The guy across the table next to Matt gave a loud groan. “Freedom’s better.”
Love. It sounded pretty damn good to Jax. And Aislinn hadn’t stopped smiling. Maybe love sounded good to her, too.
Not that he was pushing it with her. Uh-uh. He was taking it slow and easy. One step at a time.
Hailey laughed and shook her head. “Ignore Jerry. He thinks he’s a player.”
“Yes, I am.” Jerry pounded the table once to emphasize his point, causing their drinks to jump. “And proud of it. I like to keep my options open—and wouldn’t you know? There are a lot of fine ladies out there who like to keep their options open, too.”
Matt introduced them. “Jaxon, this is Jerry. He’s been my friend since first grade.”
Jerry, a bearded ginger, with freckles across his nose and all over his muscular arms, offered Jax a hand across the table. “He means there’s no getting rid of me. And he is right.”
“Good to meet you, Jerry.” They shook.
A cocktail waitress brought their drinks and the band started another song, this one a ballad. A slim, older woman with purple-streaked hair strummed a guitar and sang about love in a small town.
Aislinn leaned close. “That’s Keely’s mom, Ingrid. She wrote that song.”
“And she owns this bar and she’s also a rock star, right? With Pomegranate Dream?”
“Wow. Impressive—but the band’s a thing of the past. Ingrid’s back in town to stay.”
Her soft cheek was so close. He dropped a kiss there and she let him. It all felt like a dream. The best kind of dream, the kind that happens to be real.
The band finished that set, took a break and then started playing again. Jax nursed his beer and let himself enjoy the evening, with Aislinn at his side, the place packed with people having a good time.
Jerry seemed to know everyone—especially all the women. They came by the table, one by one and in groups of two, to flirt with Jerry and to try to get Matt’s attention. Aislinn’s brother showed little interest in any of the pretty women angling to catch his eye. He was friendly enough, but there was something in his eyes that said taken.
Outside on the patio, people pushed the chairs and tables to the side and made a dance floor under the sky.
Jax was a lousy dancer. He’d never had much practice. Still, tonight, with Aislinn beside him, he got the appeal. A slow one would make a good excuse to hold her in his arms.
“Dance?” he asked.
“Yes.” She flashed a smile that made his stomach flip.
And then they were up and moving. They wove their way through the crowded tables out to the open space. The night air was damp and cool, smelling of salt and sea. The overcast sky hid the stars, but the moon appeared now and then, showing its ghostly silver face and then vanishing again behind the clouds.
He took her in his arms. She fit like she was born to be held by him and he wished they could just dance on and on forever, with the music soft and slow, the sound of the waves rolling in out there on the beach and the moon playing peekaboo in the cloudy sky.
* * *
They stayed until a little after midnight.
Aislinn had left her car at the cottage. Jax tried to talk her into riding home with him.
“I’ll drive you in tomorrow and you can get the car,” he said as he opened the passenger door of his truck for her.
She got that look, the one that said she’d made up her mind and no man was changing it. “That’s an extra half hour each way in the car, sixty minutes o
f our lives we’ll never get back.” She hopped up to the seat and he pushed the door shut. When he got in on the driver’s side, she said, “Take me to the cottage. I’ll get my CR-V and follow you home.”
Forty minutes later, they pulled into their side-by-side spaces in the garage at Wild River. She got out before he could run over there and open her door for her.
But when they converged onto the breezeway, she stopped and turned to him. And then she put her hand on his chest, right over his suddenly racing heart. “I had a good time tonight—a wonderful time.”
“Me, too.” He clasped the smooth curves of her waist in either hand.
And she swayed in close, sliding both hands up to hook around his neck. “I’ve missed you the past few days, Jaxon. Missed you a lot. Even with us living in the same house.”
He tipped up her chin and kissed her. She tasted so good, like everything he wanted, everything he’d once given up hope of ever finding, ever having. When he lifted his head, he said, “Come back to me.” She simply gazed up at him, eyes so dark and deep. He tried a smile. “Wait. Was that a yes?”
It worked. She laughed. And then she grew serious again. “I do want to be with you tonight.”
His heart did a little jig inside his chest. “Will you think I’m easy if I just keep saying yes?” When she only gazed up at him, eyes wide, mouth silent, he prompted, “Go ahead. I am listening.”
She chewed the corner of her lip, hesitating. But she finally came out with it. “If I need to get up and go back to my own room, I need to know you’ll be okay with that.”
He wouldn’t, not really. But whatever she needed, he intended to deliver. “All right. When you want to go, I won’t try to talk you out of it.”
She frowned. “If. I said if.”
He fell back a step. “Why do I get the feeling we’re about to have an argument?”
Now her sweet mouth was trembling. “You probably shouldn’t put up with me. I’m an emotional disaster lately.”
He moved in close to her again. How could he not? She drew him to her without even trying. He traced the shape of her ear and smoothed her hair back with a stroke of his palm. He loved her hair, loved the warmth and the thickness of it, the way it curled around his fingers, dark as midnight in his hands. “I just want you, Aislinn. What you said before is true. It is simple for me. I keep trying to remember that it’s not so simple for you.”
She turned her mouth into his hand, her eyes drifting shut. He felt those soft lips and the warm touch of her breath against his skin. Every nerve in his body heated. Burned.
When she looked up at him at last, she said, “Let’s go upstairs.”
* * *
They went in through her room again, so that she could unlock the inner door and leave it wide open.
For her future escape, he thought with equal parts desire and exasperation.
He hung back, watching as she crossed the sitting area to the bed. She kicked off her pretty high-heeled sandals and folded back the covers the way any wife might do. When she turned to him again, she held out her hand.
He couldn’t get to her fast enough.
They shared a long kiss. And then, simply and quickly, they undressed.
Naked and so beautiful, she reached up her arms to him. He gathered her close and took her down to the sheets.
The other night had been perfect.
But tonight felt even better.
Simpler. Truer.
He touched her and she lifted herself toward his hand. She was slick and ready, opening like a flower in the sun.
He took his sweet time with her, dipping two fingers in, and then three. She came apart so sweetly, rising, shattering, rising again.
When she reached for him, he knew he wouldn’t last long. And when she took him in her mouth, he was absolutely certain it was all over.
But somehow, he held out, held on, as the need to go over sang in his blood. He muttered dark promises of what he would do to her, burying his hands in her hair, holding out until he couldn’t hold back any longer.
She drank him down, every drop.
They collapsed against the pillows. He pulled up the sheet to cover them and wrapped his arms good and tight around her.
They whispered together.
She said Keely had fired her at her own request. “I want to focus on my work in the studio. Lately, I have a lot of ideas and I’m going to explore every single one.”
He said he had buyers coming next week. “They’ll be here Tuesday.”
“And stay for dinner after?”
“Yeah. They have a five-year-old son.”
“I’ll introduce him to Bunbun and Luna—oh, and next Sunday, I have to go to Daniel and Keely’s for dinner, with a family meeting afterward. I’m nervous about it. I don’t know how it will go.”
“You’re telling them about Madison Delaney?”
“Yeah.” She faked a bright tone. “‘Guess what, everyone! You have a sister you’ve never met!’ Ugh. My great-uncle Percy will be there. I’ll probably just let him do the talking. He’s the one who’s reaching out to Madison Delaney, letting her know she has a family in Valentine Bay.”
Jax smoothed her hair and pressed his lips to her forehead. “I’m going with you.”
“What?” She pushed against his chest. The mutinous curve of her mouth said it all.
He tried again. “Please, Aislinn. Take me with you.”
Her expression softened, but not completely. “It’s going to be weird and awkward. You don’t need to be there.”
“I want to be there.”
She flopped back against the pillows and glared at the ceiling. “I’m so on edge over this. I don’t even know what to say to them. And I feel that I already should have told them. I mean, I spent all day with my sisters today and I didn’t say a word. They’ll probably be furious at me for keeping it from them.”
“They love you. They’re not going to be mad at you.”
“You don’t know. You can’t be sure how they’ll take it.”
“All the more reason I need to be there.”
She turned her head and looked at him then. “No. It’s a bad idea.” Her mouth was set, determined.
But he refused to give up. “It’s a family dinner, right?”
“Didn’t I just say that?”
“I’m your husband. Doesn’t that make me one of the family? And this is an important meeting. What are they all going to think of me if I don’t show up to support you for this?”
She narrowed her eyes at him and he knew that he had her. She could refuse him if he was going for her sake. But she didn’t want her family thinking less of him. “Okay, fine,” she grumbled. “You might possibly have a point there.”
He pushed his advantage. “I’m going. Accept it.”
She rolled to her side and cuddled close to him again. “I surrender—about this, anyway.”
Something in her voice alerted him that there was more she wanted to say. “What else?”
She tipped her head back and scrunched up her face at him. “You’re not going to like it.”
“I’ll decide about that. Tell me.”
“Well, as soon as the rest of them know about Martin and the switch, they’re going to start wondering about the way we suddenly got married when I’d never even mentioned you before.”
“They don’t know that you worked for me once?”
“Even if they remember my eight-week summer job five years ago, Keely’s the only one I ever told about my thoroughly inappropriate crush on you. They’re not going to make any connection between then and now. But they are going to suspect that there must be a correlation between our out-of-the-blue marriage and what Martin did—and hey.” She laid her hand against his cheek, pressing enough to make him meet her eyes. “This is not your happy face you’re
wearing.”
He tried really hard not to scowl. “You’re right. I don’t like where this is going. Everybody in the world doesn’t have to know the whole truth about everything. Sometimes it’s just not their business.”
“But I love them. And I trust them. And it will hurt them to wonder, to know there’s stuff I’m keeping from them about something that’s really important to all of us. Jax, they have a sister they’ve never even met. They’re going to want to know the whole story behind that. And we’ve both agreed already that our marriage is real, even with an expiration date. No, I don’t want to run up and down the streets of Valentine Bay telling everybody I meet about what Martin did. But my family isn’t ‘everybody.’ My family needs to know.”
“No, they don’t.”
“Yes. They do. They need to know, and when we tell them, they’re going to understand. It’s not our fault that Martin Durand decided to manipulate us from the grave. This ranch is everything to you, and you’ll do what you have to do to save it. I’m willing to help you. And I’ll make some money in the process. It’s an honest transaction. And hey, it turns out we like each other—in bed and out—so it could be a lot worse.”
“You were planning to tell them all along,” he accused.
“Not always. But in the last few days I have been thinking that honesty is the best policy when it comes to this—for them, I mean, for my family.”
“I don’t like it.”
“I don’t blame you. This situation is seriously twisted. But at least we’re doing the best we can with it.”
“I was hoping to get along with your brothers. So much for that.”
She did a little double take. “What are you talking about?”
Even deeply annoyed with her, he couldn’t help thinking how beautiful she was, those black eyes gleaming, her hair the color of a raven’s wing, wild now, tangled around her face. He skated the back of his index finger down the creamy skin of her arm. “I never had a sister, but if I did, I’d beat the holy crap out of any man who put her in a situation like this.”
“Oh, Jax.” She actually chuckled. As if there was anything the least bit funny about it. “You didn’t put me here. I’m a volunteer.”
Almost a Bravo Page 13
