You Were Meant For Me

by Kait Nolan

  “I remember every word you’ve ever said to me.”

  A flash of uncertainty flickered over her features. “Why did you do this? I mean, I understand why you want to change the building for Miranda. But why turn it into this?”

  Mitch weighed the truth against the likelihood it would scare her away and opted for honesty. “Because it’s a good idea that fits with the revitalization efforts already going on in Wishful. And because it was a way to keep you with me.”

  “Mitch.” Her voice was drenched with an emotion he was optimistic enough to believe was hope. “I haven’t taken off the necklace you gave me.” Her fingers brushed over it, drawing his attention to the lovely length of her throat.

  He wanted to press a kiss to the hollow. Did she remember what the shopkeeper had said? That the thistle represented devotion?

  “I like seeing it on you. Maybe that’s a little caveman of me.”

  “I don’t mind. It was a way to keep you with me, too.”

  It wasn’t precisely the declaration he wanted, but it was an opening, a beginning. An admission that he hadn’t been in this alone. He could build on that. He was very, very good at building things.

  Stepping into her space, he ran a finger over the silver filigree, watching her shiver, her eyes going to half mast. “I’ve got this fantasy about this necklace.”

  “What’s that?” The huskiness in her tone had more blood draining out of his head.

  “Seeing you wearing nothing but this, while stretched out on my bed.”

  She snapped her gaze to his, eyes molten.

  “Will you give me that fantasy, Tess?”

  Without hesitation, she stepped into him. “Yes.”

  Mitch cupped her nape, tipping her face up to his. But instead of taking her mouth, instead of diving headlong into the heat bubbling between them, he brushed his lips over her brow, her temple. Tiny, whispering kisses all over her face and down the column of her throat. Tess dug her hands into his waist, hanging on as he made it to the hollow of her throat and drained the starch out of her knees.

  Sighing his name, she dropped her head back to give him better access. She felt his smile against her throat.

  “So lovely,” he murmured.

  Tess wanted to strip him down as he did the same to her, until they could give in to the frenzied, frantic beat of attraction she’d felt since the moment she’d seen him again. Right here. Right now. She wondered exactly how sturdy his drafting table was. But that was her fantasy, not his, and she’d promised. So she held on and endured his ruthless patience, letting him seduce her with his touch, his kisses, into believing they had all the time in the world. She fell into that fantasy with him, in this place that was utterly his, as she wanted to be.

  He eased them down the hall, never stopping his onslaught against her senses. Her jacket fell to the floor somewhere outside his home office. Gooseflesh pebbled her arms as she wondered when he’d get to her camisole. As they made it to the stairs, he slid his broad palms beneath the hem of her skirt.

  “I like the power suit,” he breathed.

  “Yeah?”

  “I’ll like it better like this.” He nudged the fabric up around her hips, exposing the lacy underwear. “Mmm.”

  Tess half expected him to drop to his knees and explore, right there. Instead, he ran his hands over her butt and down her thighs, boosting her up.

  “Wrap your legs around me.”

  She didn’t have to be told twice. Taking advantage of her position, she made her own leisurely exploration of his throat and ears as they climbed. Her nails lightly scraped along the fine hair at his nape as she very gently bit the lobe of his ear. He hissed in a breath and she abruptly found herself pinned against the wall on the landing, the hardness behind his fly pressed against her center.

  “Do you know what you do to me?” he demanded.

  Her lips curved into a wicked smile as she rolled her hips against him. “I have some idea.”

  His fingers curled into her thighs as he clearly struggled for control. “Later,” he breathed. “Later I will happily take you on every surface in this house. But this first time, I want you in my bed.”

  “I’m holding you to that promise.”

  He was growling as he surged up the last of the stairs and stumbled down the hall, into a bedroom. Tess had dim impressions of heavy wood furniture and cool gray walls, before he set her back on her feet and took her mouth, his hands plunging into her hair. Tess yanked his shirt free, fingers fighting with the buttons to get to skin. The more desperate she got, the more he seemed to find his control, until they were back to that impossibly languorous pace. How could he do this, when she felt ready to fly apart at the barest of touches? Why wouldn’t he let her?

  When at last he’d stripped her down to the necklace and laid her back on the bed in the pool of late afternoon sun, the look on his face nearly sent her over the edge.

  “You are so damned beautiful.”

  “Touch me.”

  “Oh, darlin’, believe me, I intend to touch and taste every inch.”

  And he did. With excruciating patience, he worshipped her body, driving her up with his hands and his tongue until she screamed—twice. Only then, when she lay boneless from pleasure and the afternoon shadows had grown long, did he strip out of his own clothes and reach for a condom to sheath himself. As he crawled onto the bed, stretching out above her, Tess found the energy to lift her arms and reach for him. He settled into the cradle of her hips, finally, finally notching his erection into her drenched and swollen folds.

  “Please,” she whispered, brushing a kiss over his jaw. “Please, I need you.”

  Gaze fixed firmly on hers, Mitch slowly slid inside her. Waves of pleasure threatened to drag her under, and Tess had to fight to keep her eyes open. But she wanted to see him, wanted that connection as he filled her. Over the past weeks, she’d tried to tell herself she’d romanticized what she’d experienced with him. She’d tried to convince herself that she’d attributed more to it than had really been there. But as he began to move, a torturous, delicious rhythm she hoped he could keep up until the end of time, Tess knew she’d been wrong. Because this was better than she remembered. This was more. This was home.

  I love you.

  The words clogged in her throat, held back only by a vague sense of panic. It was too much, too soon. She couldn’t say it. Not here in his bed as he made the sweetest love to her. So she said his name instead, letting everything she felt spill out in her tone, in the touch of her hands and the rise and fall of her body as it met his. And when he lost that exquisite patience at last, when his hips began to piston faster, harder, deeper, she gloried in every stroke, clinging to him as her only anchor in the storm that washed them both away and praying that, in the end, they wound up in the same place.

  Chapter 6

  Mitch was going to go mad if he couldn’t touch Tess. That silky fall of hair shone like mink in the morning light, and his fingers itched to stroke through it. He knew perfectly well he couldn’t lay a hand on her at all here. He had to police every gesture, every expression to avoid the gossip. Dinner Belles was packed full of the morning rush crowd—downtown business owners, parents who’d opted for a cup of coffee after the school drop-off, and the senior contingent who liked to meet for breakfast and linger for hours.

  Tess had walked across the green from The Babylon to meet him for the tour they hadn’t gotten around to for the past couple of days. They’d been far too busy having that sexy tour of his house between all the work putting together the proposal for her father. For all he’d never brought a woman there before, he would never look at any room in it ever again without imagining her naked. And he wasn’t entirely sure he’d ever be able to work at that drafting table again without getting hard. The only thing that would have made it better was being able to keep her in his bed at night instead of delivering her back to the hotel after what felt like stolen hours. But they were being very conscious of appearances. So
, despite the threat to his sanity, Mitch kept his hands to himself.

  “What sounds good?”

  She looked up from the menu and shot him an easy smile that had him wanting to loose a mile-wide grin in return. “I have no idea. It all looks amazing. What’s your favorite?”

  “Biscuits and gravy.”

  “What’s that like?”

  Mitch stared at her. “You’ve never had biscuits and gravy? Woman, what kind of sad, sheltered life have you led?”

  “One outside the South.”

  “Your daddy’s from Memphis!”

  “He’s been gone from Memphis a long time, and my Grandmother Peyton is not the type to indulge in home cooking.”

  “That’s just tragic.”

  His horror just seemed to amuse her.

  “What’s got your boxers in a knot this morning?” Mama Pearl automatically refilled his coffee cup without looking.

  “This poor girl has never had biscuits and gravy.”

  “That right?” She turned to study Tess with those unfathomable black eyes, so Mitch took it upon himself to make introductions.

  “Tess, I’d like you to meet the love of my life, Mama Pearl Buckley. She makes the best pie in a three hundred mile radius. Mama Pearl, this is Tess Peyton, Trey’s daughter.”

  “Is it now?” Mama Pearl’s interest sharpened. She cut a glance back at Mitch that had him wanting to shrink down in the booth. Surely she hadn’t figured out that Tess was The One.

  Her hmph seemed to indicate otherwise as she shifted her attention to Tess. “Well now, it’s nice to finally meet you. Your daddy talks about you all the time.”

  “Nice to meet you. Mitch informs me I have led a sad and sheltered existence and I must have a proper Southern breakfast. What do you recommend?”

  Mama Pearl narrowed her eyes in speculation. “For you? Sausage biscuits and grits. You want any eggs with that?”

  “Just one. Scrambled.” Tess tucked the menu back between the napkin dispenser and condiment rack.

  “Comin’ right up.”

  As Mama Pearl ambled away, Tess frowned. “Isn’t she going to take your order?”

  “She already knows my order. And she’ll remember yours until the end of time, unless you change it. It’s part of her magic.”

  “Hey you two.” Cam stopped by their table, his fingers laced with Norah’s.

  “It’s jumping in here this morning. Do y’all mind if we join you?” she asked.

  In answer, Mitch scooted over, repressing a soft sigh of relief. Much as he wanted Tess all to himself, it would be easier to maintain their cover as just friends with company there to distract the conversation. After a moment’s hesitation, Tess did the same.

  Cam slid in beside her. “What are y’all up to?”

  “Breakfast before a proper tour of town,” Mitch explained.

  Norah clasped her hands in glee. “Oh, I hope you’re doing a walking tour. It’s the best way to see downtown and the weather’s so nice.”

  Mitch grinned at her. “You just want me to show off your handiwork.”

  She grinned back. “True story. It was damned good handiwork.”

  “And none of us have forgotten it, Wonder Woman.” Cam snagged his wife’s hand and leaned across the table to kiss it.

  Tess didn’t quite manage to hide her wistful look. Mitch vowed to shower her with easy affection at the earliest opportunity. He wondered how long it would be before they could come clean and just be together publicly.

  Cam caught Mama Pearl’s eye and signaled for coffee, but it wasn’t the diner’s proprietress who came over with the coffee pot, it was Delia Watson, with the rest of the Casserole Patrol in tow.

  “Good morning, y’all,” she said cheerily.

  “Are you moonlighting as a waitress now, Miss Delia?” Mitch asked.

  “Oh, Pearl’s got her hands full for the moment, and I can pour coffee as well as anybody else.”

  Meaning she’d absconded with the coffee pot to try to get a leg up on the morning’s gossip, and Mama Pearl was secure enough in her position as Queen of Gossip to let her.

  “Morning Miss Betty, Miss Maudie Bell,” Cam murmured, turning over his coffee cup and watching as Miss Delia filled it with only a little splash.

  “Well, are you going to introduce us to your new friend, young man?” Miss Maudie Bell demanded, with a significant look from Mitch to Tess.

  Miss Betty whacked her on the arm. “You’d know who it was already if you’d come out with us last week. That there is Trey Peyton’s daughter, Tess.”

  Tess’s mouth dropped open. “I feel certain I’d remember having met you.”

  “Oh no, dear, we haven’t been formally introduced,” Miss Delia cooed. “We ran into Mitch the other night after he dropped you off at the hotel.”

  As if that explained everything. Which, to the Casserole Patrol, it did.

  Rather than launching into proper introductions, Miss Delia turned to Cam and Norah and beamed. “Now when are you two lovebirds gonna give us an excuse to start knitting those baby booties?”

  Across the table, Tess choked a little on her coffee.

  “Yes!” Miss Maudie Bell exclaimed. “You know we’ve gotta know what color yarn to buy.”

  Miss Betty scoffed. “I already finished my blanket. I’m just waiting for a nursery to put it in.” She fixed Norah with an expectant look.

  “They might appreciate a chance to just enjoy being married for a while before they start adding babies to the mix,” Tess pointed out. “Statistically, marriages that wait to have children last longer.”

  The Casserole Patrol blinked at her as if that was the most radical suggestion they’d ever heard.

  Before one of them said something like, “Why, dear?”, which would no doubt be followed up by a very stiff and polite explanation of how other people’s reproductive choices were no business of theirs, Mitch intervened. “Miss Maudie Bell, how are things going with Chester?”

  That query sufficiently derailed the questioning, and when Mama Pearl arrived a few minutes later with a tray full of food—including Cam and Norah’s usuals—the trio of nosy blue hairs headed across the diner to bug Ben Rawlings, the fire chief, about when exactly he was going to organize a fireman’s calendar.

  As soon as they were out of earshot, Tess muttered, “They have absolutely no right to poke at you about children.”

  “No, but something like right will never stop the Casserole Patrol from butting in. They mean well,” Norah explained.

  “But what if you didn’t want children?”

  “Oh, we do. Eventually. But we’d rather have a while to…practice first.” Cam’s smile spread slow as honey as he stroked a thumb across the back of his wife’s hand.

  “Yeah, yeah. Rub in your newlywed bliss, Cuz.” Mitch gave an exaggerated roll of his eyes.

  Norah leaned in to bump his shoulder. “Buck up. You’ll find the right girl one of these days.”

  I will not look at Tess. I will not look at Tess.

  “Anyway, we’re having a cookout on Friday night. You have to come,” Cam told Tess. “Everybody wants to meet you.”

  She paused, a spoonful of grits halfway to her mouth. “Everybody? I thought I already met everybody.”

  “You met the family,” Norah explained. “This is all our friends.”

  Tess’s expression was caught somewhere between a smile and a frown. “Why would they want to meet me?”

  Mitch couldn’t stop himself from smiling. “Honey, you’re big news in town right now.”

  She looked a little green at that.

  “Don’t worry. I’ll take you and run interference as necessary,” he promised.

  “I’d appreciate it. Can I borrow your kitchen?”

  “Any time. Why?”

  “Because I may not be Southern, but even I know you don’t show up to a cookout empty-handed.”

  Friday night and all its attendant socializing came way too soon for Tess’s taste. But she
’d dutifully prepared her appetizer and climbed in Mitch’s truck for the drive, despite fantasies of bailing and making use of that gigantic soaker tub in his master bathroom.

  “Cam and Norah’s place is out on Hope Springs.”

  She glanced at Mitch over in the driver’s seat. “It’s really called Hope Springs?”

  “Really is. The fountain on the green is fed from there. It’s the whole crux of Norah’s rural tourism campaign.”

  “Wishful, where hope springs eternal. I saw the banners.” They fluttered on all the lamp posts on Main Street.

  “A couple years back, GrandGoods was trying to buy up the land out here to put up one of their big box stores. That’s how Norah and Cam got together in the first place. She stuck around to fight it and ended up buying the whole parcel for sale right out from under them. Then she wound up donating a big chunk of the land to the city for a park that Cam designed.”

  Wonder Woman, indeed. “That was incredibly generous of her.”

  “I think she was as much in love with Wishful as she was with Cam. Anyway, they built a house right down by the water. It’s a helluva spot. If we’ve got time after we leave, I’ll swing you by the park so you can see it.”

  Clutching the tray of appetizers she’d made, Tess wondered how long they had to stay to meet social obligation. She’d spent most of the day working with her father at his office, which was great, as she felt more on even keel with him when talking business. But it had meant no time alone with Mitch other than the brief stretch in his kitchen while she’d been making the bruschetta. She was hyperaware of the fact that her time here could be coming to an end. If her father didn’t go for the pitch she’d put together for this small business incubator, she’d be headed back to Denver to her normal job. But that was a worry for Sunday, when they had that family dinner. For tonight, she needed to get her head in the game and be properly social. Even if all she really wanted to do was be anti-social with the man sitting beside her.

  As soon as they pulled up to the house, Tess recognized Mitch’s work. It wasn’t the same style as his own house, but there was something in the lines of the single-story plantation home that reminded her of him.