“Do you like it?” he asked, turning to face me, his back to the roaring fire. He held his hands out toward it like Vanna White.
I stepped into the room and took it all in. “It’s … gorgeous,” I admitted, shocked by how quickly he’d set it up. “You really did DYI the shit out of it,” I whispered, inspecting the perfectly straight tree. “That’s an engineering feat,” I said, pointing at the tree stand.
He waved his hand at me. “Not really, just a five-gallon bucket, a little wood and some eye bolts did the trick. Do you have a sheet or something we can use to cover the bucket?”
I tapped my finger on my chin and then gave him a finger gun. “I do, hang on.” I jogged down to my room and dug around in my closet. I found what I was looking for and brought it back to the living room, one end trailing behind me.
I knelt and tried to wrap it around the top of the bucket. The material kept slipping, and with only one hand, I couldn’t keep it from falling off or into the water. “Dammit, stay there,” I growled, holding one side down with Justice while I tried to grab the other end with my hand.
“Here, I’ll help.” He knelt behind me and reached around, grabbing the long scarf. He helped me wrap it around the bucket twice and then tugged on it here and there until it hung straight. “Perfect,” he whispered, his lips near my ear. A shiver ran through me when his beard brushed against my cheek. I bit my lip to keep from turning my head and laying them on his. He was too close and I ducked out of his embrace, then I stood and pulled my sweatshirt sleeve down over Justice.
“It is perfect,” I agreed. “Thanks for going to all the trouble. Now, if we just had some lights and ornaments.”
“We do, but I’m saving them until after dinner. We’ll decorate the tree then.”
I turned to face him and stepped right into his chest. His shirt was soft against my hand and his eyes were a deep ocean blue in the light from the fire. “Did you bring Christmas decorations with you?”
He shook his head, but his gaze never left my face. “Didn’t need to. You had plenty of things to decorate the tree with. Some aren’t traditional ornaments, but you don’t strike me as a traditional kind of woman.”
I swallowed hard, wanting to tell him the truth, but knowing it would be a huge mistake. “I don’t even know what a traditional Christmas is, Hayes. I’ve never had one.”
“How would you know if you’ve never had one if you don’t know what a traditional Christmas is?” he asked, sliding his hand into the hair above my ear.
“No, what I mean is, I’ve never had a Christmas before,” I clarified.
His finger tilted my chin up until I was forced to meet his eyes. “You’ve never had Christmas? You’re how old?”
I refused to sigh, even though I wanted to. Partly from frustration and partly from the fact his eyes were sigh-worthy. “I’m twenty-seven, Hayes. Not that you’re sup—”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m not supposed to ask a woman’s age,” he finished. “It was necessary to get to the bottom of the number of no Christmases strike I’m breaking this year.”
“My no-Christmas strike?” I asked, his breath warming my lips from where he stood over me.
“I’m ending your twenty-seven-year strike as of now, Mercy,” he ground out. “This year, we’re celebrating Christmas together.”
I raised both eyebrows. “Last I heard, you were checking out on the twenty-third.”
His eyes hooded and his chest expanded to fill the remaining space between us. “I’ve decided to extend my stay until the twenty-sixth.”
“But your family,” I stuttered.
“We’ll get together for the new year.”
“What about work?” I was desperately searching for any reason to halt his progression toward my lips.
“I’m the boss. I make the rules.”
His intensity grew and I had to put my arm around his neck to keep from falling over. “You’re assuming you can extend your stay. Maybe your cabin is already booked.”
His laughter was low and grumbling in his chest, but it reverberated through to mine and made my nipples harden instantly. “I happen to know you have no reservations until after New Year’s. Even old Mr. Boling took off early. We’re alone. All alone.”
I bit my lip and he moaned. He closed the distance between us, grasped my lip in his teeth, pulled it from mine and then released it gently. “I swear to God if you bite that lip one more time I’m going to kiss and suck it until it’s plump, swollen, and too tender to bite,” he growled, his beard twitching with the effort it took to control his desires.
“You like things your way, don’t you, Mr. Rutherford?” I asked, my voice soft and disturbingly sexy. I caught myself rubbing my nipples across his chest and it was electrifying, regardless of the clothes that separated us.
“I’m the boss. I always get things my way.”
“Except here, I’m the boss,” I informed him authoritatively. I was well aware I was playing with fire, but for some reason, he drew out my dangerous side.
He licked his lips and I audibly whimpered at the motion. “Maybe you’re the boss of this camp, but right now in this room, with your body pressed against mine, I’m the boss,” he promised, his lips tasting mine again for a split second.
My pulse picked up its pace and my eyes widened in terror as he held me to him, his arm locked around my waist and his hand splayed across my back. I fought against his hand, but it didn’t loosen. His other hand came up to grasp my cheek lightly instead.
“I’m not going to hurt you, Mercy,” he whispered soothingly. “Someone did. I see it every time I get within a few feet of you, but I’m not him. Do you understand I’m not going to hurt you?”
My head nodded without my knowledge or consent. A smile played at his lips and his beard twitched triumphantly.
“I’m going to kiss you now. Are you okay with that? Are you going to like it?” he asked gently, his hand splayed across my back. Somehow my mind knew it was protective and not possessive, and my eyes lowered to his lips, their pink flesh begging to be on mine.
His head lowered and when we touched, I gasped, the sound like an explosion in my head. It drove him harder into the kiss and his hand slid into my hair, using it to tug me into the position to give him greatest access to the deepest recesses of my mouth. His tongue was warm, long, and thin when it danced into my space, sparring with my tongue for a chance to taste me, to caress me, to be the only man I’d ever think about again.
“Mercy,” he ordered, taking his lips off mine for a split second, “I want to feel your arms around me.”
I tightened my left arm around his neck and directed him back to my lips, but he hesitated, his eyes holding mine while he lifted Justice. I fought against him, preferring it stay by my side, but he leaned down and kissed me again until I was putty in his hands. He wrapped it around his neck and held my upper arm, his lips suspended on my pink flesh, but his eyes open and staring into the depths of mine.
“Understand something right now, Mercy,” he hissed, his thumb tracing the swollen flesh of my lower lip, “by the time I leave this place you will know your worth. Do you understand me?”
It was like he read all the secrets I kept hidden away in the journal in the back of my mind. The thing was, there was no way he could know. I made sure that part of my life was well and truly hidden.
The words, that will never happen, were what came to my mind. I hadn’t known him long, but I knew him well enough to know that answer was not what he was looking for. I was painfully aware he would not accept those words leaving my lips.
Instead, I put them back on his in a desperate attempt to forget everything other than the man in front of me and the knowledge that this time, just this one time, my mother might be right.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
HAYES
The woman was magnetizing and she didn’t even know it. She was this tiny, beguiling, alluring vision of the woman who belonged in my bed, under me, and around me every night for
the rest of my life. A jolt ran through me and then a shudder.
No, Hayes, you know how that will end. You have enough commitments with work alone. You don’t have the time or energy to keep a woman happy, loved, and in Mercy’s case, protected. You’ll fail at all of those, miserably, so don’t even attempt it. She’s not like all the other women who throw themselves at your feet.
She’s different.
She’s afraid.
She’s broken.
She’s strong
She’s damaged.
She’s fierce.
She’s lonely.
She’s independent.
She wears her past every day.
She hates her past.
She hates him.
She hates what he did to her.
She hates what she did to him.
She knows who she is and she accepts she will never be anyone else.
She has more depth in her little finger than you’ll ever find in this life.
She is more in this one place than you’ll ever be running the multibillion-dollar company that holds your name.
You are weak compared to her.
Get up, walk out the door, and don’t look back.
I shook the inner voice off. I wasn’t going to walk away. I was going to stay here and spend the rest of the night with her first. Then I’d walk out of her life and she’d be all the better for it.
I wanted to grasp her around the waist and tug her to me, but I kept my hands to myself while she busied herself loading the popcorn machine in the store. Popcorn might sate my physical hunger, but this woman would be the only thing to ease the deep ache of emotional hunger that controlled me. It was a nasty monster of self-doubt and self-hatred that hung around my neck like a medal.
“I always have fresh popcorn when the camp is at full capacity,” she explained. “The guys love my popcorn.”
I cleared my throat and dragged my eyes away from her bottom that swayed with her every movement. “I bet they do,” I groaned, my body plastered against hers. “I love watching popcorn pop. It’s so satisfying.”
She chuckled, but didn’t turn. I could already read her and when she was stiff like this, she was trying to keep herself from touching me. From kissing me. From dreaming about my lips all over the rest of her beautiful, scarred body. “You mean I’m not alone in my fascination?”
I couldn’t hold myself back any longer and slid my arms around her waist. “Not in this room. This room is filled with those fascinated by popping popcorn.”
She shuddered in my arms before she spoke. “Why are we doing this again?”
I lowered my lips to her ear. “Doing what, gorgeous?”
“Uh, making popcorn,” she stuttered, her voice soft and wispy.
“Because I’m starving,” I whispered, inhaling deeply. I wasn’t inhaling the fresh popcorn scent. I was inhaling the scent of her, all of her. She was fresh air, sunshine, and a hint of strawberries on a summer day.
“I’m supposed to be making stew,” she half spoke, half moaned. “You’re distracting me.”
I held her in place when she tried to leave, but I made sure it was lightly and without force. “It’s stewing. Leave it be. Wait for it, the show’s about to start,” I promised and tipped her chin back toward the popcorn machine.
The first white kernels pushed the top of the hopper open and cascaded down the side, forming a satisfying pile in the cart. She leaned into me, her body relaxed by the scent that filled the store and the sound drowned out our words. I buried my nose in her neck, inhaling deeply until the machine finished its job.
She turned and braced her hand on my chest. “That should tide you over until the stew is ready. I’ll grab a bowl,” she said, her lips teasing me with every word they formed.
“Oh, darling, neither the stew nor the popcorn will tide me over, but it’s a start.” My lips acted on their own accord to capture hers and suck gently, her whimper enough to tell me she wasn’t against me taking the kiss further. My tongue took its turn, stealing between her lips and stroking hers until she collapsed against me, her head tipped back in abandon. I’d never seen such a ravishing sight in my entire life, and I’d been with some extremely ravishing women. None of them, ever in all their made-up glory, had the overpowering beauty of simplicity and innocence that Mercy Jane Denfield, a.k.a. Mercy Jane Johnson, radiated. She was the whole package, even if she didn’t think so.
She said nothing, just let her hand trail off my chest and took a step to the right before she dashed away. I watched her go and wondered how I was going to convince her to trust me, when I wasn’t sure she even knew what that was.
The stew was gone and we were sipping the wine I’d brought over from the cabin. She was sitting across from me, her eyes glued to the tree where we’d just finished wrapping several strings of icicle lights around the branches. I had found them in the shed and hoped they weren’t burned out. For once, luck was on my side.
“I never thought about how festive a tree could be in a home,” she mused, while she wrapped tinfoil around a cardboard star. “I can’t wait to turn the lights off and lay under the tree.”
I smiled and finished the popcorn and wild berry string I’d been making. Her face reflected the joy of the season and my chest puffed up at the idea I had a little something to do with that.
“I used to lay under the tree with my brother and sister when we were little. We would try to guess what was in the brightly wrapped packages under the tree.”
“Did you ever guess right?” she asked, her focus on the star. She had to concentrate on keeping the cardboard from slipping out from between her legs. I wanted to offer help, but at the same time, I understood it was wise to wait for her to ask. She was determined to make a star for the top of the tree, so I didn’t object.
She was capable. So capable I was always taken aback by how she could do so many complicated tasks with one hand. Tasks I couldn’t do with two. For instance, she skinned those rabbits without a second thought to the fact that she didn’t have two hands to work with. She cooked, cleaned, shoveled, plowed, hunted, and cut firewood without complaining. Those were things most of us with two hands complained about, but not Mercy. I suspected part of the reason she didn’t complain was there wasn’t anyone around to complain to. The other part of the reason was she saw it as her lot in life. The consequences of her choices. She was also well aware there wasn’t much choice when you owned a camp like this. Rather than complain, she had to go after it and figure out a way to get the chores done.
“No, and we discovered why one year. The boxes my parents had under the tree every year were empty!” I laughed at the memory. “We never noticed on Christmas morning that the wrapping was different. We were too excited that Santa had come.”
“How did you find out?” she asked, her tongue sticking out just a hair while she worked on her star.
“Funny story, actually.” I strung the popcorn garland around the tree before I answered. We’d been munching on the rest of the popcorn with our wine and I was relaxed and happy for the first time in three months. “I think I was about eight and my brother was six. We decided to wait until my parents went to bed and then we stole one of the boxes and took it to our room. Once we got the paper off, we discovered it was light because it was empty.”
She laughed and the sound was rhythmical and lilting. It was like birds singing from the treetops on a cold winter day. I shook my head and rolled my eyes internally. Get a grip man.
“Your mom had you fooled.” She triumphantly held up the star. “I did it!”
I pulled her up off the couch. “It’s beautiful, just like you.” I gave her a wink and a kiss on the cheek. “Let’s save it for last. Now that the lights and garland are on, it’s time for the other ornaments.”
She motioned around the room. “Uh, Hayes, unless you’re going to hang spoons and forks on the tree, we’re flat out of ornaments.”
I grinned, excitement for the holiday finally filling
me. “Not so. You’d be surprised what you can find when you look hard enough. Have you ever been in the back of that equipment shed?”
She put her hand on her hip. “I have, actually. It’s a disaster, so I did the sign of the cross and walked away.”
“Are you Catholic?” I asked, surprised.
She laughed with her hand on her hip and Justice behind her back, something I noticed she did a lot. It was easy to see she was sparing society from what she thought was the worst thing in the world. “No, I’m Jewish.”
I paused, my finger in the air and my mouth open. I closed it, then opened it again. “I would ask if you’re kidding, but something tells me you aren’t.”
She pursed her lips and shook her head back and forth. “Oh, dreidel, dreidel, dreidel. I made you out of clay,” she sang.
God, she was delightful. Why did we have to find each other here, at this time, in this way?
“Which explains why you had twenty-seven years of no Christmases.” I dropped my head into my hand. “I’m such an idiot.”
She offered me a hug and her warmth and tenderness made my heart swell. At the same time, her touch sent tingles of something I couldn’t name through my soul. “You’re not an idiot. You’re kind, thoughtful, and enthusiastic. I like that about you.”
I frowned at the now offending tree in all its stupid glory. “Apparently, I’m also clueless, bossy, and overbearing. I asked if you were Jewish and you said no, you were a Grinch.”
Her hand rested on my chest, right over my heart, making it jump instead of beat. I was irrevocably taken with this woman. Mercy me was all I could think of when I stared into those chocolatey eyes. Mercy me.
“You’re not clueless, I have lips and could have told you. You are a little bossy and overbearing, though. You might want to work on that.” She winked and tugged on my beard.
The Secrets Between Us (Billionaire CEO Romance) Page 8
