by T. S. Joyce
I crossed my arms. “Did he also tell you he was messing around with Becca in the hallway before he turned Kung Fu Caleb?”
Opal gasped and almost choked on a chip. “Mira, your life is like a movie.”
I snorted. “A horror film.”
Sadey crumpled up her trash and pointed down Main Street. “First float. And what do you mean messing around with Becca?”
“I mean, she was latched onto his completely unbuttoned shirt and their faces were an inch apart. He definitely looked like he was about to kiss her.” Why did my voice drop to an embarrassing whisper on the last two words?
“Six more floats until Caleb’s.” Sadey air-balled her wadded up trash at the trash bin and missed it by a lot. She sighed and scrambled to retrieve it. “I suck at basketball.”
“Yeah, honey,” Opal said, scrunching up her face. “You do.”
“You’re pretty good at painting houses,” I offered. “You know, if playing professional sports doesn’t work out for you.”
“Five more floats,” Sadey said.
Darn my eyes as they searched for him.
Sadey pulled a bundle out of her purse. “I made these for us.” She held out two tiny flags that read McCreedy in yellow script letters. One of them was spelled wrong.
“Homemade?” I asked.
“Shut up. You get the misspelled one for that.”
We stood at the railing and watched the floats full of happy townspeople as they waved to the crowd below. Opal pulled up a chair and snatched the limp flag out of my hand.
“I’ll cheer for a McCreedy,” she said, stretching to see their float. “I’m sorry, sugar, but your daddy is a spicy looking man.” She lowered her voice and grumbled, “And Ms. Opal likes her sausage with a kick.”
I groaned but Sadey laughed. “I’ll tell him you said so.”
“Please do so with relish.” Opal waved her flag harder as the edge of the car the McCreedy’s were driving peeked around the side of a huge float of a makeshift football field. A huge billy goat hung in mid-air, head-butting a giant football.
Sadey poked my elbow with her flag. “He likes you, you know.”
“Who Evan? He doesn’t like me. He just wants to boink me. Or at least that is what he told me before he got pummeled by your other brother.”
Sadey sighed in exasperation. “The other brother is of whom I speak.”
“Please. Caleb has made it clear, on several occasions, that I would ruin his precious reputation and that he doesn’t have feelings for me. I embarrass him.”
“Yeah,” she conceded. “He hasn’t handled things very well. You should have seen him at Sunday dinner. He was a mess.”
I tossed her a worried look, and she smirked. “I knew it.”
“My feelings have no effect on his feelings, Sadey,” I reminded her.
Sadey shrugged and cheered, waving her tiny flag gallantly. I rested my forearms onto the wooden railing and swung my gaze to the refurbished Model T that made its way toward us in the street below. Caleb waved and nodded to people. He greeted old friends and acquaintances and shook hands with some of the older men who approached the car. Evan and Brian acted similarly in the back seat, and Mr. McCreedy waved and drove like a pro.
Even if I was mad at Caleb, I couldn’t help the jitters that fluttered in my stomach when I watched him. I hadn’t seen that smile before. He seemed relaxed, in his element. These were his people. The ugliest part of me let go of the lingering anger. Of course, he should stay away from me. He was right. His father and brothers were right. How could I be so selfish to think he should give up his relationship with his town in order to be with me? On top of everything else, Caleb had been honest with me from the start. He had never hinted with words that he cared about me as anything more than his project. His debtor. Not to mention, he was dealing with being a newly turned bear shifter. He had no room in his life for me. I’d been foolish to get so worked up over a man who had done nothing wrong—who hadn’t led me on. The anger at myself was as sharp as the crack of a whip, and I bit my lip against the sting.
Caleb looked up, almost as if he could feel the turmoil roiling within me. Such a dark and turbulent feeling had to create some sort of brown and muddied aura around me surely. It couldn’t be that he was so connected to me, though. His eyes held surprise. Then satisfaction. Then determination that rivaled the grizzly that maimed him. Caleb said something to his father and opened the door. The car was still in motion, and his father’s shocked reprimand could be heard from where I stood.
“What the hell is he doing?” Sadey breathed beside me.
I hadn’t a guess. He hopped out of the moving car and pushed through the crowd. The confounding man was headed straight for the pie shop.
He came to a stop right under me. “Mira Fletcher. Is there room for one more up there?”
My mouth hung open. I hadn’t even the good sense to snap it closed.
“Oh, dear goodness,” Opal whispered through a grin. “This is happening.” She cleared her throat and spoke loud enough for him to hear. “Caleb McCreedy, the door’s locked and we’re not missing the parade to let you in. If you’re going to do this, you better do it right. The fire escape will hold you.”
Caleb grinned, and I was convinced that a heart could actually skip a beat if one was faced with a smile as capturing as his. Or maybe I was having a full-blown heart attack.
“He has lost his damned mind,” I whispered as he grabbed onto the fire escape.
The town watched as Caleb scaled the bright red wall of the Main Street Pie & Candy Co. in order to seek out one Crazy Mira Fletcher. He hopped over the railing and wiped his hands off. His breathtaking grin had become bigger with the exertion. Sadey bounded out of the way when Caleb came to stand beside me. He was so close, I could feel the warmth coming off his arm.
“Well, you’re in it now, Mira. You ready?”
I was highly suspicious. “Ready for what?”
“I’m going to kiss you.”
I darted a glance to the waiting town below and then back to him. “But, I’ve never kissed anybody before.”
Caleb leaned over and brushed his lips against mine. Softly. Slowly. More tenderly than I thought a man as powerful as him would be capable of. I couldn’t pull away. I had frozen into place, and the warmth of his touch was the air I had been desperate to breathe. A salvation that loosened a trapped part of my soul. His mouth moved against mine, and his tongue brushed the closed seam of my lips. His fingers traced my jaw, and he stood, straightening me with him. His hands clenched my hair like I still wasn’t close enough, and when my mouth parted for him, he dipped his tongue against mine. I felt like I was falling.
Easing back, his lips curved up into a smile. “Now you have.”
Chapter Seventeen
Mira
I had been kissed. I had been kissed! Not only had I been kissed, but it had been by the most alluring man I’d ever met. It changed the way I saw our meeting in Jake’s. Maybe he’d just been trying to help me but didn’t know how and mucked it all up. He was a good man. The rightness that settled into my bones at the realization was overwhelming.
The parade below was a blur because Caleb kept touching me. Talking to me low, for only my ears.
“I wanted to protect you. I thought I was doing the right thing, but I can’t do it anymore. I can’t hurt you or stay away from you.”
“Tell me you’re the one who keeps dropping the fish on my doorstep,” I whispered.
He brushed his lips against mine again and smiled. “I don’t like seeing you hungry. My animal side doesn’t either. I hunt for you every time I change.”
“Will you tell me everything?”
His face fell. “It’s hard to talk about. Is it something you need?”
“I think it’s something we both need. Maybe you can tell me more about what you found in the journal, and then you won’t have to be alone with all of this. I knew what you were before you did, remember? You can trust me wit
h anything.”
His eyes grew serious. “I know I can.”
We leaned over the railing, and his warm hand rested on the small of my back, rubbing it. This was really happening, and it was happening to me.
I wanted to kiss him again.
His lips were so sensual when he talked. He’d shaved this morning, and I yearned to reach out and touch his face. He felt like mine, so I did.
Smooth against my fingertip, his jaw stretched with a slow smile. “You want to get out of here.”
“Yes,” I whispered, too fast.
A deep chuckle trickled from him as he stood straight, pulling me in until my cheek rested against his sternum. His heartbeat was racing mine.
He was so warm, I stepped closer, burrowing into the blanket of safety he seemed to have enveloping him. His arms wrapped around my shoulders, and he rested his cheek against the top of my head. Dipping closer to me, his whisper tickled my ear and made my legs lock up. “I’ve been waiting a long time to do that. To kiss you.”
I eased back and frowned. “How long?”
“Since I watched you shoot that grizzly over me.” The sincerity in his eyes was so deep, I’d drown right here and happily.
Memories of it stormed me like a battlefield. We’d fought for our lives together that day. “You mean since you saw my boobs?”
His laughter was instant, booming, and his smile reached every facet of his face and landed in his dancing eyes. Leaning forward again, he said, “They’re perfect.”
“Flattery will get you everywhere with me.”
He tilted his head, laughter still playing at his lips. “Come on. I want to show you something.”
Tossing Sadey and Opal a wide-eyed glance, I followed Caleb down the stairs. The parade had come to an end, so I opened the store and flipped the sign. Opal had assured me I could keep my day off, and she could handle the post-parade crowd, but I still felt a little guilty leaving. Up until the point when she hung over the balcony, catcalling like a maniac and waggling her eyebrows from above. Opal would be just fine without me today.
Caleb wrapped his strong hand around mine, like it was the most natural thing in the world, and led me through the crowds. If anyone gave us dirty looks, I didn’t notice. I was too enamored by his hand holding mine and the feeling of utter freefall that made flip-flops in my stomach. It was scary to admit how much I liked him—how much I needed him already.
Caleb didn’t slow until we reached the back of Bealls where he had parked the truck. Most of the parade goers seemed to be hanging around Main Street. The smell of food carts and popcorn filled the breeze. When we were away from the masses, he pulled me up against his side and draped his arm over my shoulders. I’d never been drunk before, but this must be what it felt like. Caleb looked down at me with such adoration, my heart jumped, and my throat filled with all of the things I wanted to say to him.
At the door of his truck, he pressed his back against it and drew me in. Slowly, he lowered his lips to mine and drank me in. I melted into him, pressing and pushing until I was molded to the strong curves of his taut chest and stomach. This time wasn’t so scary. It wasn’t for show, and it wasn’t my first, and if I was honest with myself, Caleb’s lips already felt familiar. And I trusted him. He was strong and had obviously had practice doing this, so I let him teach me in that gentle way of his. I ached for more, for everything.
But when he pulled away, breath ragged, he looked at me like I was the one who’d taught him something, which baffled me. “In the truck, woman, before I lose my mind.”
He pulled the door open and helped me up with an offered hand. And when I was settled, he reached across and buckled me in. Now, I could’ve done it myself easily, but he seemed to need to be close to me, to take care of me, and I understood. I felt it, too.
The belt clicked into place. He stood, searching my eyes for some answer I hadn’t a guess at before his gaze dipped to my lips again. I laughed. Caleb was just as hungry for my touch as I was for his. The truth of it was written in the raw look in his eyes. The one that made my insides tremble to touch him again.
He pulled away with a grin, then shut the door. The truck rocked as he slid behind the wheel. As he pulled onto a dirt road behind Beall’s, he slid a hand over my thigh and rested it there. His hand belonged there. How could a man who’d denied me his touch for so long feel so comfortable now? I looped my hand around his wrist and stroked comforting little circles to keep him in place, and he slid me a smoldering look before his eyes found the road again.
On and on we drove until we hit the winding road to his dad’s house. I buckled against revisiting a place that had been so hard on us. Someday I would go back, but I didn’t want to today.
“Caleb?”
“Don’t worry. I’m not taking you to the house. I want to show you someplace I’ve never shown anyone before. My family will never know we’ve been here.”
Caleb was letting me in. I didn’t know how I knew it, but I felt it in my bones that he hadn’t ever let anyone in like he was doing with me right now.
He pulled onto a dirt road that didn’t look like it had been used in a long time. It was overgrown, and briars scratched against the undercarriage and sides of the truck, like Mother Nature didn’t want humans in her secret garden. The truck rolled on, bouncing and jouncing until we reached a ravine.
I slid out of the truck and was awestruck. Cicadas sang, birds chirped, and bullfrogs croaked. The thick trees made a canopy that doused everything in shadows with the occasional sunray peeking through to the forest floor.
A river slashed through the land, winding this way and that, and the bubbling currents could be heard over the sound of the animals and insects.
“This way,” Caleb said from beside me. He held onto my hand again, like he needed the connection to me, and led me up a small path. Under his other arm was tucked a folded blanket.
We climbed higher until we looked over the ravine, and at the top of the hill, under the shade of a giant oak tree, he smoothed the blanket onto the leafy ground. From here, I could see the river below and the town in the distance. The forest surrounding us was breathtaking.
My woods were home, but Caleb’s woods were magic.
He sat and leaned against the trunk of the old tree, then held out a hand for me. I sat between his legs and relaxed against his chest.
“I used to come here when I was a kid,” Caleb said low, like he didn’t want to interrupt the bird song from the branches above. “Evan used to drive me mad, and I’d tear off for this place to get away from him. None of my family ever discovered it, as far as I know, but this was where I found peace. I didn’t visit here at all after I moved out, but when I met you, I started thinking about it again. I’ve come out here a few times since the attack, just to clear my head, you know?”
I inhaled slow and tilted my head up. “I do that in my woods, too.” I understood it more than he could ever guess.
“I was wrong, Mira. I’m sorry for hurting you and for making you feel unimportant. I thought if I could fight my feelings for you, that you’d be better off, but I can see how much I’ve hurt you.”
“No more running.”
He shook his head, eyes never leaving mine. “I’m in it now.”
“No more secret trysts with Becca by the bathroom,” I said with a mock frown.
“That,” he said with a chuckle, “was just a really unfortunate case of bad timing. We weren’t doing whatever it looked like. We were arguing.”
“Mmm,” I murmured, tracing the edge of the scar on his neck. “I want to argue like that.”
His gaze dropped to the river. “You scare me.”
The words hurt. I didn’t want to scare him. All I wanted to do was make him happy. “I don’t mean to.”
He wrapped his arms around my chest and pulled me close. Inhaling deeply, like he was smelling my hair, he leaned his cheek against mine. “I know.” The words rumbled against my back, and the soft brush of his lips against my n
eck made me shiver.
“What was that?” he asked, a smile in his voice as he froze against the sensitive skin of my throat.
“It feels nice when you touch me. I think about what we did in your truck a lot.” The admission brought heat to my cheeks.
His breath shook as moments stretched on. I twisted, leaning my cheek against the tripping pulse in his throat. His eyes were a raging storm when I eased back, and he searched my face for something I couldn’t fathom. Slowly, I lifted my lips to his.
His lips crashed onto mine with none of the patience or restraint he’d shown at the parade. Out here, we could be us, and right now, I didn’t want gentle either. I wanted him to show me how much I meant to him without words. His mouth moved against mine, stroking, lapping, enticing my lips to open for him, and when I did, a helpless-sounding growl escaped his throat. His hands tangled in my hair, and then he turned me to face him. His tongue stroked against mine and made me yearn for more.
As he palmed the back of my head, the soft sound of his growl rattled against my ears. I relaxed my neck and let him have my lips. Commanding and powerful, he drew more and more from me until I was left breathless and wanting. His hand brushed my collarbone and trailed down to my waist, dragging fire as I wrapped my arms around the back of his neck. It still wasn’t enough.
How long we stayed there like that, wrapped up in each other, I couldn’t guess. The sun was lower, and clouds had come in from the east, but that seemed less important than Caleb’s burning touch. He pulled my shirt to the side and kissed the circular scars, and I couldn’t find it in me to care about the memories they caused. Caleb was healing me with his touch. With his mouth urgent against my skin, I moaned and gripped his hair as he reached the base of my throat.
