by Maisey Yates
“I can see her just fine from here,” he said, his voice foreign to his own ears. “She looks perfect to me,” he said, not sure what else you were supposed to say about a baby. Not sure at all what a person was supposed to say in this situation. To the sister you didn’t know anymore.
“She is,” Ace said, his tone firm.
Gage had a feeling that Ace would effectively end anyone or anything that ever threatened his wife or daughter.
He respected that. And as much as he couldn’t quite believe that Sierra was a grown woman with a baby, as badly as it settled with him in general, he knew that he couldn’t have picked a better man for her.
For some reason, that cast his thoughts back to Rebecca. She had an older brother. One who would probably kill him if he had any idea what had happened tonight. There was no way Rebecca’s brother, or any man, would ever happily look at him and their sister and think that he was the best man she could possibly end up with.
Good thing he didn’t intend on ending up with anyone.
“I just… I had to come and see you,” he said.
“I’m so glad that you did.” She smiled.
“Maddy was right,” he responded.
“About?”
“She said that you were nicer than she was.”
That made Sierra laugh. “It depends on who you ask.”
“Not really,” Ace said. “Sierra is nicer. Unless she’s drunk and recently bucked off a mechanical bull. Then she’s kind of mean.”
“There’s a story there, I take it.”
“There is,” Sierra said, sounding cheerful. “I’m going to tell it to you someday.”
He believed it. And there was something in that simple promise that warmed him. Made him feel… Something a lot like hope.
“Get some rest,” he said. “Thank you again. I’m glad I got to come and see her.”
“Of course. You’re her uncle Gage.”
Those words hit him square in the chest. Now there was another person in Copper Ridge who was depending on him. Who was part of his family. His blood. A web that kept on expanding. There was no cutting ties to this damn place.
As he looked around the hospital room, he wondered why he had ever wanted to.
He nodded once, then turned and walked out of the room. It wasn’t the best goodbye. But then, he wasn’t very good at goodbyes in general.
When he got back into the waiting area, Rebecca and Lydia were there, holding coffee cups. Neither of them seemed to be interested in drinking them, which only served to reinforce his belief that the coffee in question had merely been decoy coffee.
“Are you ready to go?” he asked Rebecca.
“If you are,” she said, sounding slightly dazed. He couldn’t really blame her.
“You’re just going to go?” Maddy asked.
“I saw the baby,” he said. “So, yeah.”
He didn’t know how to do this. He didn’t know how to stand around with his siblings and have a conversation that wasn’t loaded. He didn’t know what to do with the emotions in his chest. He didn’t know how to stand there and look at Madison and not pull her into a hug. Because she was a woman now, and not the girl he remembered. Because she had been hurt, and he hadn’t been here. Because it had just been so damn long. But you couldn’t hug a stranger, even if she was your sister.
And he never really hugged anyone, even if he knew them. Hell, he hadn’t even hugged Rebecca and he’d taken her virginity.
“I rode with Rebecca,” he said. “I don’t want to keep her too late.”
“I’m not in a hurry,” Rebecca said.
He moved nearer to her, and put his hand on her lower back. “Are you sure? I thought you had to be up tomorrow.”
“You know, I should get going.” Rebecca shot him a deadly glare. And he knew that it had everything to do with the fact that she was afraid of what he might do next in front of his family and Lydia.
He looked back at everyone and noticed the shock on their faces. Letting them all know he had seduced a nice girl like Rebecca would only confirm their suspicions that he was a prick. Probably ease their consciences when it came to hating him a little bit.
But that didn’t sit right for some reason. Not after Maddy. Not after seeing Sierra and the baby. Still, there was nothing else to say. Nothing else to do.
So, he grabbed Rebecca’s hand and led her out of the hospital.
*
REBECCA’S HEART WAS THUNDERING, and her head was starting to pound. She felt disoriented, confused and a little bit like she was living the world’s longest day. Today, she had kissed Gage for the first time. Tonight, she’d gone to a bar and danced with one of her best friend’s best friends, and come very close to propositioning him. Then, she had been hauled out of said bar by Gage, and she had lost her virginity.
Then they had talked. Really talked, with a whole lot more honesty than she liked to employ with people. Then they’d gone to the hospital, and somehow, she had thought it would be a good idea to drive him. Probably because she could sense that he needed her to, just as she could sense that he wanted to pretend he didn’t.
Which suited her just fine, because she would rather pretend that he didn’t need her to either.
Now, they were back in his truck, and this time he was driving.
“I’ll take you back to your car now,” he said, turning onto the road that would take them back to Ace’s bar.
“Thank you,” she said. She didn’t even know what time it was now. Edging on to last call, if it wasn’t closing time altogether.
She felt… Well, she didn’t know what she felt. She tried to shrink the evening in her mind, compartmentalize it. She went to the stretch of time she had just spent at the hospital. That walk down the hall with Lydia had been uncomfortable. Lydia clearly suspected that something was going on between Gage and herself, but she hadn’t outright asked.
She was familiar with Lydia, but they didn’t really know each other, and they had certainly never discussed their dating habits, or anything of a remotely personal nature.
Lydia was mayor of Copper Ridge. And while she was perfectly cordial to Rebecca, she just wasn’t the kind of person who would associate with Rebecca. Not beyond campaigning, anyway. Though, Rebecca supposed that as a small-business owner in the town, things were a little different now. But she could never quite shake off the feeling that she was nothing more than a poor, scarred girl from the wrong side of the tracks.
And then, Gage had done his level best to get her out of the hospital as quickly as possible by making physical contact with her. She hated that she had been so predictable. She knew he had only done it to get her moving. She supposed it served her right for meddling. She had no right to meddle in his family business. Moreover, she didn’t know why she cared.
She didn’t know how she could see him as anything other than the man who had ruined her life. But now it was complicated because he was both her own personal monster and her lover.
Really, only she could make a decision this bad.
She didn’t feel better. She didn’t feel fixed. She didn’t feel like she had solved her problem. In some ways, she would be able to relate to her friends a little bit better. She would at least know what all the fuss was about. Because, as messed up and topsy-turvy as all of the emotions surrounding the sex were, the sex was, objectively, amazing.
She had absolutely nothing to compare it to, but orgasms she knew. She had plenty of those on her own. She was a capable, red-blooded woman, after all. But those were… They were all under her control. She had them when she wanted them and never when she didn’t. There was predictability to them. To achieving it all on your own.
She had no control with Gage. And he had done things to her that… She knew things. She knew plenty about sex. But theoretical sex is not actual sex. Actually having those things done to you made them wicked and almost beyond belief rather than uncomfortable and slightly giggle-worthy.
She had definitely not been g
iggling during the sex.
She was overheating thinking about it, and she needed to get her mind on something else.
It didn’t matter, because just then, he turned into the parking lot at Ace’s. “Thank you,” she said, practically leaping out of the truck before it had fully stopped. She said a prayer of thanks that she had actually remembered her purse, and that her keys were inside of it. She needed to get some distance between herself and Gage.
He got out of the truck, the driver side door closing hard, the sound echoing across the empty lot. Ace’s had clearly emptied out promptly tonight. Probably because other people had left in a hurry to hook up. Just like they’d done earlier. She tried to shove that thought, that memory out of her mind.
And when she looked at him walking toward her, she tried to think of him as that monstrous villain she’d imagined him to be. But it was hard. Hard when she had been intimate with the man. When she had seen the way he had responded to the news of his sister giving birth.
Harder still when he had confided in her about some of those things. That Sierra had been six when he left. That it clearly hurt him, the passage of the years, how much he had missed.
That he wasn’t some callous monster who had left town and never thought of them again. He had thought of his family. He had thought of her. It was easy to be offended about that. That he had somehow co-opted her pain and made it his own. But maybe he just had his own pain.
That thought made her feel like her chest had been cracked open for some reason. It was uncomfortable, invasive, and it seemed to demand something of her. She didn’t know what.
She went to the driver side of her truck, unlocked the door and opened it, then she turned to look at Gage one last time. There was something tortured in his expression, something drawn and tired. He looked older than he had at the start of the evening, reinforcing that feeling that today had actually contained years.
Each and every one seemed to be written on that gorgeous face. She couldn’t stop staring at him then. Looking at him like it was the first time she’d seen him as he stood there illuminated by the security lights, the sharp, blue glow highlighting his cheekbones, casting the planes of his face into sharp relief.
She looked down at his forearm, exposed because the idiot wasn’t wearing a jacket. At that tattoo. She had touched his body. Had touched it naked. He was muscular, hard and rough, hairy in all the right places, just like a man should be.
She wished that he were just a man. Just a man she had decided to sleep with for the first time. And it made her angry that he wasn’t. That this couldn’t be simple. That it couldn’t just be fun. That it couldn’t just feel good. That it had to be just tonight, and never again.
As if he read her mind, he let out a harsh, low sound, and crossed the space between them, taking her into his arms and pulling her up against him, claiming her mouth with his. He kissed her deep and long, sliding his fingertips down between her shoulder blades, along the line of her spine and down to cup her ass.
She whimpered, arching against him, pressing herself hard against his erection. She just wanted to hold on to him, to hold on to this. Maybe it was better that it was him. That it wasn’t someone she should want, wasn’t someone she would want again when she was thinking clearly. It wouldn’t be awkward later, because they were never going to hang out. And when they saw each other, the feelings had never been easy anyway. So, it could hardly be worse.
She justified. She justified all those things as he pushed her back, laying her down across the bench seat of her truck. He pressed his hand between her thighs, sliding his fingertips beneath her dress, beneath the elastic of her panties.
He stroked her, where she was wet and aching for him, his thumb making tight circles over her clit.
She reached out, grabbing hold of his forearms. “Gage,” she gasped, “I want… I want…”
“No,” he said. “You’ll be way too sore. Just take this.” She hated that he had read her mind. That he knew she had been about to beg to have him again. And she hated even more that he had refused.
But not half as much as she hated that he had taken her from slightly muddled confusion to so aroused she couldn’t think straight in under thirty seconds. White lightning streaked from where he touched her down deep to her core, her internal muscles pulsing. She was hungry for him, for his penetration. And she begged. Made incoherent moaning sounds as he continued to torment her, as he ratcheted her desire up hotter, higher.
And then, it completely shattered over her, like a pane of glass, glittering and sharp all around her, cutting into her. She couldn’t catch her breath, didn’t want to, as glittering shards of sensation worked their way beneath her skin, invading every part of her. She couldn’t do anything, couldn’t say anything. She could only feel.
And when it passed, she became very aware of his hard body above her, of the tight band of his arm, wrapped around her waist, holding her against him. Of those blue, endless eyes. Eyes as sharp as any blade cutting deeper than the pleasure. Leaving more profound scars than any that could be seen written across her skin.
She gasped, extricating herself from his hold, scooting backward, putting her hand over her face. “I… Not again,” she said.
“Rebecca,” he began.
“Just. Tonight.”
“I didn’t hurt you, did I?”
She shook her head, even though she was lying. He had hurt her seventeen years ago, and on so many other occasions since, without even being present. But she had a horrible feeling that tonight he had hurt her worse, with repercussions that would show up when she least expected it.
“It’s fine. Of course you didn’t… It isn’t that… I wanted it,” she said, because she couldn’t have him believing anything else.
“You’re upset.”
“I’m tired. I just need to go home. I need to be alone.”
She needed solitude desperately. Because the only other option was breaking open in front of him, and pouring out all of these emotions onto him. And a very large part of her felt like she would rather die. She didn’t share these things with people. Not with anyone.
She certainly wasn’t going to share her emotions with him, with the man who was basically the reason she was such an emotionally stunted nutcase. Much to her relief, he didn’t press. Instead, he turned and got back into his truck.
She let out a sigh of relief. There was a very large part of her that wished Gage West would just drive off into the sunset, or the sunrise—which was more accurate to the moment—and disappear for another seventeen years.
She started the engine, and let out a sharp sob the moment the roar filled the cab, blotting out the sound her tears made as she pulled out of the parking lot and onto the highway. She would fall apart here, where no one would see, and then by tomorrow everything would be fine. The next time she saw Gage, she would have everything together.
Tonight had been all about letting go of baggage and liberating herself. It stood to reason that it would feel strange at first. But everything would normalize. And now, maybe so would she.
She was desperate to believe it. Because otherwise, she might just be falling apart for no good reason. She had survived too damn much to crumble now.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
BY THE TIME Rebecca walked into Lane’s Mercantile at lunchtime she had more or less convinced herself that she was in control of her emotions, her body and her feelings. Sure, she had alternately spent the night weeping and tossing and turning because she was aroused and wanted nothing more than to be touched by Gage again. Which was never going to happen, so her body needed to get over it.
She felt refreshed, and much less dire in the light of day, which was helpful.
She didn’t know why everything had felt so crazy last night. Probably all of the emotions, and the climaxes. But today she felt renewed. She felt like maybe she had finally put a demon to rest.
She felt…oh crap. Clearly she had been celebrating a little bit too soon.
/> Because there was Finn up on a ladder looking at light fixtures in the mercantile. Being very right there, when she would rather he weren’t at all.
“Hi, Rebecca,” Lane said, her eyes fixed on Finn.
“I came for lunch, since you said you were sampling that new cheese that you got.”
“It’s from France,” Lane said.
“We make cheese,” Finn said, his tone hard.
“And the Laughing Irish cheese is great,” Lane said, “but while local cheese is certainly a draw, I need to carry European cheeses too. So get over yourself. Your cheese is not the only cheese, Donnelly.”
Clearly, Lane was ignorant about what had transpired between herself and Finn the night before, and Finn wasn’t paying any attention to her, which was more typical than the interaction they’d had last night.
Still, seeing Finn reminded her of last night, which reminded her of everything that had happened after the two of them had parted.
All of the Gage things. The things that she was trying to be not completely psycho about.
“My cheese is the only cheese anyone would ever need, if they would just try it,” he said, descending the ladder.
“Was that some kind of weird, cheese-based euphemism?” Lane asked.
He cocked his head to the side, his expression long-suffering. “I wouldn’t waste my euphemisms on you, Lane.”
She waved a hand. “Whatever, man.”
Rebecca’s eyes clashed with Finn’s, and an electric current of awkwardness arced between them. She had a feeling that was all on her end, since Finn was infinitely more experienced with bar hookups and the like.
“Was everything okay last night?”
Finn was looking at her with far too perceptive and searching eyes.
“Yeah,” she said, looking down and walking a few steps for no particular reason except that it gave her something to do.
“Why?” Lane asked. “What happened last night?”
“Nothing,” Rebecca said.
“Some guy came and dragged her out of a bar,” Finn said at the same time.
