“Oh! I’m so sorry.” The words were lacking, but they were all she had. “He was lucky he had you as a friend.”
Jason shook his head. “No, he wasn’t. If I hadn’t lost my temper, he’d still be alive. I always end up hurting those closest to me.” He paused yet again, as though to pull himself together. “Now, how about you finish untying my boot?”
Kara blinked repeatedly before making short work of unstringing his laces. “Is there anything that can lessen the pain in your knee?”
The tension in his face soothed as they moved on to a new topic of conversation. “Sometimes I use a heating pad, but without power that isn’t an option.”
She tried to think of a substitute. “Do you have a hot water bottle?”
He broke out into a chuckle. “Do they still make such a thing?”
She shrugged. “Hey, I’m just trying to help.”
“I know. And I appreciate it.”
The sincerity in his eyes sent a warmth swirling in her chest. When he smiled, her heart tripped over itself. She needed some distance. Some air. Anything to calm the rush of emotions charging through her body.
“I’ll be back,” he said. “I need to change into something dry.”
She nodded and made her way over to the mess of wood on the floor. Work was a welcome distraction, but all too soon she had the logs neatly stacked, and had no idea what to do next. She plopped down on the couch and reached for a magazine. It was a sports issue, but thankfully, not the swimsuit edition. When she lifted it, something fluttered to the floor. A photograph.
It landed upside down. She wondered what image was on the other side. His ex-girlfriend? Did he sit here at night thinking of her? The chance that she’d been letting herself get all tangled up in old emotions while he was secretly pining for another woman left Kara spinning. The old Jason wouldn’t have done that, but this new Jason she knew next to nothing about.
Anxious for an answer, she snatched up the photo. Her gaze riveted to the image of two young men with similar blue eyes and brown hair, each holding a colorful snowboard. Their appearances were so strikingly similar that they’d been mistaken numerous times for brothers.
Shaun...
At that moment, the floorboards creaked, announcing Jason’s presence. He joined her on the couch. “Ah, I see you’ve found the picture of Shaun. Do you remember that time?”
Did she remember? She was the one who’d taken the photo.
“I remember.” She swallowed hard. “We were sixteen. And life was so much easier back then.”
Jason took the photo from her and held it in front of him. “Never thought we’d be sitting here nearly twelve years later, and things would be so screwed up. Back then we were the Three Musketeers. Now you and I hardly speak to one and other. And Shaun’s...”
“Dead.” The word pierced her chest.
“I know. It’s been what? Seven years since he died in a car accident.”
“How do you know about it?” She turned to him. “When you left, I thought you cut off all contact with Pleasant Valley. Or was it just me and your father you cut out of your life?”
His brows furrowed together. He reached out to her, but she scooted to the far end of the couch. “It wasn’t like you’re thinking.”
“Then how was it?”
“When I left, I vowed I wouldn’t look back. It was easy to get lost in my job, my mission. In the beginning, I’d volunteer for whatever assignment came up—regardless of the risk—but as the years passed, my curiosity about what went on back here grew.”
She crossed her arms and glared at him. “So who did you contact?”
“You’ve heard of the internet, haven’t you?”
She released a pent-up breath. “Oh.”
“That’s where I came across the Pleasant Valley Journal and stumbled over the article about Shaun’s car accident. Damn shame. He was so young. He had his whole future to look forward to.”
She nodded. Unable to find her voice, she thought of the boy who’d always followed Jason around, from childhood through their high school days. He’d always been there for Jason and her. Trusted, funny and dependable. Those were the traits she’d loved about Shaun.
It wasn’t until Jason left town that she’d learned Shaun had been harboring feelings for her. With her being madly in love with Jason, she’d never even considered that Shaun’s devotion was anything more than a deep, caring friendship. But the night Jason broke her heart at the Christmas dance, Shaun had been the one to drive her home. And again, a couple of months later, he’d been there at one of the lowest points in her life. He’d reached out to her and...
“Kara, are you okay?” Jason asked, moving next to her.
She glanced back at the photo, seeing Shaun’s sweet smiling face...so much like her daughter’s.
“I’m fine.” Her voice was barely more than a whisper.
“It’s okay. You aren’t alone. I miss how things used to be, too.”
The wind howled outside, while Jason’s heated gaze warmed her soul. The past and the present collided. His thumb brushed over her cheek and down her neck. Kara’s heart thumped madly. Could he feel the blood pulsating through her veins, making her head dizzy with need?
His gaze dropped. His pupils dilated. He was going to kiss her. Her breath caught in her lungs. This was wrong. But it’d be only once. For old times’ sake. Drawn to him in the same manner a hummingbird craves sweet nectar, she licked her lips with the tip of her tongue.
His head lowered. She should turn away.
Instead, her eyes drifted closed. His mouth pressed to hers. A moan of long-held desire formed at the base of her throat. This was crazy. Utter madness. And in that moment she wanted nothing more than to be here with him, like this.
She slid her arms over his shoulders. Her fingers stroked his short tufts of hair, enjoying the texture.
His hands moved to her waist, pulling her closer. Her chest bumped against the hardness of his. Her palms slid down his shoulders, savoring the ripple of muscles. No man had a right to feel so good. She attempted to impress every delicious detail, every spine-tingling sensation to memory. She never, ever wanted to forget this moment.
His mouth plundered hers. She welcomed him with an eagerness of her own. Her protective walls fell away, leaving her open and vulnerable to this man who made her body sing with desire.
Her breath came in rapid gasps. Her hands slipped inside the collar of his shirt. His skin was smooth and hot.
“Kara,” he murmured, as his lips traced up her jaw. “I want you so much.”
She wanted him, too. The years peeled away. Lost in a haze of ecstasy, she couldn’t form even the simplest of words. Instead, she sought out his lips and showed him how much she wanted him.
A thundering crack sent her jumping out of his arms. Dazed, she glanced around the room.
“What...what was that?” she asked, her breathing labored.
“It’s okay,” he said, running a hand over her hair. “Probably a tree limb snapped in the wind. As long as it doesn’t come through the roof, we’re in good shape.”
Satisfied they were still safe in their little bubble, away from the realities waiting for them just outside the door, she turned her hungry gaze back to him. She leaned forward, eager to taste him once more. Thirsting for him like a person lost in the desert thirsts for water, she pressed her lips to his mouth.
Yet his lips did not yield to her.
They were pulled tight, resisting her advances.
Confused, she sat back.
The flames of desire in his eyes had died out.
“This can’t happen.” His voice was raspy and his chest heaved. “You and me. This thing. It can’t happen. Not now. Not ever.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
EVERY MUSC
LE IN Jason’s body tensed, bracing for the firestorm brewing in Kara’s eyes. She yanked herself out of his hold.
“You’re right.” She ran a shaky hand over her mussed-up hair, failing to smooth the unruly waves. “I don’t know what I was thinking. You rejected me once. Why in the world did I think it’d be any different now?”
“It’s not you. I never rejected you.”
“Really? That’s odd. I seem to recall you making me promises of forever, and then just leaving, with no explanation.” Pink stained her cheeks as her voice rose almost to a shout. “You didn’t even have the decency to tell me what I’d done wrong. You never gave me a chance to fix things.”
He smothered a swear word and shot to his feet, ignoring the ache in his leg. With a pronounced limp, he moved to the fireplace. He had to tell her. He had to explain the terrible secret that drove them apart—the one that would keep them apart forever.
“It wasn’t you. It was me,” he said, turning to meet her glare.
“Sure. Whatever you say.” Her eyes said she didn’t believe him.
“I already told you how I got my buddy killed. Isn’t that enough to convince you that I’m bad news?”
“That was a very unfortunate accident.” She settled her hands on her hips. “It has nothing to do with this...with us.”
He’d have to go into the whole sordid story to make her see that his hasty departure had been in a moment of shock—of self-defense. And it had absolutely nothing to do with anything she’d said or done.
Refusing to give in to the pain in his leg, he paced to the end of the fireplace mantel, then turned, with a precision drilled into him during his time in the military. He’d never divulged his shameful secret to anyone. At least his father had done one decent thing in his life and kept it to himself. Except for the fateful night when he’d flung the gruesome secret in Jason’s face.
His gut churned as the nightmare began to unfold in his mind.
Jason paused. Looked at Kara. Opened his mouth. Then closed it.
With a jerk, he turned away. The pain in his leg was no match for the agony in his chest. He continued pacing. Where did he start? And what did he do when his worst nightmare came true—when Kara looked at him with revulsion? An acidic taste rose in the back of his throat and he swallowed hard.
“Don’t do this again. Don’t shut me out,” she insisted. “Talk to me.”
“I can’t—”
“Yes, you can. Tell me what awful thing drove you from your home—from me. Or is it that there isn’t any secret? Did you just chicken out when things got too serious? Instead of facing me and explaining why you wanted out of the engagement, did you find it easier to bolt?”
Did she really think him such a coward? He considered not telling her, considered holding back out of spite, but that would be childish. After everything, she deserved the truth. No matter how much it cost him.
“It all happened the night I was supposed to meet you at the Christmas dance.” His voice grew uneven and he paused to clear his throat.
He searched for the right words. There were none. His palms grew moist. Puzzlement lit her eyes, as though she was trying to guess what he would say next.
“I was on my way out the door when my father stopped me.”
Jason inhaled an unsteady breath and blew it out. “We started arguing about his expectations for me around the resort. I’d had enough of him criticizing my job performance, nitpicking my every move. I blurted out that I planned to enlist in the army. He was livid. I’d never seen him so angry. He told me I was an ungrateful, sniveling brat and that I owed it to him to run the place.”
Jason glanced up to see the color wash out of Kara’s face. Her eyes were large and round, prompting him to keep going.
“I said I was tired of being a slave to a man who lived his life inside a bottle. I didn’t stop there. I also told him you and I were getting married and leaving this place. He laughed in my face. His alcohol-laced breath made me want to puke.”
Jason forced another breath in, then out. “He said no woman would want to marry me when she found out the truth. I told him there wasn’t anything he could say or do to keep me from marrying you.”
Boy, had he been wrong.
He swallowed hard, fighting back the wave of fear over Kara’s impending repulsion. He wanted more than anything in the world for her to understand, but how do you understand the incomprehensible? How do you reconcile yourself to the fact that the person you thought you’d once known was a stranger?
He just had to say a little more and then it’d be out there. There’d be no more fighting this attraction, because she’d never let him get close to her again. And he wouldn’t blame her.
“My father staggered up to me. He stabbed his finger in my chest and stared at me with those bloodred eyes. He told me I was an ungrateful bastard. His words were slurred, but their point came across loud and clear.”
Kara’s hand flew to her mouth. Her eyes shimmered with pity.
When dreadful seconds of silence fell over the room, she asked, “Why in the world would he say such hateful things to you? No parent wants to see their child leave home, but...”
“But he was drunk, and furious at me for what he saw as betrayal, for leaving him here to deal with a resort that was losing money left and right.”
After seven years, the events of that night stood out crystal clear in Jason’s mind. His father’s words still held the power to stab at his heart, forcing him to blink repeatedly to clear the blur in his eyes.
In his mind, he could still recall his father’s last blow—the one that shattered any hope he’d had of having a life with Kara. He wasn’t his father’s biological son. Under the strained circumstances, that should have given him some comfort—but it didn’t.
The truth about his origins was so much worse. He’d run from it for so long that now there was no place left to hide.
He was the spawn of a monster.
The breath hitched in his throat. Kara would never be able to look at him the same if he told her. The thought ripped at his gut.
“Still, you were barely twenty years old,” she said, drawing him from his jagged thoughts. “How could he do such a thing? I understand why you left, but why didn’t you take me with you? Or at least talk to me so that we could make plans?”
With his head hung low, Jason turned away. “I couldn’t.”
“Why? What aren’t you telling me?”
“You won’t understand,” he shouted.
Frustration balled up in his gut over his cowardice to spit out the real reason he’d left, the reason he could no longer be with her. He was the son of a rapist—his mother’s rapist.
“I never knew you thought so little of me.” Pain reflected brightly in Kara’s eyes. “I thought...I thought back then that we could tell each other anything.”
His vision blurred. His throat started to close. He had to stomp down these tormenting emotions. He was a soldier. He was strong. He could get through this and be honest with her.
He lifted his head. His gaze met hers. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. The thought of her being repulsed, or worse, being afraid, silenced him.
Besides, what did it matter now? They’d both been reminded that they weren’t good for each other. Nothing more needed to be said.
“I have to get some more wood,” he muttered, needing to be alone for a moment to collect his thoughts.
“Right now, in the middle of our talk?” Disbelief and frustration laced her voice.
“We’re going to need it tonight.” He walked to the wood pegs by the door to grab his coat.
“But you just got some—”
“Not enough.”
CHAPTER NINE
THE FOLLOWING MORNING, the rumble of a snowplow signaled their
freedom. Jason didn’t waste any time calling the towing company for Kara’s car. Learning there was a considerable wait for service, he ushered her out the door. He needed to get her home. Now. He couldn’t let his thoughts become any more muddled.
The ride down the mountain, though still treacherous in some places, was a far cry from the night before. Kara leaned against the door, leaving as much space between them as possible. She stared straight ahead while an ominous silence filled the SUV.
“Turn right here. My dad said they’d be at my house, checking to make sure none of the water pipes froze during the night. I can’t wait to see my little girl.”
Excitement laced the last sentence. Love for her daughter had filled that part of her heart he’d broken so long ago. If only things had been different—if he’d been different—he’d have a place in her heart, too.
“You can drop me off here,” she said, at the foot of the long driveway.
“That’s okay. Since someone took the time to plow the drive, the SUV shouldn’t have any problems making it to the top of your hill.”
The little white house with deep blue shutters held his full attention. It was so small. Not that his log home was a mansion, but he’d swear her whole house could fit in his great room. How did she live in such tight quarters—with a toddler, no less? She’d constantly be stumbling over discarded toys.
“You own this?” he asked.
She nodded. “It’s cozy, but it’s home.”
He took note of the pride glittering in her eyes over owning this gingerbread house. “It’s a real nice-looking place.”
“Thanks.” She grabbed the door handle. “I’m sorry for imposing last night.”
“I’m glad I was there to help.”
The door swung open and she grabbed her things before slipping out of the vehicle.
“Wait,” he called. “You never answered me about staying on the payroll until after the first of the year.”
Her pink lips pursed. Little lines formed between her brows, as though the decision was a real struggle for her. He’d thought his offer had been sweet enough. Could she sense his desperation? Was she holding out for more money? Or did she simply hate the idea of working for him?
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