All He Ever Wanted

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  A muscular thigh that looked hard and solid as it bulged against his well-cut charcoal gray trousers.

  She quickly looked back at the napkin and cookies in her own lap.

  “We had cookies, of course. Beautifully prepared by Denver’s finest pastry chefs.” He shifted a little, putting one arm behind her on the back of the chair.

  She was finding it difficult to breathe. She’d spent many an afternoon in the kitchen with her mom and sisters baking cookies. For holidays. For fun. “My parents live in Arizona,” she announced baldly.

  “Were you close to them?”

  She nodded. “Still are. They still hold hands. It’s great.” An enduring marriage like her parents’ is what she’d thought she’d have when she’d said her vows to Jess.

  So much for that.

  “Any other siblings beside the doc?”

  “Sisters. Both younger.” She picked up a cookie. Nibbled a corner of it. Oatmeal raisin.

  Figures. She loathed oatmeal raisin. That’s what she got for letting herself be so distracted by a man. By Cameron.

  “How long were you married?”

  She started. “Six years. You?”

  “Five. You still love him?”

  Her fingers went lax and the cookie tumbled to the sturdy green-flecked carpet. “That’s a very personal question.”

  “Yeah.” His head nearly brushed her thigh as he leaned over and retrieved the cookie. He set it on the corner of the desk and looked back at her. “Are you?”

  “No.” She’d called Erik a jumping bean, but it was her nerves that were jumping all over the place now. “Are you?” she challenged.

  “In love with your ex? Not likely.”

  Her lips pressed together. “Ha-ha.”

  His gaze was on the cookies again. “Yes.”

  Her jumping nerves collided and collapsed into wreckage. Well. She’d asked, hadn’t she? “I’m sorry.”

  His gaze slanted to her face. “For what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He slowly took another cookie. “This is what Laura wanted,” he said after a moment.

  “Broken gingerbread?”

  His lips twisted. “A regular life like this.” He lifted his chin, encompassing the families who milled around the room. The children who raced back and forth. “She wanted to move here so damned bad. Had a vision in her head of the kind of childhood Erik would have. The kind of home we’d have. How we’d be part of the whole small-town deal.”

  She could see each individual lash of his thick, sooty eyelashes. Could see the fine lines barely webbing out from the corners of his dark eyes. “Then she’d be pleased,” Faith said quietly. “That you have what she’d wanted for you.”

  “Yeah.” His gaze roved over the room and she could practically feel the restlessness seeping out of his pores. “Too late, though,” he added grimly.

  She curled her fingers, realizing that she’d actually begun lifting her hand as if to touch his hair. And wouldn’t that be the height of folly? “Because she…died.”

  “Because I didn’t start living the life she wanted until after she died.” He pushed to his feet. “Don’t think Erik’s coming with punch anytime soon. I’ll be back.” He headed toward the line of people at the refreshment table.

  Faith watched him go. He wasn’t necessarily the tallest, or even the biggest man there. He did have height and mile-wide shoulders on his side, true. But the thing about Cameron that made him stand out from the others was not his physicality. It was something…deeper. Something that came up from his soul.

  And rather than being put off by his confirmation that he still loved his wife, she feared she was only more intrigued than ever.

  Realizing she was staring—and probably drooling on herself as well—she looked down at Erik’s journal. It was displayed in a manner clearly meant to be read, so she flipped open the thick paper that served as the cover, and looked at the first page. Erik’s writing was slapdash, as if he could hardly be bothered with penmanship when there were more interesting things in the world to attend to. But it improved as she paged through, reading the weekly entries that covered a span of about three months.

  At the end was his recounting of his adventure down the mine shaft. He’d even drawn a picture—a well-drawn picture for that matter—of himself, being drawn up the shaft by the safety harness and rope, with Faith down below him.

  “He inherited his mother’s ability to draw, too.”

  She looked up, already aware of Cameron’s presence before he’d spoken. He held out a clear plastic cup filled with red punch. She took it, carefully avoiding his long fingers, and sipped. “You don’t draw?”

  “Stick figures are more my speed,” he assured dryly. “Toss in a little calculus, trig and math analysis, and that’s my art.”

  “And high school sports.”

  “Yeah.” He drank from his own cup. “I think Erik’s permanently camped out at the refreshment table. He doesn’t usually get homemade cookies, either.”

  “Maybe I’ll have to get out my cookie sheets,” she murmured.

  “You bake?”

  “I’m not all about the search and rescue,” she said dryly.

  His lashes dropped. “Yeah. I know. I need to apologize. For last night.”

  At least he hadn’t apologized for the kiss.

  Again.

  She wasn’t sure she’d have been able to take it, if he had. “We both said things we probably shouldn’t have.”

  His index finger tapped his plastic cup. “Truth is, you’ll make a great mom. When you decide to have a family.” He looked around the room. “There are at least six people here who don’t have the interest in their own child that you have in Erik. Who would rather be anywhere other than here.”

  Faith was grateful his attention was elsewhere. She choked down her punch in a huge gulp, then transferred the napkin and remains of the cookies to the desktop and stood. “I don’t suppose school functions are everyone’s cup of tea.”

  “They weren’t my parents’.” His voice was matter-of-fact. “Only time they came was when it was time to pick me up from boarding school at the end of each term.”

  She tugged her scarf back into place and picked up her coat. He’d gone to a boarding school? Sounded lonely.

  “I have to go,” she said. “I’ll just sneak by and tell Erik. If I can get his attention away from his girlfriends there.”

  “Girlfriends?” His head snapped around.

  There was nothing blasé in his expression now. And if Faith weren’t feeling so off-kilter, she might have found his surprise amusing. “Also known as Winter and Spring. They’ve barely let him out of their sight since we came in the classroom.” She headed toward the refreshment table and worked her way toward Erik.

  “Can we go tobogganing again soon?” he asked after she’d told him it was time for her to leave.

  “Depends on my schedule,” she said honestly. He had a smear of chocolate on his chin and the front of his hair stood up in a cowlick.

  Her head told her she would be better off staying far, far away from either of the Stevensons.

  But her heart?

  She tweaked Erik’s tumbled hair and crouched down to his level. “I’ll see what I can arrange, okay?”

  “Cool.” He smiled. And even though he was surrounded by classmates, he leaned forward. His hug was brief, but tight.

  And it stole her heart.

  She rose and turned. Felt the slam of Cameron’s brown gaze when she saw him standing just behind them, and had to look down, unable to withstand the intensity of it.

  “I’ll walk you to your car,” he told her. “Erik, you stay in this classroom until I get back.”

  Erik looked surprised. But he nodded. “’Bye, Faith.”

  She winked, though what she wanted to do was hug the boy again. “’Bye, Juan.”

  “How come she calls you Juan?” she heard Spring whisper as she and Cameron headed toward the door. Before they le
ft the building, she stopped to pull on her coat. Cameron took it from her and held it up for her.

  She tucked her tongue between her teeth and silently slid her arms into the sleeves. Then he closed his hands over her shoulders and turned her to face him. His fingers brushed her chin when he buttoned it.

  “Faith! Wait!”

  She drew in an unsteady breath and looked back to see Erik racing down the hall.

  “Erik, I told you to wait in the classroom.”

  “I know, Dad. But I forgot this.” He pushed an oversize sheet of paper at Faith. “I made this for you. I had to get it down off the bulletin board.”

  Faith took the paper and turned it until she could see the front. It was a watercolor painting and the sturdy brick lines of the fire station were clearly recognizable.

  “That’s you,” he stabbed his finger at the slightly blurry figure astride a snowmobile outside the building.

  “I figured.” She couldn’t stand it. She leaned down and kissed his forehead. “Thank you. I’m going to hang it up at home when I get there.”

  He rolled his eyes a little, but grinned, then he was racing back down the hallway toward his classroom.

  “Yeah,” Cameron murmured. “You’ll be a great mom.” His hand touched the small of her back even as he reached forward to push open the heavy door.

  Cold air washed over her hot face as she stepped outside. “Actually,” her fingers tightened unconsciously on the corner of Erik’s painting. “I really don’t plan to have kids.”

  She felt his sidelong look at that and quickened her step. Cameron’s long legs easily kept pace, however. And when they reached her SUV, he snorted softly. “Think making your own parking space where there is none might just be worse than double-parking.”

  “There’s a foot of snow between my wheels and the grass,” she defended lightly. “I’m not damaging anything. And the only one who’d delight in giving me another ticket would be Bobby Romano.”

  “Another ticket. Wild woman.” He pulled open the driver’s side door. “You didn’t lock it.”

  “Not much point.” She’d never been called a wild woman before. She thought she might just like it. “Thunder Canyon isn’t a hotbed of criminal activity.” She climbed up into the vehicle.

  He stepped closer, inside the open door. “Maybe not. But it’d be safer for you.”

  “I think I’m pretty safe,” she demurred.

  The streetlight overhead shined down on his bare head, casting his dark auburn head with a gilded sheen. He stood close enough that she could feel the warmth of him. His coat hung open, and it would only take one small move and she could slide her hand over the pale gray shirt that draped his hard chest.

  “Are you?”

  Her lips were tingling again. “Hmm?”

  His deep voice seemed to drop even more. “Safe.”

  She curled her hand tightly around the steering wheel. A much safer alternative than touching him. The only one in danger of anything was her. But maybe it was better that Cameron was still in love with his wife. There was no danger of her being hurt again, the way she had been when Jess walked out, if Cameron found out just how much she was lacking.

  “I’m safe as houses,” she finally whispered.

  He leaned down, his mouth hovering inches above hers.

  A car drove by, tooting its horn. “Hey, Coach! G’luck on Friday!”

  Cameron straightened. He lifted his hand in acknowledgment of the drive-by well-wisher. “Parking under a streetlight.” His voice was dry. “Perfect.”

  She stuck the key in the ignition, rather amazed that she managed it on the first try. “It’s safer,” she said.

  He was silent for a long heartbeat. Then he smiled. He backed up, out of the way of the door. “Drive carefully.”

  “Always.”

  But he wasn’t so breezy. “I mean it, Faith. Be careful.”

  She nodded slowly. “I’ll be careful, Cameron.”

  He studied her for a moment longer then, apparently satisfied, he nodded once and pushed her door closed. He stepped away from the truck so she’d have room to back out of her impromptu parking slot.

  She drove away, with the reflection of him in her rearview mirror.

  He stood there until she turned out of sight and she continued on home.

  Safe?

  Who was she kidding?

  Chapter Nine

  “We forgot to get your tennis racket back to you last night.”

  Faith’s hand tightened around the telephone and she managed to scatter the pages of the budget she’d been working on for Jim across her desk.

  The last voice she’d expected to hear on the other end of the phone when it rang was Cameron’s.

  “And here I was about to put in a missing racket report.” Her voice was deliberately light.

  “I still owe you a dinner.”

  “You don’t owe me anything.”

  “You didn’t have a chance to eat last Friday at The Hitching Post. I’m tossing some steaks on the grill tonight. If you’re interested.”

  She was interested. That was the problem.

  “Erik’s been practicing with the toboggan, too. Think he has some trick he wants to show you.”

  She pressed her fingertips against her forehead. Shifts had just changed and there was a lot of commotion inside the station. “I’ll be on call this evening. I wouldn’t want to disappoint Erik if I get called out.”

  “He’d just have something new to brag about at school tomorrow.”

  In his background, she could hear a school bell. It sounded even noisier on his end than it did at the fire station. And it took no effort at all on her part to envision Cameron at his desk, students pouring into his classroom. “Cameron—”

  “Erik’s not the only one who’d like you to come.”

  She swallowed. Hard.

  “You still there?”

  “Yes.” She pushed out the word. “All right. Um…can I bring anything?”

  “Just yourself. Come by around seven. We’ve got a practice game after school. Romance,” his voice sharpened. “If you want to avoid the principal’s office, get off the desk.” His tone changed again. “See you tonight.”

  “Okay.” She’d barely gotten the word out when he’d hung up, and she sat there for a long moment staring at the receiver in her hand.

  “Works better when you talk into it, Blondie.” Derek stopped by her desk. He dropped a plastic container by her elbow. “Cake.”

  She finally hung up the telephone. Glanced at the container. “Thanks.” She shifted it to the side, off the budget papers.

  His eyebrows shot up. “Okay. Tanya was right. Something’s up with you.”

  “Nothing’s up with me.”

  He leaned way over, crossing his arms on the desk, to peer into her face. “That’s chocolate cake in there, and you’re not diving into it? Something is up all right. Wanna tell Uncle Derek about it?”

  She rolled her eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Have anything to do with the coach?”

  Faith’s cheeks warmed. “No.”

  “Even though he was kissing you last night at the elementary school?”

  She gaped. “How…he was not.” He hadn’t kissed her, because of the car that had driven by.

  Derek was grinning, looking knowing. Faith bunched up the papers and tapped them against the desk, squaring the edges. “He’s just still feeling grateful.”

  “Keep telling yourself that, Blondie.” He nudged the container. “Better eat this up before word gets out that I didn’t bring anyone else any dessert. You might find yourself in a dogfight or something.”

  She snatched the container, protective, and tucked it in her desk drawer. “Nobody gets between me and chocolate,” she assured him.

  But Faith didn’t get a chance to eat the chocolate cake that afternoon. Nor did she make it to Cameron’s for dinner.

  The entire team was called out just after noon, when an AMBER a
lert was issued for a three-year-old girl who’d gone missing just outside of Bozeman.

  And it was well after midnight when she finally dragged herself home, where the only thing to welcome her was the flashing red light on her answering machine. She hit the Play button on her way into the kitchen.

  Her mother’s voice trilled out, talking about the beautiful weather they were having in Arizona, and when was Faith going to take a vacation and come see them?

  Faith opened the refrigerator door. Stared at the unexciting contents. Derek’s chocolate masterpiece was still tucked away in her desk drawer at work. She closed the door and leaned wearily back against it. Listened to her brother’s message, calling to see if she wanted to have lunch later that week. Then a third call.

  Cameron.

  She pushed herself away from the refrigerator and left the kitchen to eye the message machine, which sat next to the phone on a small maple telephone stand that her mom had passed on to her years earlier. She pressed the Stop button. Rewound it a few seconds. Pressed Play.

  Faith. This is Cam. Practice ran late. But you’re not here, anyway. Heard the AMBER alert on the radio. Figured you’re out on it. Guess I’ll have to feed you another time.

  She crossed her arms, avoiding the temptation to rewind the message and listen to it again.

  But the messages weren’t finished.

  Faith. Cam. It’s after eleven. Just saw the news. Call me when you get in. I don’t care how late. Call. He reeled off the number.

  The machine’s red light stopped flashing. All of the new messages had been played.

  She unfolded her arms, feeling just tired and weak enough to actually dial that number. But something held her back. Cowardice? Sensibility?

  She went into her bedroom and replaced the uniform she’d been wearing for so many hours with her thick, comfortable robe. She pulled off the clasp holding back her ponytail, and dropped the gold loop on her dresser, rubbing her hand against her tired scalp.

  The phone rang, sounding sharp and imperious. And she knew, just glancing at the extension, who would be calling her at this hour.

  She sat on the side of the bed and slowly picked it up. “Hello?”

  “You didn’t call.” Cameron’s voice was low. Deep.