Make Me Beg (The Men of Gold Mountain)

by Rebecca Brooks

  He knew, too, what a mistake wasn’t—deciding to give more of himself, and asking for more in return. A mistake didn’t come from showing who you were, what you felt, what you wanted. Not what you’d pretended for years, building up layers of protection until you could no longer see your heart through the armor it wore, but all of you: the good, the bad, the works in progress. He and Mack had played games for so long, showing only those slivers of themselves they deemed safe enough to reveal. But they had whole lives. Real selves. It was time to show those, too.

  With Mack’s help, he slid the sign off the roof of the truck and propped it against the back. Then he stepped aside.

  She didn’t say anything, and he was afraid she hated it. This was a completely boneheaded thing to have done.

  Then he looked over and realized she was crying, silent tears trickling down her face.

  He’d messed up. He didn’t know how, but he had. He wanted to tear out his hair, slam the door and drive off and never set foot in Gold Mountain again. Why on earth had he thought—

  Then Mack smiled, a huge, beautiful grin that lit up her face the way he’d remembered from the first night he saw her, beaming from behind the bar. A smile that gave her eyes the same brightness she had in that photograph of her sandwiched snugly between Billy and Todd. “You asshole,” she said, cry-laughing. “What the hell have you done?”

  “I thought the new place could use a sign,” he said. “I hope your team hasn’t already made one.” He paused. “Although if they have, I’m hoping you’ll like mine better.”

  Mack looked up at him, bewilderment all over her face. “It looks how I designed it.”

  “It looks like the sign for Billy’s,” he said, and watched her mouth open in shock.

  “How did you know?”

  “Google and I make a great team. I know it’s not exactly the same, since there’s no y to loop into the apostrophe. But I hope it’s close enough.”

  “Are you kidding, Connor? It doesn’t have to be exactly the same. It shouldn’t be exactly the same. Where did you find someone to do it so well?”

  “I did it,” he said, and Mack stared at him, stunned. “At Matthew’s. I would have been here sooner, but it took longer than expected.” He laughed sheepishly and held up his hand, bandages around two fingers and a thumb. “Don’t worry, I’ll live.”

  “Connor,” she said, and his breath caught at the simple sound of her saying his name. “It’s beautiful.”

  “You don’t have to like it.”

  “Would I lie to you?”

  “No,” he said truthfully. “That’s one thing I can say for sure. I know you never would.”

  She took a step toward him, as though she were about to reach out, and he wanted to grab her right then, pull her close and make her understand he was never going to let her go.

  But then she caught herself and held back. “It’s incredible, Connor. I had no idea you could do work like this. But—” She frowned, and he felt the hit to his gut at that word alone. Of course there was a but coming. But I can’t accept it. But it doesn’t change anything. But I still don’t want to be with you.

  “But why on earth would you make this?” she said, like she really had no idea. She had no idea how he saw her, how he felt about her, how much had changed in his feelings over the three years he’d known her—and also, how little. How he was still the same person who’d walked into Mack Daddy’s that night, taken one look at the woman behind the bar, and wanted only to be near her. Why else had he taken a job where he was around her 24-7? Why else had he found the one way to be close to her, even if it wasn’t in her bed?

  “Mack,” he said, searching for the words. But there was only one explanation that encapsulated everything. “Because I love you,” he said, and he wanted to kiss the shock off her face until she never doubted it again.

  “I love you,” he repeated. “And I’m sorry. I’m sorry for blowing up at you, but I’m even more sorry for running away. This doesn’t make up for it. Nothing makes up for it. But I had to come back and say it. No.” He shook his head, rethinking. “Not just say it, but show you.” He plucked another sunflower out of the back of the truck and handed it to her, and then another, and another, until her hands were full and she couldn’t hold any more. “I love you, Mackenzie Ellinsworth. I’m pretty sure I’ve loved you for a very long time. And I want you to be happy. I want you to have your bar. I want you to have Mackenzie’s with the name out front, across the top of the menu, on everyone’s lips as they talk about the best place in town. I knew the sign you wanted—God knows I’ve seen you doodling it a thousand times.” He laughed. “I thought maybe I could make it. I thought maybe I could be part of your life. I thought… Well, I thought if you’re still looking for a head chef, I could apply to work at Mackenzie’s. Again.”

  He took a breath, trying to gauge her reaction. Did she hate him? Think he was crazy? Want him to leave? It was so hard to tell what she was thinking!

  Finally she said, “Damn,” and shook her head. “You sure know how to grovel.”

  He couldn’t say what that was supposed to mean, but she was grinning. She’d stopped crying, although the tears had left her eyes shining and bright.

  “I figured you basically get one chance to spill your guts and make a fool of yourself, so I wanted to get it right.”

  “You must have practiced.”

  “For about a month straight.”

  She nodded. “It shows.”

  “Well?” He cocked an eyebrow. “How did I do?”

  She laughed, and the sound made his heart soar. “A-plus in both effort and execution. Although I don’t know where I’m going to put these flowers.”

  “The bar. Your house. Anywhere you need the reminder that you’re loved.”

  She held the sunflowers, but then her smile dropped and she turned serious again. “But why would you want to come back? You don’t want to work at Mackenzie’s. You don’t even want to cook anymore. Why on earth are you here?”

  “Did you miss the whole groveling part? Should I have brought two trucks of flowers? I’m here because I love you, I want to be with you, and I want to work with you again. I want my life back—the life I had here. And I want it to be with you. Not secretly, not tiptoeing around, not pretending we hate each other in public while jumping into bed the first second we’re alone. Would you do that, Mack? Would you try something real with me?”

  His heart thundered in his chest while he waited for her response.

  She was so careful, so measured, he didn’t know what it would be. Then she said, “I don’t want to confuse the two,” and his heart sank. Who was confused? He certainly wasn’t. He’d waited so long. Did they really have to give this more time?

  “If you want the restaurant, you can work here without being with me,” she said. “If you want to be with me, you can have me without the restaurant. It doesn’t have to be both.”

  It wasn’t exactly her jumping into his arms to ride into the sunset, but there it was, that phrase “being with me.” The hope of possibility.

  Connor took a step closer. Another inch and they’d be pressed together. She flushed, and he knew what she was thinking—of the last time they’d stood like this in a parking lot, together.

  “It’s both,” he said, looking into her eyes. “It’s always been both. I’m not here for the restaurant alone. I can work anywhere. Hell, I can start a restaurant anywhere. But I don’t want that. I want a restaurant with you. But most of all, I want you, Mack. Even if I can’t work here, or you’ve already hired someone, or you’d rather we keep work and play separate. I’ll figure out something—as long as I can be with you. This whole time, the years I’ve been here, it’s always been you.”

  The inch between them became a centimeter, then a breath, then nothing as she pressed her head to his chest, leaning into him. He kissed her forehead and wrapped his arms around her. He couldn’t imagine ever feeling more right than he did in this instant, standing in the
middle of the parking lot, dust on his boots and Mack in his arms.

  “But you hate the name Mackenzie’s,” she murmured into his chest. “You think I’m an egomaniac. Which makes it sound like you hate me, too.”

  He squeezed her tighter, not caring if he crushed the flowers between them. “You are an egomaniac. And a control freak. And a pain in the ass.” She started to pull away, but he held her there. “But you’re my egomaniac. My control freak. My very own pain in the ass.” Mack stayed in his arms, pressed against his chest. Finally he said, softly, “Sam told me where the name comes from. That’s how I got the design for the sign.”

  Mack wrenched away sharply.

  “Will you wait and listen before you lash out at me?” he said. “Will you give your friends and me the benefit of the doubt for two seconds before you assume the worst of us? We care about you, Mack. She didn’t call me to gossip, some kind of Let’s dish on Mack bullshit. Please.”

  He reached for her hand. He needed to touch her, to let her know she was safe with him.

  “I wish you’d told me,” he said, as soon as he trusted she wasn’t going to pull away. “I want you to have the place you’ve always dreamed of, with a name that has a story behind it. That means something important to you.”

  He thought she was looking past him, unable to meet his eyes. But then he realized it was more like she was looking through him, focused on a place at the center of his heart even he couldn’t see. “Of course it means something important to me,” she said quietly. And he understood, finally, fully, how he had let her down.

  She cleared her throat, gaining momentum. “You’re asking me to give you the benefit of the doubt. To assume your intentions are good. Because you”—she swallowed hard—“love me.” Her eyes fluttered up at him as she said the words. “I wish you gave me that consideration, too. That you’d trusted I had a reason. Maybe you’d think it was a good one. Maybe not. But surely you could have believed there’d be something compelling me besides pride.”

  “Unlike me,” he said, shaking his head. “The restaurant I wanted, the place I thought I had to have—it was all about my ego, thinking I had something to prove. When I found out what you hadn’t told me—”

  Mack shook her head furiously. “I’m not your pity case.”

  “I never said you were.” The words came out in a growl, protective and fierce. “You can trust me. I swear to God, Mack. You can trust me.”

  “But how can I trust you not to leave?” The question didn’t come out with the tough, no-bullshit tone he associated with Mack. It was the voice of someone else, someone genuinely asking. Who really did need to know.

  But it wasn’t someone else, he corrected himself. That was the wrong way to think about her. This person was as much a part of Mack as the woman kicking ass behind the bar. She was strong and vulnerable, needing him and fiercely self-reliant. She wasn’t a contradiction—she was a person. Not all that different from him.

  “I’m not always going to be perfect,” he said, and Mack laughed. “I know, it’s hard to believe. But I might say the wrong thing. I might not always be exactly what you need. But you need to know that I’ll always be trying. If you’ll help me, I promise I will always try.”

  Mack turned and started walking across the parking lot, toward the restaurant. He followed, hoping she wasn’t walking away from him.

  Before she got to the front door, she stopped. “I’m sorry for what I said to Abbi. And to you.” She let out a breath. “Wow, does it feel good to finally say that. I didn’t mean it, you know.”

  “I know,” he said. “I understand.”

  “I was afraid of what we were doing, of what we had. Like if we got too close, it would crumble. You’d decide you didn’t want to stay in Gold Mountain. Or with me. Or any number of things could go wrong. If I kept you at a distance, if I made it clear to everyone there was nothing going on… In a way, I guess I ran away before you did, ending things before they began.”

  “And then I went off and did exactly what you were afraid of,” he said. “Way to go, me.”

  She smiled. “Tell you what. I’ll trust that you’re here for me, even when you mess up, if you’ll do the same for me.”

  “Always,” he said immediately, and he meant it down to his core. “But I can’t read your mind. I can’t know if you say one thing that you mean another. That go means stay, I’m leaving means come follow me, that I hate you means—” He swallowed the words.

  “Means I love you,” she finished in a whisper.

  “I’m not putting words in your mouth.”

  She grinned. Wickedly.

  “But you love putting things in my mouth,” she said, and heat flamed his face. Could he take her right now, up against the front door of the restaurant? Facing the street while cars drove by?

  Maybe a little too public, even for them. She knew what he was thinking, though. With one hand she held the flowers. With the other hand she reached out and hooked her pinkie finger around his.

  “I love you,” she said.

  Connor’s heart was pounding. It felt as though he’d run here straight from Oregon and would never catch his breath.

  “I love you,” she repeated. “I think I’ve felt that way for a lot longer than I let myself admit. But I’ve had too much time to sit around and wish things had been different, that I’d been less afraid. I’m not going to waste another second pretending I don’t need you when I do.”

  “I don’t want this to be another thing we fall into because it’s right in front of us, so there’s always some excuse for why it isn’t real.”

  “I have to show you something,” she said, and she took his hand and pushed open the door to the new Mackenzie’s.

  Connor couldn’t believe what he saw.

  “What did you do in here?” he asked, bewildered.

  “Made something real,” she responded, then frowned. “Do you like it? Is it too bright? It’s not too late to change, I guess. Paint everything over. Start new.”

  He shook his head, having no idea where to look first. “Mack, this is amazing. But it’s not anything like what you wanted.”

  She’d widened the kitchen and bar and taken down the dividing wall so everything was open. The bar was a light wood to make the space seem spacious, and there were small votive candles on each table, including the large communal table in the center. The tables also had bright flowers in shallow dishes, bringing out the reds and blues splashed all over the walls.

  The walls themselves looked like spring in the mountains. Colors on the back wall resolved themselves into a field of wildflowers and then turned to abstraction from far away. Another wall looked almost like the bark of a tree, rich, earthy browns shot through with sunlight, darkening into a mossy green as the eye traveled down.

  He turned to her. “Do you like it?”

  “I don’t think I’ve ever been in a place that looks more inviting,” she said. “And that’s exactly what I’ve always wanted Mackenzie’s to be.”

  “But this is so…bright,” he finally said. “You wanted dark wood, low lights, simplicity. You wanted—”

  “A place that looked like Billy’s. Don’t look so surprised. I can admit it. I guess even after so much time, I wasn’t ready to move on.”

  “But now?” he asked.

  “I think it’s time for Mackenzie’s to be its own place. Don’t you?”

  He stepped forward and wrapped her in his arms. “I think Mackenzie is already in a league all her own. And her bar/restaurant is going to be, too.”

  “You mean our bar/restaurant,” she corrected. “If you want it to be. I know it’s not fancy. It’s not the kind of place that’s going to get you the recognition you deserve.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t care about that. I don’t need someone else’s affirmation to help me steer my life. I’ll admit, it’d be nice if my father stopped freaking out that I’m wasting my life. No,” he said when she went to interrupt. “He does think that. But I c
an’t live my life worrying about what he or some restaurant critic or anyone else thinks anymore. And you—” He shook his head, unable to believe it. “It’s like you could see what I wanted better than what I could. The bright colors. The communal tables. The whole idea of sharing plates.”

  “It’s not five stars,” she said.

  He kissed her nose. “It’s ours,” he said. “And that makes it perfect.”

  “I like the sound of being yours,” she said, and lifted her lips to his.

  Connor took the flowers from her hand and locked the door, knowing the one thing they needed to make the space truly theirs.

  So this is it, he thought as he kissed her and then carried her back toward the bar. This was what had been so important to Mack this whole time—what he couldn’t wait to get used to.

  This was what it meant to be home.

  Epilogue

  Connor stood behind Mack and tightened the blindfold around her eyes. “No peeking,” he admonished, but Mack couldn’t see a thing.

  “Ready, birthday girl?” Abbi asked.

  “I’m ready to find out what you sneaky bastards have been up to,” Mack said.

  “No insulting the party guests,” Connor admonished. “Or we might not let you find out.”

  “I’ll be very, very good,” Mack said in a tone especially for him—the kind she knew could make his cock jump on command. Mackenzie’s had been open for six months, and they’d christened close to every part of the restaurant, including the table where Mack and their friends were now seated, the remains of Mack’s birthday dinner and quite a lot of empty wine bottles scattered about. But there was no reason they couldn’t start christening each place twice…

  But everyone was getting ready to sing, so Mack had better be thinking about Connor, the adoring boyfriend who’d made the perfect meal and a cake she could already guess was going to make her lose her shit.

  As opposed to the adoring boyfriend who spread her over the table and ravished her until she came over and over on his tongue.