by Lilian Darcy
* * *
Sutter was sitting on the top step of Paige’s front porch when she got home. Her heart gave a little jolt when she saw him. She’d experienced a lot of those jolts lately, actual surges of emotion through her system that churned up everything inside. She’d seen him fairly regularly over the past couple of weeks, and she knew her reaction wasn’t just the effect of his presence on her recently reawakened hormones, but a stronger and deeper yearning in her heart.
He smiled when he saw her, and his obvious pleasure made her feel all warm and tingly inside.
“What brings you into town tonight?”
“I needed some space.”
“More space than you’d have tucked away in Clayton’s house on an enormous ranch all by yourself?”
“Okay—maybe I wanted to see you more than I wanted space,” he admitted. “Why do you look as if you’re ready to spit nails?”
“Grocery shopping with my mother.”
“I didn’t realize you disliked shopping so much.”
“I dislike being interrogated.”
“About me,” he guessed.
She nodded.
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“I’ve been getting some grief from my family, too,” he told her.
“About me?”
“Yeah. Since you came out to the ranch the night of the election, my mom’s been wanting me to invite you to the Triple T for Sunday dinner.”
“What did you tell her?”
“That meeting the parents is a big step, and I didn’t want to rush into anything.”
She smiled at that. “It is a big step—and it could send the wrong message.”
“Ryder already asked if you were my girlfriend,” he confided. “On the way to your place Saturday.”
“What did you tell him?”
“That girls are yucky— Oh, wait. That’s what Robbie said.”
She smiled again. “Give him a few years. He’ll change his mind. He’s your nephew after all.”
“Without a doubt,” Sutter agreed.
“And he’ll use those big blue eyes and trademark Traub smile to get exactly what he wants.”
His lips curved, slowly, deliberately. “Does it work for me?”
“What do you want?” she asked warily.
“A cup of coffee?”
“I think that can be arranged.”
The phone was ringing even as Paige slipped her key into the lock. She muttered under her breath as she pushed open the door and reached for the portable handset on the table in the hall.
“You said you would call when you got home,” Mary said without preamble.
“I literally just walked through the door, Mom.”
“Oh. Okay. Well, I just wanted to let you know that Lani is covering a shift for Courtney tonight, so on her way into work she’s bringing over a piece of the pie that Lindsay made.”
“I don’t need any pie.”
“You love pecan pie,” Mary said, as if she needed reminding of the fact.
“Then you better send a big piece so I can share it.”
“Are you expecting company?”
“As a matter of fact, Sutter’s here.”
She could almost see her mother’s brow furrow. “He’s there now?”
“Yes.”
“You said you had tests to mark.”
“I do, and I will get to that after I have a cup of coffee with a friend.”
Mary was silent for a moment, and when she finally spoke she only said, “I hope it’s decaf. You’ll never get to sleep if you drink regular coffee this late in the day.”
Paige closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the wall. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”
“Okay. I love you, Paige.”
“I love you, too, Mom,” she said, because she did.
Even if her mother frustrated her beyond belief at times.
Paige disconnected the call, then proceeded to the kitchen to make the promised coffee. Though she was acting as if the phone call hadn’t bothered her, Sutter knew her too well to be fooled by the casual act. He also knew that Paige and her mother had always been close, and he didn’t like knowing that he was the cause of any tension between them.
“Why did you tell your mother I was here?”
She finished measuring the grounds, then pressed the button to start the machine. “Was it supposed to be a secret?”
“No, I just didn’t think you’d volunteer that information.”
“We’re not doing anything wrong—there’s no reason to sneak around or for me to shove you into a closet when my sister comes to the door.”
“Especially not with my truck parked out front,” he noted wryly.
She shrugged. “We’re friends, Sutter. I’m not ashamed of that fact.”
“You’re still on that friends kick, huh?”
“Because we are still friends,” she said in a firm and decisive tone.
“Do you kiss all of your friends the way you kiss me?” he asked curiously.
Her cheeks flushed with color before she turned away to retrieve a couple of mugs from the cupboard. “Okay, so we’re friends with some chemistry.”
“Some potent chemistry, I’d say.”
Before she could respond to that, the door opened and her sister walked in.
Lani dropped a plate on the counter and turned to Sutter. “Don’t you live in Seattle now?”
“It’s nice to see you, too, Lani,” he said pleasantly.
Her gaze narrowed. “When are you going back?”
“I haven’t quite decided yet.”
Paige brought the two mugs to the island, passed one to him.
“Decide,” Lani advised. “Soon.”
“Lani,” Paige said, a note of warning in her voice.
“If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to get rid of me,” Sutter said to Lani.
“I am,” she agreed unapologetically.
“You know what?” Paige interjected, her focus on her sister. “Sutter is a guest in my home. If you can’t be nice to him, you can leave.”
“I’m going,” Lani said. “But only because I’ll be late if I don’t.”
Paige sighed as the door closed again. “I’m sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry,” he told her. “I didn’t realize how much your family would object to our...friendship.”
She managed a smile.
“Maybe I should go back to Seattle,” he said, almost to himself.
She lifted her cup to her lips, sipped. “If that’s what you want.”
Her tone was casual, but her refusal to look at him made him suspect that she wasn’t as unconcerned about his decision as she wanted to appear.
“I don’t want to cause any problems for you,” he said.
“Don’t make this about me.”
“But it is about you,” he insisted. “Or maybe it’s about us.”
“There is no us.”
He didn’t argue with her claim. In fact, he didn’t say anything at all. Instead, he breached the short distance between them and covered her mouth with his own.
There was nothing tentative in his kiss this time. It was hot and demanding, and Paige was more than willing to meet his demands and counter with a few of her own. He’d always been a fabulous kisser. She’d kissed other men in the past five years, but no one had ever made her feel the way Sutter made her feel. No one else had created flutters in her belly, weakness in her knees or yearning in her heart.
She lifted her arms to link them behind his neck and pressed her body close to his. His was so hard and strong, and every hormone in her body was jumping
and dancing, begging for his attention. It had been a very long time since she’d felt this kind of desire, so sharp and fierce it was almost painful. And when he touched her, when his hands skimmed up her torso, barely brushing the sides of her breasts, she actually whimpered.
Desire pulsed in her veins, making her feel hot and weak, so hot she practically melted against him, so weak she needed his support to remain standing. His tongue delved between her lips, mated with hers in a slow, sensual seduction. His thumbs brushed over her nipples, making them pebble and ache, then circled around them, teasing and tempting. She arched against him, silently encouraging his exploration, urging him to touch, to take.
She wanted him. There was no point in denying it. But wanting and having were two very different things, and she knew it could be dangerous to indulge certain desires. Like on the rare occasions that she and her sisters went into Kalispell for brunch on a Saturday morning and she was tempted to order the mile-high chocolate cake instead of her usual spinach-and-cheese omelet. But of course, she never did. Because as much as she might want the decadent dessert, she knew it wasn’t a suitable choice for breakfast. Sutter Traub was a lot more tempting than that luscious chocolate cake—and potentially much more dangerous to her heart. Not a suitable choice at all.
But still the only man she wanted.
He eased his mouth from hers. “There is, very definitely, an us,” he told her.
Chapter Twelve
Paige wanted to believe that Sutter’s feelings were as strong and deep as her own. But as she’d pointed out to him when he’d kissed her the night of the election, it didn’t matter if he loved her or if she loved him—not so long as he wanted to be in Seattle and she wanted to stay in Rust Creek Falls.
She knew he couldn’t run his business from Rust Creek Falls for the long-term, and he’d already been in town for more than four months with only brief and infrequent trips to Washington during that time. She was hopeful that his work at the Triple T with his dad and brothers would rekindle his interest in ranching and persuade him to sell his business in Seattle and move home for good. But was that a realistic possibility?
Whenever he talked about Traub Stables, she heard the pride in his voice, and she knew he was happy there. Maybe he could be happy ranching, too, but was it what he wanted? Or was it only what she wanted for him?
And even if he did stay, she knew it wouldn’t work so long as there was tension within his family. Which meant that Paige had to talk to Ellie.
Monday night, after she’d done so, she called Sutter.
“Do you have any plans for dinner tomorrow?”
“Nothing specific, aside from eating,” he said. “What were you thinking?”
“I was thinking you might enjoy a homemade meal at your place.” She kept her tone light, deliberately casual.
“Am I cooking?”
She managed a laugh, because it seemed like an appropriate response and she didn’t want him to suspect that her stomach was tied in knots. “No, you just have to show up.”
“Then it sounds good to me. No, it sounds great to me.”
Paige ignored the guilt that churned inside her. She didn’t like misleading him, but she’d run out of other options. If Sutter and Ellie were ever going to bridge the gap between them, they needed a little shove toward the chasm. “Will you be at the ranch all day?”
“Actually, no. I’m going to be at Alistair Warren’s place. He needs a hand to go through the boxes in his basement, to see if there’s anything that can be salvaged.”
“That sounds like an all-day job.”
“He said there were only about a dozen boxes.”
“And he’ll have a story for every item and an anecdote about every scrap of paper,” she warned him.
“Just tell me what time you want me to be home and I’ll be there,” he promised.
“Does six-thirty work?”
“Perfectly.”
* * *
Paige had been right.
Alistair Warren had a story to go with every piece of junk in his basement, but Sutter didn’t mind. The retired schoolteacher had never married, which meant that he had no children or grandchildren with whom to share the countless stories he’d amassed over seventy-four years. It also meant that what should have been a half-day job had taken the better part of a day, and still they weren’t close to being finished.
Alistair held a bundle of water-stained letters in his gnarled hand. “Did you know I was engaged once?”
Sutter shook his head.
“Lizzie Carmichael was her name.” The old man smiled a little at the memory. “We’d even set a wedding date. Then we got into an argument about something—honestly, I don’t even remember what—and neither of us was willing to give in to the other.”
He shook his head sadly. “She gave me back my ring, and I let her go. And I don’t even remember why.” Alistair tossed the damaged letters into the trash, then looked at Sutter. “Do you have a woman?”
“I’m working on it,” he said, suddenly conscious of the late hour. “In fact, she’s cooking dinner for me tonight.”
“A local girl, then,” Alistair noted. “Does that mean you plan on moving back to Rust Creek Falls?”
“I haven’t made any firm plans.”
“Women like a man to have a plan,” the old bachelor told him. “So you’d better make one, otherwise you’ll end up old and alone like me.”
“Right now, my plan is not to be late,” Sutter told him.
“What time is she expecting you?”
“Six-thirty.”
“Then you’d better be on your way,” Alistair advised.
Sutter nodded. “Do you want me to come back tomorrow to help finish this up?”
The old man seemed surprised by his offer. “If you don’t have anything better to do, that would be appreciated.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he promised.
Twenty minutes later, he pulled into the driveway of Clayton’s house. He felt a quick pang of disappointment when he didn’t see Paige’s car, but when he walked in the back door, he immediately recognized the scent of his favorite buttermilk-fried chicken.
He smiled at the thought that Paige had cajoled the recipe from his mother for the occasion. The smile faded when he realized that it wasn’t Paige standing by the stove—but his mother.
“She set me up.”
He hadn’t intended to speak the words aloud—and didn’t realize he had until he saw Ellie’s tentative smile wobble.
“It was my idea,” she said quickly.
“I doubt that.” If Ellie had wanted to ambush him, she would have done so weeks earlier. The fact that she’d done so only now, after Paige had insisted he needed to talk to his mother and work things out, proved that her meddling fingerprints were all over this plan. And he wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about that.
The flush that colored his mother’s cheeks further confirmed his suspicions. “I just wanted a chance to talk to you, to say...”
“What did you want to say?”
His mother’s eyes filled with tears. “That I’m sorry.”
And that quickly, he felt the shell around his heart begin to crack, just a little.
“While I was waiting for you, I was trying to figure out what I would say,” she admitted. “How to tell you everything I’ve been thinking and feeling, how much the regrets have weighed heavy in my heart for the past five years. I had a speech prepared, but I can’t remember any of it now. All I can tell you is that I’m so sorry.” Despite the tears that spilled onto her cheeks, her gaze didn’t waver. “I know I was responsible for your decision to leave, but I never wanted you to go.”
Leaving hadn’t been his choice so much as a necessity at the time, and he’d been an outcast from his fa
mily for five years because harsh words had been spoken and difficult decisions had been made. But over the years, he’d realized that he bore as much responsibility as anyone else for those words and decisions, and if his mother was brave enough to take the first step toward bridging the gap between them, then he could at least meet her halfway.
He took three steps toward her and opened his arms. Though her eyes were still swimming with tears, he saw the quick flare of hope and then she was in his arms, holding on to him and sobbing against his shirt.
“I’m sorry, too,” he said, when her sobs had finally subsided.
She pulled herself from his embrace and tried to wipe the tears from her cheeks, but they wouldn’t stop falling. “Why are you sorry?”
“Because I was too proud and stubborn to come home when I wanted to.”
She cupped his face in her hands. “Those are traits you come by honestly enough. Just like loyalty, which brought you home when we needed you.”
“When I heard about the flood—I was so worried about the ranch, about all of you.”
“I can’t tell you what it meant to me to see your truck in the driveway that first day you came back—to know that you’d finally come home.”
He remembered the smile that had spread across her face—and how quickly it had disappeared when he’d pointedly reminded her that his home was in Seattle now, and that he would stay at Clayton’s house while he was in town to help out, so long as they needed help.
“I understand why you chose to stay here,” she told him now. “I didn’t like it, but I understood. And knowing that you were just a few minutes up the road was so much better than you being in a different state.
“But if you want to move your things back to the main house, you’re welcome to do so. Your room is just the way you left it— Well, I picked up some things you left lying around, and I’ve cleaned and vacuumed a few times since you’ve been gone, but it’s mostly the same.”
He smiled at that. “Thanks, but I’m not sure how I’d feel about living with Mom and Dad again—even temporarily—after being on my own for five years.”
