Ask Me Why

by Marie Force

  “Yup. When Mr. Right comes along, it can make even the most die-hard single girl fall, and fall hard.” Rachel grinned.

  “Like you with Nick,” Susie said to Maggie. “Am I right?”

  The last topic Maggie wanted to discuss was her and Nick, all wrapped in some romantic bow. “I think Rachel’s got enough romance going right now for all of us put together.”

  Rachel clasped the book to her heart. Her diamond reflected the firelight and spattered sparkles on the table. “I know. It’s all because of J.W.”

  “If he wasn’t such a great guy, I would hate you right now,” Susie said. “All I want is a guy like Logan in this book. He’s ah-mazing.”

  “Oh my God, yes,” Katie Ann said. “The way he takes care of her after she has that fall—”

  Susie sighed. “And how he carries her down the aisle at the end—”

  “And don’t forget that kiss on page seventy-five,” Maggie said. “When he looked into her eyes and drew her close, it was . . .”

  They all turned to look at her.

  “What?”

  “You sighed when you said that,” Rachel said. “You never sigh.”

  “Or wax romantic,” Charlotte added.

  “Or get pedicures,” Maggie said, her voice sharp. “People change.”

  “Or sexy guys in shorts change them.” Susie grinned. “Seems being with Nick is having a good effect on you. You’re getting all girlie.”

  “That girlie stuff won’t last past the wedding, believe me.” Maggie waved a hand over her shorts, her faded T-shirt. After a long day on the girlie side, Maggie had changed back into her comfort zone. But still she felt off, as if the clothes didn’t quite fit. It had nothing to do with the way J.W.’s eyes lit up when he saw Rachel, all pretty in a summer dress and low heels, and the little bit of envy Maggie had felt at that. “You can’t work in my industry and be taken seriously if you’re running around in pink skirts and heels all day.”

  “Maybe not, but you can get a whole lot of men to do your bidding.” Katie Anne laughed. “And that’s always a good thing.”

  Susie picked up a cookie and took a bite. “Speaking of men doing a woman’s bidding, what did you guys think of the heroine daring the hero to marry her in this book? That was quite the twist on marriage of convenience.”

  “I liked it.” Katie Ann grinned. “I think women should always do the asking.”

  Charlotte sighed. “I don’t. I like the romance and wine and flowers.”

  Noralee came walking over to the group with a new batch of cookies. She was the consummate hostess, which was why book club was so popular. It was like going to a favorite aunt’s house—a favorite aunt who had serious baking skills. “When you get to my age, honey, you’re happy just to have the wine. After you drink that, you can’t stay awake long enough for the romance anyway.”

  They all laughed, then took turns pointing out their favorite parts. The question came round to Maggie, and when she looked down at her book, she realized she had dog-eared page seventy-five. “That first love scene. That was my favorite.”

  “Really? How come?”

  “It was”—read to me by Nick in that dark, husky voice of his—“sweet. Tender.”

  That caused the others to let out a woo-hoo. “I think the wedding mood is rubbing off on Maggie,” Katie Ann said. “She’s becoming positively romantic.”

  It had to come from being around the other bridesmaids. Getting caught up in the wedding mood, as Katie Ann said. The romance novel in her hands, which still rang with Nick’s voice whenever she looked down at the pages.

  Except come Saturday night, this fairy tale—if that’s what she could call it—would end, with her and Nick going back to being nothing more than coworkers. It was what she wanted—to get this over with and go back to the safety and security of the world she knew, the world she controlled. The one where she was on track with her career and not worried about snagging her manicure in her bangs.

  Yet even as she told herself that was what she wanted, an acetone-addled side of her brain wanted the exact opposite. That side wanted Nick to bring that romance novel to life, and for her to be the starring heroine.

  She stuffed another cookie in her mouth, but even the sugar didn’t quell the nagging fear that by starting this charade with Nick, she had opened a door she was never going to be able to shut all the way.

  SEVEN

  NICK SAT ON the front porch of Herbert’s house, sipping a beer, enjoying the night air, and thinking about M.J. It was something he did often—far more often than he’d ever told her. If someone asked M.J. what Nick Patterson did on his days off, she would say he was flipping through one-night stands faster than a blackjack dealer with a deck of cards. She had no idea the number of nights he sat in a broken wooden chair in the yard of the Money Pit and did exactly this—drink a beer and think about her.

  “Thanks for your help today.” J.W. came outside and handed Nick a second beer before taking a seat beside him. “When Rachel said she wanted an outdoor wedding, I thought it would be a quick, easy thing. I had no idea that I’d be spending the whole week weedwacking and setting up chairs.”

  Nick chuckled. “If it was up to us guys, there’d be a preacher and a thirty-second ceremony.”

  “And a barbecue and a case of beer.”

  “Amen to that.” They knocked beers, then Nick leaned back on his elbows and looked up at the night sky. Few clouds filled the vast space over the state of Georgia, and the stars twinkled like a million winking eyes. “You nervous about Saturday?”

  “Hell, yes, I’m nervous. I don’t know a guy who isn’t scared shitless about getting married. It’s the whole forever thing, ya know?”

  “Forever’s a long time.”

  “But that’s part of what makes it so awesome.” A big smile curved across J.W.’s face. “Call me a sap, but I’m head over heels for that girl, and don’t want to spend a day without her. Shit, this is gonna sound like I’m one of those guys who wears an ascot—whatever the hell that is—but when I think about waking up and not having Rachel in my life, well, it’s kinda like how I felt when I watched them take Old Yeller out behind the barn. Ya know what I mean?”

  Nick pictured himself framing a wall with some dude, instead of M.J. standing beside him, cracking jokes while they wrestled two-by-fours into place. Imagined finishing a long day in the hot sun with a cold beer alone, instead of beside her, sharing that sense of accomplishment. Thought of sitting on an overturned bucket, wishing for a bag of chips because he’d forgotten again and M.J. wasn’t there with a knowing shake of her head and a ready bag of Ruffles.

  Yeah, it was kinda like losing Old Yeller to rabies.

  “So, you and Maggie,” J.W. said. “Been serious a long time?”

  “Not long, no,” Nick said. “We work together and have been friends for a couple of years. To be honest, I’m afraid I’m going to mess that up.”

  “If you think dating her changes friendship, wait ’til you marry her. That changes everything in a thousand ways.” J.W. grinned. “But marriage has a few perks that you don’t get at work.”

  “True.” Though Nick hadn’t enjoyed any of those “perks” with M.J. The two kisses—holy shit, those had been amazing—but taking it further, well, hell, he wasn’t sure that would be a good choice.

  J.W. propped his elbows on his knees and let the beer dangle from his fingers. “My dad once said to me, if you meet a woman who means more to you than your truck, your dog and hunting with the boys on Saturday mornin’s, then you hurry up and quit being an idiot and marry her.”

  “And that’s what you’re doing with Rachel?”

  “Well, she might disagree on the stop-being-an-idiot part, but yeah, I’d rather buy her a ring than buy a new truck. And that’s sayin’ something.” He got to his feet. “Anyway, I better get on home. Rehearsal dinner is tomorrow.”

  “What, no wild bachelor party planned?”

  “Nope.” J.W. looked back at the hou
se, casting his gaze toward the second story and a light that burned in the bedroom to the west, waiting for Rachel. “I already found the best woman in the world. No need to throw dollar bills at the runners-up.”

  J.W. said good-bye, got in his truck, and pulled out of the driveway. A four-door Mazda pulled in right after him, a stream of giggles pouring out of the open windows. M.J. and Rachel climbed out, dispensing hugs and good-byes to the others, then turned toward the porch. Rachel said something to M.J., which made her laugh, the merry sound filling the air like music.

  Damn. She was beautiful when she laughed. Beautiful in the kind of way that hit a man in the gut with a one-two punch.

  Rachel peeled off from M.J. “I’m going to bed. You two enjoy this beautiful night. Maybe reenact that scene from page seventy-five.”

  Rachel went inside. The screen door flapped shut, leaving Nick alone with M.J. The crickets chirped their night songs, and the stars sprinkled the lawn with light.

  “Scene on page seventy-five?” Nick asked.

  Even in the dim evening light, Nick could see crimson fill M.J.’s face. “Uh, just something from a book we’re reading.”

  His gaze dropped to the book in her hands. The same book he’d grabbed from her a couple days ago. “What’s on page seventy-five?”

  “Nothing. I’m going in.” She started to climb the stairs past him, but he reached out, snagged the book and started flipping pages. “Nick!”

  “Sixty-five, sixty-seven, seventy-two . . . ah, here it is. Page seventy-five.” He made a big production out of cracking the spine and shifting under the porch light. “Hey, wait. Isn’t this the passage I read to you?”

  “Yes, but that’s . . . that has nothing to do with why I chose it.” She let out a gust. “Give it back, please.”

  “Oh, really?” He tucked the book between his back and the porch post. “Then why did you tell Rachel about it?”

  “Nick, I don’t want to play this game again.”

  “What game?”

  “Catch and release of my book. Just give it to me.”

  “Not until you tell me why you picked that passage as your favorite.”

  She let out a gust and tucked her hair—down and curling around her shoulders, he noticed—behind her ear. “Forget it. I’m going to bed.”

  He scrambled to his feet and caught her arm, spinning her toward him. She collided with his chest, her eyes wide and dark, her mouth open with surprise. Her perfume, something deep and floral, whispered between them, an enticing mystery, because M.J. never wore perfume to work. He wanted to dip his head and follow the trail of that scent, capture it along her wrists, her neck. “Tell me why.”

  Her mouth opened, closed. “I . . .”

  “Why?”

  “Because it . . . it . . . was a good scene.” She shook her head and looked away. “Let me just go to bed, Nick.”

  But he knew, in that instant before she looked away, he knew. She’d chosen it because of the way hearing those words spoken aloud had shifted the air between them, charged it in a way that it never had been before.

  Quit bein’ an idiot.

  He’d been one for two years too long. He’d had two years to show her how he felt, two years to prove he was working on Nick 2.0, two years to open up his mouth and act on how he’d felt from that first day he saw her. Two years too damned long.

  Before he could hesitate again, Nick leaned in and kissed Maggie. No preamble, no warning shot, just a searing hot kiss that detonated a roaring fury of need in his gut. She opened against him, her arms sliding around his back, her tongue darting out to play, and Nick was lost.

  He scooped her into his arms and trundled down the steps and across the yard. She let out a giggle. “Where are we going?”

  “It’s a surprise.” Then he kissed her again before she could ask any more questions. The garage door stood ajar, forgotten after their yard work earlier today, and Nick nudged it open with his knee, then carried M.J. inside and over to the black restored 1962 Lincoln convertible he’d seen there earlier today. Nick broke the kiss, then dropped her gently into the backseat and tugged open the rear suicide door.

  M.J. sat up. The garage was dark, the only light from the moon outside and Maggie’s wide green eyes. “What are you doing?”

  “Fulfilling your fantasy.” Then he shook his head and cursed. “That’s not what I meant to say. I mean, you told me you’d never been in a convertible, and of course, never done it in a convertible, and I thought, since I never have either . . .” He let his voice trail off because it was still coming out all wrong. God, he was an idiot. Every time he tried to be the non-idiot he wanted to be, he went right back to sex, like a Cro-Magnon man on steroids.

  “Oh, come on, Nick. You’ve done everything with everyone and—”

  He put a finger on her lips. “I keep saying this wrong. Being here right now, in this car, isn’t about who has had sex, where they did it or with whom. I brought you here because . . .” He let out a breath, prayed he was reading her right, that he wasn’t about to screw up the most important relationship in his life. “I want to show you how special you are to me. And I’m saying all that stupid crap about first times and backseats because I’m scared as hell that I’m going to mess this up and lose you.”

  “Nick, we’re friends. Good friends. We shouldn’t muddle that with this.” She waved between them, in that warm space infused with electricity and desire and temptation.

  “I know what we have right now is pretty awesome. Hell, you’re pretty much my best friend, M.J. But I want more. I’ve wanted more for a long time.”

  “I don’t think I can give you more. What if—”

  He put that finger on her lip again. “My grandpa always said that if you let them, what-ifs grow like weeds. Let one in, and another follows right behind it. I don’t want to think about what-if. I want to think about what could be. And I think what could be is pretty damned awesome.”

  “Could be. Could not be.”

  “Always the realist.” He trailed a lazy path down her cheek. He couldn’t seem to stop touching her, to stop staring into those hypnotic eyes. “Do you want to know why I agreed to go with you to this wedding? To pretend to be your date?”

  “Because you needed money for your renovations and a new hot water heater—”

  “Because I wanted to be with you. I don’t give a damn about buying a new hot water heater. I just want you. That’s all. That’s all I’ve ever wanted, M.J.”

  A heartbeat passed, one that seemed to last as long as a lifetime. He was so sure she would tell him to take her back to the house, that this was only a charade, that he was reading her wrong, misreading the message in her lips when they’d kissed.

  “Then say my name, Nick,” she whispered. “You’ve never said my name.”

  Because saying it crossed a line that he had firmly drawn in his head a long time ago. The line that kept her on the Friends divide of his life. The line that kept him from telling her what he really felt—and finally, irrevocably, change things between them. He was done waiting, done staying in the cautious lane.

  He met her hypnotic eyes with his own, and thought a man could drown in those green depths. “I want you, Maggie. No one else.”

  Her lips curved in a slow, sweet smile. “I don’t care if it’s true. I just like hearing you say my name.”

  “Oh, Maggie.” He leaned in closer, holding her against him, whispering the words on her lips. Two years, he thought. Two years too long. No more waiting. “It’s true. Only you, Maggie.”

  She sighed, then wrapped her arms around him and pulled him down onto the black leather seat. He slid a hand beneath her shirt, up over the warm, silky skin of her belly, to cup her breast through the soft lace of her bra. The lace surprised him, like a secret side under the hard edges of Maggie. He tugged off her shirt, then tossed his own on the concrete floor, wanting her skin against his. It wasn’t about sex; this was about something more. About being joined to the one woman in the
world who filled in all his missing parts.

  She reached up and placed a palm on his right arm. Her touch was light, curious, fingers dancing over the image. “A tiger, huh?”

  It was the first time Maggie had ever touched him that wasn’t for work. He felt like a middle school boy, for God’s sake. “Didn’t I ever tell you the story about my tattoo?”

  She shook her head. “I’ve never seen it, either. You always wear a shirt.”

  “So that I don’t end up, what did you say? Cut or hurt. Because Lord knows your bandaging skills suck.” But it touched him all the same that she worried and cared.

  “Hey, in my defense, it was a deep cut. And you were out of everything but those little round bandages that aren’t good for anything.”

  “Got me quite the laughs from the nurse at the emergency room at least.” They shared a grin, another one of those memories that knit between them like stitches in a blanket, then he dropped his attention to the tattoo. “When I was five, my father took me to the zoo. There was a tiger there, pressed right up against the glass. He roared, and scared the devil out of me.”

  She laughed. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. You were only five.”

  “My dad encouraged me to go back up to the window, to face what scared me again, and stand up to it, with the safety of the glass between us, of course. He told me that for the rest of my life, I’d always have a choice. I could run away from what scared me or face it head-on.”

  “And did you? Go back to the window?”

  He shook his head. “That would be the Hollywood ending, wouldn’t it? And then I’d become some Rocky wannabe, not afraid of anything. Nope, I ran back to my dad and begged him to take me to see the penguins instead. I didn’t face that tiger again until I was fifteen, and when I went back to the zoo, with a date—”

  “Of course.”

  “And the tiger looked so much smaller than I remembered. He was bored with me that time and just turned away and laid on a rock.” Nick traced the outline of the tattoo. “But my father’s lesson stayed with me, and when I turned eighteen, I got this. It’s kind of my motto for going forward with things that scare me.”