by Jen Doyle
There was a beat of silence and then her eyes went wide. “Oh, my God. You’re having girl trouble.”
Proving he was totally off his game, Deke’s gaze swung to Fitz. Who, incidentally, had become unnaturally interested in cutting the triplets’ pancakes into increasingly tiny pieces. Her head jerked up when, in a tone that was more warranted by, say, a flying saucer landing in the back yard, Lola asked, “Fitz, is Deke having girl trouble?”
For Christ’s sake.
If Fitz had been uncomfortable before, she was downright deer-in-headlights now. Recovering just in time, Deke snatched the bacon out of Lola’s hand and ate it himself. Served her right. “Jesus, Lola. It’s women not girls.” Since Lola had been drilling that into his head for years, she didn’t have as quick a comeback as usual. Taking full advantage, Deke flipped the burner off, deposited the rest of the bacon on the plate, and then dropped the frying pan back on the stove.
Fitz was too honorable to straight out blow him off, but she’d totally seize the moment to give an excuse if he let her. So without even looking in her direction, he grabbed his baseball cap from the hook by the door.
“I’ll be in the Jeep,” he said to the room.
As he sat there waiting, however, the whole conversation irritated him. All of this irritated him. He was still having a hard time with what had happened to Fitz, even if she wasn’t. He’d bet a thousand dollars she’d taken more than a weekend to get over it, so he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to. But fine. He could deal with that on his own. The real problem was that she’d kept it from him all this time. She’d let him go happily and cluelessly about his business.
He wanted to kiss her again. Hell, he wanted a whole lot more than that. But she was one of his best friends and he was one of hers. If she couldn’t trust him with that piece of her life, then what exactly were they playing at here?
The screen door slammed shut and Deke looked up to see her bounding down the steps in a pair of cutoffs he wanted to pull right off her. But he wasn’t going to touch her again. Not until they’d talked.
He kept his eyes focused in front as she got in, starting to drive without even saying a word. If she wasn’t going to bring up their latest kiss then he wasn’t either. In truth, his words had escaped him. He was so afraid whatever he ended up with would be wrong and he’d lose her forever. So he was quiet as they drove out of town, out E63 towards Cambridge, breaking off and taking one of the dirt roads up to Ballard Creek. It appeared to be okay with her since she was quiet, too.
Of course, he definitely didn’t win any points when the first thing he said after pulling his Jeep to a stop was an incredulous, “When the hell did you start to knit?”
Looking down at the bag she was holding—with knitting needles tucked in with her laptop—and then back up at Deke, she didn’t bother to hold back her grin. “You have a problem with knitting?”
No, he had a problem with Peggy, who knitted her way through every Little League practice and, thanks to Fitz, had also been stuck in his head since last Thursday night. But this conversation was going to be hard enough. No way in hell was he starting there. “You never did it before.”
Ah, yes, there he was, quick with the useless statement. Hitting it out of the park, Deacon. Outstanding.
Fitz’s amusement turned into an outright laugh, no doubt at his misplaced irritation.
So sue him. He was used to being her go-to guy. He was also kind of annoyed she had this whole secret past Nate and Jules knew about but he didn’t. And he really didn’t like that he hadn’t seen her in two whole days and now that he had her in his sight again, all he could think about was the way the slight citrusy scent set his blood flowing.
Shit.
He was here to talk, damn it.
Her eyes left his as she shrugged. “Ella and Jules are teaching me.”
He was trying to keep an easy smile on his face. Trying not to let on what he was really feeling: lingering anger at what she’d held back and a nearly disabling desperation to taste her again. He’d never not known what to say to her. He’d never even been tense around her. Not before this past week, at least. But right now his hands were so tight on the steering wheel his knuckles were actually turning white.
Her gaze came back to his. “Are we talking first or are we actually going to get some fishing done?”
She said it as though she knew what was coming. Which was good, because he sure as hell didn’t, even though, yes, a conversation was the obvious goal. This was even worse than he’d expected, however. His chest got tight whenever he glanced her way. His throat went dry when his eyes came to a rest on her sitting there in the Iowa Dream T-shirt she wore, fitted a little too perfectly to her curves. He wanted to nuzzle his way up those sleekly muscled legs, all the way up past the dip at the inside of her knees.
“Fishing.”
After glancing over at her one more time—a mistake, of course—he got out of the Jeep and went to set up the gear.
“You and your dad seemed to be having a pretty heavy talk the other night,” she said. “Everything okay?”
His head snapped up. “We’re not here to talk about me.”
She raised her eyebrows but didn’t call him on it.
He went about his business as briskly as possible, keeping his hands busy as she helped. No telling where they’d go if he wasn’t holding on to something already. Like to her hips, for example. Maybe her hair.
But, no, she hadn’t just let him go about his business, she was just lying in wait. As soon as he’d sat down on the back tailgate and cast his line, she wedged herself in next to him and said, “Why do you seem so pissed?”
“I’m not pissed.” He wasn’t. Unsettled, yes, but not angry. It was just that he’d been pretty content with his life all the way up until a week ago. And now he wasn’t. He’d been completely and totally thrown.
“Oh, my God,” Fitz murmured, looking at him with way too much focus for him to be comfortable. “You’re pissed at me.”
“What?” he said, jerking his head toward her. “No.”
“Yes,” she answered, with both amusement and surprise. “You totally are.” Leaning in closer, not a huge distinction given the tight space, she said, “Please tell me it’s not seriously about the knitting.”
“Of course not. I just...”
Fuck.
Twisting away from her, he reached back to the cooler and pulled out a beer. So what if it was nine in the morning? And then, because he couldn’t keep it inside any longer, he kind of snapped, “I don’t know. Are there any other massively big things going on in your life that I don’t know about? I mean, it’s not like we’ve been friends for sixteen fucking years or anything.” He moved over a little so their sides weren’t lined up together, all her curves right up against him. “Jesus, Fitz. Why didn’t you tell me? Did you really think I wouldn’t want to know?”
Her lip trembled until she bit it and he had to look away. If she started crying, he was done. Under no conceivable circumstances would he be able to keep his arms from going around her if that happened, and once he had her back in his arms God Himself—or Nate; because Nate would probably shove God out of the way whether it earned him eternal damnation or not—would have to pry her out.
Except when she answered, “I’ll be sure to let you know if I get a sudden hankering to take up crochet,” he realized it wasn’t that she was trying not to cry. It was more an attempt not to laugh out loud. Because, yes, he may have been losing his shit just a little bit.
With a glare, he twisted the cap off his beer and took a huge swig.
It was rare that anything truly got to him. This was getting to him.
At least she had the decency to blush a little. Then, knowing full well the distance he’d just put between them, she leaned over again and bumped her shoulder against his before
looking away and saying, “They’re your people, Deke. You love them and they love you.” She reached back for her water bottle. “I wasn’t about to take that away from you.”
Okay. He’d known that was her way of trying to protect him. But the woman seriously needed to get her head on straight.
“My people?” He looked down at her. “I love you, Fitz. Anyone who doesn’t get that isn’t someone I want to know.” He wanted to grab her but he forced himself to lean back on his hands instead. “How could you think I’d take Peggy’s side over yours?” He took a long pull of beer and then muttered, “For sixteen fucking years.”
To his surprise, she laughed, although there was no joy in it. She shrugged a little as she looked away. “Well, it does sound kind of pathetic when you put it like that.”
Hell, no. “Don’t twist my words. You know that’s not what I said.”
Rather than give him the comeback he expected, the cocky and confident smartass Fitz he knew, the smile she gave was a sad one. Her head went down and one of the strings trailing off the hem of her cut-offs became the most fascinating thing she’d ever seen, apparently. It certainly took up a lot of her attention. “I can’t go back there, Deke,” she finally said, so softly he could barely hear her. “I can’t be that broken little girl again.”
All of the anger seeped out of his soul. It actually hurt to hear her sound like that.
But then her eyes went hard as she slid her gaze out over the water. “I won’t ever let people see me that way again.”
Well, okay then, he thought, biding his time by taking another drink. “So we’re back to the whole not pitying you thing.” Which had never been the case in the first place, but whatever.
She looked up sharply. Suspiciously. Then her smile turned wicked as she glanced down at his lips and then back up again. “As in the conversation we had before you kissed me the first time? Maybe we are.”
Well, damn.
Yes, she’d sent that text this morning. And, yes, she’d sure as hell kissed him back. In fact, despite her Father’s Day declaration that this was a bad idea, she hadn’t exactly been sending any stay away signs. If anything, and whether it was intentional or not, she’d been pushing the throttle up steadily, almost as if to see how far it could go.
Deke took another long swallow of beer as every cell in his body went on alert.
If Fitz was any other woman in the world, he wouldn’t be thinking twice about any of this. She’d be in his arms already. Her shorts would be off and he’d be going down on her right here in the back of his Jeep.
This was new ground, though. Too important not to tread carefully. Deliberately.
“As in,” he confirmed. It took everything he had to hold himself back as he added, “So let me be entirely clear. I don’t play games. I tell you exactly what I’m thinking and I expect the same. If I kiss you and you kiss me back, I take that as a sign you want more. Don’t tease me about getting down on my knees unless you want my mouth on you for real. If there’s some exploring you want to do, I’ll draw up the freaking map.” Ignoring the hum buzzing through him, he put his bottle down behind him and leaned back. “But you need to tell me where we end up.”
Chapter Thirteen
Fitz’s heart was beating so hard it was a miracle she was able to think over the sound of it. Her breath caught at his words.
She didn’t want to fall—was terrified of being in a place where she had no sense of herself, where he was the only thing keeping her grounded. She never wanted that with anyone. Certainly not in a permanent sense. But she couldn’t deny how badly she wanted just once to take flight. To let herself go for just that one moment in time.
She wasn’t so good with trust, but he was the closest she got to it. And she knew that if she thought too hard, she’d think herself right out of this place, never to reach it again.
“I want you to take me somewhere I’ve never been,” she whispered. “But I need to know you’ll bring me right back.”
Those eyes that could see so frighteningly far into her soul narrowed. He knew exactly what she was getting at, yet she still needed to say, “You have to promise me this won’t change who we are. That we’ll still be...us.”
“Fitz...” he said in the most tender way as he took her hands in his. Possibly because he could see this scared her out of her mind.
A fuse raced its way through her veins, making it physically impossible to pull away. It was proof of how dangerously close she was to an edge she shouldn’t be approaching.
“Promise.”
His response to that was to angle up her head so she had no choice but to look directly into his eyes. It was mesmerizing, almost. Hypnotic. “Trust and honesty,” he said. “As long as we have that, we’ll be fine.”
She smiled. A little tentatively, truth be told, yet entirely unable to tear her gaze away. “Sounds kind of like a line to me.”
“Not a line,” he answered, pulling ever so slightly back. “Not like that.”
No, she could see that. It wasn’t a line he used for persuasion, it was more the one he wouldn’t cross. How he lived the life he did in every way. What you saw was what you got. And, truthfully, it was the only reason she could even consider this. He was probably the one man in the whole world she trusted this much, who she knew with absolute certainty would take care of her until she came back to earth. Who terrified her, yes, but also the only man she felt safe with. Entirely and utterly safe.
So, well, “Okay.” She leaned into him and inhaled that perfect, masculine scent.
“Yeah?” he said, smiling after a pause. “I’m not just wishing that up?”
Her reply was to push herself up and brush her lips over his, and then drop her head down to nuzzle his neck. It was something she’d been wanting to do for days.
He groaned. “There is no fucking way that should feel so good.”
She agreed entirely. It made no sense that even just the feel of his skin under her lips sent shivers running down her spine. When he put his hands on her waist, lifting her and moving her over him so she was straddling his lap, she was pretty sure the tremor that ran through her meant this was already the best sex she’d ever had.
His hands went up under her shirt and he lifted it over her head. And...
Oh. Her eyes closed as his hand came up over her breast.
“You do realize,” he was saying, “that I’ve had actual dreams about this.”
Considering her own dreams—and the fact that he was slowly brushing his thumb back and forth over her increasingly sensitive nipple—the only response she managed was a whimper when his tongue replaced his thumb. She knew he’d be good—no man could have the reputation he had and not be. But how was it possible to feel so good based on so little?
Pushing the cup of her bra aside, his mouth came down over one breast as his hand stroked the other. She arched her back, offering up more of herself to the beautiful wet heat of his mouth. With his tongue still doing magical things, he eased his hand down her back, taking a detour to the snap and then zipper of her shorts. He didn’t attempt to take off her shorts, but he did take advantage of their being loose in order to slip his hand inside and come down over the curve of her hip. And now that he had hold of her, he pulled her right in against him and...
“Oh, God.” That felt so incredibly good.
So good, she didn’t think twice about pressing forward.
She didn’t think, period. She was usually a lot more hesitant, wondering what should go where and if she was doing something wrong. This was Deke, though. As strange as it was in so many ways—her breast was in Deke’s mouth for heaven’s sake—for maybe the first time in her life, she gave in to the raging need to explore.
She pushed him back into the Jeep without thinking twice. “Take this off,” she commanded, pushing at his shirt eno
ugh for him to pull it over his head.
With a soft chuckle, he said, “I like this side of you,” as he shifted farther into the bed of the Jeep, watching her. His eyes roamed over her body as his hands went down to her legs, and he dropped his thumbs down to the inside of her thighs.
“So soft,” he murmured, every one of his muscles rippling as he slowly curled up to swirl his tongue around the very tip of her nipple before easing back down again.
She let the shiver run through her and then bent down to do the same to him. Then she set to exploring, running her hands over every single one of those muscles and following with her tongue, pausing finally to say, “Why do you taste so good?”
He laughed. “I live to serve.”
“Mmm,” she murmured, because, on her hands and knees now and hovering above him, she’d gotten to the good part. He was covered up, but she still closed her eyes and took a deep breath to calm down her racing heart. “Please tell me you have a condom.”
Since she hadn’t opened her eyes yet, she couldn’t see him smile. But she could feel it.
“I sure as hell do,” he answered, nuzzling up the side of her neck and setting her to shivering again. “And thank fucking Christ, because with you over me half-naked and staring at my dick...?”
Her eyes flew open and she drew her head back. “I wasn’t staring!”
Now he was smiling widely, totally laughing at her. “You absolutely were.”
Then he reached down between them. Thinking he was unbuttoning his own shorts, she almost jumped out of her skin when his hand went down the front of hers instead, his fingers brushing over panties that, if she hadn’t already been one hundred percent upfront about it, would have proven exactly how ready she was.
Except he wasn’t taking any chances, it seemed. “Tell me you want me to touch you,” he said, his voice rough. His hand eased down the crease of her thigh. “Tell me this is where you want to be.”
