by Toni Blake
“I know,” she whispered, despite the general hum of party noise coming from the other side of the house. “How are you doing?”
“Better. I guess.”
He didn’t sound too sure. “You guess?”
He shrugged, clearly not wanting to talk about it. “Getting by. More importantly, how are you, pussycat?”
Hearing the nickname again warmed her. “I’m…okay. I took the teaching job and it’s going well.”
“Good.” He nodded.
Then she noticed a new tattoo—it peeked from under the sleeve of his T-shirt on the opposite arm from where the skull resided. Curiosity led her to reach out and lift his sleeve so she could see the whole thing. “What’s this?” A thin cross descended over his biceps and at the top were the initials W. B., the W. on one side of the cross, the B. on the other.
“When Wayne died, I promised him I’d never forget him. Guess I figured this would be a good way to make sure I kept my promise.”
Mick expressed his love in different ways than she did, in different ways than most people she’d known. But he expressed it strongly, and she felt herself falling for him even harder than she already had and wondering exactly what the hell she was going to do about it. She’d been aching to see him, but now that he was here…God, when he left, it was going to be like starting right back over again.
“Anyway,” he said, “I also, uh…brought you this cat.”
He motioned to the box and she looked down, unable to believe it was the first time she’d really noticed it. An incredibly cute tiger-striped kitten stood in the box looking up at her. “Oh my gosh, aren’t you adorable,” she cooed instinctively—before raising her gaze back to her ex-lover. “But…a cat? For me?”
“It needs a home,” he explained. “And I figured…maybe it could replace Snowball…so you won’t feel alone anymore. I’ve been calling it Trouble—but don’t judge him by that, he’s not all that bad.”
Just then, the cat began to meow, over and over again.
“Shit,” Mick muttered, then gave the cat a look, murmuring, “And you were doing so good, too.” Peering back up at Jenny, he said, “He gets on these meowing jags, but otherwise, he seems okay to have around.”
Jenny held in her smile, then reached in the box to scoop out the tiny kitten. It continued to mew, but she held its warm little body close to her chest, stroking its fur until it quieted. “He’s just scared,” she said to Mick, “but once he gets settled and starts to trust me, he’ll be all right.”
Their eyes met, and something so tender moved invisibly between them that she feared she’d start to weep.
Until finally Mick blinked, ending the moment, and saying, “So, does this mean you want the cat?”
She hadn’t thought she wanted a cat when she got up this morning. But she was already instantly and undeniably in love with this one. And maybe it was about time she opened her heart this way. So…“Yeah, I want the cat.”
“Good,” he said. “He, uh…made me think of you. I knew you’d give him a good home and know how to take care of him.”
“The him part,” she said, trying for a smile, “is that official, or an assumption?”
He shrugged. “Looked like a guy to me, but I’m not a cat expert.”
When she flipped the kitten over in her palm and spread his tiny legs to check, Mick looked taken aback. “Too young to be sure,” she announced, “but as far as I can tell, you were right—he’s a…guy.” She smiled in conclusion, and so did Mick, just a little—and she wanted to touch him, but she didn’t.
“Well, I better let you get back to your party.”
“Okay,” she whispered, her stomach in knots.
His voice dropped lower. “Take care of yourself, pussycat.” Then he turned to go.
Jenny watched him walk across the yard as she hugged the kitten back to her chest, petting it some more. She felt like Mick was taking a part of her with him. The part that he’d taught to be wild, reckless, carefree. And the part that he’d taught lessons to about the black and white and gray of life, and standing up for what you thought was right even when it put you at risk.
And it was as he reached the edge of the yard…that she realized she couldn’t let him go—not just yet. “Mick—wait,” she called.
He stopped, looked over his shoulder, and her heart melted. Now what?
But it took only a second for her to find the answer. Be wild, be reckless, be carefree. Just one more time. So she stooped to place the kitten in the box Mick had left on the ground beside her and started walking toward him.
And when she reached him, she looked into his beautiful eyes and said, “I still love you like crazy. I…ache for you, Mick.”
His eyes changed in an instant, and she knew—without doubt—that he ached for her, too. “Pussycat,” he breathed, shaking his head, glancing at the ground for a long moment before looking back into her eyes. “I’ve been…lonely without you. Fucking miserable, if you want to know the truth. But I didn’t come back here, even when I quit being mad at you, because…look at you. Look at this.” He motioned first to her dress, then all around them, at the yard, the cars, the people laughing on the other side of the house, she supposed. “I don’t fit here. And anywhere I do fit is…not a nice enough place for you to be. You deserve this kind of world, this kind of life.”
“So do you,” she insisted. “If you want it.”
But Mick just shook his head, still unconvinced.
And it made Jenny angry, angry enough that she didn’t try to hide it, clenching her fists and stomping one foot on the ground. “Damn it, Mick, what’s really changed? Before my dad messed us up, you were…almost willing to stay here, to give it a try. What’s changed since then?”
“I came to my senses,” he said as if it were obvious. “I don’t look like the people at your picnic, Jenny. I don’t act like them.”
“And I don’t want you to. I just…want them to see in you the goodness I do. And I want you to see the same thing in them. And I know that can happen, if you just…trust me. Again.”
When he didn’t answer right away, Jenny reached out and took Mick’s hands in hers. Then she looked down—at how his darker, work-roughened fingers twined with her lighter, softer ones. They looked good together, their hands, felt even better together. She squeezed tight and lifted her gaze to his. “Mick, I’m asking you—if you love me, stay with me. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me, too.”
And to Jenny’s surprise, Mick looked positively stunned. “Me?”
And that’s when she realized—he still didn’t get it. He still didn’t get how deep her love for him ran, how much she believed in him, how vital it felt to have him in her life.
She nodded profusely and said, “You love all of me. The good girl, the bad girl—even the girl who butts into your business when she shouldn’t. Do you have any idea how rare that is? How special? No one has ever made me feel as…as free inside as you do, Mick.
“And since you left, I keep trying, really hard, to be free, to be the person I want to be, but…sometimes I feel like I can hardly breathe without you next to me, letting me just…be me.” Then she dropped his hands and lifted her palms to his darkly stubbled face. “Give this a chance. Give us a chance. I love you, Mick. I love you, I love you, I love you.” And then she kissed him.
It was a soft, slow, but utterly heated kiss—their mouths simply touched, lingered together, for a long, hot moment that allowed it to stretch all the way into her panties. She took in the musky, masculine scent of him that she’d missed so much and yearned to feel his hard body pressed against hers.
And then she waited. Because that kiss was all she had to give. It was the kind of kiss that held the world, and life, and promises, and if that wasn’t enough to make him take a risk and stay here with her, she knew nothing would be.
And then, finally, he put his hand behind her head and drew their faces close once more, and breathed, “Kiss me like that again, pussycat,
and I’ll do whatever you want.”
So she did, over and over, until—with their faces still not more than an inch apart—whispered, raspy words began to spill out of him unexpectedly, like a dam breaking, like something he’d been storing up inside for a very long time. “I love you, Jenny Tolliver. I love you so damn much. I was a fool to ever leave you. I was a bigger fool to stay away. I don’t care what these people think of me—I only care what you think of me. As long as you love me, honey, my life’ll be better than I ever thought it could. You’re all I need, pussycat. You’re all I need.”
After they kissed some more, until they were almost breathless, Jenny pulled back in his embrace to smile up into his eyes. “I guess the only question now is—can you live with Trouble?”
“I’m used to it, honey,” he answered quite seriously.
She laughed. “No, I meant the cat.”
A grin unfurled on his handsome face as he let his eyes fall half-shut, and he looked sexy as sin when he replied, “For you, pussycat, anything.”
A few minutes later, Jenny led Mick by the hand around the back of the house and into the heart of his first Destiny picnic. The first person to spot them was her father, who came to greet them with a smile. “Wondered where you’d gotten off to,” he said to Jenny, “but now I see. It’s good to see you, Mick. Glad you’re here.”
Jenny saw the genuine surprise flash through Mick’s eyes, just briefly, but then he held out his free hand to shake her father’s and said, “Thanks—it’s…nice to be here.”
Just then, Anita arrived, looking far more comfortable already than Jenny might have expected. She said to Jenny, “I met your neighbor, Miss Ellie. She’s something. Only she thinks I work in a car, instead of a bar.”
“This is my dad’s girlfriend, Anita,” Jenny said to Mick. Then, “Anita, my…boyfriend, Mick Brody.”
And as soon as her dad and Anita went on their way—back to help Ed with the grill, Mick turned to Jenny, wide-eyed, and said, “That’s your dad’s girlfriend? I’ll be damned.”
She laughed. “I know.”
When Sue Ann hurriedly approached, stating that she feared there was going to be a paper plate shortage, and then mumbling under her breath, “Dear God, what’s with all the deviled eggs?” she finally stopped, then flinched—clearly having just noticed that there was a totally hot man holding Jenny’s hand. “Uh, hi,” she said, clearly dumbstruck.
“This is Sue Ann,” Jenny said. “Sue Ann, this is Mick.”
“Uh-huh,” Sue Ann murmured, clearly robbed of speech.
“He’s…coming back to stay in Destiny—with me,” Jenny added. And their eyes met and hers said silently to Sue Ann, Did I lie about how sizzling hot he was? and Sue Ann’s replied, No, girlfriend, you most definitely did not.
“I’m…really glad to hear that,” Sue Ann said, finally pulling herself together.
And Mick said, “I’ve heard a lot about you from Jenny. And I’m sure you probably have doubts about me, with good reason, but I hope you’ll give me a chance to prove myself, to prove I’m good for her.”
And when, a few minutes later, Mick was pulled into a conversation with her father and Ed about grills, Sue Ann said to Jenny, still utterly stunned, “You, uh, didn’t mention that he was debonair and knew exactly the right thing to say.”
Jenny shook her head, just as shocked. “I didn’t know. Trust me, he’s full of surprises.”
“Like suddenly showing up here today?”
Jenny nodded, then bit her lip to hide the grin. “It would seem that he was a fool to ever leave me and I’m all he needs.”
Sue Ann pressed a palm to her chest, looking all aflutter. “Oh my God, that’s amazing. And I know this means you’re going to be trumping my sex again, but that’s okay—I just want you to be happy.”
After they’d eaten, but before the game of horseshoes Sue Ann’s husband talked him into, Jenny introduced Mick around to Tessa and Amy and Lettie Gale, among others, who all behaved politely and tried to hide their shock—and awe.
“I knew it—I knew there was a secret man!” Jenny heard Amy say softly to Tessa as they walked away.
And Tessa replied with, “You know, when we were young, I always secretly thought he was sexy, but I just never told anyone.”
After which Jenny drew Mick up under the maple tree to introduce him to Miss Ellie. “Miss Ellie,” she screamed, “this is Mick Brody! He’s my boyfriend!”
And she stood there waiting to hear how dear, sweet Miss Ellie would twist her words this time, but instead the old woman just said, “Oh my—he’s a big improvement over Terrence.”
“Why do you say that, Miss Ellie?” she yelled.
“Well, are you blind, dear?” Miss Ellie asked. “Look at him. He’s hot.”
* * *
Epilogue
The following summer
Jenny and Mick headed across the lake in the green canoe, her telescope resting between them. “Pretty soon,” he said, “we won’t have to paddle over here every time you want to look at the stars.” By day, he did masonry work at the new development on the edge of town, but by night, he was busy building a balcony above the front porch, where the trees wouldn’t get in the way. They’d bought the house from her father, so they felt free to remodel and redecorate at will now. And as for the shrine to her mother, it was all packed away somewhere at her dad’s house, as it should be. Anita was an understanding woman, but not so understanding that she wanted a life-size portrait of her boyfriend’s late wife hanging in the house—and to Jenny’s dad’s credit, he finally seemed to “get it.”
“You know I can’t wait ’til my balcony’s done,” she said to Mick, “but I’ll still want to keep coming over here sometimes, too.” The canoe glided smoothly across the water, nearing the southern shore, and crickets sang in the trees.
He grinned. “You just like what happens in the woods on the way up the hill.” They never planned it, but sometimes, when they passed by the spot where they’d first bumped into each other, they found themselves reliving that first meeting.
“Maybe,” she said, aloof, teasing.
He arched one eyebrow in doubt. “Maybe, pussycat?”
She smiled in concession. “All right, definitely. But it’s about more than just sex. I never would have met you—again—if I hadn’t come over here to look at the stars. And we wouldn’t have had that lovely wedding in Miss Ellie’s English garden, and you wouldn’t be the unofficial horseshoe champion of Destiny. I didn’t even know you played horseshoes until you beat the socks off of everybody at my Labor Day picnic.”
He shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a man of hidden talents.”
She let a wicked grin sneak onto her face. “I won’t argue with you on that.” He still rocked her world in bed like no other guy could. “Besides, you’ll like coming over to this side better once the cabin is knocked down and the cemetery is enclosed.” That was the plan for next summer—Mick wanted to make a nicer resting place for his brother, and there was nothing about life in the old house he cared to remember.
“Probably, but…don’t forget what I told you about school. I like it here a lot now, but if you decide to go back to school, do your astronomy thing full-time, I’m on board. I still hate knowing that bastard stole your dream,” he growled.
And Jenny only sighed. The truth was, she’d never been happier than she was right now, and she loved her job and being close to her father and her friends, and she suspected her old dreams were best left in the past—yet she also loved that Mick valued them so much on her behalf. Then she asked him something that had somehow never come up between them before. “What was your dream, Mick? Back when we were young?”
An uncharacteristic look of contentment washed over his face. “To live on your side of the lake. And…to fit in there.” He raised teasing eyebrows. “So I’m livin’ the dream, baby.” But she knew he was also being serious.
When the canoe glided up onto the sand, they stepped out an
d Mick grabbed the waterproof bag holding her equipment. She trudged ahead of him into the woods, but as the trees closed in around them, blocking out the remaining light of the day, Jenny slowed her pace to maneuver the hill.
That’s when she felt Mick’s hand slide around her waist, up under her tank top. Her whole body warmed as his touch grazed her skin, and a sigh of pleasure escaped her even as she looked over her shoulder to say, “What’re you doing?”
He leaned in behind her to kiss her neck. “Thinking…the stars can wait.”
Jenny bit her lip as Mick’s sweet kisses moved through her like hot liquid—but still protested. “The sky is perfect right now, Mick. And the weatherman said there’ll be clouds later, rain by midnight. And I want to try out my new lens.”
“Too bad—I want you,” he rasped in her ear. “Right here, where I first had you.”
Okay, that made her a little wet, but still…“Mick—come on. Stars first, sex later—I promise.”
“Sex now,” he argued, sounding just a little like a caveman and pressing against her until she felt the full effect of his erection at her rear.
“Mmm,” she heard herself moan in response. “But…come on, let’s go.” She reached for his hand, took it in her own, then proceeded to draw him up the steep landscape.
Until he stopped her again, with his body. Just like the first time—he stepped in front of her on the trail and said familiar-sounding words, but they came out more seductive than menacing this time. “Listen, honey, you’re not going up that hill.”
“Oh yes I am.” She tried to push past him, but he stepped in her way again, molding his big hands to her shoulders.
“You don’t want to mess with me, pussycat,” he warned.
“And if I do?”
