Harlequin Superromance February 2016 Box Set

by Anna Sugden

  “All right. I may be done.” She crouched a little so she could be eye level. Luckily, his hair was thick and wavy, so being perfectly even hadn’t been a total necessity. She made a few more snips, her heart rate accelerating when she realized he wasn’t staring at some point behind her anymore.

  No. He was staring right at her. Intensely, though not frustrated, as he’d been earlier when he’d kissed her. His eyebrows were drawn together in something like confusion.

  She swallowed, setting down the scissors on the sink and brushing stray hairs off the side of his face. The fact of the matter was, she liked being close to him. Touching him. Sure, it made her feel all jittery and squirmy, but it was a good jittery and squirmy.

  She kind of ran her hands over his hair. Okay, there was nothing kind of about raking her fingers through his hair. She was totally feeling up his hair. But it was coarse and some pretty color between blond and brown. All different highlights. “I think I did okay.”

  His head had fallen back, and he looked up at her, her fingers still in his hair. He was handsome under all that shag. How much more handsome might he be if she could see more of his face? A square jaw to go with the sharp nose? A chin with a cleft? Razor-sharp cheekbones?

  Would those eyes always look troubled and a little haunted, or was there some joy to be had in his life?

  Well, a few drinks, a haircut, a little scalp massage and he actually looked more relaxed than she’d ever seen him. Maybe she could relax him a little more. She shouldn’t, she knew. She should keep this friendship hands-off. They were boss and employee, too.

  But the man needed something. He needed to be touched, held. He needed to feel something other than painful memories and frustrated dreams, and sex wouldn’t cure anything. Not a damn thing, she knew, but it might take his mind off it all for a bit.

  So, screw it. She was already almost in his lap, her fingers claiming ownership to his hair, and he was watching her with some internal war she’d never understand going on in his head.

  She kissed him. Because she didn’t want him to be warring, internally or otherwise. He’d had enough war and getting blown up by bombs. Somehow, someway, she wanted to soothe, and this was the only way she could.

  It took him a few seconds to catch up, but when he did, his hands rested on her hips. Almost hesitantly, but, seriously, how had she not noticed before today how big his hands were?

  She leaned into the space between his legs, tracing his bottom lip with her tongue until his mouth parted. She’d hoped he’d move his hands, feel her up a little, but they remained at her hips.

  Which wasn’t bad. It was kind of sweet. Not trying to hurry things along. Just enjoying. The contrast between lips and beard, the heat of his palms on her hips, the tentative way his tongue brushed hers. The little catch in her chest when he sighed against her mouth.

  She pulled away, just a hair. “I’m not sorry for kissing you, by the way.”

  His head fell back, and those intense eyes studied her. “You might be sorry. Eventually.” He said it so earnestly, any of the happy left from the kiss petered out.

  She’d never known pity to be a turn-on, and maybe that was it. What she felt wasn’t pity. It was more like empathy. She felt for him. Wished his burdens were a little lighter.

  Well, she couldn’t lift any burdens, but she’d always been good at distracting people from their burdens. Alcohol and pie had worked briefly. The last option she knew of was...tempting.

  Obviously he’d changed his mind about not being able to kiss her, so maybe...

  “You know what you need?” she asked, her fingers finally leaving his hair, trailing over his neck, brushing the remaining strands of hair off along with the towel. She traced his collarbone, then dragged her index finger down the center of his chest.

  He didn’t make a move to stop her, and he didn’t look away. So, she didn’t stop. She’d keep going until he wanted to stop. If that meant doing something she’d regret in the morning, well, it wouldn’t be the first time.

  “What do I need?” he asked hoarsely.

  “A little...” She knelt in front of him. Strange, the way her heart hammered in her chest, the way nerves fluttered in her stomach. She’d propositioned a few guys in her day and had long since moved past the part of her sex life where she was jumpy with a guy, but something about Wes made her nervous.

  But not nervous enough to stop. He needed this, she couldn’t help but think. What better girl to offer? “A little distraction.” She brushed the last few pieces of hair off his thighs and then flipped the button of his jeans.

  * * *

  IT WAS AS if he’d been knocked flat by that bomb again. He couldn’t move, and there was a buzzing in the air.

  She was going to...

  He closed his eyes, ordered himself to focus. Maybe if he focused hard enough, he could fight off the panic.

  He blinked his eyes open as Cara pulled the zipper of his pants down, the sound echoing in his ears like close-range gunfire.

  She was going to touch him. She was going to touch him, and what if it happened again? Sure, Cara hadn’t been teasing him all night, but this wasn’t out of nowhere, either. She’d had an effect. He was hard, and she had done this before. Often. She’d expect things of him he didn’t know how to do and then—weirdo. All those voices from years past. Giggling, taunting.

  Can’t seal the deal. Liz making it all a joke.

  Or two years ago, when he’d gone to therapy again and had come out certain he’d been healed. Absolutely ready, because therapy was supposed to solve everything. The woman he’d picked up at the bar had backed away from his panic like someone tiptoeing away from a sleeping child. What’s wrong with you?

  Cara’s fingers brushed the waistband of his boxers and... He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t bear her touch, her sweetness, whatever pity she was enacting. He couldn’t take it.

  Weirdo. Weirdo. Weirdo. What’s wrong with you? Who can’t keep it together for a few seconds? Some kind of creepy pervert.

  He pushed at her shoulders and stood up abruptly. The chair tipped toward the bathtub. Cara knocked into the vanity.

  “Ow.”

  “Oh, no, I h-hurt you? I’m s-so sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” He was losing it. Hurting women and pushing away from something he wanted.

  “I’m okay. Wes, are you—”

  “I have to go.” He couldn’t be in this tiny room anymore. Not with her. The smell of perfume and pie and...

  He turned abruptly, tripping over the chair but catching himself against the door frame before he fell completely.

  He managed to climb over and get out. In the hallway he sucked in a little breath, but not much of one until he was in his room. Door closed. Safe. Safe.

  With Cara still out there. And he’d hurt her. And... He pressed his fingers to his eyes to alleviate the stinging there.

  So, he couldn’t. Couldn’t pull that trigger. Couldn’t get over some dumb thing that had happened half a damn lifetime ago. He could kiss a woman, but he couldn’t let one proposition him. He was pathetic. And a total dick, to boot.

  He jerked open a drawer and yanked on a T-shirt, ignoring the itchiness on his chest from the hair that hadn’t fallen off. Then, because he could think of no better way to deal with the overwhelming tide of frustration and self-disgust, he slammed his fist into the wall.

  Then he let out a string of curse words under his breath because it hurt.

  His windows were open, and he could hear Phantom whining outside on the nearby front porch. He needed to let him in, but that would mean passing the bathroom and possibly seeing Cara and how could this have happened?

  Where had everything veered so off course? When you let her in. Or maybe when he’d offered a hand to help her up at the market. Or maybe when he’d stopped his truck that day to ask her if she was okay. Or maybe a million little curves away from his path of solitude and isolation.

  Curves that hadn’t felt bad when he was doing them. For a
few sparkling moments, walking in a creek, making pacts and playing truth or dare and letting her cut his hair, he thought he’d been making some kind of progress. Some kind of forward movement he hadn’t made ever.

  Because she was somehow special? What a fairy tale. It was all a mirage, a warped hallucination. He was still him. The him he’d always been. Always ruining everything.

  Always.

  Bringing the strays back to apartments he knew they weren’t allowed to have pets in and getting his family kicked out. Nerves ending the night with Liz early enough that she’d felt the need to tell everyone. Going into the military and ruining his chances to become a vet. The night after therapy with a girl he couldn’t even remember as the final nail in his coffin. Wes Stone’s path of never doing it right.

  When would he ever get that through to his idiotic hope?

  He needed Phantom. He hadn’t had a downward spiral like this in a while, going all the way back to the beginning. He needed the dog and to calm down and remember that he was alive, he’d saved lives in Afghanistan, he’d built this business. There might be things he’d never get over, but failure was only part of him. Not the whole.

  Not the whole.

  He forced himself to the door. Even though his arms shook, he pulled it open and stepped into the hallway. Maybe Cara had left. Or...

  He heard sniffles as he approached the open bathroom door. No. Please, no. When he dared look into the bathroom she was sweeping the hair into a dustpan.

  Sniffling and wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her shirt.

  No.

  Propelled by the sheer wrongness of it, he stepped into the doorway. “You don’t have to—” She was crying. She was cleaning up his bathroom, crying and, well, apparently things could get worse.

  “I’m sorry,” she said in a high voice. “I’m an idiot. This was such an... Ugh. I’m sorry.” She rubbed a palm against her cheeks.

  “No. It’s so not you. None of it. It’s me. Please, don’t...” He couldn’t even say it.

  “I know you kissed me and all, but that does not automatically mean you want anything more than that from me, and that’s my fault. And—”

  He pressed his fingers to his eyes. Her words caused little pricks of pain on the base of his scalp. This was wrong. He couldn’t let her blame herself.

  “I’m an idiot and I’m sorry and—”

  “I’m a virgin!”

  He didn’t want to look at her, didn’t want to see her reaction, but he was coward enough most of the time. So, he forced himself. Wide eyes, mouth hanging open. Well, at least she was surprised. Probably be worse if she wasn’t.

  No. No, not much was worse than this.

  * * *

  CARA TRIED TO wrap her mind around that statement. Virgin. He’d freaked out like that because he was a virgin? That didn’t seem right. Wouldn’t a virgin be eager to get the deed done?

  Besides, even with the hair and the beard and the grumpiness, he was so sweet and good. How could he have never...?

  Maybe his injuries had done more damage than just to his hip and arm.

  But she could have sworn he was hard. Sure, it was hidden under the denim of his jeans, but she’d seen it. It wasn’t some wishful thinking on her part.

  “So, um, is it okay to ask why?”

  “Cara—”

  He was going to shut her down, and she wasn’t sure her curiosity would allow her to live if she didn’t push, just a little. After all, he’d freaked out on her. Didn’t she deserve something? “Like, religious reasons? Or philosophical? Or health?”

  “No. None of that.”

  “It never happened for you? That’s not something to be ashamed of, Wes. You’re a little shy around women. That’s okay, I—”

  “I just can’t.”

  “Something happened during the war? Or when you were a kid?” Her stomach churned at the thought.

  He pinched the bridge of his nose. “There’s no good reason. I panic.”

  “Like every time? And you don’t know why?”

  “No.” He pressed his lips together. It was strange how different he looked. His hair was still shaggy, but it was so much lighter. If she’d had a chance to trim his beard a bit, he’d be...

  Not the time to think about that, fruitcake. She hadn’t known it was even possible to screw up propositioning a guy, and she had done it.

  “Wes, I hope you know you can tell me. Whatever it is. I like you. Maybe, selfishly, I need to know it wasn’t me.” Because if it was, she wasn’t sure she’d recover from that.

  He dropped his hands from his nose. “It wasn’t you. It wasn’t.” He shook his head. “You’re beautiful and perfect, and you shouldn’t cry, because this is all me.”

  “Well, I’ll take the beautiful compliment because I’m vain, but we both know I’m not perfect.”

  “It feels that way. Right now.”

  She rested the broom against the wall and moved the chair out of the way. She approached him, though she held off touching him. Part of her wanted to, to offer some kind of physical comfort, but it seemed as if any touching from now on needed to start with him.

  The way he’d pushed her away. Yes, it had been panic, but she wouldn’t forget the shock of such a visceral rejection anytime soon. That she’d been so completely, utterly wrong to kneel in front of him. Touch him.

  “Please, tell me,” she croaked. “Whatever it is. How can I not think it’s me if I don’t know why that happened?”

  He swallowed. “You can’t take my word for it?”

  The old feeling of failure crept into her bones. Maybe it was his panic, but she’d driven him there.

  “Liz.” His voice was little more than a creak.

  Cara tried to make sense of it. “It has to do with Liz?”

  He nodded. “Um, when we went on a date.” He ran a shaky hand through his hair and seemed confused when his hand went through a lot faster than it used to. “A-anyway, we were going to have...”

  “Sex?”

  “Yeah. Yes. That. S-sex.” He said it so determinedly, as if he was not about to let her be the only one who could say it. “It was a failure from the start. She asked me out to make some other guy jealous, then I couldn’t pay for the expensive meal she ordered, and... But she said she wanted to. All night, she talked about what we were going to do, and I hadn’t before, and when it was time to... I couldn’t. I mean, I—” he made a motion around his crotch area “—too soon. So, we couldn’t.”

  “Wes, you were, like, sixteen or whatever. My God, if I had a quarter for every time a guy got a little too excited, I’d...” Sound like a hooker, so she let that sentence trail off into nothing.

  “The kids at school did not share your cavalier attitude.”

  “Kids at school? Why would they—She told people?” It was bad enough to be a bully, which Liz had been to Mia, but spreading Wes’s secrets was even worse. “I should have punched her. I should have—”

  He rested his hand on her wrist. It was the lightest of touches, but she stopped raging.

  “It’s not her fault. Not really. A normal guy shrugs it off and finds some other girl and gets over it. But I’ve never been normal. I’ve never been able to shrug stuff off. Anxiety. Turns into migraines. Ever since kindergarten when Greg Sampson made fun of my mom’s sad attempt to make my clothes. I hide from people because I can’t deal. I’m all malfunctioning parts, Cara. I thought maybe I could fix this. That was the thing in our pact. My trigger to pull, but I can’t. It’s in my head, and it’s not coming out.”

  She wanted to tell him that he was wrong. But what did she know? She dealt with her mother’s anxiety by avoiding her. She’d helped Mia break out of her shell by being straightforward about what Mia needed to do.

  Wes didn’t deserve either treatment, but Cara didn’t have a clue what the right thing would be.

  “Please, don’t feel bad or cry. This was all me. Let’s forget tonight ever happened. It’s okay. I’m okay. My life is okay without thi
s. We just have to stop pretending it’s ever going to be a possibility.”

  Because his hand was still resting lightly on her wrist, she touched her palm to his cheek. Forget? When he... Oh, the poor guy had made progress. He was letting her in—why, she couldn’t guess. “Oh, honey, no.”

  He stepped back, away, which had her cringing. “No?”

  “We had a nice night. And we made a pact. You held up your end. You tried. Maybe you didn’t make it all the way, but, hey, you told me what’s holding you back. So I am going to do the same. Make my step with the pie stuff.”

  “Cara—”

  She didn’t know what to do, so she kept going. Speaking her heart. Which was scary. But it certainly couldn’t be any scarier than the stuff Wes was dealing with. “Nothing that happened or anything you said changes how I feel about you. I like you. I’m attracted to you. I’m not running away scared.” She should. Not run away scared, but run away because she was bound to make this worse.

  “B-but you should.”

  She wanted to cry that he would echo her thoughts. That he thought he was the problem. No, it wouldn’t stand. She was going to do something right. She was going to help him make this step—if not with her, with somebody.

  She ignored the twisting in her gut at the thought of priming the pump for someone else. She forced herself to smile, sassy, easy Cara. The girl who didn’t take things seriously. That was exactly what he needed.

  “Never been very good at doing what I should. Now, if I’m crashing on the couch, I’ll need a pillow and a blanket.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  WES DID NOT SLEEP. How could he when he was reliving every second of the moments from kiss to meltdown to confession? When Cara was asleep on his couch?

  Assumably. Unless she couldn’t sleep, either. Which he told himself not to think about approximately two million times over the course of a completely miserable night of nonsleep.

  He had freaked out. It was only one step above the original infraction with Liz, maybe two above the night after the therapy thing, and while Cara had a point that he probably wasn’t the first teenager to get too excited too early, it couldn’t reverse the fallout from that incident.