Five Days Grace

by Teresa Hill

  "Maeve wanted you to have the place. She's grateful Tink is so happy with you and that you make time to bring him to visit her. She's moving into an assisted living center, hopefully closer to you so you won't have so far to go to bring Tink to her."

  "And she's okay with going into assisted living?"

  "I think she's both sad and relieved that she won't have to do everything for herself anymore. She's eighty-five years old. She finally admitted it to me." She'd refused to tell them her age for the longest time. "So, what do you think?"

  "I think... That's an awfully expensive present," she said.

  "Grace, I told you I've been overseas a lot in the past twelve years. When I do that, there's practically nothing to spend money on. I'm not rich by any definition, but I've got money in the bank, even after paying her in cash for the property."

  "Oh. Okay."

  "I know a man isn't supposed to say anymore that he'll take care of a woman, financially, but I'm not Luc. I work for a living and like it. I'm not saying we'll have an extravagant lifestyle, but I don't think you're looking for that."

  "No, I'm not. And I work for a living, too, and like it."

  "I know. I'm glad. I want you to be happy, in every way."

  They were sitting there grinning at each other when Tommy strolled into the room.

  "Jesus, look at you," his brother said. "Laid out in a hospital bed, pathetic as can be, and you have a woman like her sitting by your side, taking care of you?"

  "Yeah, I do," Aidan said, grinning like crazy.

  "You know you look like shit, man. You have ever since you got hurt. Scrawny and pale and just... like shit. And you get her?" He motioned toward Grace. "How the hell does he do this? And here's something for you to think about. I make a lot more money than he does, and nobody ever tries to kill me."

  "It's that pretty face of his," Grace said. "I couldn't resist."

  "Well, I'm much better-looking than him, too," Tommy insisted.

  "Sorry, you're too late," Aidan said. "She's mine."

  Tommy shook his head. "I don't get it. You were only there for a few weeks, and you weren't even in her town. You were at the lake."

  "Uh-hmm," Aidan said, holding out the painting so his brother could see it.

  "Yeah, like I said, middle of nowhere. Pretty, though." He looked to Grace. "Did you do this?"

  She nodded.

  "Zach said you were good." He looked back at the painting. "So, somebody tell me the story. What the hell happened? You're at the lake, at the cabin. And?"

  "She broke in," Aidan said.

  "I had a key," Grace reminded him, then told Tommy, "and he pulled a gun on me."

  "Oh, sure. I always pick up women that way. The gun does it every time. So, am I going to be an uncle?"

  "Not yet. We're taking things slow," Aidan said.

  "Slow? You were there for two and a half months."

  "Like I said, we're taking things slow."

  Chapter 22

  His trip at the beginning of March seemed interminable, with a late plane, a missed connection. It took forever to get a shuttle from the airport. He'd been calling her, but didn't get her until he was ten minutes away.

  "Hi," he said, feeling better just knowing she was on the other end of the phone.

  "Hi," she said, and he could hear her big smile in her voice.

  "What are you wearing?"

  She laughed. "Oh, it's going to be one of those phone calls?"

  "No, it's not. I have a surprise for you. I'll be there in ten minutes."

  She gave a little squeal. "Really?"

  "I will, and that's not the surprise. Be naked when I get there. I have plans for you."

  "This is so much better than a naughty phone call," she said.

  "I'm counting on it. See you in a minute."

  And then there was nothing to do but try, one more time, to plan exactly what he wanted to do to her. He'd indulged himself on the plane by doing just that for a couple of hours, forced to just sit there and not move, and he'd closed his eyes and thought of Grace.

  The shuttle driver, who must have overheard Aidan's conversation, gave him a broad grin as Aidan tipped him, grabbed his bag and took off, all thoughts of stealth abandoned on this trip. He did go to the back door, because he usually came in that way and she often left it unlocked if she was home and knew he was coming. Drove him crazy, but she did. Small-town living, she said. He knocked, and sure enough, it was open, so he walked right in.

  "Grace?" he called out. Maybe she was waiting for him in her bed. He'd just rounded the corner of the kitchen and walked into the family room when he spotted her standing in the dining room. "There you are. Why are you still dressed? I told you to be naked when I got here."

  The dog barked once, then came barreling toward Aidan.

  Grace pressed a hand over her mouth, giving him an odd look, then removed the hand and said, "Uhh... My father's here."

  "Oh, that is not funny, Grace." He took off toward her, the dog following him, practically dancing with excitement and wanting attention.

  "No, really, it is," she insisted, laughing as she stood there.

  "Not funny at all," he said, and then, right before he got his hands on her, a man stepped into the dining room to stand beside her.

  Aidan guessed the man was in his fifties, and solid as could be. He looked like he could push through PT as easily as Aidan at the moment and was glaring like he might knock Aidan down in the next few seconds.

  Grace was laughing so hard she had tears falling down her cheeks.

  Holy Shit.

  It was all Aidan could do to stand his ground, to not take a step back and then maybe another. He'd been dreading the moment her family found out about them, because he knew how protective they were of her, and he understood the urge. They wouldn't like the fact that he and Grace had kept their relationship a secret. Then they'd probably find out just how messed up Aidan had been for most of the past year, because Tommy knew a lot of it and Tommy knew Zach.

  So it was a delicate situation, to be handled delicately. He knew they hadn't liked her first husband, and he planned on getting them to like him, because he wasn't going anywhere.

  Now, he'd just barged in and asked this man's daughter why she'd been so slow to strip naked for him on command?

  Holy Shit.

  Aidan snapped to attention, as rigid as if the Commander in Chief himself were standing there. It was all he could do not to salute the man.

  Grace had a hand on her father's forearm, maybe thinking she needed to restrain him, and she'd stopped laughing, mostly. "Daddy," she finally said. "This is Lieutenant Commander Aidan Shaw. Aidan, this is my father, Sam McRae."

  "Sir," Aidan said, giving the slightest nod of his head in the man's direction.

  Sam McRae did not extend his hand, did not show the slightest hint of welcome or even acknowledge the introduction, except to finally ask, "And how do you know my daughter?"

  Hmm. What to say? She broke into your cabin at the lake, which your son so kindly loaned me, then I pulled a gun on her and managed to convince her to spend the next five days and nights with me?

  "We met last fall," he finally said.

  "Last fall?" The man might have called him a liar right then, but he turned and looked at Grace first. Still smiling, she nodded, admitting it.

  That obviously came as a surprise to the man, but he didn't glare at his little girl. He gave her a look like he couldn't quite believe she'd keep a secret like that from him, and maybe one that said something like, My little girl lets men treat her like this? Waltzing in and demanding to know why she still has her clothes on?

  And then they all just stood there, Aidan silently begging for it to be over or to find himself waking up still on the plane, on his way to her, not here yet. Her father looked like he was planning to tear Aidan limb from limb, and Grace just kept smiling, like she could wrap both of them around her little finger and knew it. Aidan feared she didn't understand just how
much fathers hated the idea of their little girls with any man.

  "Daddy, I'll bring him by the house another time to meet Mom, and you two can talk then, okay?"

  She wrapped her arms around her father, gave him a big hug, then a kiss on the cheek, and her father didn't take his eyes off Aidan the whole time. But she finally got the man out the front door, and Aidan practically collapsed onto one of the dining room chairs, cussing like the sailor he was, with Tink concerned and crying by his side.

  Grace came back in, laughing like this was the funniest thing in the world. "Oh, my God, if you could have seen your face!"

  "My face? Did you see your father's? I thought he was going to take me out with one punch, and he looks like he could do it."

  "He's in really good shape for a man of his age," she said.

  "Shit. He reminds me of an Admiral I met once, except the Admiral only had a mild dislike for me. Your father is never going to forget this. Or forgive it. He hates me."

  "He's just a tad over-protective of me, always has been. I think he looks at me and still sees me in one of my little angel costumes from when I was three."

  "And I'm the man who yelled at his angel-girl for not taking her clothes off fast enough. Shit."

  "I'm sorry." She laughed again. "He was walking out the door when you called, but he forgot something and came back, and then I couldn't get rid of him fast enough. I was trying to get him out the front door, before you came in the back, but he never uses the front door of my house, and he knew something was up."

  "He is going to hate me for the rest of his life."

  "No, he's not."

  "I'm the guy who's also been sneaking around with his daughter in secret all these months," Aidan pointed out.

  "Well, yes. But he'll get over that."

  "I'm going to need my uniform when I meet them. Him, again, and your mother for the first time. God," Aidan said. "Maybe even the damned choker—"

  "Choker?"

  "Full dress whites. The collar's a bitch, so we call it the choker. I think I'll need that and every medal I've ever been awarded. Do you think that would impress him? I have three purple hearts—"

  "It'll be fine, I promise. Once he gets to know you—"

  "Baby, he doesn't want to know me. He wants me to drop dead, right now, before I can ever lay a hand on you again."

  "Which you still haven't done since you got here," she said, walking over to him and pulling him to his feet.

  She wrapped her arms around him and kissed him soundly.

  "Hi," she said, sweet as could be. "So, what is my surprise?"

  "Oh, that's gone. Probably scarred for life by that little meeting with your father and never coming back."

  "What?"

  "I woke up with a hard-on this morning. And the morning before that," he said.

  "Oh!" Her whole face lit up at that, and then she laid a hand over the zipper of his pants, which was flat as could be, no signs of life at all, just as he predicted.

  "Really. It's gone. I may never get it back."

  She made a dismissive sound, looking supremely confident. "I'll fix that."

  "I don't know, Grace. I've been traumatized."

  "Right now, we're going to think about something else." Her hand was still delicately cupping him through his pants, while she smiled at him with that gorgeous mouth of hers, her eyes sparkling with amusement and maybe pure joy.

  He kissed her once, then again, and finally started to remember exactly why he'd surprised her with this visit.

  "God, I've waited so long for this," he said.

  "Did you lock the back door, when you came in?" she asked.

  "Yes."

  She took him by the hand as she locked the front door and led him down the hall toward her bedroom, stopping along the way to tell the dog to get on his bed in the family room. He pouted and cried a bit, knowing he was about to be left out and not happy about it.

  Once inside her room, Aidan took his good, sweet time undressing her. Standing with her in his arms by the bed kissing her, slowly and with as much patience as he could muster, taking off one piece of clothing and then kissing her again.

  He could feel the smile across her lips as they kissed, pure joy surrounding them.

  She had one hand on his side, low on his hip, and one delicately cupping him through his jeans, softly raking her nails along the fabric at times, lightly pressing against his cock a moment later, and hallelujah, this was going to work, finally! He could feel his body doing exactly what it was supposed to do.

  She turned her attention to undressing him, got his shirt off, pushed him to sit on the side of the bed so she could take off his shoes and socks, then pulled him to his feet to undo his jeans. She pulled down the zipper and in one motion, got rid of his jeans and briefs.

  He was planning on pulling her with him to the bed, but before he could, she sank down to her knees in front of him and went to work on him with her mouth.

  "Ahh, Grace." He sucked in air, his head spinning as all the blood in his body rushed to his cock. "I'm not sure this is a good idea right now, much as I love it."

  "Please? I've been waiting for this, too."

  He let a hand rest against her head, needing to touch her, trying to let her know how much he loved this, trying not to look down at her. Because the sight of Grace, his beautiful, very good girl, on her knees, loving him this way, was almost more than he could stand.

  He started to shake with the effort it took to hold back, and she must have felt that, because she stood up, peeled off her pretty lace panties—flesh-colored, from him, and just amazing on her, although truly, every pair she wore was.

  Then she pushed him back onto the bed and climbed in beside him.

  "So," she said, smiling, "Tell me what you want."

  "You. Just you."

  "And how do you want me this first time? I assume you've given it some thought?"

  He laughed. "About a million hours."

  "So, what did you decide?"

  "As long as it's you, Grace. I just need it to be you."

  She rolled onto her back and pulled him on top of her, and in the end, it was just him lying on top of her, sinking inside her, finally, that wet, welcoming heat that was Grace.

  He needed that connection with her, needed to feel their bodies joined in this way, needed to be as close to her as he could get.

  "I want this to last forever," he said, his elbows braced on the bed just above her shoulders, her face cupped in his hands. "I need to be here, just like this, with you, for as long as we can stand it."

  "Okay," she said.

  And he laughed. "Okay, says the most agreeable, most beautiful woman in the world, to anything I say. Have I told you how much I love that about you? That I can say anything, even the hardest things, and you say, 'Okay.' I love that."

  "You just have the best ideas," she said, rocking gently against him.

  He closed his eyes and groaned, savoring the sweet sensation the slightest movement by either one of them brought.

  "I know," she said, thrusting so subtly against him once more. "We can make it a game."

  "A game? Baby, you come up with the best games."

  "Or maybe a dare?"

  "Okay. What's the dare?"

  "Who can last the longest without moving."

  "No, no, no. I have to move. Just a little bit." And he did, making her whimper and then sigh, so sexily.

  "Okay, a little bit," she agreed. "Just that. What you just did. What I did. A centimeter. Nothing more."

  "Grace, I have to tell you, the thing about these games of yours? I just don't see any way I can possibly lose."

  * * *

  Rachel McRae was in her kitchen calmly sipping wine when Emma, her oldest daughter, walked in, leaving Zach and Sam in another room, raging. She could hear them, Sam sounding madder than he'd been in years.

  "I've been sent to the kitchen to talk some sense into you," Emma said. "And that's a direct quote. I've never seen Sam l
ike this."

  "He met Grace's new man."

  "Oh! He's here? In the house somewhere? I didn't think she'd ever let us meet him."

  "No, he's at Grace's," Rachel said, holding out her open bottle of wine to Em, who nodded her acceptance. It might be a long night in the McRae house.

  "So, what's wrong with him?" Emma asked, as she turned and found a wine goblet in the cabinet.

  "Apparently, it was a memorable first meeting. He didn't realize Sam was there and... said something Sam didn't need to hear."

  "Something I didn't need to hear?" Sam had arrived in the kitchen, still furious, their son behind him. "He's an ass. Didn't she learn anything from That Damned Frenchman?"

  Sam wouldn't even say his name anymore. It was just That Damned Frenchman. Rachel understood. She despised the man, too, but she had hopes for the new one. First, she didn't think Grace would make a mistake like that again. And more than that, she'd seen how happy her youngest daughter had been the last few months. It had been such a relief, to finally see her happy.

  "So, what did he say?" Emma asked.

  "He waltzed into her house like he owned the place and complained because she didn't take her clothes off fast enough for him," Sam said, still bellowing.

  And Rachel laughed, couldn't help it, because she didn't think it had been anything like what Sam thought, although there was no telling him that. She knew how worried he'd been about Grace for so long, how much he loved her. It was a special kind of hell for a father to think he saw a man taking advantage of one of his daughters or hurting her.

  So Rachel was trying to be understanding. "Tell them exactly what he said, Sam. Word for word."

  "You think that makes it any better? He said, 'Why are you still dressed? I told you to be naked when I got here.' "

  "And what did Grace do?" Rachel asked, hoping her husband might have calmed down enough to actually listen this time.

  "She laughed," Sam said, like that made him mad, too.

  "How did she laugh? Like she was embarrassed?"

  "I would think so. I'm her father!"

  "Or did she sound happy, Sam?"

  He stood there, dumbstruck for a moment, obviously searching his mind for the moment, wanting to remember.