by Elsa Jade
So strange. She knew he’d done work on the house. He had a solid, active—and always paid-in-full—line of credit at the lumber and hardware store her parents owned. Perplexed, she trailed him into the kitchen and stopped dead as her mouth fell open.
“Gabriel,” she breathed, gazing through the windows that made up the eastern wall of the kitchen. “This is…”
She trailed off because words couldn’t really describe the beauty he’d carved from the rear of his property.
“Can I?” She glanced at him, silently begging for permission to take a closer look.
One corner of his mouth lifted. “Go ahead. It’s only a little bit of a secret.”
Her eyebrows drew together as jealousy twinged in her chest. “I guess I’m not the first girl to have seen it.”
“You’re the first woman,” he said, with such emphasis that her breath caught.
Joy swallowed. “So I’m a woman now?”
Her age—their age difference—had been his primary argument against pursuing the attraction she knew they both felt. She’d expected things to change when she finally turned eighteen. Gabriel couldn’t argue the legality of their seven-year age gap once she was officially a registered voter.
Except, as it turned out, he could still argue. When age didn’t matter anymore, he flipped the experience card. She had to go away for school. She had to experience the world. Grow up, he’d said, and while he hadn’t derided her age, he hadn’t looked past it either.
As if he remembered his words, too, Gabriel rubbed the heel of his hand across his chest and nodded at the landscape beyond the glass. “It won’t be in full bloom until the weather warms up.”
“Hmm.” Accepting his diversion, she pivoted to the wall of glass for a closer look. Since most of his property was choked by thick stands of trees, he didn’t have a lot of space to landscape. That hadn’t stopped him from maximizing the potential of what he did have by landscaping up instead of out.
Greenery grew thick close to the ground, cushioning the base of a miniature man-made mountain. The carefully arranged tower of huge rocks stretched as high as the two-story house’s peaked roof. Here and there, square foot planters nestled against the stone.
“Is this even legal for a residential zone?” she asked, studying the hand and footholds that would allow him to scale the craggy rock.
“Don’t know. Don’t care. If someone comes along with a fine, I’ll pay it.
Inside her bra, her nipples pebbled and she hugged her arms over her chest. Bad boy Gabriel did it for her in so many ways she couldn’t even begin to count them.
“You’re cold. I’ll get something for you.” He abruptly left the room.
Joy bit her lip and rubbed at the goose bumps on her arms. She should have packed a coat but Florida had been hot for weeks already and she’d tucked her winter gear into storage. She had no need for warmer clothes. She would be back in Florida before the end of the week.
A knot cinched in her stomach. Closing her eyes, she dropped her forehead to rest against the glass and choked back a gasp of soul-deep pain. It felt so utterly, devastatingly wrong to be planning a life without Gabriel, but what else could she do?
“He doesn’t want me,” she whispered to the snow. The kissing—and everything else—in the alley must have been spurred by Evan’s presence. Why else would Gabriel suddenly touch her after years of dodging her tentative advances?
Some noise—was that a growl?—brought her hateful self-talk to a halt. Jerking her head up, she twisted to find Gabriel in the doorway. His broad shoulders filled the space completely. Her fingers curled, remembering the achingly brief time she’d felt his muscles flexing with passion beneath her hands.
Unable to meet his eyes, she focused on the zippered hoodie that hung from his white-knuckled fist.
“I’m sorry,” she stuttered. “I probably smeared the glass. I didn’t mean to touch it.”
“Don’t,” he said roughly. “You can touch anything I have. Anything.”
“Okay,” she whispered, nauseous from the cocktail of need and pain churning in her stomach. She still couldn’t look him in the eye. Despite the wide-open view behind her, the room felt like it was closing in. Her breath started coming in short, choppy bursts.
God, she was going to cry.
Not for the first time where Gabriel was concerned.
“I need to get going.” She ducked her head to hide her quivering lips. “My parents will ask even more questions if I’m not home by the time they get back.”
God, that sounded so young and stupid. No wonder he kept pushing her away.
Gaze on the floor, she walked toward him, hoping he would just step aside and let her go. When he didn’t move, she stopped and licked her lips a couple times, drowning in the warm, woodsy scent of his skin. Afraid her voice would break if she said anything else, she stood there, inches from him, and waited in miserable silence.
He broke it with a ragged groan. “Joy, look at me.”
“I can’t,” she whispered.
“I want you,” he said, low and fierce and forceful. “My life is nothing but wanting you.”
He stroked her cheek with the backs of his fingers. The slow, savoring caress cracked the dam that held her tears and they spilled over, sudden and so fast, she couldn’t stop them with her hands.
Mortified and overwhelmed, she choked back a sob and shoved at him, trying to push him out of the doorway so she could go. Gabriel caught her wrists and hauled her against his chest. His lips swallowed her startled gasp.
Joy struggled against his hold until he tangled his tongue with hers and drew it into his mouth, forcing her to become an active participant in the kiss.
When Gabriel started walking her backward across the kitchen, she gave herself over to him. He maneuvered her like a puppet, guiding her on some path she wouldn’t fear as long as he walked it with her.
His heart pounded against her breast and his hardness burned her belly. Desire crackled through her, white and bright as lightning, as Gabriel backed her up against a counter. He devoured her, stealing her breath until she whimpered at the pain of the hard edge digging into her back. A rough sound escaped his throat as he tore his lips from hers. Releasing her wrists, he hooked his hands behind her thighs and effortlessly lifted her to sit on the counter.
As he palmed her knees and pushed her legs wide, her head fell back against the cupboard.
“I want you,” he rasped, pinning her with his eyes. His thumbs dug into the tender flesh of her inner thighs as if he thought he could embed his words in her muscles. “I. Want. You.”
With a groan, he hauled her to the edge of the counter and pressed his hardness against her pulsing, aching core. He felt huge, hot, and while part of her quaked at the impossibility of her body taking his, a bigger part of her craved the challenge. Heat rushed to her center, leaving her dizzy with need as he seized her mouth again.
Desperate to feel him, she ran her hands up his flexing forearms, over his shoulders, and raked her nails down the sides of his neck. Despite the layers of clothes between them, she felt his cock flex with a surge of arousal. That wasn’t enough. Needing more, she dropped her hands between them and pulled at his shirt, then the waist of his jeans.
Gabriel grabbed one of her searching hands and pressed it back against the cabinet beside her head. Breathing hard, he abandoned her lips.
As he rubbed his chin against her cheek, the dark shadow of his beard abraded her skin. “We can’t do this. I can’t. There are too many things you don’t know.”
Humorless laughter huffed past her lips. “Really? You’re going to use experience as a wall between us again?”
“Joy—”
“No.” She shook her head and wrenched free of his grasp. Stabbing her finger against his chest, she said, “You told me to go and I did. You told me to live my life. I did that to the best of my ability, with my heart here with you. Whatever you thought I should learn, I’ve learned it. Now the only t
hing left I want to know is you. Why won’t you give me you?”
Gabriel backed away as her voice rose, until she was shouting and the space between them felt like an ocean.
With hot tears rolling down her cheeks, she slid from the counter. “I’m going.”
She got all the way to the front door before his voice sliced the air behind her.
“The guy you brought with you,” he bit out. “Who is he?”
It took her a minute to figure out what he meant. With only a small pang of guilt over using Evan as a weapon, she said, “He’s the man who wants what you don’t, and God, I’m so done with saving myself for you.”
Gabriel was on her so fast, it took her breath away. He crushed her against the door, his chest to her back, his desire hard against her bottom, and put his lips against her ear. “He can’t have you, Joy. You belong to me. With me. There’s no inch of you I don’t want. There’s no inch of you I won’t claim when you’re ready.”
Without another word, he left her alone. Shaking, she let herself outside into the snow.
The wind had picked up. It chilled her wet cheeks and sliced through her stupidly thin shirt. Head down to watch her step, she zipped her jacket and curled her hands up into the sleeves. Within moments, Gabriel’s warmth was a distant memory. The flames of desire he’d stoked within her unfortunately lingered.
“When you’re ready,” she muttered angrily as she stopped through the snow deepening along the side of the road. His measuring stick was a mystery. How could she be any more ready? A look from him made her stomach flip. She trembled at his touch.
Unbidden, a thought crossed her mind, stopping her in her tracks. Maybe her readiness wasn’t the issue. Maybe it was all on him.
Blinking snow from her lashes, she lifted her head and frowned at the trees that stretched out ahead of her, framing the two-lane road.
Could that be it? And if it was, why? She started to turn with a half-formed thought to go back and demand an answer, but movement between the trees stopped her.
The cloud cover threw a grey cast over everything and even though it was barely noon, the space between the leafless trees was dark. Snow swirled, not so heavy as to obscure vision—yet—but heavy enough that she wasn’t sure she really saw what she saw.
Wolves weren’t extinct in Michigan, but they weren’t so plentiful that she should be eye to eye with one on the outer limits of a town.
Frozen, scarcely daring to breathe, she watched the wolf. It stood at a canted angle, shoulders toward her, haunches behind a tree, every bit as motionless as she.
Snow crusted its coat, which was a shade of grey darker than the angry sky. Inexplicably, her hands itched to sink into the wolf’s thick ruff. She even took a step toward the animal before the rumble of engine yanked her back to her senses.
As if it, too, had been taken by her and released from some kind of spell, the wolf shook its head and sidled back into the cover of the trees. With a pang of loss, Joy watched the wolf go.
No longer able to ignore the approaching vehicle, she gingerly stepped off the road into a shallow ditch. A moment later, a blue truck with attached plow came around the bend and slowed to execute a three point turn. Gabriel’s truck, it was probably Forrest at the wheel.
She didn’t recall ever seeing Zev take the driver’s seat, not even this one that Forrest and Gabriel had shared since the three men rolled into Calla Beach seven years earlier.
She was already up out of the ditch when the truck rolled to a stop, now pointed in the direction she’d been going. The door popped open and Zev dropped down to the ground.
“Get in,” he said with a dark glower. “We’ll drive you the rest of the way.”
Flushing over what he didn’t say—you silly idiot or something equally appropriate—she slipped past him and stretched up to grab the handhold above the door.
Some men would have given her a boost up into the seat but Zev kept his hands to himself. He waited until she scooted across the bench seat before climbing in behind her. Without a word, Forrest put the truck in gear and resumed his slow crawl along the snow-slick road.
After a minute, she wedged her hands between her knees and let out a heavy sigh. Zev glanced at her but Forrest was the one who spoke.
“Heading out on foot wasn’t the best idea you’ve ever had, Joy.” His voice held no censure but she still flushed.
“My degree is in accounting, not creative arts,” she said stiffly.
“What are you going to do with it?” Zev asked.
“I’m taking a position with a clothing store chain. In Miami.” The words didn’t feel right coming out of her mouth, and the tension that filled the truck made her squirm. Needing redirection, she nodded at the tree line. “I think I saw a wolf. Was there a population surge while I was away? My dad didn’t mention it.”
Instead of dissipating, the tension in the truck seemed to twist into a tighter knot. She looked up from the road to find Zev staring at her with interest.
“You follow the wildlife population changes?” He sounded curious instead of disbelieving.
“Not religiously or anything. This is a hunting town. People talk about the state of things.”
“Wolves aren’t booming,” Forrest interjected. “Michigan Tech reported that Isle Royale is down to three from last year’s nine. We were put back on the federally endangered list back in December.”
“Forrest.” A warning edged Zev’s tone. Joy frowned at him but Forrest spoke again.
“Have you signed any contracts yet? For the new job.”
Grateful for an excuse to look away from Zev’s probing gaze, she let out another sigh. “Not yet. I’ll be meeting with someone in HR when I get back next week.”
“Don’t do anything until you talk to Gabriel.”
She stiffened. “I can’t keep waiting for him.”
“Joy…”
“I can’t.”
Forrest fell silent and didn’t speak as he guided the truck around another bend. The trees broke up for a gravel driveway. The rear tires fishtailed as he took the turn off but Forrest deftly corrected and they rolled up to her parents’ house without incident.
Zev pushed his door open and climbed down, leaving the way clear for her. She scooted toward the door. Forrest reached out and put his hand on her arm, probably the only time he’d ever touched her deliberately. The strangeness alone was enough to stop her. She blinked at his hand, then looked up quizzically.
“One more chance?” He asked quietly.
She swallowed. “It’s not really me, is it? I realized that while I was walking. It’s him, and I don’t know what he’s waiting for.”
Forrest grimaced. “I don’t know either.”
She waited, but when he let her go without saying anything else, she slid from the truck. Tears stung her eyes all over again. Embarrassed, she ducked her head and silently walked past Zev. By the time she let herself inside, she was hot, flushed and breathing hard. She hid in the shower, where she cried until her throat felt swollen and raw and the water grew so cold, it tore at her flesh.
As she dried off and dressed, she heard her mother’s distinct cupboard-slamming in the kitchen. Each clatter and bang was a wordless command for either Joy or her father to come forward and account for their actions.
When Joy was little, the noise was all for her father. Rob Sutton was a good man—Joy was proud to call him daddy—but he’d never learned to read minds, so regularly found himself in a bit of domestic trouble. As Joy got older, she found herself sharing kitchen time with him equally.
Today, she knew the banging was for her, and her mother wouldn’t stop until Joy went in to explain herself.
Sighing, wishing she’d had the good sense to get a room at the motel like Evan, she squared her shoulders and went down to talk to her mom. As she walked past the open front door, she wrinkled her nose at the bitter odor of cigarette smoke.
“You should quit, Daddy,” she called through the screen.
/> “Some things you just can’t quit. I think you know that. Come out here. Let your mother cool down.”
“She’s not going to.” But Joy grabbed the afghan off the back of the couch and went out onto the porch anyway, happy to avoid her mother a little longer.
She found her father at the far end of the porch, blowing smoke out into the falling snow. As the door closed behind her, he flicked the cherry off the end of his cigarette and tucked the remaining butt into his breast pocket.
“I haven’t run into Gabriel at the store recently,” her dad said as he settled on the porch swing. “How’d he fare through the winter?”
Joy shrugged and cuddled into the thick wool blanket. “I don’t know. We didn’t really talk about the weather.”
He raised his eyebrow but didn’t ask what they did talk about. As astute as her father was, Joy figured he had his own ideas.
“I guess it’s pretty much the same winter every time, anyway. Your mama wants you to move away from here, you know.”
She stared at the trailer she’d rented with the intention of emptying her bedroom and moving to Miami for good. “I don’t want to take the job. I don’t want to live in Florida or anywhere else without… I just know life here, Daddy. I know what it has in store for me. I had eighteen years of it before I went to college, remember?”
“You had eighteen years of living it, baby girl, not eighteen years of making it. There’s a difference, and the making is a hard, long stretch with some long, dark nights in the middle.”
“You and Mom have a good life.”
“I’m not Gabriel Danes, and your mother knows that. Loving him might take you places you aren’t prepared to go.”
She squirmed uncomfortably. “I don’t—”
Her father raised a hand, cutting her off. “You do. I know it, and so does your mama, which is why she’s in there tearing her kitchen down right now. You’ve been upside down over him since you were old enough to—well, since you were old enough. I’m not here to tell you that you don’t feel what you feel. I am here to tell you some men aren’t as simple as others. You need to ask Gabriel what kind of life he’ll give you, and make sure he tells you the straightforward truth. Then you decide. Don’t go to him blind.”
