Mr. Forever

by Sara Daniel

  “Olivia.” He grasped her hips in his big hands and slowly lowered her down.

  “Keep saying my name. I like hearing it.” Like was too weak to describe how she felt as he slid into her, inch by steady inch. She nibbled along his firm, bristled jaw before settling her mouth back on his smooth, full lips. She lifted herself again.

  Caleb’s breath came out in a shuddering gasp. “You’re going to wish I’d pleasured you first if you keep this up.”

  She laughed, pleased that his control was razor-thin. Hers was nearer to the brink than he knew, coming closer with each drop of water bathing her in sensual awareness and teasing her skin. She kissed him hard, thrusting her tongue to the rhythm of their bodies. He had no reason to worry about her being cheated. She was getting everything she wanted and more. So much more. More love than she wanted to feel. More need for him than she knew how to control.

  She clawed at him and pushed him harder, demanding everything he had as her body began to uncoil. She clamped her hands on both sides of his face and devoured his mouth, swallowing his low moans of pleasure and need. She wrapped both her legs around him and clung to him, kissing as if her life depended on it. Waves of emotion exploded inside.

  She closed her eyes, absorbing the final shudders of his orgasm. Her body slowly relaxed — melted, actually — against him. She let her lips linger on his mouth for a moment longer. “I might thank the person who filled your bed with jam.”

  “My money’s on your son,” Caleb said.

  “What?” She opened her eyes and drew back.

  “Austin. I saw him going into the kitchen before community hour. He told me he was getting a glass of water. I didn’t think anything of it.”

  Austin. She never considered he could do such a thing. She pulled back from Caleb, disentangling their bodies and reached around the shower curtain for a towel. “I thought the two of you were on good terms now.”

  “He may pick up on your moods more than you suspect.”

  “What do you mean?” Ice slid up her spine and through her veins. She wrapped a towel around herself and pushed her dripping hair out of her eyes. She’d tried to keep her heartache to herself and not let it interfere with the way she interacted with her son. Her baby had just turned six. Yet her unruly emotions had turned him into a devious monster.

  “Kids pick up on their parents’ emotions, the highs and the lows.” Caleb said, as she’d heard countless times from his lips and read in his books.

  She should have predicted he’d say it. But for the first time since her marriage fell apart, she realized he was right. All of his preaching was right. Her emotional ups and downs caused her son trauma. Austin had issues, evidenced by the shoelace prank he’d pulled on Caleb when he was here last time.

  And now it was starting up again, worse than ever. Her inability to keep her emotions in check was the direct cause of severe emotional issues in her son. She had to get her priorities straight and put Austin and her foster children first in her life.

  Chapter 23

  The night had gone from bad to amazing, incredible, and stupendous. Now Caleb had the premonition it was going back to bad. Talking about Austin while they were still naked and entwined was poor timing on his part. Unfortunately, he couldn’t take it back.

  Olivia didn’t look at him as she stepped out of the shower, a towel securely around her torso. “I’ll prepare another room for you to move into.”

  A few minutes ago, he would have assumed she meant her room. But the emotions that had swamped them inside this shower seemed to have evaporated on her end. He couldn’t quite say the same for himself as he stood dripping and alone inside the tub. “Actually, I’m partial to this room. I’d rather stay here.”

  She looked like she was going to lash out at him. Instead, she swallowed and said, “Fine. I’ll get clean sheets. I’ll be back in a couple minutes.”

  He didn’t want her to leave. She was already too far away. He snagged her hand, trying to close the physical distance. “What did I do? Are you angry with me because I accused your son? I’m not angry with him.”

  “No, I’m not angry, just enlightened.” She handed him a towel, sliding her hand out of his grasp as she did.

  “I’d appreciate being enlightened.” She was the one spot in his life that was wonderful, exactly as it should be. He wanted to hang on to it. But she seemed underwhelmed by him standing naked in front of her.

  In fact, she’d already left the bathroom. The door of the room opened and then closed again as she walked out, dressed only in the short white towel. He sighed and scrubbed his towel over his hair.

  By the time he’d dressed in a clean pair of underwear and a V-neck T-shirt, Olivia returned in a ratty gray sweat suit. She didn’t acknowledge him as she set to work stripping the sheets.

  He pulled a corner from the bed. He was special to her. He had to make her believe what his heart already knew. She was special to him too. She was his better half. It went without saying she was the perfect mother for Liam. Liam had realized it long before he had.

  “This is my job.” Olivia gripped the sheet with white knuckles. “I can do it alone.”

  He never doubted her competence. “I want to help. I’m not an ordinary guest. Don’t treat me like one.”

  Her eyes filled with tears. He had no idea why that statement would cause her to cry. He wanted to drag her back in the shower. They could make out until everything was wonderful again and nothing mattered but the most basic feelings for each other.

  Instead, he said, “Can we sit and talk or just hold each other? We got cheated out of our afterglow.” He blamed himself. He’d brought up Austin when he should have been totally focused on her glorious, wet, naked body.

  She carried the stained sheets out the door and came back into the room hugging her arms across her chest. “How we feel doesn’t matter. I have a child and my first responsibility is to him.”

  “So?” It hit him that he’d probably written something similar in one of his books. Of course her first responsibility was to her son, but their feelings still mattered. He had a child too, and he knew she didn’t want him any less because he was a package deal.

  “So, I’m not your mother. I’m not going to put Austin through what your mom put you through. When I’m on an emotional low, he starts acting out with jelly on the sheets and shoes tied to the chair.”

  “Don’t blame yourself for Austin’s actions, and don’t throw yourself in the same category as my mother. I lived it. I know the difference. You provided a stable home for Austin.”

  “And it’s going to stay that way.” She snapped the elastic of the clean bottom sheet underneath the mattress.

  She was upset. She wasn’t thinking clearly. He didn’t know how anyone could think clearly after such mind-blowing sex. Not to mention it was too late at night to think at all. But he hated that she was going to leave once again less than totally satisfied from their lovemaking. He wanted to make something end right, for her sake.

  “I’d like to talk to Austin about what he did.”

  She hesitated. “He’s my son. Discipline in my job.”

  “I’m not going to interfere with that. But you said yourself that I know what he’s going through.” He saw she was weakening, so he pressed his case. “Just talk. I’m not going to raise my voice or ply him with guilt.” He almost reminded her he was a therapist and then decided that wasn’t the smartest avenue to take.

  He truly did want to help kids. As Olivia had pointed out before, he’d never used his degree to work specifically with them. He couldn’t dwell on what he could do to change the direction of his life right now. Austin wasn’t a test subject for a new career. He was the key to Olivia’s heart.

  If he couldn’t get Austin on his side, he didn’t have a prayer of making a future with Olivia. It was what he wanted. His heart and emotions longed for a fulfilling life at her side. She’d given him plenty of chances before, but he denied himself based on rules that couldn’t poss
ibly lead to happiness without love. Now he’d come to that realization and Olivia had closed her heart to him.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be in school right now?”

  Austin’s arm jerked as he tugged up the shoulder straps on his snow pants. He sat on the floor and concentrated on his boots, settling into sullenness. “Duh, it’s Saturday.”

  “Duh, guess I wasn’t thinking.” Caleb shoved his hands in his pockets. He wished he’d brought Liam as a buffer, but he’d made the right decision asking his mom to watch the baby. Caleb had wrecked this relationship. It was up to him to repair the bond with Austin. “Does your mom still have the scones out from breakfast?”

  He shrugged. “Go see for yourself.”

  It was a less than promising start, but he forged ahead. “Here’s the thing. I have a lot of strawberry preserves I don’t want to go to waste, but I don’t like to eat plain jelly. I thought if I had a couple scones to mop it off my sheets — ”

  “Did you tell Mom?” Austin scanned the main room, verifying they were alone.

  “Well, I could.” Caleb bit his cheek to keep his smile in check. He had Austin’s complete attention now. “She’s in charge, so she’s the person I should definitely talk to, but I thought maybe we could clear this up man-to-man.”

  Austin puffed up for a moment before turning defiant again. “It’s your fault, anyway. You made my mom cry. She used to always be happy.”

  And Caleb had never been happy, not really. He didn’t enjoy media appearances, writing books, or counseling couples. His whole life was focused on duty. Things he thought he had to do. He’d even avoided getting close to great kids like Austin because he was afraid he would somehow turn into a bad guy.

  Then he’d turned into the bad guy with Austin, regardless of his efforts. But he’d improved his relationship with Liam, despite himself. Now he had to fix things with Austin. If he did it right, he could make them all happy, including Olivia.

  “Do you think she’ll be happy if she finds out about the jelly?” Caleb asked.

  Austin’s mouth turned down. “What do you want me to do?”

  “It looks like you’re going sledding. Do you mind if I join you?”

  “I don’t have a choice, do I?”

  “You always have a choice.” Caleb had to make sure Austin made the right one if he had any shot at winning back Olivia. “You love your mom and want to make her happy, right?”

  “Yeah, duh.”

  “I love her too.” He’d barely thought it, let alone said it aloud before, but he’d known last night. Once he’d gone looking for love, it had surrounded him and filled him to overflowing. “It’s too bad we both couldn’t take care of her and make her happy. But then, you do a better job than me. I always mess up. You don’t need my help.”

  “Caleb.” Austin’s voice was very small. “If you love my mom, why is she so sad?”

  Aw, shoot. He knelt on the floor and looked Austin in the eye. “I love your mom. I know that now. But when I was supposed to take care of her for you, I didn’t think I did and I wasn’t very nice to her. Now I’m really, really sorry and I wish I’d never done those things.”

  “Kind of like me with the strawberry preserves,” Austin said.

  Caleb wrapped his arm around this son of his heart and drew him to his chest in a hug. “All’s forgiven, buddy.” But he wouldn’t breathe easy until Olivia exonerated him for the grief he’d put her through.

  “Mom and I are going sledding,” Austin said. “Want to come too?”

  “Absolutely. But let’s surprise her, okay?”

  A day at a time. One foot in front of the other. As soon as she got Caleb out of her house, she would feel a little better. By the time she survived twenty-four hours since they’d made love, the worst would be over. And then she’d be on to another day. As long as she made it through the first, surely the second and the third and fourth would get progressively easier. Within a week, agony would be part of her everyday course and nothing out of the ordinary.

  But she was still on the first twelve hours of the first day.

  She wound her scarf around her neck, pushed her hat down over her ears and went outside to join Austin on the sled. She allowed him to go on the bunny hill alone if she was running behind schedule, but he was forbidden from taking on the bigger slope until she’d joined him.

  “You’re here. Let’s go.” Austin threw her the rope for the metal runner sled and raced ahead to the cliff run. He was eager, as usual, but the issues she’d been so certain were turning him into an unruly monster seemed to have disappeared. She needed to broach the subject of the jellied sheets, but she hated to ruin his morning and make hers more miserable. Besides, she’d told Caleb he could talk first and didn’t know if he had.

  One foot in front of the other. Austin had already reached the top of the hill by the time she plodded up the last ten feet. She pulled the sled next to her and turned it perpendicular to the slope so it wouldn’t slide down. She lifted her gaze to Austin and instead connected with Caleb.

  He rose from a prone position in the snow next to a plastic disc. No. He couldn’t be here. She wasn’t prepared for an encounter. Her heart quivered. She looked at Austin, expecting him to act out.

  He grinned. “Caleb wants to sled too. We had so much fun last time. It’s not the same without him. I know you think so too.”

  Way too devious for a six-year-old. But Caleb was obviously a partner in this crime. Her heart trembled a little more. “What’s going on?”

  Caleb reached for her hand. She took a step back to avoid him. Standing so close and carrying on a conversation was hard enough. She couldn’t cope with touching him too.

  “I’ve had a watershed of emotions lately,” Caleb said.

  “How inconvenient for you.” She should send Austin away before he witnessed another emotional dip. There was no way he wouldn’t pick up that she was upset.

  “No, actually. They make my life fuller. The only thing better would be to share them with you and for you to return my feelings.”

  She narrowed her eyes. This wasn’t the Caleb she knew. That man didn’t have feelings, let alone talk about them. He had the emotionless soul she was searching to create in herself.

  He wiped his hands on his coveralls. Coveralls. Caleb Paden, the man who wore his suit pants even when he was sledding, was now dressed in heavy winter coveralls, boots, and a green scarf the exact color of his eyes with pink pom-poms at the ends.

  Caleb clasped her shoulder before she could turn away. “Ignore the scarf. My mother’s going to knit me one in manly colors, but she let me borrow this while she’s watching Liam. I know better than to tackle these hills without something to protect my neck.”

  She tapped her foot. “What I really want to know is what you’re doing here.”

  “I love you, Olivia.”

  She stopped breathing. She saw his lips move and heard the words come out, but it wasn’t possible. He would never love her. “I misunderstood you. What did you say?”

  He pulled her toward him, surrounding her with his embrace. “I said I love you. I know you’re thinking about all those idiotic things I said before when I didn’t know what I was talking about. Feelings terrified me. I’ve been running from them for years because they’re so powerful. I didn’t want them to rule me. I thought my life would dissolve in one chaotic mess. But it did anyway.”

  “I thought you blamed me for that.” Once again, she was about to cry. She fought to hold the tears in. Austin was watching. He needed emotional stability. Somehow, she had to find it and hang on to it.

  “If you’re to blame for anything it’s for being so wonderful and caring I discovered what it feels like to be loved and cherished.”

  “Coming from you, I guess that’s a bad thing.” She gulped, but the lump wouldn’t dislodge from her throat.

  “No.” He hugged her tightly. “You changed me. You made me a better person. You made me realize there was more to marriage and more to li
fe than the rigid steps I laid out in Forever. You made me realize love — your love — is the only thing that could fill the void in my life.”

  She wrenched herself from his arms. She felt so brittle. If he touched her again, she would fall apart. She put the wooden sled on the middle of the trail. “Come on, Austin. Let’s sled down.”

  “Mom, he loves you.” Austin sat in the snow next to the sled but didn’t get on. “I thought you’d be happy. Isn’t this what you want?”

  She blinked, trying not to cry when her son was watching her so intently. Everything was so simplistic. If Caleb loved her, she should be happy. “It’s not that — ” She broke off.

  Caleb loved her. He loved her. It was that simple. It was all she needed. She looked at Caleb again. “You really love me?”

  He smiled and his heart seemed to shine through. “Austin, I bet you we can sled farther than you.”

  “Cannot.” He jumped on the wooden sled and flew down the hill.

  Olivia watched him steer competently. He took the sled nearly as far as he’d taken it the day he and Caleb had raced her for a kiss. “What did you two bet on?”

  “If I win, I get to marry you.”

  Yeah, right. It’d be like the kiss where he refused to cash in. She wasn’t getting her hopes up this time. “Twenty-four hours ago, you were engaged to my sister.”

  “Twenty-four hours ago, I was still in denial that I possessed any emotions. Look, I know this is sudden. I’m willing to wait until you’re certain my love isn’t a fluke.”

  “I don’t care if it’s a fluke. I want to be certain it’s going to last forever.”

  He framed her face with his heavy winter gloves. “I’m out of theories, but I can promise you my love, my friendship, my emotions, my respect, my faithfulness, and my place in your world.”

  She didn’t want another relationship where they inhabited separate worlds. “I want my world to be yours too.”

  “You’ve got it. Are you still trying to become a foster parent?”

  “Yeah. Is this going to be a deal breaker?” She was so overcome with joy right now she’d consider giving up her dream for him.