Winning Over Skylar

by Julianna Morris

  “I’ve been thinking about what we could do on Saturday,” Aaron murmured finally. “Since bowling was a disaster, I thought we could do something less ambitious here at the house, like barbecuing or getting pizza and watching movies.”

  Skylar lifted an eyebrow. “Do you barbecue?”

  “No, but it can’t be that hard.”

  She chuckled. “Get pizza. Barbecuing for the first time is extremely ambitious.”

  “How tough can it be?”

  “Let me put it this way—one of our neighbors set fire to his deck two summers ago when he was grilling and it spread to the side of the house. His wife will never let him forget it—his birthday present this year was a fire extinguisher.”

  Aaron reluctantly gave up the idea of a barbecue and visions of everyone having fun in the backyard. He didn’t want to look like an idiot in front of Skylar or the girls, and trying to douse a flaming steak would look pretty idiotic.

  “All right. Then on Sunday I thought we could—”

  “Not Sunday,” Skylar interrupted. “We’re busy. Joe and Grace are coming to dinner.”

  “Oh.” Aaron didn’t bother trying to get an invitation, as well. He wasn’t ready to meet Skylar’s in-laws, and it was unlikely she would go for it, anyhow.

  He turned his attention back to the photo album. He didn’t find any wedding pictures as he turned the pages, but there were shots of Jimmie Gibson scattered here and there. The man had been rangy, with broad shoulders, sandy hair and a perpetual smile—and he’d looked at Skylar and Karin as if the sun rose and set in them.

  James Gibson’s blondish hair wasn’t dissimilar from Karin’s, but hair color didn’t guarantee anything. After all, Spence had brown hair and eyes, while Melanie was quite fair...just like Karin. Aaron counted back, for the hundredth time, the weeks and months between when he’d dated Skylar and Karin’s birthday. Nine months. It was inescapable.

  He didn’t need genetic tests. If he accepted that Skylar hadn’t slept around when they were together, he had to accept that Karin was his daughter.

  * * *

  SKYLAR TRIED NOT to watch Aaron as he looked through the album. She was torn between wishing he’d become bored with his attempts at fatherhood, and hope that he was starting to genuinely care. Life was uncertain, and having someone else who loved her daughter wasn’t such a bad thing, was it?

  Aaron gestured to a photo of Karin in her junior-high-school soccer uniform, kicking a black-and-white ball. “Karin hasn’t mentioned that she used to be on a team. Not that she’s talked that much to me,” he said wryly. “Does she still play?”

  “She quit last year after her father died. Being a teenager is hard enough without losing someone you love, and it was so sudden the way it happened. But you don’t need to hear the details.”

  “Maybe I do. It’s something that affects Karin profoundly.”

  “All right.” Skylar drew her legs up under her and tried to control her breathing. “It...it was on a Saturday afternoon and Jimmie went to Trident to have his dad install a toolbox on our new truck. He wasn’t supposed to be gone long, and I was wondering what was keeping him when the doorbell rang. It was the highway patrol.”

  “Hell.”

  “That sums it up perfectly. They didn’t want Karin to stay in the room, but she’d already guessed the truth. It was a terrible accident, halfway between Cooperton and Trident—an 18-wheeler was speeding and ran a stop sign. I couldn’t protect her from it...couldn’t let her be a child for a little longer. I was in so much shock, I didn’t even know what to say.”

  Skylar shivered. The grief was easing, and she was starting to remember the happy times before she remembered the loss, but nothing could soften the memory of that afternoon when the world had fallen apart.

  “You’d just lost your husband, Skylar,” Aaron said slowly. “And you couldn’t have said anything to make it easier for Karin. I don’t know much about kids, but I know that. Nothing could have made the truth easier. Do you really think telling her an hour later would have made a difference?”

  “I suppose not. We sat on the couch, and I held her until Jimmie’s parents arrived, and a thought kept beating at the back of my mind, making everything even worse. You see, Karin wanted to go with Jimmie, then at the last minute a friend called and she went swimming instead.”

  “God.” Aaron had gone white around his mouth, and she knew that he’d grasped how close Karin had come to being in the accident with her father.

  She took his hand and squeezed it. However uncertain she might be of him, she’d experienced that plunging sensation in her stomach too often not to understand.

  The timer on the stove went off, reminding her of the food in the oven, and she scrambled to her feet, grateful for a distraction. “I think our dinner’s ready,” she said. “Shall we eat?”

  Aaron set the photo album on the coffee table with slow, deliberate movements. “Sure.”

  * * *

  AARON BARELY NOTICED how the meal tasted. Vittorino’s served excellent Italian cuisine, but the food might as well have been sawdust.

  He’d hoped for a nice, light evening with Skylar in front of a cheerful fire, and instead he had gotten an emotional sucker punch. Karin had talked about how it felt when her father died, but she hadn’t said she’d planned to go with him.

  It was unthinkable that she could have died, and Aaron breathed a silent prayer of gratitude that his daughter been spared along with her mother, because it was chillingly plain that Skylar could have been in that truck, as well.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  RESTLESS, SKYLAR PUT her empty plate on the coffee table and got up to look at the movies on the shelves.

  “I wouldn’t have pegged you as a classic-movie fan,” she said over her shoulder.

  “They’re for Melanie. Her tastes are eclectic, especially for a teenager—old films, ghost-hunting reality shows and science fiction. I ordered those a couple of weeks ago and have been waiting for the best moment to surprise her.”

  “The family room is going to be such a big surprise, she may not notice a few dozen movies.” Skylar scanned the titles. “Desk Set with Hepburn and Tracy, The Adventures of Robin Hood...” She grinned as she saw a film she’d loved as a girl. “Ohmigod, Hobson’s Choice. I haven’t seen that since I was a kid. It’s a great romantic comedy set in the 1800s.”

  “You mean a chick flick.”

  “No.” Skylar took out the DVD and threw the plastic case at him. “For a comment like that, you’re going to have to watch it with me.”

  She popped the disc in the machine. In the movie, a widowed father haunted the local pub while his feisty eldest daughter ran his boot shop before striking out on her own. Skylar returned to the couch and settled down. Perhaps she’d loved Hobson’s Choice because the daughter made her own destiny, despite her drunken father and the barriers of class and expectations about women in Victorian England.

  She was quickly drawn into the familiar story and didn’t object when Aaron draped his arm around her shoulder. The tale was romantic and wickedly amusing at the same time, and it was a relief to have something less intense taking their attention. By the time the movie ended they were curled up together, their bare feet stretched toward the crackling fire.

  “I withdraw my chick-flick remark. That’s a terrific movie,” Aaron declared.

  Skylar yawned lazily. “Uh-huh. I love the old films, but I didn’t know this one had come out on DVD.”

  “It’s yours.”

  “But you got it for Melanie.”

  “I’ll get her another.”

  Skylar thought about refusing, but she really did love the movie and it wouldn’t be the end of the world to accept a gift from him.

  Aaron stroked her hair. “You were also right about this couch.”

>   “Oh?”

  “It’s awesome, as Melanie and Karin would say. Do you remember saying awesome and gross that much when we were their age?” he asked with a perplexed frown.

  “I don’t know—it feels like a long time ago. The other day Karin announced that twenty-nine was old. I didn’t remind her I was three years older than that.”

  He kissed her forehead. “You’re too beautiful to worry about getting old.”

  Skylar blinked. It seemed forever since she’d thought much about her appearance and it was nice to think she still had something to recommend her. “That’s nice of you to say.”

  “Not nice, just honest.”

  She still felt pleasantly mellow from the movie and firelight and soft couch. “Hmm. Give me your honest opinion on something.”

  “Sure.”

  “Do you think bustles were sexy?”

  Aaron cocked his head to one side. “Bustles?”

  “Yeah, they talked about it in the movie. The two younger daughters were wearing bustles to catch male attention, and their father thought it was immodest.”

  “Oh. Well, they really aren’t the fashion any longer.”

  “But let’s say it’s 1880 and you’re a gentleman around town. You see a lady walking down the street with her skirt pouffed out in the rear. Bustles did draw attention to a woman’s backside, and they wagged when she walked. Eye-catching, don’t you think?”

  “I can’t say they do anything for me. I prefer tight jeans.” He kissed her forehead.

  “But they didn’t have tight jeans in Victorian England. They had bustles.”

  “They also had corsets, child labor and no airplanes. However, I’m sure I would have appreciated a fashionable lady as much as the next guy. Especially if the lady looked like you.” They had slid downward to the point she was lying on the couch, and he was resting his weight on his elbow, gazing at her with a smile. “You get loopy when you’re sleepy, don’t you?”

  “A little. Sometimes.”

  “I like it.”

  “I’ll have to wake up to drive home.”

  “Don’t go yet.” Aaron traced the line of her jaw, and a warm, quiver went through her abdomen. She might be out of practice, but she recognized the look in his eye.

  She shifted her leg so she could run her toe along his calf. “If I stay, I might end up sleeping on the couch. What will the neighbors say if my old truck is in your driveway all night?”

  “You didn’t used to care what the neighbors thought.”

  “No, I just pretended not to care. There’s a difference,” Skylar said quietly. “But since I couldn’t be respectable, I was determined to prove everything the gossips said about me and my parents was true.”

  * * *

  AARON HATED SEEING the shadows in Skylar’s eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

  It was amazing that she’d grown up to love Cooperton...especially since Cooperton had failed her when she was a child, letting her parents hurt her. He traced her mouth with the tip of his finger, remembering the times he’d seen her with a swollen, split lip or a black eye. The abused girl, who’d grown up with gossiping fingers pointed at her, had become a remarkable woman.

  Her beauty took his breath away as much now as it had when they were seventeen. Nobody had forced her to be a good mother; she could have gone to Hollywood or New York to be a model. If anything, that’s what he’d thought she was doing when she dropped out of school. And though he wished she’d told him about Karin, he was infinitely grateful she’d stayed close to Cooperton, where he could find her.

  Skylar’s French braid had tumbled over her shoulder, and he unfastened the band on the end, carefully separating the thick plait. Firelight glinted, sparking gold and fiery red, and he fanned the long strands, enthralled by their brilliance. He remembered how she used to charge into class, hair flying, a glint in her eyes daring anyone to give her trouble. There hadn’t been a girl in school who could compete.

  “You’ve never cut it short?”

  “I think it’s easier to take care of this way.”

  Aaron opened the first button on her top and waited to see if she’d object. The other buttons followed more quickly and beneath the practical cotton work shirt, he found a lacy peach confection. As bras went, it ranked at the top of his approval level.

  “I’m sure I don’t need to tell you it unhooks in the front.” Skylar’s expression was unfathomable, but he knew she was telling him, in her own way, that she was making a choice to be with him.

  “No, you don’t.” Aaron bent down to kiss her. It was probably a mistake to take this any further, but at least it was a mistake they’d be making together.

  He unhooked the bra and groaned at the curves beneath, flicking his thumbs across each responsive peak. In the years since they’d been together, he’d made love to some beautiful women, but none like Skylar, and the hard demand of his body made it difficult to think clearly. At least there were condoms in his wallet—that much hadn’t changed since Melanie’s arrival in his life.

  Skylar’s clothes went flying until she was naked and glowing in his arms, and gathering the long waves of her hair in his fingers, he stroked it over her breasts, wanting her to need him more than her memories.

  * * *

  SKYLAR WAS NO longer sleepy, the grabbing need in her belly fueled by Aaron’s caresses. She tugged his shirt free from his jeans, and he helped pull it over his head. Part of her hoped to see a businessman’s body, going soft from too much deskwork, but the taut planes of his chest were anything but soft.

  “What are you thinking?” he whispered.

  “I’m not.”

  “Not what?”

  “Thinking.”

  She wasn’t. Instinct was taking over, and she undid the waistband of his jeans. His arousal was so hard against the zipper that she eased her fingers inside, teasing and protecting him as she eased the tab downward.

  The harsh hiss of his breath sounded in her ear and she smiled. He kicked the denims away. They were skin to skin and it was both satisfying and arousing. She opened her thighs and felt him probing her slick, hot center...then groaned when he drew away.

  “Damn,” Aaron muttered, reaching toward the floor as if searching for something. A moment later he grabbed his jeans and fished his wallet from the back pocket.

  Of course, a condom.

  Skylar’s passion cooled briefly as she realized how close they’d come to unprotected sex, but before she could say anything, Aaron drew one of her nipples into his mouth, tugging the hard point gently one moment, the next suckling deeply. Heat streaked through her veins, making her forget everything but the need growing at the apex of her thighs, a need that seemed impossible to satisfy.

  His erection was hot against her thigh, then unerringly sliding inside.

  Skylar’s fingers dug into Aaron’s shoulders as he thrust deep. Time lost all meaning as he intensified the rhythm, her hips moving with him urgently. He whispered to her, and she could sense him holding back, waiting for her to climax, and abruptly her body convulsed in a long wave of pleasure.

  A few seconds later he followed her.

  And as Aaron collapsed on the couch next to her, both of them gasping for breath, an errant thought crossed her mind...he really had learned a lot since they were seventeen.

  * * *

  SKYLAR GRADUALLY BECAME aware that it was morning, unable to remember the last time she’d felt so relaxed. The only problem was the fuzzy blanket tickling her nose.

  Hmm, fuzzy what?

  The comforter on her bed wasn’t fuzzy. Reaching up, she flicked at the offending tickle...only to realize that she was cuddled up to a very warm, very naked man. And she was equally naked except for the blanket covering them both.

  Aaron.
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  Memories of the previous night came flooding back, and she raised herself on her elbow, staring at him. The gray light of morning was creeping into the room, and she could tell that he was still peacefully asleep. Dark beard shadow covered his jaw and he was annoyingly attractive, while she must look a fright.

  Skylar touched her hair, remembering how Aaron had undone her braid and played with its heavy length. They’d made love twice, the second time well after midnight. The fire had died down into glowing coals, and she’d opened her eyes to see Aaron bending over the hearth, piling wood onto the grate. She’d planned to go home then, only to have him convince her it was too late...and that there were much more interesting things to do than get dressed and drive across town.

  “Are you regretting last night?” Aaron asked, startling her. He’d awakened and was gazing at her. “Because of your husband?”

  She thought about Jimmie and the happiness they’d shared together, and the guilt she’d felt, being attracted to another man. Yet Jimmie would have said it was absurd. He’d believed in living fully; it was one of the things she had loved about him.

  “No regrets.”

  It was true...and yet still a shock to find herself in bed with Aaron. That is, asleep on a couch.

  Okay, he’d changed, and the changes were very appealing. Her heart was becoming far too involved, but she had to think about her daughter. If Karin had grown up knowing Jimmie wasn’t her biological father it might be all right, but it would be cruel to complicate her grief with belated revelations now. Besides, just because Aaron was determined to have a role in his daughter’s life, it didn’t mean he wanted more than that.

  Skylar’s internal alarm clock told her it was past the time she usually got up and she wiggled upright. The big, comfortable sectional was still a snug fit for two adults, though they’d managed well enough.

  Aaron yawned and put a hand behind his head. “Where are you going?”