She was beginning to feel as if she belonged.
And God help her, that was the last thing in the world she wanted to happen.
THE FIRE WAS DYING down. Lily and Aaron had already left. Kate had taken her girls home an hour ago. Lynn Kendall and Tom Baines had dropped by to be congratulated on their engagement, and Mitch had introduced Tessa to the world-famous journalist. Caleb had walked Maggie and Will Leatherman to their truck half an hour earlier, then gone up to bed. Sam was spending the night with Tyler Phillips. Soon he would have a few minutes alone with Tessa, Mitch thought.
Charlie and Beth were still there, but Charlie had already loaded up the chili kettle and started his truck. It was cold and still, and frost was thick on the windshield. Charlie turned up the collar of his coat, glad for its heavy warmth for the first time that season. Beth and Tessa had put away the pickles and cheese and crackers and the last of the pumpkin cookies Ruth and Rachel had sent over, and were talking quietly as they crossed the yard. There was nothing left to do but finish his beer and put out the fire.
“I had a great time tonight, Mitch,” Beth said, coming up behind his lawn chair to rest both hands on his shoulders. “The pumpkin carving was great. When did you start doing that?” Beth had been living in Iowa during the years she and Charlie were divorced. She’d only come back to Riverbend that summer.
“The year before Kara left,” he said. And wished he’d kept his mouth shut. It was a bad habit he’d gotten into, breaking his life into two parts. Before his divorce and after.
Beth squeezed his shoulder, a signal she understood, perhaps better than the other River Rats, what he’d gone through. “Thanks for inviting us. It was like old times tonight,” she said, leaning over to give him a peck on the cheek. “River Rats reunited.”
“Except for Jacob.”
“Yeah.” Beth straightened again. “Where is he?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“Do you suppose he’ll ever come home?”
“He didn’t come home when Abraham died. I doubt he’ll put in an appearance after all these months.”
“What happened with him?”
“I wish I knew.”
Beth turned at the sound of heavy footsteps deliberately shuffling through the fallen leaves. Their dry woody scent lay heavy on the night air. “Ready to go home, Charlie?” she asked.
“Yep.” Charlie wrapped his arms around her and nuzzled her neck. “Got a big day ahead of me tomorrow.”
Mitch stood up as Tessa walked into the circle of light around the dying fire. She had a couple of blankets and an old afghan of his mother’s folded over her arm. He’d brought them out for Kate’s twins, Hannah and Hope, to wrap up in when they complained of the cold. She was smiling at Charlie and Beth, but the smile was pensive and didn’t light her blue eyes.
“Good night, Tessa,” Beth said. “Call me for lunch next week, okay?”
“I…I’ll do my best. We’ve been very busy at the store.”
If Beth heard the reluctance Mitch detected in Tessa’s voice, she ignored it. “Great. I’ll look forward to it. C’mon, Charlie. It’s time to get you home to bed. You need your beauty sleep.”
“It’s not beauty sleep I need,” Charlie said with a wolfish grin.
Mitch rose from his chair. “The chili was magnifico, as always, buddy.”
“Yes,” Tessa seconded. “It was delicious.”
“I’m saving the five-alarm batch for Superbowl Sunday.”
“C’mon, Charlie, I’m freezing,” Beth prompted.
“Your wish is my command,” he teased, and they headed off down the walk.
Tessa watched in silence as his friends drove away. Mitch put his empty beer bottle in the cooler beside his chair and picked up a bucket of water to douse the fire. “Thanks for your help tonight,” he said when the silence had stretched out too long.
“I enjoyed it. I’ve never done anything like that before. Whatever made you think of such a thing?”
Mitch shrugged. “It just grew like Topsy. The first year it was Sam and a few friends. Then a few more. We started having it at the store a few years ago. I’ve been growing pumpkins out front that long, too. Any kid who doesn’t have a pumpkin when he gets there can pick one out of the patch. The doughnuts and cider don’t cost much, and the store gets some free publicity.”
“I don’t think that’s why you do it.”
He poured more water on the fire, let the snap and sizzle of steam hitting the hot coals delay his answer. He watched the smoke eddy into the branches and the stubbornly clinging brown leaves of the big oak that had dominated the yard ever since the house was new. She was right. He didn’t do it for the free publicity. The doughnuts and cider and overtime for his employees, which Tessa wouldn’t know about until she got her paycheck, cost far more than an ad in the Courier or airtime on WRBN.
She answered for herself. “You do it because this town means a lot to you.”
“My roots are here, Tessa,” he said, watching the steam rise off the darkened logs.
“And your heart.”
He nodded, poking at the dying embers with a stick, moving them apart. The smell of wood smoke was strong in the frosty air, the night suddenly very dark as his eyes reacted to the loss of the firelight. “I belong here,” he said simply.
“And I don’t.” Her words were so soft he could barely hear them, but they cut deeply into his soul with a sense of loss that was sharper than a knife.
He went to her and took the blankets from her arms, dropped them onto the seat of his chair and took both her hands in his. “You could belong here, Tessa. You’re already starting to put down roots and you know it.”
“No.” There was real panic in her voice. He ignored it.
“You felt it tonight, maybe even before. But tonight I could see it in your eyes, I could hear it in your laughter. You’re forming a connection to this place and these people.”
“Mitch, don’t. I can’t—” He could see tears forming in her eyes as his vision adjusted.
“Shh, Tessa. Don’t say anything. Let me do the talking.” Tugging her with him into the dense shadow of the old oak, he leaned his back against the rough bark of the trunk and lowered his mouth to hers. “Better yet, let’s not talk at all.” He kissed her, long and slow and thoroughly, the way he’d wanted to since almost the first day they’d met.
He angled his hips to bring her close without putting pressure on the baby. She resisted him for a moment, then molded herself against him. He untied the belt of his mother’s old coat and slid his arms around her. She pressed herself closer. Her breasts were lush and full and his body responded instantly.
“God, Tessa. I knew kissing you was going to be the best thing that ever happened to me.” He wanted to tell her so much more. That he had longed to hold her this way for days. That he wanted so much more—her body, yes, but her heart and soul, as well. But all he could do now was learn the taste and scent and feel of her. “Kiss me back.”
Her mouth opened under his, and she kissed him back, longingly, hungrily. He bracketed her face with his hands and held her still, afraid the kiss would end too soon. She made a sound deep in her throat, and he felt her hands on his hips, holding him lightly, then more boldly as the kiss grew more intimate.
Flame erupted around him as though the fire had come back to life. The half-formed, half-denied longings of the past two weeks fused together like glass forming from sand and fire. This was the woman he was meant to be with. This was the partner he wanted to go through life with. No matter what the difficulties, no matter what obstacles she threw in his way, he would make her his.
“I love you, Tessa,” he said, barely breaking the contact of their mouths to say the words.
She went very still in his arms, then laid her head against his chest. He could feel her trembling against him and turned her a little so that he could tighten his embrace without causing her distress. God, I shouldn’t have said that. Not out of the
blue that way. Not so soon. But it was the truth, and he couldn’t keep it in his heart any longer.
“You can’t mean that, Mitch.” The night was quiet. It was late. Only the barking of a dog across the river and the slow roll of a car going by on River Road broke the silence, but still he had to tip his head to hear her words.
“I love you, Tessa,” he repeated so that there could be no mistake.
She lifted her head and a stray beam of moonlight caught the sheen of tears in her eyes. “I don’t believe in love at first sight.”
“I do,” he said, and he meant it.
“I’m pregnant,” she said, pushing against his chest with her hands. He released her but caught her cold hands between his when she would have turned away.
“I noticed.”
“I’m pregnant with another man’s child.”
“Do you still love him?”
She dropped her gaze for a moment, then lifted her eyes to his. “No, God help me. I don’t love him. But I thought I did.”
“And you’re not in love with me.” He shouldn’t be pushing her this way. He should sweep her into his arms and take her to her bed in the boathouse and make love to her until she couldn’t think or analyze her feelings. He wanted her to feel his love and his willingness to make a commitment to her and her child.
“I don’t know. I…” She moved swiftly to free her hands from his. She took two steps away. “I have my baby’s welfare to think of.”
“I love children, Tessa.”
She closed her eyes, not so much shutting him out as shutting herself inside. “I don’t want to be hurt again.”
“You won’t be, Tessa. I promise you.”
CHAPTER TEN
TESSA WAS SHIVERING like the oak leaves overhead. She couldn’t seem to stop. She laid her head against Mitch’s chest, heard the fast steady drumming of his heart. His coat smelled of wood smoke and sawdust and apple juice. Hannah McMann had spilled a cupful of it on him when she’d run full tilt into him, giggling that she and her sister were being chased by “monsters.” The monsters were Sam and his friend Tyler.
Mitch had only smiled and wiped away the stain with a paper napkin, sending Hannah on her way with a hug, and cautioning Sam and his pal not to get the little girls too excited so close to bedtime. He was a such a good man. A good father, as different from Brian—her baby’s father—as night from day. She choked back a tiny sob.
He loved her. He had said it not once, but twice. And if he loved her, he would love her baby, too.
If he really loved her, that was, and didn’t just feel obligation meshed with sexual desire.
That had to be what it was. Obligation, honor, integrity. A man like Mitch would honor those impulses, might even confuse them with love.
He felt her trembling in his arms and pulled her closer against him. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m fine.” She didn’t sound fine and she knew it.
“It’s freezing out here. Let’s get you inside.” She made no protest as he turned her toward the boathouse. Once inside the apartment he led her to the sofa, and when she was seated he turned up the thermostat. Almost immediately she could feel warmth return to the room. “You shouldn’t let it get so cold in here,” he said, his voice raspy. He didn’t come back to the sofa, but remained on the far side of the room.
“I don’t like to waste electricity when I’m not going to be here.”
“It doesn’t cost that much to heat the place. I insulated it damned good.” He raked his hand through his hair and turned back to the couch. In the blink of an eye, he closed the small distance between them. “Tessa, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said what I did out there. Just forget it.”
She felt small and helpless sitting while he stood over her. For a moment she let herself wonder what it would feel like to be able to lean on him for comfort and support, not to have to take on all her dragons by herself. It was too tempting a fantasy to indulge. She stood up so that she only had to lift her head slightly to meet his gaze. “We can’t just forget it.”
He made a noise deep in his throat, a low feral growl. “Okay, then let’s say I had one too many beers.”
“I only saw you drink two the whole evening.”
He pulled her back into his arms. “God, Tessa. You’re not going to make this easy, are you? I know you weren’t ready to hear me say I love you. But I did say it, and there’s no taking it back.”
“You can take it back,” she said softly. “I’ll understand.” Tears still pricked behind her eyelids. She wanted so desperately to say she loved him, too, but her insecurities prevented the words from forming.
“It doesn’t work that way.” He kissed her again, hungrily, passionately, telling her even more plainly than words how much he wanted her.
Tessa felt breathless and a little dizzy. She hadn’t felt particularly sexual during her pregnancy. Brian hadn’t seemed to enjoy making love to her once she started to show. By then she was already growing apart from him and almost welcomed his indifference. But there was no indifference in Mitch’s kiss or his embrace. He wanted her. His erection was hard and hot against her thigh. And she wanted him. At least her heart and body did, though her brain refused to surrender.
That stubborn, scared, uncertain part of her made her lift her arms and push against his chest, separating them a fraction of an inch, then a little more. “I’m not ready for this, Mitch,” she said truthfully. “I can’t think straight when you kiss me like that. And I don’t believe you’re thinking straight, either.”
“Don’t think, Tessa. Just feel,” he said roughly, but he made no move to pull her back into his embrace.
“No.” She shook her head, seeing the movement reflected in the darkness of his eyes. “That’s what got me where I am today.”
“Here with me,” he said softly.
She took a deep breath. “Here with you. Pregnant. Unmarried. Nearly penniless. Mitch, don’t you understand? I thought I loved Brian and I was terribly wrong. Now—” She stopped abruptly and turned away, walked to the window to look out at the black ribbon of water scattered with starshine. She’d been about to say, Here I am, falling in love with you.
But she could not. She dared not say it aloud, because this was how she’d felt at the beginning with Brian.
Mitch came up behind her and put his arm around her, just above where the baby lay sleeping beneath her heart. “There’s nothing wrong with falling in love at first sight, Tessa.”
“There is if it doesn’t last.” Unshed tears blurred her words. “If it wasn’t really love in the first place.”
“You couldn’t know it wouldn’t last.”
“I don’t want to go through that again.”
“Neither do I. This time it will be for keeps. I promise you.”
She twisted away from his embrace and immediately felt the chill of her aloneness. Instead of throwing herself back into his arms, she forced herself to move another step away. “I’m not ready for any kind of commitment, Mitch. I have my baby to think about. And you have Sam. Have you considered him in all this?”
“Yes,” he said. The light from the small lamp barely reached this end of the room. Mitch’s face was in shadow, but she thought he sounded slightly less sure of himself than before.
“What if he doesn’t want me?”
“He’ll come to love you just as I have, Tessa.”
“Perhaps.” She wished with all her heart she could believe that. “But what if I can’t be the kind of mother he needs?”
“You’ve been great with him so far.”
“As an acquaintance. Maybe even a friend. But not as a mother.” She couldn’t bring herself to say stepmother. She would love Sam as her own if she dared.
“You’re going to be a wonderful mother, Tessa.” There was no uncertainty in his voice this time. His rock-solid conviction brought fresh tears to her eyes, but she blinked them back, just like the others.
“I need time, Mitch. And we don’t have time.
”
He reached out and took her hand, moving a little closer, yet still allowing her the space she both wanted and needed. “Give me that time, Tessa, if you don’t feel you can give me your heart. I can wait for you to say you love me. I can wait until you have as much faith in yourself as a woman and a wife—and mother—as I have. But I can’t let you walk out of my life.”
“Mitch…” He was going to ask her to stay in Riverbend. Oh, God, how could she deny him that when it was what she herself so wanted?
“Promise me you’ll stay in town. At least until after the baby is born and you’re strong enough to travel.”
“No strings attached?” She steeled herself against the treacherous familiar longing to belong to this place and this man. The baby had been sleeping until that very moment. Now she came awake and moved strongly, adding her insistence to the clamoring of Tessa’s heart.
She watched Mitch’s jaw set, felt his muscles tense. His hands squeezed hers, reflexively, painfully, and then he let her go. He nodded. “No strings attached.”
Her joy was bittersweet. She would be able to stay here in her cozy little boathouse apartment. Annie Stevens would deliver her baby. She wouldn’t have to impose on Callie and complicate her complicated life even more. But she would have to do it all without Mitch at her side.
“I need time, Mitch,” she said, praying he would understand what she barely understood herself.
“You can have all the time you need.”
She wondered how long that would be. Could she ever truly trust her heart again? How could she? With Brian she hadn’t known the difference between infatuation and love. With Mitch she was very afraid she wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between love and gratitude. Not on her part, but on his. Mitch was a white knight, a man of integrity, and she was the closest thing there was to a damsel in distress in Riverbend, Indiana.
Maybe his heart was as unreliable as hers. After all, he was divorced. He’d failed at love just as she had. He needed time as much as she did, even if he didn’t think so now. She was going to have to be strong and unwavering for both their sakes. Because if she risked falling in love—and lost—a second time, she knew it would truly break her heart.
Last-Minute Marriage Page 13
