by J. M. Madden
But as soon as he stepped inside the room and she opened her arms to wrap herself around him, soggy towel and all, he lost his train of thought. She was a warm, vivacious woman and had no idea what kind of man he was. Why did she welcome him like this?
“I really should go,” he murmured.
“Why?” she asked, nibbling kisses up his neck.
Diego couldn’t come up with a single reason right that second. As her body moved against his he relished just being close to another person like this. With his upbringing, warmth and physical comfort were tantamount to weakness. He’d been raised to be hard, self-sufficient, maybe even a little bit cruel. You had to be to survive the streets where he did.
His mother had been the cruelest of them all. Diego had been a not so pleasant surprise when she was a very young woman, the product of a rape, and he had heard about the trials he had caused her for his entire life. His birth had basically been the insult on top of the injury. The woman seemed to take delight in making his life exceptionally hard. There were times when he wondered if she even cared if he lived or died. Fuck, who was he kidding? She’d told him many times she’d wished he’d never been born. His brother, on the other hand, had apparently arrived at exactly the right time, because she lavished all the love on him she’d reserved from Diego.
So this womanly warmth that Lilly wrapped around him affected him on several different levels. He’d been with women before, but none that he couldn’t walk out on with a nod of thanks. Diego knew it was because he was the one becoming emotionally invested.
The thought shocked him so bad he winced.
“What?” she asked, reaching up to caress his right cheek.
He turned his head away, unable to articulate what was going on in his head and body. “I need to…I need to go, Lilly.”
Diego forced himself to pull away, though it physically pained him to do it. Turning away from her crestfallen face he dropped the robe and began to dress.
“What’s wrong? We were having a great night and you suddenly shut down.”
He shook his head, pulling away from her hand on his elbow. “I just need to go. Lock up behind me.”
Without even being completely fastened he walked out the door. The last glimpse he’d had of the tears in her eyes was almost his undoing but he forced his feet to keep moving. As he rounded the hood of the Jeep he had to cuss himself. And he didn’t stop as he drove down the mountain.
* * *
Lilly looked after Diego’s car taillights in disbelief. What the hell had just happened? They’d been having a fun night until he’d answered the phone. Who had been on there to put such a downer on them?
She walked back into the den where the fire blazed in the hearth and stood before the flames. They’d had fabulous sex. Had she been a little too clingy afterward? Had she said something to make him think she expected more from him? She didn’t think so. She’d tried specifically not to make him feel any kind of pressure. Surely he hadn’t taken offense at her teasing.
Lilly plopped down into the armchair, wondering how the heck she’d gotten so hung up on a guy that couldn’t even be around people. Was that why he’d intrigued her? Was she that much of a glutton for punishment?
Not normally. She’d made her mistakes with men, but none so epic as Diego.
But it didn’t feel like she’d made a mistake. In spite of his walls and prickliness, Lilly was drawn to him. And it had only gotten worse after they’d slept together.
Maybe that was the answer. Maybe being close like that scared him.
If that was the case Lilly would wait a bit and see what happened. Then, if he didn’t come to her, she’d go looking for him.
* * *
Grif stared at the phone in his hand in disbelief.
“What’s wrong?”
Kendall stood in the doorway, basket of laundry in her arms.
“Why are you doing laundry so late? I thought you went to bed?”
Stepping forward he took the heavy load from her.
Kendall sighed. “I was about to but realized Zoe has gone through most of her onesies. And Jameson spilled something sticky on his blankie. I just stole it from his sleeping arms and I feel terrible.”
She leaned up for a kiss and he accommodated her happily, marveling at the way she managed to handle so much. “Well, I’ll do this if you want to go lay down. You have an early Skype-call tomorrow with the Australians and you need to be ready for that.”
She nodded. “So is something up? You had a strange expression on your face.”
Grif debated what to tell her, but decided honesty was probably the best way to go. “Remember you mentioned something about Diego and Lilly getting together several months ago, and I laughed?”
Knowledge sparked in her stunning green eyes, so well photographed through the years. His wife had been a knock-out when she’d been working New York. Hell, she still was. But what made her even more stunning was the brilliant mind under that glorious mess of blond hair.
“What have you not been telling me?” he rasped.
Kendall sighed. “Nothing really. I know Diego checked on her the night of the Gala. I also know that Lilly may have ridden to Salt Lake with Winnie and Diego, and might have had wild, passionate sex with him there.” She grinned and leaned up to press a kiss to his chin. “Haven’t you seen the way Diego watches her? They both have that cow-eyed look to them. It was only a matter of time.”
Grif shook his head. “Cow-eyes? Brian tells us his dating woes but Diego is a hard nut. I didn’t notice anything. Let alone did he say anything.”
Blinking her tired eyes up at him, Kendall gave him a look. “You’ll notice now, though, won’t you?”
The sound of a baby wailing over the monitor on the counter made them both sigh, but Grif nodded his head toward their bedroom. “Go ahead. I’ll check on her and get laundry going. I was going to be up for a while anyway.”
“I love you, Grif. Thank you for being you.”
“I love you too, babe. I’ll try not to wake you when I come to bed.”
She wiggled her fingers over her shoulder and he took the barest second to watch her lovely ass sway down the hallway before he set the basket aside.
Zoe looked up at him with tear-drenched green eyes, her pudgy little hands holding onto the side of her crib. Her dark frizzy hair stuck out in every direction. Grif knew he was a pushover but when she lifted her arms to him when he walked in the room, his heart melted. Bracing his prosthetic under her bottom, he lifted her up into his arms. And immediately felt why she was crying. “No wonder you’re grumpy, soggy-bottom girl.”
Quickly and efficiently he stripped her of the soaked clothes and diaper. It was old hat now. Jameson was the one that tried your patience. He would barely slow down for a diaper change, let alone a clothing change. If he could run around naked every day he would do it.
Zoe, on the other hand, wanted her diaper changed. She seemed to understand that the better she held still the quicker he could clean and change her. Zoe was definitely a princess in training, with all of her attendants just waiting to do her bidding for her.
When he lifted her into his arms the second time, she curled against him. Grif grabbed her favorite blanket from the crib and let her burrow into it as he sat in the rocker. Resting his cheek against her head, murmuring to her that she needed to go to sleep, Grif tried to absorb the moment with his precious little girl. She smelled only of sweetness and baby shampoo from the bath earlier tonight.
If Diego could have a chance at a family like this, in spite of his background, Grif would do everything in his power to help things along.
Chapter Seven
Diego called himself ten kinds of fool. It wasn’t Lilly’s fault he was too scared to even consider a life with her. He was just too fucked up on too many levels.
She’d felt so good, though. And she was completely right; he didn’t break the rules enough. His youth had been an experiment in breaking all rules. Now that he was
older and wiser, he didn’t feel the need to break out of any molds. The Marines had cured him of that.
And the Marines had given him that belonging he’d always craved. When he’d handed in his papers and gone to Lost and Found, they’d done the same for him, but he truly felt like he had a closer connection to the men at LNF than he’d had to those in his own company. It was probably because they all had their own disabilities, but that common ground gave them a secondary connection, besides being former military.
His phone rang in his pocket and he almost didn’t answer it. If it was Lilly he didn’t know what to say to her. Brian was on the other end.
“Hey, Brian. What’s up?”
“I told her. I told her my legs were gone.”
There was shuffling and a clink on the other end of the line. Was he drinking? Shit, if he was drinking, that couldn’t be good.
“I remember. You told me this a couple days ago, remember?”
Diego pulled over into a gas station and shoved the Jeep into park.
Brian didn’t answer for a long time. “She said she didn’t know why I hadn’t told her something so huge and that I obviously didn’t have any trust in her. Which, I guess she’s right,” he sighed. “I mean, if I trusted her I would have told her, right?”
Diego sighed. His buddy sounded sloshed. And obviously he didn’t remember having this same conversation a few days ago.
“Maybe,” he conceded. “That’s a pretty big secret to keep.”
“Shit,” Brian sighed. “What else can I fuck up in my life?”
Diego didn’t think he needed an answer so he didn’t say anything for a minute. “You okay, buddy?”
“Yeah,” Brian said. “Just tired. Tired of fighting everything, you know? Tired of wanting to be accepted, tired of being alone…just so tired.”
Alarm bells began to ring in Diego’s mind. “Hey, how about I come over and commiserate? I just screwed up too. Big time.”
“Really? Yeah, okay. I’ll be here. Hey, pick up a bottle of something, would you?”
Diego didn’t want to take him anything, but he would. “I’ll grab something on the way,” he promised.
When he arrived, six-pack of beer in hand, he had to knock several times before Brian answered the door. For a heartbeat of time, he wondered if Brian had done something drastic. But then he heard footsteps on the other side of the door.
Brian didn’t look too bad, considering he was rehashing the dumping he’d gotten days earlier. A big smile crossed his face when he saw Diego and he waved him in. Diego received a slap on the back and the beer was taken from his hand. Brian wasn’t normally a drinker, so seeing him waver a little as he walked down the hallway was strange. Disconcerting.
Alcohol was one of those things all veterans had to be careful of. When the flashbacks or hallucinations or whatever you had to deal with became too much, it was very tempting to try to drown those voices out with liquor. He’d done it several times himself. But the danger was in drowning those sorrows too much. It became an addiction too easily.
Brian had done this a couple times, luckily only when he’d been dumped. Diego followed him into the living room and dropped down into the chair that he preferred, back to the wall. Brian had picked up the remote to a game console and started shooting terrorists. Diego didn’t like the game—it seemed too real to him—but his buddy did.
“She said it was juvenile to keep something so momentous from her.”
Diego lifted his eyebrows and had to smirk as he looked from the game to Brian. “Where did she get that idea?”
Brian looked at him, then back at the screen and laughed. The light slowly faded from his eyes. “Damn. Maybe she’s right. Here I am twenty-seven years old, playing video games with my buddy.”
Shaking his head, frowning, he shut the game off and took a swig of beer.
“You know, Ortiz, that girl had her shit together. I mean, I could see staying with her for a while.”
Diego raised his brows at that. “Really? Wow.”
Brian nodded, beer resting on his chest as he slumped back against the couch. His eyes had gone drowsy. “She was beautiful. Had that solid, steady, sweet personality. Beautiful hair,” he sighed. “Like spun honey.”
Diego watched Brian drift off to sleep and debated what to do. He could stay for a while, in case he woke up. Pulling his phone from his pocket, he swiped the code and went to the homepage. No messages. After the way he left was he actually expecting her to contact him?
Fingering the screen he tried to think what to say. But nothing came to him. Maybe they both needed to cool off.
Brian didn’t wake up. After an hour of listening to him snore, Diego left the condo, locking the door behind him. Jogging to his Jeep, needing to expel some restless energy, he debated going for a drive, but he had work in the morning. So, he headed to his condo a few blocks away.
Letting himself into the utilitarian space he tossed his keys to the bowl on the end table. Shucking his boots and coat he fell to the couch, pulling his phone out again. Still no messages. As he had known there would be no messages from her. Shit.
He paced the apartment for the better part of an hour before finally withdrawing the phone. I’m sorry, Lilly. I shouldn’t have left like that.
Almost immediately a message popped up.
You’re right. You shouldn’t have.
Diego waited for more—an invitation to come over and talk about it or something—but nothing else came through. Well, at least she had responded. Tomorrow he would contact her and see if he could come over. What he was going to tell her he had no idea.
* * *
Lilly loved the house. It had everything she wanted and more.
Log cabins and chalets were ubiquitous to Vail, but she’d wanted something different. And the female realtor had found it for her.
With a charming, sweeping gabled roof with curled eaves, the house looked more like something you’d see in an English countryside than on a mountain in Colorado. The builders had been from England, she’d learned, and missed the stonework and flavor of their native country. As she wandered through the house looking at the oversized rooms, she knew in her heart it was exactly what she’d wanted. Fireplaces with iron grates, hardwood floors with huge throw rugs, everywhere she looked she found something new and unique to love about the house. The far wall of the basement had been made into a pub complete with oak bar and stools. The rest of the space had been made for entertainment with a TV mounted into the wall, a heavy pool table that Gina told her would come with the house. There was no way the table could be removed because the house had been built around the huge thing. Though not her normal type of hangout, she found she loved the character of it.
The most appealing aspect, though, was upstairs.
It was obvious that a woman had had free rein to design as she’d wanted it. The master bedroom was truly jaw dropping. Thick cream-colored carpet underfoot, a see-through fireplace between the bedroom and bath, heated floor tile in the bath. Lilly couldn’t imagine needing anything else; until the realtor showed her the bookshelf.
“You will love this, Lilly.”
With a gentle nudge Gina pressed on the bookshelf. On silent hinges it folded back to reveal a hidden room. No, she saw with a gasp, a hidden walkway.
“This was added on later. The woman that owned the house before had been crafty, I suppose, because her husband built her this walkway. It crosses over to the garage. The entire second floor has been designed to be a workroom of sorts.”
There was a sitting room on the house side of the walkway, then a carpeted hallway. Lilly gasped yet again when she saw the workroom. Wide and bright with a long table centered in the middle under skylights. The workroom had its own power, plumbing and even a tiny kitchen area in the back corner. A staircase opposite from the kitchen led down to the garage. If she had sat in her chair and designed her own workroom, she couldn’t have done any better. It was absolutely top notch. No, it wasn’t the typic
al Vail cabin, but it more than secured itself as a wealthy getaway.
She could design in here, fabricate, have meetings. Do everything she needed to do to run her business.
Lilly gave an offer for the house on the spot and because it was a bit of a strange fit for Vail and had been on the market so long, the offer was accepted as soon as the realtor called the owner. Within hours, she was the new owner of a house that she could move into immediately.
Lilly walked into her parent’s guesthouse and began to panic, wondering what she needed to do first.
Call Kendall.
She didn’t answer. Damn.
Grabbing a paper and pen she sat down in her cushy chair to make notes. She would need movers, cleaners. The new place had been pristine, of course. She’d have to buy some furniture too. Here at her parents’ house she hadn’t needed anything of her own. Now she did. And she certainly wasn’t shipping it from her apartment in New York. No, she’d have to get all new everything.
That was both thrilling and terrifying.
Luckily for her, she had friends in Vail. And New York.
She sent her buddy Franco an email with pictures of the house attached. Franco was an assistant to an interior designer. He could at least give her some suggestions for color and style. Next she called a moving company. They had an opening in four days. She gave them her name and a deposit.
Then freaked.
* * *
Diego went to Mrs. Markham’s the next day in a pretty dark mood. The woman seemed to sense he was off.
“Who peed in your cheerios?”
In spite of himself he barked out a laugh. “No cheerios today.”
“Maybe that’s your problem,” she informed him archly.
Diego shook his head, unwilling to get into the whys of his mood.
“Lilly didn’t cook your breakfast before you left? I’ll have to talk to that girl.”
Diego cringed. “We didn’t make it to breakfast.”
She paused in slipping on her coat. “You really screwed up, then.”
He nodded and wondered if he dared talk to her about it. Maybe having a woman’s perspective would shed some light on his total confusion.
