by Noelle Adams
He’d drawn her. Her. Sitting at his table, leaning over a drawing she was working on, her hair falling over her shoulders, the lines of her face and neck much more sensual than they were in real life.
She looked pretty. More than pretty. She looked deep, full of something rich and warm. She looked like herself but also more than herself.
She couldn’t believe that this was how Kent saw her.
“This is... amazing,” she managed to say. She was breathless, and her cheeks were hotly flushed. There was no reason for it, but her heart was racing.
Kent didn’t answer. He was still staring down at her drawing.
“Kent?”
“You... drew me.”
“Yeah. I did. Just like you drew me.” She tried a casual smile but wasn’t sure she was very successful. “Nothing else to look at right now.”
“Oh. I guess so. This is fantastic. I’m not really...” He cleared his throat and evidently changed his mind about what he was going to say. He raised his eyes to meet hers. “This is how you see me?”
“Well, yeah.” She suddenly wondered if he saw in the drawing the same thing she’d seen in his—something more than who he thought he was.
Had she revealed more than she’d known in the lines of that sketch?
She wondered what it was.
“I’ve never drawn a beard before. It was harder than I thought.” She was pleased that her voice sounded almost normal.
“Oh. Yeah.” He was staring down at the drawing again. “Can I... can I keep this?”
“Sure. Sure, you can. As long as I can keep this one.”
“You want it?”
“Of course I do. It’s amazing. I didn’t know... I didn’t know anyone saw me this way.”
He took a strange little breath and didn’t meet her eyes. “I do.”
She had no idea what to say to that, and it felt safer not to say anything. So instead she stood up. “Well, it’s still early, but there’s nothing else to do and there’s no way I’m getting out of here until tomorrow, so I might just go to bed if that’s okay.”
“Oh. Of course.”
“I’ll sleep on the couch.”
He finally seemed to have recovered from his distraction over the drawing. He scowled at her. “You will not sleep on the couch. I’ll sleep on the couch. You’ll sleep on the bed.”
“But—”
“But nothing. What kind of guy do you think I am? I’ve got some clean sheets to put on. I’m not going to let you sleep on the couch.”
She started to argue but gave up when she saw he was wearing his stubborn face. If he wanted to give her the bed, she wasn’t going to complain. The couch was big enough he’d probably be fine on it for one night.
Together, they remade the bed with clean sheets, and then she went to the bathroom, brushed her teeth with the toothbrush she kept in her bag, washed her face, and brushed out her hair. She stared at herself in the mirror. She was still wearing the huge sweatshirt, and it was getting hot now since the woodstove was heating up the room so well. So she took the sweatshirt off.
There. She looked ridiculous in the long T-shirt and rolled-up flannel pants, but that was fine.
If Kent was interested in her body, it was only because her body was convenient. She didn’t want to be merely a way for him to relieve pent-up tension. She would hate that, and it wouldn’t be good for either of them.
So it was just as well her body was safely hidden away beneath the baggy clothes.
When she came out of the bathroom, Kent was putting more wood in the stove. “I’m going to grab a water,” she said.
“Sure.” He’d put the sheets they’d taken off the bed on the couch. It looked like he’d be comfortable enough. “Grab one for me if you don’t mind.”
She did, setting his on the table and taking hers over to the nightstand. She felt a little awkward as she climbed into bed while he was standing not very far away.
“I’m going to take a quick shower before bed. When I come out, I’ll blow out the candles.”
“Sounds good.”
She listened to the sounds of him in the bathroom until she started to feel a little strange about it and turned over and tried not to hear.
He was in the shower for longer than she’d expected. She wondered what he was doing in there for so long, but then she decided she was probably better off not knowing.
When he finally came out, the smell of soap wafted out toward her. It felt strangely intimate.
“Did you have any hot water?” she asked as he blew out the candles.
“A little. It was lukewarm.”
“Oh, sorry! I forgot about my clothes in there drying out.” She couldn’t help but wonder what he’d thought about finding her underwear hanging in the shower.
“It’s fine. I moved ’em.”
“Okay. Thanks.” She rolled over, hardly believing she was going to sleep in the same room as Kent Matheson. “Good night.”
“Good night, Penny.”
She listened as he walked over, lowered himself to the couch, stretched out, and covered himself up.
Occasionally she could hear him breathe.
Six
KENT HAD TO JERK OFF twice in the shower before he was in a fit state to come out into the main room of the cabin.
If it had just been a physical urge, he was sure he could have handled it without too much trouble. But it could never be simple physicality with Penny.
She knew him—maybe better than anyone else. And he knew her and all her sweetness and warmth and creativity and generosity. That drawing she’d made of him had blown him away because it had turned him into someone else, someone she cared about, someone she admired. The feeling was obvious in the lines of the sketch, and he’d been so moved by it that he’d had trouble speaking for a long time after he’d seen it.
He still wasn’t sure what he might do if he got close enough to Penny to touch her.
So he’d thought it was smart to take a shower. But then he’d opened the door to find her underwear hanging right there—the red bra that he’d seen earlier when her neckline had drooped. The lace had molded over the full roundness of her lush breasts in a way that wasn’t good for him to remember. The sight of her bra had reminded him of how it had looked when she was wearing it, and there was underwear to match, which meant she wasn’t wearing anything under those flannel pants.
He moved her clothes from the shower. He had no choice if he wanted to turn on the water.
He was so aroused he’d come about thirty seconds after stepping in the shower, and then he’d stood there trying to relax and had ended up getting hard again so he’d had to get himself off one more time. Trying—and failing—not to think of her.
When he came out of the bathroom at last, he was hopeful he could make it through the night without asking Penny if she’d let him screw her senseless.
He stretched out onto the couch and tried not to think about Penny in his bed, soft and warm and curvy and very female.
In his bed.
His body was interested in that fact, but he forced the image of her out of his mind.
They’d both been lying in silence for about five minutes when Penny said into the dark, “You remember that night we fell asleep on the couch?”
He knew immediately what night she was talking about. They’d been hanging out on a Friday evening when he’d been fourteen. They’d painted for a while, and then they’d watched a movie on the couch in the sunroom. It was late after the movie was done, and he hadn’t wanted to go home and find out how much his father had been drinking.
So he hadn’t gotten up to leave. Penny hadn’t made him leave, as if she understood his reluctance. And eventually they’d both fallen asleep until Penny’s father had discovered them sleeping after midnight.
“Your dad was so mad when he found us,” Kent said with a kind of fond nostalgia. “He thought we’d been up to something naughty.”
“Well, you were kind of sleeping o
n top of me.”
“I wasn’t really. I might have leaned over toward you in my sleep.”
“Your head was on my butt!”
He chuckled. He’d been genuinely asleep and then so surprised by her dad’s angry voice that he hadn’t even been able to process what it felt like to sleep on top of her that way.
He’d been fourteen.
So young.
“Well, it was an accident, as I tried to explain to your dad.”
“I think he was mostly mad because he’d always assumed Olivia would be the naughty one. Boys never really liked me.”
“That’s not true. Everyone liked you.”
“Well, yeah. In a way. But guys never liked me the way I wanted them to like me. You know, I’ve only had two boyfriends in my whole life.”
“What? You’re joking.”
“No, I’m not joking. Why do you make it sound so unnatural? A lot of women don’t have a huge number of boyfriends. I promise I’m not some sort of naïve virgin. I have plenty of experience with men. There just haven’t been... huge numbers of them who’ve been interested in me romantically.”
That made no sense at all to Kent. It seemed to him like every man in the world should have been in love with her.
But he could tell she was speaking the truth, and he needed to answer the slight edge of insecurity he heard in her tone. “Well, men are stupid most of the time. If any of them really took a look at you, then they’d be moving heaven and earth to get you into bed.”
There was a strange, tense silence from the other side of the dark room, and Kent wondered if he’d said too much.
Then Penny said, “Thanks.”
He didn’t know what to say after that, so he didn’t say anything.
It was a long time before he went to sleep.
IT WAS STILL DARK WHEN he woke up. Too dark to be morning yet.
He had no idea why he’d awakened or why he was cramped on his side on the couch until he heard a noise across the room and remembered Penny was here.
He sat up and blinked over in her direction, discovering she wasn’t in bed. She was sitting down at the table. She’d lit a candle, so her body was illuminated in the otherwise dark room.
“You okay?” he asked.
She jerked like he’d startled her. “Yeah. Sorry to wake you up.”
“You didn’t.”
“You think I believe that? You woke up right when I’m in the middle of getting a snack?”
“You’re getting a snack?’ He stood up and stretched his back. The couch could have been worse, but it definitely wasn’t like sleeping on a bed.
“Yeah. I was hungry. I don’t know why since I don’t usually eat in the middle of the night. Sorry to wake you up. And sorry for raiding your cupboard.”
He came over to see that she’d gotten peanut butter and graham crackers and had made a mug of hot chocolate.
Deciding that sounded pretty good to him, he made his own cup and then sat down beside her and reached for the crackers.
“You’re eating too?” she asked, looking pleased at that fact.
“Sure. Why not?” He spread peanut butter on a cracker with the knife she’d left in the jar and then took a big bite. “You couldn’t sleep?”
“I slept for a while. Then I just woke up and couldn’t go back to sleep. I guess that’s why I got hungry. It does look like it’s finally stopped snowing out there.”
Kent had completely forgotten about the snow. He stood up, still chewing a bite of cracker, and went to peer out the window. It was so dark he couldn’t see much, but there didn’t appear to be snow falling down in the few inches he could see out.
He’d put on another pair of flannel pants and a clean T-shirt after his shower, and now it felt like his pants were riding low, so he hiked them up. When he turned around, Penny turned away, as if she’d been watching him.
He wondered what she was thinking.
He wondered if she still thought he was an asshole for how he’d been rude to her, for how he’d behaved for the past several years.
Shit, it was a wonder she didn’t hate him.
Penny had never been one to hold a grudge, but he didn’t deserve for her to act like nothing had ever come between them.
He wanted to explain. He wanted her to understand.
He sat back down at the table across from her and blurted out, “I was nineteen.”
He’d obviously taken her by surprise. She was listening to him but not following his train of thought.
“What happened,” he explained. “What happened to make me... pull away. I was nineteen.”
She was frowning now, obviously thinking through what he said. “I know you left home when you were nineteen, but you didn’t become a hermit then.”
“I know. But that night was when it started. I was nineteen. I was living at home still so I could keep an eye on Phil and Scott. I didn’t like to leave them alone with Dad.”
“Your dad never... he never hit them, did he?”
His father hadn’t always been a bastard, but he’d gotten worse every year. That was why no one had believed him when he’d accused Jed Holiday of lying and cheating. Jed Holiday was supposed to be a good man, and Kent’s father wasn’t.
“No,” he said. “He never hit them. And he never hit me until that night.”
“He hit you?”
“He punched me. We were in a fight because he’d come home drunk again, and I was just so tired of it. So we got in a fight, and I got in his face, and he... hit me.”
Penny’s face was twisted in something between horror and sympathy. “I’m so sorry, Kent.”
He shrugged. “It’s not... It’s just one of those things. I was nineteen. I wasn’t a helpless kid. He got so mad he couldn’t control himself. I can... I can kind of understand.”
“He was your dad, Kent. He should have done better by you.”
“I know. He sucked as a father. But that wasn’t the worst thing. The worst thing was, that night, I almost hit him back.”
Penny gazed at him with her wide blue eyes and didn’t say anything.
“I was so close. I was bigger than him by then. I’ve always been bigger than everyone. I’ve learned never to... never to lash out physically. But that night I almost hit him back. I would have hurt him. And it just... scared me.”
He couldn’t believe he was telling her this. He’d never told anyone. Scott had been out that evening—he’d been working on a local farm and had often kept late hours—but Phil had been home when it happened.
Phil had been fifteen, and he’d been home.
“Kent, I think that must have been natural,” Penny said softly. “To be angry with your dad. To want to hit him back.”
“I didn’t just want to hit him. I almost did. My own dad.” He shook his head, still feeling sick at the memory. “So I left home. That’s why I left home. I couldn’t stay and just wait for the day when I lost control. I would have left town for good, but I was still worried about Scott and Phil, so I rented this cabin. And eventually Scott went off to college and grew up. And Phil grew up and left home. And everything fell apart between our families. And no one needed me anymore. When I finished college, I got a job I could do from home, and it seemed safer to just keep to myself. It was never a conscious choice. Like I said, I’m not totally cut off from people. I go into Charlottesville some, and I used to go quite a bit. It just felt safer to stay away from people who knew my dad, who... who made me think about him. My life seemed to confirm that I can’t do relationships. Not good ones. So I didn’t... even try.”
“Oh, Kent.” Her voice was gentle, almost tender. “You know that’s not true, right?”
“What?”
“You can do relationships. You were friends with me for eighteen years, and you never let me down.”
For no good reason emotion caught in his throat at that. “Not eighteen years. We weren’t friends when you were in the cradle.”
“Pretty much. I remembered havi
ng that contest over who could draw the better dog when I was like four years old. We were friends for all those years. You can do relationships.”
“That’s only because I pulled away before I had a chance to mess our friendship up.”
“You can keep telling yourself that if you want, but I know it’s not true.”
She was so beautiful in the candlelight, with her eyes deep and her lashes thick and her lips curved sensuously that Kent had to fight a wave of arousal that almost matched the power of the clench in his heart.
“I think it is,” he said thickly.
“And I know it’s not. You’ve always been a good friend to me until you decided that you didn’t want to be.”
“I did want to be. I just didn’t want to mess it up. And don’t tell me I wouldn’t have eventually ruined it because I’m about to ruin whatever’s left between us right now.”
She blinked. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I’m about to kiss you, and what would that do to our friendship?”
He wished he was better at guarding his words, hiding his feelings, but he’d never been good at that like Scott and Phil were. He was almost as bad at it as Penny.
Penny’s voice was hoarse now. “You’re about to...”
“Kiss you.”
Her cheeks flushed in the flickering light, and she met his gaze in something like a challenge. “Then why don’t you?”
“Why don’t I what?”
“Kiss me. What the heck do you think we were talking about?”
“You want me to kiss you?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Because we’re friends.”
“And that means I’ll never want to kiss you?”
He was breathless now for a different reason. Things were happening so fast he couldn’t keep up. “You want me to...”
“Kiss me.” She swallowed down the last of her hot chocolate. “If that’s what you want. If it’s no good, then we won’t do it again.”
He stared at her, breathing heavily until he couldn’t hold back anymore.
She was asking him to kiss her, and everything about her was kissable.
