Unbroken by Love (The Basin Lake Series Book 4)

by Vercier, Stephanie

  “I know that it sounds horrible,” he says, a few last desperate thoughts surely floating through his head. “But we can work it out… I know there’s a way!” And then he’s pulling me close to him again and trying to bring his lips close enough to touch, but I pull completely out of his grip and slap the hell out of his cheek, my hand catching the rim of his eyeglasses.

  “Leave me the fuck alone!”

  He’s still holding his cheek when I turn to open the door, but he recuperates quickly and is following me as I storm down the hall, my heartbeat nearly exploding. I don’t dare take the elevator and get stuck in what amounts to a small locked room with him, so I run toward the exit sign, push open the door and take the stairs two at a time. Without looking back, I can sense him closing in on me, and this is the first time since I’ve known Shawn that I find myself actually afraid of him.

  Bursting through the door at the bottom of the stairs, I tear through the hall and then run into the parking lot. I could keep going, enough adrenaline pumping through me that I could likely run the several miles it would take to get home. But I don’t want to risk the long, isolated stretch of wheat fields and desert scrub in between here and town with Shawn screaming how he can’t live another day without me and perhaps doing much worse. Skidding to a halt halfway across the parking lot, I yank my phone out and try to decide who I should call, my mother or the police.

  I’ve got the phone halfway to my ear, Shawn closing in, when I turn slightly and see a truck roaring into the lot, moving closer and then stopping right in front of me.

  Garrett?

  “Get in,” Garrett says through his rolled down window, his truck idling in the parking lot and him already opening the door for me.

  I don’t ask what he’s doing here. I’m just grateful that I’ve gotten away from Shawn, grateful to feel safe and secure again.

  CHAPTER TEN

  GARRETT

  Once Kate is safely in my truck, I put it in park and get out, run around the front and step between it and the crazed lunatic who’d been chasing her. “You need to leave her the hell alone,” I tell him with my most menacing voice, using the height and muscle that got me into the NFL as a barrier between him and Kate.

  “This isn’t your concern.” His face is red with anger, his spectacled eyes more focused on the girl now safe in my cab than me.

  “It is my concern when you’re chasing a girl and scaring the living crap out of her.” I cross my arms over my chest and give him the glare I used to give the players on other teams.

  “What is she to you? Because I fucking love her. Can you say the same?”

  He loves her?

  “Well, can you?” he repeats, taking a step toward me, appearing one part hopeless, the other out of his mind. It’s a look I know well, one that was probably plastered on my own face when I’d lost Paige all those years ago.

  I don’t answer at first, just attempt to negotiate what he might do next. I’ve got at least four inches on this guy, maybe five, but he’s determined. I could take him, but he’s fired up enough that he might do a little damage to me too.

  “Just leave her alone, okay?” I instruct. “I want you to turn yourself around and head right back into the hotel. If I catch you coming after her again, I’ll beat the living shit out of you. Got it?”

  He lets out one of those pressured, desperate breaths, one that says he’d probably shoot me if he had a gun, which I’m hoping he doesn’t.

  “I mean it,” I say with continued authority. “Turn around right now so she and I can leave.”

  He grits his teeth—he’s seething. But then he deflates, seems to realize he’s been beaten, and I know now he’s not going to resort to violence. “Fine,” he says. “I don’t know what she is to you, but you might just find yourself disappointed.”

  I could tell him the only disappointment I’d feel about Kate is if she left Basin Lake and never talked to me again, but I stay quiet and stare him down, my arms still crossed over my chest.

  He looks over my shoulder, and I don’t have to turn to realize Kate either doesn’t look at him or is staring him down like she wants to kill him—I can see it all in the way his eyes fall, like his soul is pretty much being crushed. With a shake of his head, he turns around and starts back to the hotel. I don’t take my eyes away from him until he’s inside. Then I take a quick look at Kate and climb back up into the cab.

  I just want to get her out of here, away from that guy, so I don’t say anything until I’ve pulled out of the hotel parking lot.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yes…” she says, her body shrinking next to mine, her eyes focused on the floor of my cab.

  “Do I need to call the cops on him?”

  “No… no… please don’t do that. I just want to leave.”

  I drive slowly toward town and turn down the country music I’d had on pretty loud when I spotted Kate running through the hotel lot. I’m not sure what the odds of me pulling off the freeway exit at just the right time to see a girl I just knew was Kate rushing through the lot, her head and body speeding past cars and toward the road, but I’m just glad I was there.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” More than likely, she doesn’t, but I can’t help myself in offering.

  “You don’t really want to hear about my messed up life, do you?”

  I can pretty much feel the weight of her eyes, and sure enough, she’s looking right at me when I turn to her. “I want to hear about whatever you’re willing to tell me. That guy looked insane, and I’d feel a hell of a lot better if I knew the back story and could keep it from happening again.”

  She laughs, not an amused laugh, but an angry one. “You don’t owe me any protection, Garrett. You don’t owe me one damn thing.”

  “Jesus, Kate, I’m just trying to help. Is it so bad that I might care about your well being?”

  “What were you doing coming to the hotel exactly? Huh? Were you gonna hook up with a girl or something?”

  Damn. If she’s trying to push my buttons, she’s doing a good job of it. “What the hell would make you say something like that? I was picking up parts for my dad’s tractor in Spokane.” I nod back at the bed of my truck, full of some metal cylinders and other engine parts.

  She looks back too and shrinks more than she already is. “Sorry. God, I’m sorry.” She buries her face in her hands and then comes up for air. “You didn’t deserve me saying that. Shawn just got me so angry, and here I am taking it out on you.” She touches her hand to my upper arm, then pulls it back. “Thank you.”

  “It’s okay,” I say, wishing she’d have kept that hand on me. “I just need you to know I’m not anything like this Shawn guy or whatever the hell his name is. Did he hurt you?”

  “Not physically.” She sighs. “But I suppose you could say he’s caused me some emotional pain and more than a few sleepless nights.”

  That crazed lunatic in the parking lot had kept Kate up at night? I got a pretty good look at him, and he doesn’t seem the type she’d go for. Then again, I have no idea the type she goes for. She obviously hasn’t been going for me. “I’m guessing he’s not from around here? Considering you were at the hotel and all.”

  She tucks some strands of hair behind her ear. “No… he was my managing coordinator at HFU, and he happened to be at some regional retreat in Seattle and just decided it was a good idea to come out here even when I told him not to.”

  “He stalking you? I’d be glad to pay him another visit.”

  She shakes her head. “No, please, Garrett. He’s harmless… mostly,” she tags on, as if reassessing him due to his most recent action. “He’s just regretting a decision he made with us, but he knows it’s too late… I think that will be clear to him once he takes the time to think about it.”

  “Kate, he didn’t look very accepting, and—”

  “Please stop, okay? I’m thankful for you stepping in, but I don’t want to discuss him anymore, all right?”

  I don�
�t really want to talk about him more either, so I drop it.

  Not much is said for the rest of the drive. I’m sure I could make small talk with her, but I’m not going out too far on a limb to know that she might just want some quiet time. So, it isn’t until I pull up in front of her house that I finally decide to say something, something I’ve needed to say for a while.

  “This is probably the worst time for me to bring this up, Kate, considering what you just went through with that guy,” I begin, my throat going kind of dry, “but I’ve held my tongue long enough. And if I keep on holding it, I’m not sure there’s ever going to be a right time to say what I need to.”

  She eyes me cautiously, but she’s attentive at least. Her silence allows me to go on.

  “I’ve got feelings for you, Kate… not just some passing interest, but something deeper. And I don’t know what you had with that guy or why you broke up or if you’re totally over him or not, but I need to toss my hat in the ring. I need to let you know that I want more than a friendship with you, even if you shoot me down. I think I’ve learned that if you feel something for someone, it’s better just to tell them, so this is me telling you.”

  I’m out of breath by the time I finish, and it’s only now that I recognize how fast my heart is beating and how my stomach is pretty much twisted up in knots. I’m waiting for her to say something, to say anything, and I guess I can at least be grateful that she’s smiling.

  “I care about you too, Garrett… but I just don’t want either of us to be disappointed.”

  I risk putting my arm around her, and she doesn’t shrink away from me. She actually scoots in a little closer. “How are we going to know if we don’t try? Damn, Kate, I haven’t felt like this about anyone before, not even your sister, okay?”

  She blushes again, and I love seeing her cheeks pink up.

  “Then make me a promise. Promise me that you’ll give me a chance, that if you fall in love with me, that it’s real love, not something that depends on some unrealistic version of who I’m supposed to be.”

  “Of course,” I say, just the fact that she’s giving me a chance at all erasing whatever future doubts I might have about her. And then I lean in, lean close until our foreheads touch. There’s a tightening of my crotch because, damn, Kate smells good, feels good, sounds good. Everything about her is good, but it goes beyond whatever physical need I’ve got for her. There’s more to this girl, and as I press my lips against hers, I can only feel eagerness at what all there may be.

  She kisses me back, lands her hand on my side, and between the kiss and the touch, I’m not going to be able to hide the hard-on that’s about ready to burst out of my jeans.

  My eyes are still closed when she pulls herself away, and my body is still reacting even when she draws her hand back.

  “I’ll see you soon… and thank you,” she says, opening her door and jogging off toward the front porch before I can even get out of the truck and walk her myself.

  She does at least turn around and wave at me this time, and I wave right back. While she’s left me with some yearning, she also just gave me a huge gift, the chance at something more. And with that, I turn the truck around and head back to the farm one damn happy guy.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  GARRETT

  By the time Sunday rolled around and I gave Kate a call, I was a little worried she’d have already changed her mind about giving us a go. She’d been stressed with that Shawn guy chasing her, and then I go and bare my heart to her and expect her to make a rational decision about us. But she’d answered on the second ring, sounded glad to hear from me, and readily agreed to go with me for the inspection on the Murphy farm that was scheduled for Monday morning as long as I made sure to get her to work at Forester’s by three.

  “Thanks for coming with me,” I tell her when we drive up to the farm I’ll own as long as everything falls in line.

  “Of course.” Her smile is radiant, just like the rest of her. “It’s kind of exciting even for me to see this place, so I’m guessing this all has to be really pretty amazing for you.”

  I let out a breath. “Yeah, I’ve got to count my blessings for sure. I always planned on being able to take the family farm over someday with Skyler, but I never imagined I’d have my own.”

  “You’ve earned it,” she says, putting her hand on my much bigger one.

  I’d love nothing more than to pull Kate up to me right now and do more than hold her hand. I’ve been wanting to kiss her, really kiss her, ever since that first kiss on Saturday. I think she needs me to be more patient, though, and even if she didn’t, the inspector has just pulled up in his SUV and is waving at us.

  I run around to the passenger side and open the door for Kate, then meet up with the inspector, a guy out of Spokane who my brother-in-law knows.

  “Chuck Seevers,” he says, shaking my hand.

  “Hey, nice to meet you.” I tell him.

  “And this must be your wife?” he asks before I can introduce Kate properly.

  She just laughs at his assessment, then says, “I’m Kate, Garrett’s friend.”

  I’ve got to admit I’m a little bummed when she says friend instead of girlfriend, but I guess I’m rushing things to think we’d gotten to that stage yet.

  “Sorry about that.” He takes her hand, and I swear the guy blushes. “That’s what I get for assuming.”

  We both tell him it’s not a problem and get started with the inspection. Considering the age of the Murphy house, built in the mid 1930s, I expect there to be plenty of issues, but when Chuck starts pointing out a dozen things just on the front porch, I’m already wondering if it might just be cheaper to raze the place and start from scratch.

  “She’s got good bones,” Chuck tells us after a thorough look through the first floor. “Probably needs to be stripped down to those bones if you’re planning on living here for long enough, but good bones nonetheless.”

  “I agree,” Kate says with a smile, having been listening as intently as I was when Chuck was pointing out cracks in the plaster, leaks in the plumbing and an electrical system that likely hadn’t been updated in fifty years.

  “You think I can make something out of this?” I ask her before we follow Chuck upstairs. I’m a guy who’s used to hard work, whether it had been on the farm or the hours I put in on the field, but I’m not sure I have the vision you need to put a house like this back into a suitable living condition.

  “Of course you can,” she tells me as I wait for her to go ahead of me. “I’ve seen houses get built from scratch, and this one just needs some layers peeled away and some new ones added.”

  “You think you might help me with some of that peeling?” I ask, following her beautiful form as we head up the stairs together.

  “If I can be of help,” she tells me once we reach the second floor landing.

  I take the opportunity to place my hand at the small of her back, just above the curve of her rear, settling on the soft material of the dress she’s wearing, nothing too fancy, but the kind of thing that makes her look right between sophisticated and sweet.

  “I’d appreciate it,” I tell her, appreciate it even more that she doesn’t shy away from my touch.

  The second floor seems to have more problems than the first, but that’s likely due to the fact that it has two bathrooms, both with old claw-foot tubs and a variety of plumbing issues, as well as four bedrooms with windows that Chuck tells us likely won’t keep much heat in during the upcoming winter.

  “If your plan is to live here through the cold months, then you’re going to have to replace the windows and get some kind of heating system. Half of the rooms don’t even appear to have a heat source.”

  “There’s a fireplace in the master,” Kate pipes in. “That would help a little, wouldn’t it?”

  That makes me smile. The deeper Chuck has been getting into the house, the more she’s been asking questions and pointing things out, giving me possible ideas and helping me to vis
ualize what the house could become.

  Chuck laughs at the suggestion, tells us that the chimney will need a cleaning at the very least, if not more involved repairs, but I can picture a roaring fire in the bedroom, can almost picture Kate standing in front of it.

  “I’ll just camp out in the master, then,” I say for her benefit. “People have been keeping warm with nothing more than a wood fire for thousands of years, so why not now?”

  Kate laughs, and Chuck does too.

  It takes several more hours to go through the outbuildings, and I’m so grateful that Kate is along for all of it. If she gets bored at some point, she doesn’t show it.

  “Well, it’s going to be a lengthy report,” Chuck says once we’ve finished looking at everything. “You might ask for the owners to take care of a few pressing things, but the price is pretty reasonable, so I wouldn’t say you were getting fleeced if they refuse. Anyway, I’ll be sending your report, and it was good to meet you both. You’ve got quite an eye there, Kate. Hopefully you’ll help this guy see this place to its full potential.”

  “Hey, if she’s willing, I’m more than happy to let her.”

  “I’ll do my best,” she says, her voice less bold than before.

  “I really do hope you’ll want to be a part of this,” I tell her once Chuck has driven off and we’re left alone on the property, far enough from town that the only sounds come from a distant tractor and some chirping birds.

  “It’s not my farm, Garrett, but I’m willing to lend a hand if you need one.”

  “There any other body parts you’d be willing to lend me?” I put my hands on her hips and pull her closer to me.

  She puts her hands up against my chest, looks right up into my eyes and says, “That’s a little cheesy, don’t you think?”

  “Cheesy? Me?”

  “Yes, you,” she laughs, then pulls away from me and walks across the gravel drive and toward the barn.

  I follow and figure she’s right about the cheesy thing. I wouldn’t have ever dreamed of saying something like that to a girl I was really into until I’d been around a bunch of pro football players where, in the beginning, I’d been labeled as “brooding” by the women who surrounded us. I’d learned to come out of my shell more and just go with the pick-up lines no matter how ridiculous they sounded. It’s sad to say, but a lot of the women I met weren’t really interested in my personality.