by Maisey Yates
And had enabled him to find this.
It was suddenly like he could see every stage of his life at once, from a high vantage point, watch it all coming together in a single, glorious motion.
As if every pitfall, and every step, suddenly made perfect sense.
He had never been a man who believed in fate, but he felt like he was staring at his right now. Luminous, glowing and perfect in the pale moonlight that filtered through the window. He moved his hands to her breasts, cupped her, gloried in her. And then he slid his hands around her back, moving them down, all the way to her ass. He maneuvered her from one side to the other, removing her pajama bottoms and then putting her back just as she was. She leaned forward, pressing a kiss to his chest, down to his abs, her hands working diligently on his belt and tugging his jeans down just enough.
His breath hissed when her slick, wet body made contact with his cock.
She arched her hips forward and back, rolling herself along the ridge of his arousal. Stoking the fire in his stomach that he didn’t think would ever be extinguished.
This was different. This was more than sex. It was Chloe. And it was love. And it reached every part of who he was. From his body down deeper. All the way to his heart.
She was the one who reached for the box of condoms, and she took a packet out slowly, her expression veiled as she clumsily placed the latex over the head of his arousal and squeezed him as she rolled it on slowly, protecting them both. Though it didn’t seem so bad, the thought of having unprotected sex with her. The idea that she might get pregnant. Have his baby.
Those thoughts came fast, hitting him hard, and leaving behind a certainty that overwhelmed him.
He would be fine with that future. More than fine.
With Chloe in his house forever. In his life forever.
And as she positioned herself over him, taking him slowly into her tight, wet body, his desire so great he thought his chest might burst, he held her hips tightly and pushed her down onto him fully, growling with approval as she took him all the way.
She gasped, experimenting with little movements at first, rolling her hips back and forth, establishing a rhythm that pleased them both. Everything she did was magic. Everything she did was bound to please him.
Being in her was like being home. All those feelings of rightness that she’d given him about the ranch, about his future, it was all in her.
It was all Chloe.
Chloe.
He wanted to make it last, but desire was like a hot fist, clamped around his throat, and he couldn’t fight it. It grabbed him, shook him, and threw him over the edge, his release bursting like a bomb in his gut, making him growl as he slammed up inside of her. He felt her own release hit at that moment, a sweet cry of pleasure on her lips as her internal muscles pulsed around him, and then she collapsed against him, her breath hot over his chest, her hair spreading out over his body. And he held her. He was in no hurry to move, but he was going to have to get up and deal with practicality soon.
He didn’t want to. He just wanted to hold her.
He wanted to hold her forever. And he was going to have to figure out exactly what that meant. Exactly what that looked like. Because one night was never going to be enough.
Forever was barely going to be enough.
Tanner Reid had spent most of his life giving no thought to love, and now it was the only thing that mattered.
Because it was Chloe.
Love all on its own was one thing, was for other people.
Loving Chloe was for him. He had never been more certain of anything in all of his life.
“Chloe,” he said, his voice rough.
“What?” she asked, her tone sleepy.
“I was wrong.”
“Well, that’s the first time I’ve ever heard you say that,” she said, moving away from him and rolling to her side of the bed.
“I was wrong about boundaries,” he said.
“Which boundaries?”
“About the ones that mean we can’t be together. About drawing lines around things, and pretending like this never happened.”
“But...” She blinked. “But our family...”
“Can learn to adjust.”
“And what happens if the two of us break up?”
“Well, then everyone would have to deal with that, too. But I’m not planning on breaking up with you.”
“How can you not be? You’ve broken up with every woman you’ve ever been with.”
“But I’ve never loved any of them.”
Those words brought about a crashing silence.
“You’ve never... What?”
“I’ve never loved any of them. I love you.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHLOE THOUGHT SHE was going to have a panic attack. She had been fantasizing about this very thing earlier. That he would tell her that he cared for her. That he would offer her forever.
But suddenly, he was presenting it in front of her like an enticement, and all she wanted to do was run away from it. More than run, she wanted to roll off the bed and hide under it, do something to cover herself, protect herself. Because this was so exposing, so terrifying. This offer of something that sounded a lot like forever.
This answer to the biggest Christmas wish she’d ever had.
She knew how to wish for the unrealistic. The unreasonable.
She knew how to long for things that she could never have. But she really didn’t know how to have them presented to her. Not long-term. One night...a little taste of what she wished for, a chance to build up more fantasies, to store up more dreams—that she could fathom. But this? She had no idea what to do with it. And it terrified her.
“You don’t want that,” she said.
“I don’t?”
“Tanner, you have never shown the slightest bit of interest in me.”
“And you’ve never shown the slightest bit of interest in me, but I know that you were. What we showed each other was not the truth. And what I told myself wasn’t the truth, either. But I had...a revelation, Chloe.”
“During sex?”
“You’re damn right during sex. When I was inside you. It was like I had a sense of myself, really and truly for the first time in my entire life. And I am not the kind of man who says shit like that. Who feels shit like this? I’m not the kind of man that believes in fate, or the one, or this kind of spiritual connection that comes with physical pleasure, but dammit, it’s all there with you. And I believe it. For the first time. I get it. I understand why people go to war for it. I understand why people die for it. I understand why people are willing to change their whole life for it. Because I’m willing to. Whatever the consequence. Whatever happens. I’m willing to do this for you. For me.”
“Why?” she asked, choking. “Why for me?”
“Why not? You are the single greatest force of good in my life, Chloe. You made me the man that I am. I have no doubt about that. I was aimless and drifting until you showed me why ranch work mattered. Until you made me see everything around me with fresh eyes. And you keep doing it. Again, and again. You’ve done it with sex. You’ve done it with this feeling that has taken over my body. It’s like I’m seeing everything for the first time. All because of you.”
“Well I... I’m very honored to have provided you with the revelation, but that’s not any kind of guarantee. Of anything.”
“I’m not asking for a guarantee. But I am asking that we take a chance.”
“I don’t... I don’t want to.” Suddenly she saw it. Her life as she knew it slipping away. Oh, she had imagined for a few heady moments that building a life with him would look like freedom, that it could be everything, but now she could see two sides of it. She could see losing him. Losing her place on the ranch. Her job. Everything that had ever mattered to her.
Bec
ause she would never be enough for him. She never could be.
Her own father had wanted nothing to do with her, why would he?
It would never work. Ever. She might be broken and bruised for a while if she left now, but if she wanted everything and lost it, then she would be so much more than bruised. She would be shattered. And she didn’t think she could handle that.
“We can’t,” she said, her voice hoarse and husky and colored with all the jagged edges that seemed to be rising up inside of her, all her secret fears, all her broken parts. All of the things that she had conveniently been able to ignore for years while her life was set in a comfortable pattern.
Just how terrified she was of losing her security.
How much she feared all the ways in which she might find herself inadequate if she ever really got the opportunity to try. To try for what she really wanted.
“Why not?” he asked.
“For all the many valid reasons we came up with at the inn. For all the reasons that it was valid beforehand. All the reasons that we never acted on these feelings. There were reasons. There were always reasons.”
“And I’ve decided that none of them are as important as what I feel for you. My father spent his entire life trying to learn how to love somebody, and I’m not sure that he ever did it right, but he did try. He spent his life looking for that person. He found it in your mom. We have it now. We don’t have to wait that long. I’m going to try. That’s all I can do. All I can do is try to be the best that I can be. But I will put everything on the line to do it. Everything.”
“No,” she said. “And that’s where you are acting more like your father. He was selfish. And he didn’t consider you. You or Calder or Jackson. The way that he lived his life... It wasn’t for you. I know that he was better later. I do. But that... What if this is actually just that. For you. You justifying what you would be putting our family through because you think it’s going to make you happy. I’m not convinced it will. Not me. Not you. Not anyone else.”
“Why don’t you think it would make you happy?”
“It probably would. For a while. For a while, and then what? Then what? I just...”
“You’re afraid,” he said.
“I’m not afraid,” she said. “I’m being practical. You’ve never had a relationship in your life. Not a real one. And you know that I haven’t. So we aren’t going to take the chance and blow up everything that matters. Everything that made us good, and do that for... For what?”
“On the chance that this could be forever,” he said. “On the chance that it’s love.”
“No,” she said. “It’s... It’s not right...”
“I understand,” he said, his voice rough. “You’re scared. You’re scared because you don’t know what to do when things are going your way. You’re independent, Chloe, and I admire that about you, but I also think it’s because you don’t like to depend on other people. Because you don’t know how. You told me that you like to make wishes you know can’t come true, and I believe it. I believe full well that you don’t want to go after something that you can have. Because if you were to get it, then you have to be able to give back. You have to be able to open yourself up, and admit how much something means to you. And then you might be afraid of losing it. And I think... I think that’s what scares you.”
“It’s easy for you to say. It’s easy. You didn’t live a life like I did. You didn’t live with things being promised to you and then taken away. With not being sure how long a nice apartment might last, before you get thrown out. You can enjoy a nice meal one day and go right back to starving the next, because nothing in this life is certain. And you’re not guaranteed a damn thing. I know that. When your whole life is waiting for the other shoe to drop because it always does, then you’re just always waiting for the inevitable. I’m not going back to that.”
“You think I’m going to drop the other shoe?”
“Yes. And I don’t think you would do it on purpose. But it’s just... There’s too much at stake here. There’s too much to risk. For sex. We can’t.”
“But it’s not too much to risk for love, is it?”
He knew at that point he’d pushed her too far. He knew that she couldn’t follow him there right now, whatever the reason.
Fear. That was the reason. And he understood that.
Because in the end, that was the real reason he had held back from her. Fear.
Fear that he was just his old man. That he was going to disappoint her. That he was going to hurt her. And it wasn’t until he had realized that he loved her, really, that he’d been able to get over that fear. She’d trusted him with so much so far. But this was too much for her, apparently. The end of her trust. It stabbed at him like a knife, but he couldn’t blame her, either. Not really.
He got up and began to get dressed, slowly, methodically. And then he turned toward the door, but he paused before he opened it.
“Be sure of this,” he said. “I’m the Christmas present you can have. Whatever you want, that’s all for you. I swear it. You’re going to have to be brave enough to come to me and ask, though. You’re going to have to trust me. You’re going to have to trust yourself. That we are not our parents. Even the good parts, we are going to handle differently.”
“How are you so confident in that?”
“Because I don’t like the alternative,” he said.
“Well I don’t see any possibility but that.”
“Get back to me when you change your mind,” he said.
He walked out of her room, and the next beat of his heart seemed to break fragments off of it, shocking him with the pain. With the intensity of it. He had never felt like this before. Not even when his mother had left. This intense hopelessness that seemed to drain the strength right out of his body.
He was used to a life he could control. But for so many years, the one thing he couldn’t change were his feelings for Chloe. As it turned out, the most important thing he couldn’t change was her feelings for him.
“Merry Christmas to me,” he muttered, as he went back to his bedroom. Alone.
Facing a future that would be just as lonely.
CHAPTER NINE
CHLOE DIDN’T SLEEP for the whole rest of the night, tears eventually drying and sealing her eyes shut. But still, she was restless. By the time she dragged herself down to breakfast the next morning, she had a feeling that she looked severely compromised. Probably as much as she felt. Thankfully, the boys had all gone out to go shooting somewhere in the snow, and she didn’t have to face Tanner just yet.
She needed the reprieve.
And it made her wonder if what she was doing was insanely stupid.
Because she had rejected everything he offered her to avoid pain, and she wasn’t sure the pain in her chest could ever be matched. Except, that was the problem. It could be. If she decided to start a life with him, and he then decided that it wasn’t working out, then she would be blindsided and devastated. If she trusted it... If she trusted him... Then what would happen when it all crumbled?
You’re so certain that it’s going to crumble?
Yes, she was. Because that was life as she knew it.
That’s not fair. Your mother’s always been there for you.
She ignored the argumentative voice inside of her that seemed bound and determined to encourage her to go forward with Tanner and get herself shattered completely.
“You don’t look like you slept very well,” her mother said, coming into the kitchen and giving her a critical eye.
“Thank you,” Chloe muttered, moving over to the coffeepot and filling up her mug.
“It wasn’t an insult,” her mom said. “I was just commenting.”
“Well, you certainly weren’t saying that I looked pretty,” Chloe pointed out.
“You look unhappy.”
“I just didn’t sleep well. New bed. And all of that.”
“Is that it?” The telling pause before her mother spoke told Chloe that she didn’t believe her at all.
“Yes.” Chloe was committed to her narrative, dammit. “What else could it be?”
“I don’t know,” her mother said. “Maybe what you and Tanner were talking about so intensely last night by the fire.”
“Why would you think we were...talking intensely? We were just talking.”
“If that’s the story that you want to tell, Chloe, I can’t make you tell me anything but that. I was watching the two of you last night. I’ve been watching the two of you for a long time. And I’m not an expert on everything by any means, nor am I a psychic. But I am your mother. And I can certainly tell certain things by watching people’s body language. Anyone can. There’s a way that you are with Jackson and Calder that you’ve never been with Tanner.”
“He’s the oldest,” Chloe said, feeling itchy and uncomfortable. Defensive. “And we’ve spent a lot of time together. It’s just...with me staying at the ranch and how it worked out so that I was in the house even after you left and Jim died.” She was simply staring at Chloe. “I’m not sure what you’re saying.”
“You have feelings for him,” her mother said. “I’ve been aware of that for quite some time, but I’ve never known how to approach it. I tried last night to check in on you and see how things were going. I was hoping that you might confide in me a little bit, but I can see now that you’re not going to. Not about this. I don’t want you stuck there pining after him forever.”
“I’m not... That’s ridiculous,” Chloe said. “It’s ridiculous.”
“Is it?” her mother asked. “He’s a handsome man, and you were older when I married his father. Why wouldn’t you see him for what he is?”
