Her teeth teased her bottom lip for a second before she pulled away from my side, her hand easily slipping into mine to bring me with her as she moved closer to the dozen or so blankets still left after the weekend.
I nodded at the seller when he waved, recognition lighting his age-lined face, then studied Rae as she let her free hand run over the soft material.
The seller had a few different types, from faux fur to coral fleece to Sherpa. Materials of blankets you could find in a store, but you couldn’t find his quality or sizes.
“Remember what I said about only having what could fit in my car?” Rae asked, her voice hushed and with a hint of a tease. When I nodded, she moved on to a different blanket, a secret smile pulling at her lips. “There’s a good portion of my car that is reserved for blankets.”
“There’s a thing called sheets, Rae.” A grunt forced from me when she jammed her elbow into my stomach, but I continued on. “Small, easier to travel with.”
“I have sheets, you ass.” She looked at me long enough to roll her eyes before her focus went back to the blankets. “But blankets . . . I love the feeling of curling up with one and letting it comfort and relax me. You can never have enough blankets,” she finished on a satisfied sigh.
God, she was fucking adorable.
“Understood.” I squeezed her hand before releasing it, then walked around to the seller.
“I like her,” he said with a hoarse laugh as he fixed his Stetson.
I didn’t even try to fight the smile that time. “Ah, yeah, she’s something else.” I watched as she went back and forth between two completely different blankets, as she had been since we walked up, then pulled out my wallet. “How much for those two?”
The man shrugged. “Forty.”
A huff left me. “No. Both of them.”
He just gave me a look as if he didn’t know what the problem was. “You and your friends always give the old lady and me business, and with the way your girl talks, you’ll be giving us more business in the future.”
Just like that, my smile slipped. Before I could let his words sink in and remind me why I should pull far away from Rae and go find another random girl to fuck who meant nothing, I cleared my throat and spoke even softer than before. “I can’t promise anything with her.”
“Well . . . I still like her. Forty.”
“All right, well I appreciate it.” I pulled out sixty and handed it to him, then moved away when he tried to hand one of the twenties back.
“I’ll remember that,” he called out.
With a grin and a tilt of my head in his direction, I picked up the blankets and handed one of them to Rae. Once it was in her hands, I placed my free hand on the small of her back and turned her away to leave.
“Wait, what?” Her wide stare darted between the blankets, me, and the seller. “I don’t—we can’t—I’m only getting one—I need to pay,” she stammered.
“Then I’ll take the other, and we already paid,” I assured her.
“Sawyer, no. No, I can pay for this. I’m going—”
I cupped her cheek and swept my thumb across her lips, and nearly forgot about the blankets and the people and that steel wall she’d placed between us when she sucked in a quick breath and then darted her tongue out to wet the place my thumb had just been.
My fingers instinctively curled against her cheek and brought her a fraction closer.
A rumble worked deep in my chest.
And it took every ounce of willpower not to show her exactly what she was doing to me.
“I got it, Rae,” I said, my voice rough. “Let me do this for you.”
A moment later, she nodded. After another few seconds, she turned from my hold and looked to the seller to call out, “I love your blankets.”
The man laughed and lifted a hand in thanks, then looked to me. “I like her.”
I do too.
I let my hand fall to the small of Rae’s back again, and led her through the crowd and out into the lot. Neither of us spoke as we wound through the people and cars, or as I helped her into the truck. By the time I was climbing inside, she was carefully taking the jars of honey from her purse and setting them in the cupholders, her eyes following her movements with rapt attention.
And for the first time since we’d started our trek back here, the silence felt thick and weighted. It felt like that moment before you fall—safe landing on one side . . . fatal abyss on the other. I just wasn’t sure which way we would go.
When she unfolded one of the blankets and snuggled under it, her head gently falling to rest against the window with a soft, discontented sigh, I bit back a curse and reversed out of the spot.
The day played out in my mind in flashes of her touch and pieces of our conversations as I navigated out of the lot and onto the highway. With everything we’d talked about—shit, with half of the things I’d said to her since first meeting her—I could have expected this reaction from a woman as flighty as Rae.
But for her to pull away and shut down because I’d bought her a blanket?
I let my elbow fall to where the door and window met and rested my head against my fist as I told myself this was for the best.
It had to be.
“Everyone left,” Rae whispered, the words so damn soft I barely heard her over the sound of my truck on the road.
I snuck a glance at her, confusion pulling my brows close. “What?”
“You asked what happened . . .” She pulled the blanket higher up around her and settled into the seat, away from the window, but her attention stayed on the fields we were passing. “One by one, everyone left me. Each time, they pawned me off to someone else, leaving me trapped in a place I didn’t want to be. When I turned eighteen . . . I left. No one, and nowhere, has trapped me since.”
There was nothing.
No emotion, no hint of bitterness or anger or sadness . . . and it tore at my chest.
“Were you in foster care?” The words came out so hesitant as I tried to put those pieces of Rae together.
Air rushed from her before she turned her head to look at me, one eyebrow lifted. “Might’ve been easier to handle being left behind if I had been.”
“Home . . . family . . . foreign concept, remember?”
Her earlier words came rushing back and tugged at the ache in me.
No wonder she couldn’t handle staying in any place and struggled with even the idea of committing to something as simple as a pet or furniture. She’d probably grown up taking what little she had from place to place as her own family continued to abandon her.
Fuck.
Who would leave her?
I wanted to apologize for the shitty way she’d grown up and the poor excuse for a family, but I didn’t know how with someone like Rae.
Strong, fiercely independent, and capable of taking on the world with that secretive smile.
I glanced her way again, mouth open and a jumbled apology on the tip of my tongue, just as her head rolled heavily to the side, her eyelids already shut.
In that second before I focused on the road again, I let myself memorize the way she looked then. Relaxed, exposed, perfect.
Swallowing back the apology, I looked ahead and murmured, “Thank you for telling me.”
Even though she was asleep, I could feel the rightness in the words as they left me. Rae didn’t seem like the kind of person to want help or sympathy, and I knew she hadn’t told me what she had for pity.
She was offering me a piece of herself—a piece of her life.
She’d given me a gift.
I wondered how often she trusted people with her past. I wondered if I would get to a point where I would trust her with mine.
* * *
After parking in front of Blossom, I twisted to look at Rae.
At some point during the drive, she’d curled into a ball to rest her head on her arm on the center console. She was still fully covered by the blanket, as if it were winter and not nearing summer, and looked so
damn adorable I almost didn’t want to wake her.
I brushed the tips of my fingers across her cheek and whispered her name, then repeated the action until she shifted and snuggled deeper under the blanket.
A soft laugh sounded in my throat. “Rae.” When she didn’t move, I gathered the blanket in my hands, away from her, and had to fight the next laugh when she whined.
“Why?” she asked, dragging out the word and reaching toward my lap.
I gripped her hands in mine, preventing her from touching somewhere that would only lead to her knowing exactly how badly I wanted her. “You need to wake up.”
When only a whimper left her in response, I got out of the truck and jogged around the back.
I knew exactly how exhausted she was when I reached the passenger side and found her door still firmly shut. I’d been sure she would’ve already been climbing out, even half-asleep.
Opening the door, I stepped up on the running board and smiled down at her despite the groggy way she glared at me. Seatbelt loosely in her grip, as if she’d started taking it off and had forgotten what she was doing.
“Tired?”
“You took my blanket,” she said, accusation just as heavy as if I’d stolen something of value.
I folded my arms around said blanket and shrugged. “You’ll get it back when you get out of my truck.”
Her lips, even poutier from sleep, slowly fell open. “Rude.”
“You can come with me if you want, but I need to go home and shower so I can get back here for dinner.”
“Dinner?” Her eyes drifted to the side as if she were trying to figure out something difficult. “How—but you ate so much.”
“Still have to be here. I won’t do that to my mom, and Savannah will kill me if we don’t eat.”
“Wait—what does—if we don’t eat?” she stammered. “And what does your mom have to do with this?”
“It’s Sunday. Family dinner,” I said slowly, watching her intently and waiting for the moment recognition would light in those eyes.
“Uh, right, that is definitely not something I will be doing.”
“Didn’t Savannah tell you?”
She brushed a few pieces of hair that had fallen loose away from her face, then gave me a look that shouted Savannah clearly hadn’t. And there, in her eyes, was that same unease from earlier.
“Shit, Rae, I’m not . . . I’m not trying to push something on you. We aren’t trying to push something on you.” I reached for one of her hands, unsure of what her reaction would be since we were no longer surrounded by crowds, and nearly sighed in relief when she met me halfway. “After what you told me, I get it. Or, fuck, maybe I don’t. But I know the word family makes you uncomfortable.”
She pulled the corner of her bottom lip into her mouth but kept her stare locked on mine. Refusing to back down or look away even though those pieces of her that made her human were on display.
“In my family, Saturday morning was a breakfast you didn’t want to miss. Sunday dinner was a meal you weren’t allowed to miss. At Blossom, most guests check in during the week and check out before dinner on Sunday. If they happen to still be here, they’re always invited to eat with our family—not that my mom really gives them an option to say no.”
Rae swallowed a couple times, the action catching my attention and looking like it took all her strength. “I don’t do family dinners,” she finally managed to say, her voice strangled. “I don’t do family.”
“Yeah, your family sounds like they were a bunch of assholes,” I said unapologetically. “To be honest, mine is dysfunctional at best. It isn’t like you’ll be walking into a trap, made to feel uncomfortable because we’re some happy family.”
Disbelief poured from her. “I’ve seen you around here, I’ve heard your sister-in-law talk about you.”
“You also walked in on a good conversation with Beau this morning,” I said before she could continue. “And you saw how well that was going.” I dropped to the ground and placed the blanket on the floorboard before turning her so I was standing between her legs. “After my dad died, we just . . . fuck, Rae, we broke.”
“Sawyer.” My name was a pained breath as she bent closer. Wonder and sympathy etched on her face even though her own family was something she couldn’t feel any kind of emotion for.
“Cayson had just left without reason and wouldn’t even come back for the funeral,” I said, offering her the same pieces of myself she’d given me earlier. “He, Hunter, and Beau refuse to talk to each other to this day—I’m their only link—because they all resent each other for what happened to Dad and all the shit that went down after with the ranch and in their own lives. So, I go see Hunter on Saturday mornings because my mom is there without fail making a big-ass spread, and I know the chasm in our family breaks her heart. Then, Sunday nights, I’m here because she needs hope that we’ll all be at the table again one day. But that hope fades a little more each week, and I know the Sunday I’m not here, it will be gone.”
Her lips parted, but she swallowed whatever she was about to say and instead asked, “How long has it been since your dad passed?”
“Nine years yesterday.”
“Oh, Sawyer.” A crease formed between her brows and sadness bled from her before confusion overruled everything. “Nine years, and they still won’t talk to each other?”
“Exactly. We all have shit to blame each other for, to hate each other for. I’m the only one who got over it and tried to keep us together by staying in each of their lives. They don’t see what they’re doing to our mom by holding onto grudges and keeping a distance.”
A look crossed her face as if something finally made sense to her. “That’s what you and Beau were talking about this morning.”
I grunted in confirmation. After a moment, I said, “It’s family dinner because that’s what Sundays have always been for. But this? It’s just a dinner with a broken family a couple of us are trying to keep together. You can come, or you don’t have to—but, like I said, my mom will probably drag you down the stairs.”
She studied me for a while before asking, “Do you want me there?”
I knew what she was asking.
This wasn’t about a random guest coming to our dinner—she already knew it happened.
This was her coming to my broken family dinner.
This was her witnessing my life.
And I knew she wanted me to lie.
Because the answer she wanted would give her an out, and the truth would only scare her.
The last girl I’d asked to a family dinner had annihilated me. Fitting that I had no doubts this girl would do the same.
“Please be there,” I said, the words hoarse and low.
Her head moved in a faint nod before she began speaking in soft, clipped sentences. “You should probably leave. So you can get ready. Apparently, I have to do the same.”
Part of me wanted to dig deeper, wanted to find out what else had happened for her to be hesitant about anyone wanting her when she clearly wanted this too. The other part knew I needed to take the small victory and let her go before she stopped talking to me completely.
I stepped away, giving her room to climb from the truck, and watched as she did, grabbing the blanket on the way.
I’d just shut the passenger door when she turned, chin lifted and expression unyielding.
“If I go, I’m going as a guest,” she said firmly. “I’m not going for you or with you.”
So much for small victories. “Understood.”
“I’m serious, Sawyer.”
“I said I understood.” The words were harsh and abrupt as I rounded the front of my truck to get in. By the time I was seated, she was already climbing the steps of the large house, her hips swaying just enough to make me want to both run after her and take a cold shower.
Once she was inside, I put the truck in gear and started driving along the U-shaped drive, only to stop when my eyes caught on Rae’s purse.
M
y thumb tapped rapidly against the steering wheel as I debated over bringing it to her later and just taking it to her then.
I had a feeling one way would end with Rae furious, and the other with her reinforcing that steel wall.
With a hissed curse, I shoved my truck in park, turned the engine off, then gathered everything into my arms and jogged inside.
I set the jars of honey on the entryway table, then took the stairs two at a time, my heart racing and body trembling the closer I came to Rae’s room.
Just before I reached it, her door swung open and she stepped into the doorway with her arms folded across her chest, brow lifted in amusement, and that goddamn bottom lip tucked between her teeth.
“Thought you were keeping the other blanket,” she said, the bite in her tone met with that tempting tease as if the last five minutes hadn’t happened and we were right back to toeing that line of colliding. Without giving me a chance to respond, she tilted her head toward the room. “I was closing the blinds when you got out of your truck.”
“You left your purse.”
Her brow pulled tight and she glanced around like her purse would magically appear on the floor beside her. “Oh . . .”
I brought the tips of my fingers up to her crossed arms and slowly pushed her back, following her into the room and kicking the door shut behind me. Once her bag, the blanket, and my keys were in a pile on the floor, I reached behind me to twist the lock, then continued the path.
“See, here’s the thing,” I began. “I don’t like games. So, this dancing around each other bullshit has reached its limit for me. You have baggage—real baggage—that’s more than fucking clear. But so do I.”
I let my stare trail over her body when her back met the wall, lingering on her curves and fighting the urge to trace them when she fidgeted impatiently beneath my gaze.
Desire, longing, and worry met me when my eyes locked with hers again.
“Tell me to go. Tell me you don’t want this. I’ll walk out the door and leave you alone.” I stepped closer and dropped my head so our mouths were a breath apart. “Or I’m gonna stop pretending like I haven’t thought of biting that lip for you since we met.”
Fall in Love Book Bundle: Small Town Romance Box Set Page 147
