Fall in Love Book Bundle: Small Town Romance Box Set

by Grover Swank, Denise

  “Everyone’s safe. There was some damage to houses, and of course it’ll take a while for the road crews to clear the debris, but—”

  I was light-headed with anxiety. “So that’s… wait, what did you say? The first thing?”

  Gabe placed his palm on the back of my neck, squeezing. “The rock slides are cutting off entry and exit through Big Sur. We’re connected to the rest of the world by Highway 1. Without that road, you and Lucia and everyone else will need to stay here until it clears. Stay here with… us.”

  I knew he wanted to say ‘stay here with me.’ And the part of me that was soft and weak—the girl that stood in her wedding dress sobbing in her best friend’s arms, still expecting the groom to show up—wanted that badly.

  “You got a better ETA on that?” I asked, moving back, moving away from Gabe. I pulled on Gabe’s shirt, which was massive on me.

  “Maybe… a week? Probably less. They don’t know,” Gabe said, reaching for me.

  I flinched. I couldn’t help it. I’d let this man have my vulnerability for one night, and one night only, and now I was going to be stuck here in the World’s Smallest Town with him.

  “I… I’m going to use your bathroom,” I said, “I’ll be right back.”

  And then I leapt over the pile of ropes and clothes and shut myself behind his bathroom door.

  You don’t have what it takes.

  Clarke had always been good at manipulation, but that night he hadn’t even tried to hide the cruelty in his voice. But like everything else he had done, it’d been easy to write it off as a misunderstanding (we had a lot of those). Or explain it away as a byproduct of his high-stress job, causing him to speak without thinking (he did that a lot too). And by the morning, after a night of crying in the bathroom, I’d convinced myself he didn’t mean it.

  And even though, just hours earlier, I’d done exactly what he’d said I couldn’t do—done it spectacularly—here I was. Back in a bathroom, on the verge of tears. I needed my phone. I needed Lucia, my best friend.

  But I didn’t have those things, so I splashed cold water on my face. Took deep, slow breaths. Pulled my hair into a long braid, focusing on the motions of my fingers. Waited for my heart to slow.

  The terrifying thing about Gabe was his kindness. Because Clarke had started off kind too, even a little compassionate. And just like with Clarke, I’d had this feeling when we’d first locked eyes. A feeling I used to trust, but now I knew where it led—to a relationship that would go up in fucking flames, burning down every single thing around it.

  I needed to leave Gabe’s house. And then avoid him until the roads were cleared.

  I needed to re-set.

  Re-orient.

  Back to the Josie I’d been before a Viking warrior had stormed all my defenses.

  I threw open the bathroom door, prepared to march out, but there was only Gabe in sweatpants and a zip-up hoodie, hair tied back and a concerned look on his face.

  He pressed a hot mug of tea into my hand, tilted his head. “Want to tell me why the thought of seeing me again has you freaking out in my bathroom?”

  Chapter 20

  Gabe

  She was like a skittish horse—eyes wide and staring at the mug of tea as if it was filled with acid.

  “I need to leave,” she said, stepping around me as though we hadn’t just shared the most intense sexual experience of my entire life.

  “Do what makes you feel comfortable,” I said. “And I’ll drive you if you want. But Josie… it’s horrendous out there. Dangerous to be out on the freeway. There was just a landslide not two hours ago. You don’t need to… we don’t need to do anything. But if you want to stay here where it’s safe, maybe even talk about what’s happening between us, well… that’s why I made you this.” I held the mug out to her sheepishly. “Chamomile with honey.”

  Her eyes narrowed, glancing outside. On cue, another bout of thunder shook the foundations of The Bar, and she felt it, glancing down at her feet as the vibrations rolled through the floorboards.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, settling on the armchair across from the bed. But she took the mug, so that was a start.

  “I don’t, um… stay,” she said. But then something in her shifted. “I always leave,” she said, firmly. Confidently. “I was prepared to do that, and then when you told me we were trapped…”

  She took a long sip, avoiding my eyes.

  “So what’s going on? Just talk to me. It’s not like we can go anywhere.” I meant it as a joke, but her face hardened.

  I was beginning to come to terms with the fact that Josie truly did not want to see me again. That we could be trapped in Big Sur for weeks and she’d go out of her way to avoid me.

  “Things changed for me two years ago,” she said. “I don’t like talking about it, and I’m not going to talk about it, but it does mean that I live my life differently now. I told you,” she looked up at me. “I’m a one-night-stand girl. I haven’t slept concurrently with a person in a long time.”

  “Well,” I said, smiling, “I also have not slept concurrently with a person in a long time. With some exceptions. I’ve dated casually, off and on. But nothing since my last serious relationship…” Shit, it was depressing to do the math. “Ten years ago.”

  Her face brightened in understanding. “So you get it, right?”

  “Kind of…?” I trailed off. “Still leads me back to you, freaking out in my bathroom.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I wasn’t… okay, fuck, I wasn’t freaking out in your bathroom. I thought, maybe, and now I will be embarrassed if this isn’t the case, but I thought, with the slide, and us being stuck here, and what we just did was so… you know intense and fucking amazing actually—” she shook her head, but I was stuck on fucking amazing. “—that you would want to keep seeing me.”

  A pause, and our eyes locked. Josie was captivating, wrapped in my shirt and drinking that tea like it was the best thing she’d ever tasted.

  Of course I wanted to see her again.

  “Because I don’t,” she said, and my hope popped like a balloon. “And I just think it’s going to be awkward now, us seeing each other. Which maybe we won’t. And maybe you didn’t even want to, so now I’ve just embarrassed myself multiple times for nothing.”

  She tilted her head, rubbing her fingers against her collarbone. Those slender fingers were inked with tiny dots. A sun. A moon.

  “I was just going to leave,” she repeated. “As soon as the sun came up. Which it will any minute now. And, what we did was intense, and I’m so happy for it. Really.”

  Her gaze was so sincere it broke my heart.

  “I meant what I said. It’s been a… well, a rough couple years. Tonight put a few pieces into place for me. Of my puzzle. Is that weird?” she said.

  God, I liked this girl, weird and all. “The Josie Puzzle,” I said, nodding thoughtfully. “I know what you mean. Something was missing. Tonight, you found it. Right?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  She started to get up, but I leaned forward, and something in my expression stilled her.

  “Can I tell you what my intentions are?” I asked. “Or… were?”

  Josie sighed, but then sat back down. “Okay,” she said.

  I didn’t know what the fuck had happened to her two years ago. But someone did it to her, and I itched to know where that person lived.

  “Well, since we can’t really go anywhere, I was going to make you some delicious coffee, heaping with sugar and cream,” I said and was granted a tiny smile. “Then cook chocolate pancakes for you and eat them in bed.” Josie’s entire body was softening toward mine. “And then…”

  Her eyes flared with lust. Fuck, she wanted this.

  “And then I’d see how many more times I can make you come.”

  Just like that, the delicious tension that had existed between us since our first meeting snapped back. Josie uncrossed her bare legs, and for a brief, heady moment I thought she was going to comma
nd me back to my knees.

  “Then what?”

  She re-crossed her legs.

  I swallowed a groan. “Keep seeing you for as long as you’re here. Explore what this is,” I said, pointing to her. Pointing to the bed. “This connection that we have. I think it means something, don’t you?”

  She looked away, standing up to pull on her clothes. About to leave. I debated brutal honesty. Debated telling her that she was the first woman since Sasha where I actually felt a spark. More than a spark—Josie was a fucking wildfire.

  Every member of my family was in a beautiful, committed relationship—except me, the one person everyone swore would marry his high school sweetheart and build a funky Big Sur life with her in a cute cabin in the woods.

  But I hadn’t. And I hated it. And now I was hurtling toward my forties with no partner in sight. It made me want to throw caution to the wind. Live in the present. Grab hold of a relationship that had the potential to be real.

  “Don’t you think that means something?” I asked again.

  Josie shook her head. “No.”

  The last shred of my hope crumbled into nothing.

  “I really don’t,” she continued. “Listen, as long as my car isn’t like swept away out there, I’m going to drive myself home now. I’m—”

  There was a war going on inside of her; it was evident in the bite of her lip, the shifting of her feet.

  “Josie,” I said, trying to pull it out of her.

  Something seemed to break open for a second, and she walked towards me. Took my face in her hands and kissed me, long and deep. Then she pulled away before I could get my arms around her.

  “Josie,” I said again, not afraid to beg. I’d done it tied to the bed. I’d do it again.

  “Last night was really important to me,” she said, looking me straight in the eye. “But please don’t read more into this than it was: a hot, intense fuck I’ll always remember. With a sexy and sweet bartender who’s going to make someone a wonderful husband someday,” she said.

  Then she kissed my cheek one more time and walked out the door.

  I heard the sharp sound of her combat boots down the stairs, then the front door of The Bar slamming closed.

  I fell back onto the bed. “Goddammit,” I said to no one in particular.

  The landline rang again, so I walked downstairs to the bar, staring at the mess I hadn’t cleaned up last night.

  “Big Sur Channel,” I sighed. I knew who it would be.

  “Gabe, it’s Gladys. Did you know the Satanist is leaving your bar right now?”

  “Yes,” I said tiredly. “Very much aware.” I sat up. “Also, I’m assuming you and Gloria are alive?”

  A pfft sound. “Please. Gonna take a lot more than a rock slide to take us out.”

  A shuffling, then I heard Gloria come on. “If you need to come by the post office and drown your sorrows, I’ve got Hennessey beneath the desk right now.”

  I barked out a laugh, grateful for the temporary distraction. “Sounds good. I’ve got some gossip for you later, so I’ll be in soon.” I hung up the phone before they could ask more questions. But then it rang again.

  “Big Sur Channel,” I said, more irritated than I meant to be.

  “Um… Gabe?”

  “Calvin. My man,” I said, smiling despite the terrible morning and the no sleep. “What’s good?”

  “Listen, I know it’s… shit, not even nine in the morning, but do you want a beer?”

  I sighed, thinking about the day that awaited me. The mess of the storm. And a heart that was slightly bruised.

  “Yes,” I said. “Yes, I do.”

  Chapter 21

  Gabe

  “So… Josie,” Cal said, gulping down the last of his beer. He’d just finished telling me about a “moment” he and Lucia, the supermodel, had shared last night, right before I’d called them about the rock slide.

  It was comforting to know Josie and I weren’t the only ones so swept up in the moment we never heard the gigantic rock slides that had almost destroyed my home town.

  “You like her, I guess?” he said.

  I was sorting through bottles of water and wrapping up sandwiches to take to the road crew.

  I looked at Cal, debated giving him some half-version of the truth. But I was already almost two beers in, and that combined with about three hours of sleep and four hours of orgasm denial had me a little loopy.

  “Josie’s incredible. Last night was incredible. I’d be lying if I told you I wasn’t just the tiniest bit happy they’re stuck here. Does that make me a terrible person?” Except that Josie doesn’t want to see you.

  “Nope, because I had the exact same thought,” Cal said, mouth tightening.

  Both of us were silent for a moment.

  “What about when they leave?” he finally asked.

  “It’ll fucking suck. And that’s why we’re not going to think about it. We’re just going to live in the moment, content with the fact that two absurdly beautiful women want to be around us… for reasons no rational person can comprehend.”

  We knocked our beer bottles together.

  “Live in the moment,” Cal said, nodding. “It’s what my grandfather would have said.”

  I grimaced at that, remembering my attempt to carpe diem. “Josie turned me down, actually,” I said, shrugging like it was no big deal.

  Cal half-spit out his beer. “Wait, you didn’t have spectacular sex last night?”

  I shook my head, memories from the night floating up unbidden, and I closed my eyes for a second. “We did. Have spectacular sex.” I cleared my throat. “Kind of life-changing, I guess. Not to, you know, divulge too many details but… it was different with Josie.”

  “And you do want something more to happen? Even if she’s just here for a few more days?”

  I nodded, gulping the remainder of my second beer. Reached under the bar for another. Might as well get morning-drunk. “I asked her if she wanted to keep seeing me while she was here. Explore this… connection. See what it is.”

  “And?”

  “She shut me the fuck down.”

  Cal knocked his beer against mine. “Familiar with that feeling, I’m afraid. It’s why what happened last night with Lucia was so… fucking bizarre.”

  I laughed, feeling some of my sadness lighten with Cal’s happiness. A lot of people would look at the two of them, a nerd with huge glasses and crippling shyness and a drop-dead gorgeous, famous supermodel, and never see a way they’d be together.

  But I knew better. Because I had an inkling that the two of them were going to fall in love.

  “You know my parents were exact opposites,” I said, slowly peeling the label from my beer. “They met when they were ten years old. Neighbors, which is saying a lot in Big Sur, since our houses tend to be far apart from each other. But my parents happened to live in two houses that were connected by a small field, and they grew up together. Were best friends through middle school and high school. My dad was desperately in love with her from about fourteen or so. Never said a thing but really pined for her, you know?”

  Cal grinned. “I’m already loving this story.”

  “And I love to tell it.” I did. Their love story was the one I’d longed for my entire life. “Anyway, I guess when my parents were seventeen, another kid in school asked her to prom. She said yes, and when she told my dad, it absolutely destroyed him. He always thought they’d be together, but my dad was shy. And kind of unassuming. And didn’t really think he deserved my mom. But that didn’t stop him from being devoted to her. The thing was, they were classic archetypes. He was kind of the shy loner. She was a cheerleader, popular, should have had a string of boyfriends, but she never did.”

  “Why not?”

  I shrugged. “She was also pining for my dad. Only said yes to that guy because she thought my dad didn’t love her.”

  “Ah,” Cal said. “There’s a moral to this story.”

  “There is. Which is honest
y. My parents would always encourage us to tell the truth. Share your feelings. You might…” My chest tightened, thinking about Josie. “You might not have the opportunity again.”

  Cal looked away.

  “I just want to say though, as your friend… no one thought my parents were right for each other. Too different, too young. And they’ve been together for more than thirty-five years. I see that when I look at you and Lucia.”

  Cal reddened, squeezing his bottle so hard I’d thought it’d break. “Um… well, thanks Gabe. I don’t… you know, it was just a moment. Nothing extraordinary.”

  “Liar,” I grinned, and his answering blush confirmed my suspicions. “And,” I said, coughing uncomfortably. “You should probably know. I, uh, had to give up some intel. On you and Lucia. To the Big Sur Channel.”

  Cal’s head dropped to the bar. “Goddammit,” he said.

  “Been there before,” I said, slapping him on the back. “And let this be your official welcome to Big Sur, California.”

  Chapter 22

  Josie

  I’d thought about Gabe all damn day.

  I had fumbled through a day of shooting, feeling like a zombie, completely trapped in memories of our night together. Except not just last night. Every interaction we’d had over the past two days, all on an endless loop of happiness and pleasure. I was so obvious that every ten minutes or so, Lu would point a manicured finger my way and say, “Check out that dreamy smile.”

  Which was saying a lot since she’d spent the entire fucking day with her own dreamy smile, floating on Cloud Nine after her moment with Calvin. Who was quickly becoming my choice for Lucia’s soulmate.

  I hadn’t told her many details in the morning, needing time. Space. I hadn’t been open or vulnerable with a man in a long time, and I ached all over with it—the way your muscles feel after your first hard run in years. Excited but trembling with exertion.