Brambleberry House

by RaeAnne Thayne

  * * *

  IT SEEMED IMPOSSIBLE, but he tasted better than she remembered, of cinnamon and mint and coffee.

  She should be shocked that he would kiss her, after being quite blunt that he wasn’t interested in starting anything. But it seemed so right to be here in his arms that she couldn’t manage to summon anything but grateful amazement.

  She slid her arms around his neck, letting him set the pace and tone of the kiss. It was gentle at first, sweet and comfortable. Two old friends renewing something they had once shared.

  Just as it had so many years earlier, being in his arms felt right. Completely perfect.

  Their bodies had changed over the years—he was much broader and more muscled and she knew giving birth to twins had softened her edges and given her more curves.

  But they still seemed to fit together like two halves of the same planed board.

  She was aware of odd, random sensations as the kiss lingered—the hard countertop digging into her hip where he pressed her against it, the silk of his hair against her fingers, the smell of him, leathery and masculine.

  And freesia.

  The smell of flowers drifted through her kitchen so strongly that she opened one eye to make sure Abigail wasn’t standing in the doorway watching them.

  An instant later, she forgot all about Abigail—or any other ghosts—when Will pulled her closer and deepened the kiss, his tongue playing and teasing in a way that demonstrated quite unequivocally that he had learned more than a few things in the intervening years since their last kiss on the beach.

  Heat flared, bright and urgent, and she dived right into the flames, holding him closer and returning the kiss.

  She had no idea how long they kissed—or just how long they might have continued. Both of them froze when they heard the squeak of the entry door downstairs.

  Will wrenched his mouth away, breathing hard, and stared at her and her heart broke at the expression on his face—shock and dismay and something close to anguish.

  He raked a hand through his hair, leaving little tufts looking as if he’d just walked into a wind tunnel.

  “That was... I shouldn’t have...”

  He seemed so genuinely upset, she locked away her hurt and focused on trying to ease his turmoil. “Will, it’s okay.”

  “No. No, it’s not. I shouldn’t have done that. I’ve... I’ve got to go.”

  Without another word, he hurried out of the kitchen and her apartment and she heard the thud of his boots as he rushed down the wooden stairway and out the door.

  She leaned against the counter, her breathing still ragged. She felt emotionally ravaged, wrung out and hung to dry.

  She was still trying to figure out what just happened when she heard a knock on her door.

  She wasn’t sure she was at all ready to face anyone but when the knock sounded again, she knew she wouldn’t be able to hide away there in her kitchen forever.

  “It’s open,” she called.

  The door swung open and a moment later Anna Galvez walked into the apartment.

  “What’s up with Will? He passed me on the stairs and didn’t even say a word before he headed out the door like the hounds of hell were nipping at his heels.”

  She gave Julia a careful look. “Are you okay? You look flushed. Did you and Will have a fight or something?”

  “That blasted or something will get you every time,” Julia muttered under her breath.

  “You’re going to have to give me a break here. I’ve been working all day on inventory and my brain is mush. Do you want to explain what that means?”

  “Not really.” She sighed, not at all comfortable talking about this. But right now she desperately needed a friend and Anna definitely qualified. “He kissed me,” she blurted out.

  Surprise then delight flickered across Anna’s features. “Really? That’s wonderful!”

  “Is it? Will obviously didn’t think so.”

  “Will doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do. If he hadn’t wanted to kiss you, he wouldn’t have.”

  “He was horrified afterward.”

  “A little overdramatic, don’t you think?”

  “You should have seen his face! I don’t think he’s ready. He’s lost so much.”

  “So have you. I don’t hear you saying you’re not ready.”

  But their situations were vastly different, a point she wasn’t prepared to point out to Anna. Will had been happily married when his wife died. She, on the other hand, had let Kevin go long before his fatal car accident.

  “He will figure things out in his own time. Don’t worry,” Anna went on. “He’s a wonderful man who’s been through a terrible tragedy. But he’ll get through it. Have a little faith.”

  Right now faith was something Julia had in very short supply. She could tumble hard and fast for Will Garrett. It wouldn’t take a hard push—she had been in love with him when she was fifteen years old and she could easily see herself falling again.

  But what would be the point, if he had his heart so tightly wrapped in protective layers that he wouldn’t let anyone in?

  CHAPTER TEN

  IT WAS JUST a damn kiss.

  Three weeks later, Will backed his truck into the Brambleberry House driveway, fighting a mix of dread and unwilling anticipation.

  He knew both reactions were completely ridiculous. What the hell was he worrying about? She wouldn’t even be here—he had finally managed to work the molding job into his schedule only after squeezing in a time when he could be certain Julia and her children were safely tucked away at the elementary school.

  The very fact that he had to resort to such ridiculous manipulations of his own schedule simply to avoid seeing a certain woman bugged the heck out of him.

  He ought to be tougher than this. He should have been completely unfazed by their brief encounter, instead of brooding about it for the better part of three weeks.

  So he had kissed her. Big deal. The world hadn’t stopped spinning, the ocean hadn’t suddenly been sucked dry, the Coast Range hadn’t suddenly tumbled to dust.

  Robin hadn’t come back to haunt him.

  He knew his reaction to the kiss had been excessive. He had run out of her apartment at Brambleberry House like a kid who had been caught smoking in the boy’s room of the schoolhouse.

  Yeah, he had overreacted to the shock of discovering not all of him was encased in ice—that he could desire another woman, could long to have her wrapped around him.

  He still wanted it. That was what had bothered him for three weeks. Even though he hadn’t seen her in all that time, she hadn’t been far from his thoughts.

  He remembered the taste of her, sweet and welcoming, the softness of her skin under his fingers, the subtle peace he had so briefly savored.

  He couldn’t seem to shake this achy sense that with that single kiss, everything in his world had changed, in a way he couldn’t explain but knew he didn’t like.

  He didn’t want change. Yeah, he hated his life and missed Robin and Cara so much he sometimes couldn’t breathe around the pain. But it was his pain.

  He was used to it now, and somewhere deep inside, he worried that letting go of that grief would mean letting go of his wife and baby girl, something he wasn’t ready to face yet.

  He knew his reaction was absurd. Plenty of people had lost loved ones and had moved ahead with their lives. His own mother had married again, just a few years after his father died, when Will was in his early twenties. She had moved to San Diego with her new husband, where the two of them seemed to be extremely happy together. They played golf, they went sailing on the bay, they enjoyed an active social life.

  Will didn’t begrudge his mother her happiness. He liked his stepfather and was grateful his mother had found someone else.
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br />   Intellectually, he knew it was possible, even expected, for him to date again sometime. He just wasn’t sure he was ready yet—indeed, that he would ever be ready.

  It had just been a kiss, he reminded himself. Not a damn marriage proposal.

  As he sat in the driveway, gearing himself to go inside, the moist sea breeze drifted through his cracked window and he could suddenly swear he smelled cherry blossoms.

  It was nearing the end of September, for heaven’s sake, and was a cool, damp morning. He had absolutely no business smelling the spring scent of cherry blossoms on the breeze.

  No doubt it was only the power of suggestion at work—he was thinking about Julia and his subconscious somehow managed to conjure the scent that always seemed to cling to her.

  He closed his eyes and for just a moment allowed his mind to wander over that kiss again—the way she had responded to him with such warm enthusiasm, the silky softness of her mouth, the comfort of her hands against his skin.

  Just a damn kiss!

  His sigh filled the cab of the pickup and he stiffened his resolve and reached for the door handle.

  Enough. Anna and Sage weren’t paying him to sit on his butt and moon over their tenant. He had work to do. He’d been promising Anna for weeks he would get to her moldings and he couldn’t keep putting it off.

  A Garrett man kept his promises.

  He climbed out and strapped on his tool belt with a dogged determination he would have found amusing under other circumstances, then grabbed as many of the moldings out of the back as he could lift.

  He carried them to the porch and set them as close to the house as he could, then went back to his pickup for the rest. Judging by the steely clouds overhead, they were in for rain soon and he needed to keep the custom-cut oak dry.

  He nearly dropped his second load when the front door suddenly swung open. A second later, Conan bounded through and barked with excitement.

  He set the wood down with the other pile and gave the dog the obligatory scratch. “You’re opening the door by yourself now? Pretty soon you’re going to be driving yourself to the store to pick up dog food. You won’t need any of us anymore.”

  “Until that amazing day arrives, he’ll continue to keep us all as willing slaves. Hi, Will.”

  His entire insides had clenched at the sound of that first word spoken in a low, musical voice, and he slowly lifted his gaze to find Julia standing in the doorway.

  She looked beautiful, fresh and lovely, and he could almost feel the churn of his heart.

  “What are you doing here?” he said abruptly. “I figured you’d be at school.”

  Too late, he realized all that his words revealed—that he had given her more than a minute’s thought in the last three weeks. She wasn’t a stupid woman. No doubt she would quickly read between the lines and figure out he had purposely planned the project for a time when he was unlikely to encounter her.

  To his vast relief, she didn’t seem to notice. “I should be. At school, I mean. But Maddie’s caught some kind of a bug. She was running a fever this morning and I decided I had better stay home and keep an eye on her.”

  “Is it a problem, missing your class?”

  She shook her head. “I hate having to bring in a substitute this early in the school year but it can’t be helped. The school district knew when they hired me that my daughter’s health was fragile. So far they’ve been amazingly cooperative.”

  “She’s okay, isn’t she?”

  All he could think about even as he asked the question was the irony of the whole thing. Above all else, he had tried his best to avoid bumping into her. So how, in heaven’s name, had he managed to pick the one day she was home to finish the job?

  “I think she’s only caught a little cold,” Julia answered. “At least that’s what I hope it is. She’s sniffly and coughing a bit but her fever broke about an hour ago. I hope it’s just one of those twenty-four hour bugs.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Her night was a little unsettled but she’s sleeping soundly now. I figured rest was the best thing for her so I’m letting her sleep as long as she needs to beat this thing.”

  “Sounds like a smart plan.”

  “I guess you’re here to do the moldings in Anna’s apartment.”

  He nodded curtly, not knowing what else to say.

  “Do you have more supplies in your truck that need to come in? I can help you carry things.”

  “This is it.” His voice was more brusque than he intended and Conan made a snarly kind of growl at him.

  Will just barely managed not to snarl back. He didn’t need a dog making him feel guilty. He could do that all on his own.

  It wasn’t Julia’s fault she stirred all kinds of unwelcome feelings in him and it wasn’t at all fair of him to take out his bad mood on her.

  He forced himself to temper his tone. “Would you mind holding the door open for me, though? It’s going to rain soon and I’d hate for all this oak to get wet.”

  “Oh! Of course.” She hurried to open the door. The only tricky part now was that he would have to move past her to get inside, he realized. He should have considered that little detail.

  Too late now.

  He let out a sigh of defeat and picked up several of the moldings and squeezed past her, doing his best not to bang the wood on the doorway on his way inside.

  Going in wasn’t so tough. Walking back out for a second load with his arms unencumbered was an entirely different story. He was painfully aware of her—that scent of spring, the heat of her body, the flicker of awareness in her green eyes as he passed.

  Oh, he was in trouble.

  His only consolation was that she seemed just as disconcerted by his presence.

  “I guess you probably have a key to Anna’s apartment, don’t you?” she asked.

  He nodded. “I have keys to the whole house so I can come and go when I’m working on something. All but your apartment. I gave it back to Anna and Sage when I finished up on the second floor.”

  “Good to know,” she murmured.

  He cleared his throat, set down the moldings in the entry and fished in his pocket, then pulled out the Brambleberry keyring. Of course, his hands seemed to fumble as he tried to find the right one to fit the lock for Anna’s apartment, but he finally located it and opened her door.

  “Would you mind holding the apartment door open as well? I need to be careful not to hit the wood on the frame. If you could guide it through, that would be great.”

  “Sure!” She hurried to prop open the door with an eagerness that made him blink. Even though it was akin to torture, he had to walk past her all over again and he forced himself to put away this sizzle of awareness and focus on the job.

  She followed him inside as he carried the eight-foot-long moldings in and set them behind Anna’s couch.

  “Can I give you a hand with anything else?” Julia asked. “To be honest, I’m a bit at loose ends this morning and was looking for a distraction. I’ve already finished my lesson plans for the next month and I’m completely caught up with my homework grading. I was just contemplating rearranging my kitchen cabinets in alphabetical order, just to kill the boredom. I’d love the chance to do something constructive.”

  That was just about the last thing on earth he needed right now, to have to work with Julia looking on. She was the very definition of distraction. With his luck, he’d probably be so busy trying not to smell her that he would glue his sleeve to the wood.

  His hesitation dragged on just a moment too long, he realized as he watched heat soak her cheeks.

  “You’re used to working alone and I would probably only get in the way, wouldn’t I? Forget I said anything.”

  He hated her distress, hated making her think he didn’t want her around. Was
he a coward or was he a man who could contain his own unwanted desires?

  “I am used to working alone,” he said slowly, already regretting the words. “But I guess I wouldn’t mind the company.”

  It was almost worth his impending discomfort to see her face light up with such delight. She must really be bored if she could get so excited about handing him tools and watching him nail up moldings.

  “I’ll just run up and grab the walkie-talkie I let the kids use when they’re sick to call out to me when they need drinks and things. That way Maddie will be able to find me when she wakes up.”

  He nodded, though she didn’t seem to expect much of an answer as she hurried out the door and up the stairs.

  What the hell had he just done? he wondered. The whole point of scheduling this project during this time had been to avoid bumping into her. He certainly didn’t expect to find himself inviting her to spend the next hour or so right next to him, crowding his space, posing far too much of a temptation for his peace of mind.

  “What are you grinning at?” he growled to Conan.

  The dog just woofed at him and settled onto the rug in front of the empty fireplace. When Abigail was alive, that had always been his favorite place, Will remembered.

  He supposed it was nice to see a few things didn’t change, even though he felt as if the rest of his life was a deck of cards that had suddenly been thrown into the teeth of the wind.

  * * *

  SHE WAS A fool when it came to Will Garrett.

  Up in her apartment, Julia quickly ran a brush through her hair. She thought about touching up the quick makeup job she’d done that morning but she figured Will would probably notice—and wonder—if she put on fresh lipstick.

  Would he really notice? The snide voice in her head asked. He had made it plain he wasn’t interested in her. Or at least that he didn’t want to be interested in her, which amounted to the same thing.

  More reason she was a fool for Will Garrett. Some part of her held out some foolish hope that this time might be different, that this time he might be able to see beyond the past.