But wasn’t it already too late for that? The more he thought about it, the less he wanted to cut Quenby out of his life. In the short—admittedly very short—amount of time he’d known her, she’d added so much to his life. Every time he saw her, he lit up all over. So trying to make the objectively best decision was going to be a real challenge.
And kissing her. There was a thrill in that he’d never felt before. Any time she was close to him, he had to hold himself back from pulling her close and feeling those soft, full lips under his again.
Ha. Adia had warned him not to hurt Quenby. But who was going to protect him from her?
Caleb was a little surprised to hear rattling at the door. So she was finally coming home. She walked in, and he swallowed hard at the sight of her in black Lycra workout pants and a gray T-shirt. He shifted on the sofa.
“Hi.” She dropped her gym bag to the floor.
“Hey,” he said, shifting again.
“We don’t have much time, so I don’t see any point in wasting it. I’m going to shower. If you’re smart, you’ll join me.” She walked toward her bedroom.
He couldn’t argue with that logic. Still, as he walked into the bedroom, he wracked his brain for solutions to this dilemma of his.
He had to think of a way to show her that he was serious. He couldn’t stand being forced to think of Sunday as their last day together. It was getting so that she was all he could think about. No distance, failed wedding, jerk ex-fiancé or anything else could change that. He had to have her. He had to show her that he wasn’t like that other guy. He had a few days left to do that, and he was determined not to blow his chance.
Chapter 13
Saturday afternoon, Quenby spent much longer than usual picking out just the right outfit, doing her makeup, and fussing with her hair. Luckily for her, her hair seemed to sense the importance of the day and didn’t give her as much of a fit as it usually did.
It was scary how easily he could talk her into things. They were going to spend all day at a festival somewhere out past Charlottesville. Apparently, that was how he wanted to spend their last day. She could’ve just as easily spent it in bed, but he insisted that going to this thing would be fun.
She knew she was playing a dangerous game, but unlike him, she wasn’t playing into dangerous fantasies about getting attached. She knew better than to think anything serious would start between them. But it wouldn’t hurt to give him this day at the festival.
She walked out to the living room where he waited for her.
She smiled.
He returned the smile, hazel eyes twinkling. He wore a gray collared shirt with the few top buttons unbuttoned, displaying a delicious bit of his smooth, tanned chest. Apparently, he spent a lot of time out on his boat in the summer. His summer tan hadn’t faded yet. His light wash jeans went well with it. Her eyes went down to his boat shoes. No socks. Of course.
“You ready?” he asked.
“Let’s do it,” she said. She laughed nervously, a little surprised at how nervous she was all of a sudden. “I mean, let’s get out of here.”
He chuckled. “All right.” He stood and walked with her to the door. “Our first date.”
“Date?” That was a strange thing to call it.
Caleb grinned, flashing straight, white teeth at her. “Isn’t that what you call it when two people who like each other go out to try and get to know each other better?”
She laughed. “I guess.” Although she didn’t really see the point. Why did he insist on avoiding reality?
“You guess?”
“We’ve talked about this. Besides.” She continued in a playful tone. “How do you know I like you?”
He held the door open for her. “I dunno. Guess I was just hoping you felt the same way as I do.”
“And how’s that?” She walked out and locked the door after them.
He winked at her. “I just told you. Now are we going to get out of here or not?”
“I guess.”
“You and that guess. You’re saying that a lot, ‘I guess’.”
She looked up at him and smiled. “I love the way you say ‘guess’. You make the ‘e’ sound like long ‘a’.”
“Well, at least you love something about me.”
Quenby’s cheeks burned.
Quenby owned a white Toyota Corolla. It had no leather interior and no extras, was clean and smelled like oranges. Derek had always used a citrus-scented cleaner on the interior of their cars. She’d been trying to air out that smell all week, but it just wouldn’t go.
“Mind if I drive?” he asked.
“Nope.” She tossed him the keys and headed for the passenger side. She didn’t feel like driving a long distance anyway. She didn’t see how he could. They hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before.
The drive along 64 West was nice. Quenby always enjoyed riding along that road in the autumn with the leaves turning warm, rusty colors.
They arrived in Barboursville around noon. Caleb had brought her to an autumn festival. There were booths set up selling apples from the recent apple harvests, preserves, quilts, and other foods and crafts. The delightful smells of sugar and frying fat, funnel cake and cotton candy filled the air. Kids ran around carrying helium-filled balloons on strings and shrieking with laughter. Their parents stood around watching them with adoring smiles and carrying on conversations with each other.
They wandered over to a magic show, and the magician asked for volunteers. Caleb surprised her by stepping up. He hammed it up with the magician and had everyone in the audience rolling with laughter. She’d seen the tricks involving handkerchiefs, a deck of cards, and fluffy yellow baby chick and a top hat a dozen times before, but they were still entertaining. Especially with charming Caleb on stage.
He hopped down from the stage and came back to her side while the crowd gave him roaring applause. When he put his arm around her, she said, “You looked good up there.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. So at ease. I would’ve been nervous in front of all these people. I’ll bet you’re good at public speaking.” She definitely wasn’t.
He laughed. “Want to know a secret about me?”
“Sure,” she said.
“I used to have a stutter. It kept me from making the debate team in middle school.”
“You? Really?”
“Me. Really.” He grabbed her hands and kissed her knuckles. “Want to know another secret?”
“Yeah.” He could’ve gotten that response to just about any question he asked at that moment.
“I’m falling for you.”
Quenby pulled her hands away. “Don’t start.”
“Did you ever consider that maybe this isn’t easy for me, either?” he asked. “But I’m not running anywhere.”
“Why isn’t this easy for you?”
“You’re not the only one whose marriage plans didn’t work out,” he said. “I was engaged. Twice.”
“Twice?”
He nodded. “Once to my high school sweetheart, Liz. She ended up marrying my cousin.” His gorgeous face twisted with a scowl for a moment when he said the word “cousin.” Then his expression went blank, and he said, “And last spring…I broke off an engagement with this poor woman. I thought I could make it work, but my heart wasn’t in it.” He shrugged. “I thought I was cursed when it came to women. Before I met you, that is.”
Quenby stared into his eyes, trying to decide what to do with all he’d just told her.
He chuckled. “Or maybe I’m still cursed. Things don’t seem to be going so well here.”
“How can you be so sure? I mean, about me. Us.” She had feelings for him, strong ones, but she was afraid to trust them. She had been wrong pretty much every time when it came to guys so far in life.
“The facts that I haven’t been able to take my eyes off you when we’re in the same room since I first saw you and that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you since we met are pretty strong
clues. Caleb linked his arm through hers. “You know, it seemed like a horrible thing to think at the time, but I was relieved when you called off the wedding.” He pushed a brown curl away from her face and murmured, “When you said you weren’t getting married that day, I knew I had to see you again.”
Her hands trembled, and her knees weren’t so steady, either.
“You look like you need something hot.” His eyes were soft yet intense.
“Huh?” she said weakly.
He nodded to a booth near where they stood. “Cider. I meant they have hot cider over there.”
She cleared her throat and hoped her face didn’t look as hot as it felt. “Yeah. Yeah I guess that’d be good.”
He grinned and steered her in the direction of the booth. “You’re actin’ real strange. Adorable, but strange.”
Yeah, well, it’s your fault, she thought.
Moments later, her hands were wrapped around a warm paper cup filled with cider. She took a sip. Warm, a little spicy, and very delicious.
“Thank you.”
“No problem.”
“You know, I don’t know very much about you at all, Caleb Fletcher-Smith. You should share some more of those secrets with me.”
“Oh? What would you like to know, Miz Quenby?”
“Tell me about Georgia. About your family. I dunno—anything.”
“Not much to tell. I have an older brother. Dad’s a surgeon, and nothing you could ever do will ever be good enough for him if you’re his son. Even if one of us became president, he’d probably say, ‘You’re screwing up the whole country, not just your own life now. Way to go, son.’ Mom’s a worrier and always trying to marry either me or my brother off. That woman loves to play matchmaker.”
“You’re a very to the point kind of person, huh?”
He shrugged. “What’s the point in not being that way?”
“I dunno. It’s just that some people aren’t that open.” Derek had treated every detail in his life outside of Quenby like one huge secret. Sometimes, she felt like he didn’t even like talking to her.
“Well, I am. Anything you want from me, I’ll give it up,” Caleb said, his gaze giving her the impression he was talking about something else entirely. “Now, how’s that cider?”
“Really good. You want a sip?” Quenby asked, holding the cup out to him.
He took it, his fingers lingering on hers a moment before wrapping around the cup. After sipping from the cup, he handed it back to her. “You’re right. Good stuff.”
Quenby smiled and took another sip of the cider.
Everything about the afternoon was perfect. The faint smell of burning wood in the air, the gold and rust colored leaves on the trees, Caleb so close and so attentive. Pretty much everything she could want. Especially when Caleb put his arm around her and left it there for most of the afternoon.
They drove to Charlottesville for dinner. Before eating, they took a walk around the Downtown Mall, a pedestrian mall, where they window-shopped and people watched.
“So tell me more about you,” Caleb said when they stopped to look into the window of an art shop at the paintings on display.
“What’s the point?” Quenby blurted out. “I mean, you’re leaving tomorrow.” She pretended to be concentrating really hard on one of the watercolors.
“I don’t want to be.”
“You’re in med school. You kind of have to.”
“I wish you’d say this won’t be the last time we see each other. Is it so hard for you to say that?”
“It probably won’t be. Macon’s one of my closest friends. I might go down to Georgia to visit her sometimes.”
“That’s not what I meant.” He captured her chin between his thumb and index finger. She forced her gaze to the street and watched a couple walking over the cobblestones with their golden retriever happily trotting along between them. He brought his lips close to her ear, redirecting her attention to him. “And I think you know what I meant.”
“I just got out of a bad relationship. That’s kinda how we met, remember? I’m not looking for a serious relationship right now.”
He kissed her cheek. “That’s not what I asked you.”
“Would my saying we’ll see each other again really make any difference? This week has been wonderful, but nothing about it is the kind of stuff a real, long-lasting relationship is built on.”
“It is to me.” He rubbed his hand over his jaw. “I mean, I think it could be. Eventually, that is. If you let it.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Quenby said.
He moved closer to her and said in a low voice, “I want to spend more time with you.”
“That’s going to be kind of hard to do from Georgia.” She pulled away, those red-hot feelings she’d felt for Caleb all week threatening to get her in trouble again. Biting her lower lip, she thought about what it would be like to bite his. “Long distance relationships don’t work.”
“It’s just—you’re all I think about. And I had to say something.”
“I’m hungry. You hungry? We should grab dinner now.” She shoved her hands into her pockets.
He nodded and looked down the mall. “Let’s go.”
The two of them walked past the Paramount Theater and toward the restaurant they had decided on earlier. She pulled her jacket closer to her when what she really wanted to do was pull Caleb to her.
Chapter 14
When they got back from dinner in Charlottesville, she kept her arms folded against her body after letting them into the condo. “I had a good time today. But I think…I think we need to be realistic about this before somebody gets hurt.”
Caleb took a seat on the arm of her sofa and looked at her, not saying a word.
“It was a fling, no strings attached, no hard feelings.”
He tapped his skilled, surgeon-in-training fingers against his thighs and held her gaze. She thought about the things those fingers had done to her all week long. Very skilled. He didn’t back down, didn’t say a word.
“Anything we feel right now? It’s lust,” she said, trying to convince both herself and him of that. “It won’t last. It’s stupid and silly to think we can make anything more than what we shared work. It was great, hot, but that’s all. Just some great sex. And you’re a wonderful person, but…I mean, there are just so many reasons it won’t work.” She wasn’t used to being the dumper. She’d been with Derek for over five years, and even before that, she hadn’t often been the dumper. The way she was making a mess of things proved that. She didn’t know what she wanted to say really. Maybe part of the problem was she didn’t want to say any of it. She knew that was the way things had to be, though.
Besides, it wasn’t like they’d even had anything real. But it’d sure felt real. No, she had to stop thinking like that. “I mean, you understand, don’t you?” She raked her hands through her hair.
He shrugged, but still wouldn’t say a word.
“And…and I think it’s best if you slept out here tonight.” Because she was close to the point of no return. If he touched her one more time, she wasn’t sure she could keep up her resolve to keep him out.
He stood. She backed away, shaking her head.
Please, she thought. Please don’t make me fall for you.
Caleb moved closer. “What if I kissed you right now?” His voice was low and soft, his words lengthened by the drawl of his Southern accent. The type of voice that could seduce all by itself without the aid of hands or lips.
“I think I want you to,” she said, betraying herself. With him so close, she couldn’t think straight.
“You think? You’re not sure?” He put his hands on her triceps, his thumbs rubbing hypnotic circles against them.
“I want you to. Please.” Quenby closed her eyes and melted into his fingers. His lips closed over hers. His tongue moved over hers in a seductive dance that made her give up all thoughts of pushing him away. She locked her hands behind his neck and kissed him back the way s
he’d imagined doing it all day.
“I won’t hurt you,” he whispered over her lips before kissing her again. He pulled back from the kiss a little to say, “I heard every word you said. All I have to say in return is, I’m going to make sweet, slow, perfect love to you tonight.” Caleb pressed his forehead to hers. “That’s all.”
Those perfect hazel eyes were all she could see. She moved closer until their noses touched and closed her eyes.
Caleb’s hands traveled over the thin fabric of her skirt, lingering on her bum. The desire she felt for him flared even hotter as his fingers explored areas very close to where she ached for him.
“I need you,” she whispered before biting at his earlobe.
“I know. Need you, too,” he said huskily before spinning her back to him again and pulling her close so that she felt exactly how much he needed her.
With his body pressed so close and his hands everywhere, her entire body screamed out for him. She wanted him closer. She wanted him more than anything.
“You’re too good at this,” Quenby said as his hands moved over her sides, his fingers playing into her flesh.
“At what?” he murmured against her cheek.
“Making me never want you to stop touching me.”
“Good.” He walked her to the bedroom. Still standing behind her, he unbuttoned her blouse, letting his finger trail over every new inch of skin he exposed. She shivered with delight at every touch, sure that her knees would stop supporting her every time, but somehow they held her up.
“It’s been a long, frustrating day of fighting this and I…”
“What? You what, Quenby?” He undid the last button and pushed her blouse off her shoulders. The silk brushed against her skin as it slipped down her arms. She watched it hit the floor. His fingers danced down her neck and over her shoulders, sending shivers up and down her spine.
“When did I take off my jacket?” she murmured, dazed. She was love—no passion, definitely passion—drunk.
“Out there in the living room,” he whispered, his lips brushing her ear.
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