“Still?” Her eyes glistened. “I never stopped.”
Elyse?” He took a step closer, but she backed away.
“I don’t want this, Brett. It took all of my strength to leave the first time. And I’ve stayed away because it was way easier than dealing with these feelings.”
It had been years since she’d felt so raw, so exposed, so vulnerable. For years, Elyse had locked away those feelings and lived her life on autopilot. But tonight, being with her family, sitting by the Christmas tree and holding Jack, something had changed inside her. She’d felt a yearning so intense, so wrenching, it had come from deep within her soul, from that place she’d kept tightly locked up for a decade. That place that hid all the pain she felt…about her mother’s unhappiness and her father’s disappointment. And the pain of walking away from Brett so many years ago.
She never let the feelings out. They were trapped. As out of reach as the stars from some distant planet. In her safe place. But being around Brett somehow opened the door on that pain.
“We could make this work.”
His voice echoed around the room. She shook her head, fighting the tears behind her eyes.
“No, we couldn’t. Once of us would have to give up everything we’ve worked for…everything we are…and neither of us would ever be prepared to do that.”
“So, what do we do? Continue to live our lives like this…me in one place…you in another. With each of us knowing that the other one is out there, living a half-life, knowing that part of ourselves is missing?”
There was pain and frustration in his voice and it hurt her through to the core. “Yes, we do. Like we’ve done for the past ten years.” She walked around the table and stood in front of him. “We both have to get over it. Move on. Find someone else.”
“I tried that,” he admitted. “It didn’t work.”
“Perhaps it will work next time.”
“Is that really what you want, Elyse?” He asked rawly. “For both of us to be with someone else?”
“I want…I want to stop hurting all over at the mere thought of you. Merry Christmas, Brett,” she said and stood on her toes to kiss his cheek.
By the time she made it back to the living room her hands were shaking. There were gifts to open and Maureen was summoning everyone to sit down around the tree. As a young girl, Elyse had done the same thing many times, but this time was different. Billy-Jean and Rick were settled on the couch, holding hands, while their baby slept in the cradle. Her dad and Maureen were bickering like and old married couple and she and Brett were squared off on opposite sides of the room, barely able to look at one another, but also unable to look anywhere else.
Once the gifts were opened and the wrapping paper cleared up, Elyse felt Brett come up behind her. “You didn’t ask me what I got you.”
She shrugged lightly. She’d bought him a bottle of twenty five year old scotch that she knew he wouldn’t drink, but he accepted it graciously. Her lack of gift from him had been conspicuous, but she tried not to be wounded. “It doesn’t matter.”
“Come outside.”
He grabbed her hand and a jolt of awareness raced across her skin and through her blood. No one seemed to care that they were no holding hands. Rick and B.J. were wrapped up in one another, and Maureen and her father were playing cards in the kitchen.
They were outside and walking toward the stables before she had a chance to protest.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
“You’ll see.”
By the time they reached the stables she was breathing hard. He flicked some of the lights on and the whole place illuminated. There were ten stables, mostly empty, and Brett led her down to the end. They paused a few paces from the last stall and he released her.
“Take a look,” he suggested and pointed to the stall.
Curious, Elyse moved forward and peered over the door. And gasped loudly when she saw her old buckskin gelding, Sonny, peering at her through big brown eyes. “Oh…I can’t believe it. I’m dreaming.” She turned around and saw that Brett was smiling. “How did you do this?” she asked and waited as he came forward to unclip the bolt on the door.
“He came through the sale yards about a year ago,” Brett explained as she moved into the stall and wrapped her arms around Sonny’s neck. “I recognized him and made an offer. He’d been out west working on a cattle station for a few years. But, he’s past his prime so he was put back through the sales.”
“And you bought him?”
He shrugged. “I knew what he meant to you. And I figured he had earned his retirement. He’s been here ever since. I figured that one day you would come back and that you’d be happy to see him.”
A surge of love washed over Elyse. For her old horse and for the man in front of her.
“Merry Christmas, Elyse.”
Tears came, hot and scalding and Brett reached out to wipe them with his thumb. Without thinking, Elyse sagged against him and he held her tight. His arms were like bands of comfort, strong and safe and suddenly they were only place she wanted to be.
She looked up and saw he was smiling and she touched his cheek with her fingertips. “Brett…” She said his name on a sigh.
“Yes, Elyse?”
She pressed closer. “Take me upstairs.”
His brows shot up. “Upstairs?”
She stroked his jaw. “To the hay loft.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Making love with Brett again after so many years felt like the most normal, natural thing in the world. His touch sent her spinning. His hands were sure and tender and knew exactly where to touch, where to stroke, where to feel.
By the time they made it upstairs to the small loft, Elyse was shaking from head to toe. But Brett had her secure in his embrace. He lay down a blanket and they both dropped to their knees, kissing hotly, taking one breath after another as their lips met again and again. She accepted his tongue into her mouth, felt an incredible surge of pleasure as it met her own in an erotic dance. Clothes and shoes came off quickly and once they were naked, once they had nothing but skin against skin, Brett eased her down onto the blanket.
It felt so good to be close to him, to feel the hard lines of his body pressed into the softness of hers. He touched her, caressed her, and drove her wild with his mouth and his hands. He touched her breasts, her hips, her thighs. He stroked her where she longed to be stroked until she could take no more. Elyse felt him hard against her and wanted him closer.
She said his name on a sigh and ran her hands down his back, urging him inside her. “I need you…now.”
He looked down into her face. “Birth control? I didn’t –”
“I’m on the pill,” she said breathlessly. “Please…I need to feel you. All of you.”
He took his time and drove her wild. He kissed her everywhere. He remembered the spots where she craved to be touched and found new ones. And she matched him, knowing what he liked, feeling his passion as if it was all she needed to survive. Nothing else mattered in that moment. Noting or no one could intrude. And when they came together in a white-hot frenzy of release, all she could do was say is name, over and over.
When it was over he rolled off her gently and lay by her side. The blanket was scratchy and a few pieces of straw poked through, but Elyse didn’t care. She was on a high. Her blood still pumped with a heady kind of pleasure. Nothing had ever felt as good. Nothing ever would. Only Brett could make her feel so alive and so complete.
He traced his fingertips along her breast, circled her nipple as it hardened ever more and sighed. “Well, that was something.”
Elyse smiled contentedly. “Yes, it was. You’ve learned a thing or two over the years.”
He laughed and the sound reached her way down. “As have you.”
“I guess we should get back to house at some point. I don’t want anyone to come looking for us.”
“I think we’re safe,” he replied. “Rick and B.J. are too wrapped up in one another to care what
we do. And Frank and my mother will be playing cards until midnight. In fact,” he said wickedly and rolled her over and on top of him. “We could probably stay out here for another hour and no one would know we were missing.”
He kissed her again, long and hard and full of promise. Elyse kissed him back, over and over, loving the feel of his mouth on hers. She could have kissed him forever.
And probably would have. But sanity had to prevail.
“We should go back.”
He released her slightly. “Sure, if that’s what you want.”
She nodded and moved off him. Once they were dressed and back down in the stables, Elyse spent a few minutes with Sonny and then closed the stall door.
“Thank you, Brett,” she said as he flicked off the lights. “For looking after Sonny.”
He grabbed her hand and kissed her knuckles. “No problem.”
“And for looking after my father. And B.J. And pretty much everything since I’ve been gone. I know things would be very different if you hadn’t stepped in and looked after the farm with Dad. I’m not sure I could ever repay you for what you’ve done.”
“I don’t want payment, Elyse. Anything I did, I did because I care. About Frank, and B.J.” He squeezed her hand gently. “And you.”
“Even after everything I did? After the way I left?”
He nodded. “I couldn’t just switch off my feelings for you. I tried, with Mandy…and all I did was hurt someone who deserved better. So, maybe we can do it differently this time around?”
Elyse stopped walking. “You mean, long distance?”
“Why not?” he shot back. “It sure as hell beats the alternative.”
She wasn’t so sure. “Because long distance is too hard. Especially with the long hours I do. And when you’re in the middle of cutting season I know you work fifteen hour days. How could it work, Brett? We’d be trying to grab time here and there…all it would do is make us resentful.”
“We could try.”
She shook her head. “I can’t. I know it wouldn’t work. I know me. I’m selfish in a lot of ways and I know we’d end up hurting one another.”
“So…what? That’s it? We fool around in hay loft one last time and now say our goodbyes?”
Elyse swallowed hard and nodded. “Yes. You said we needed to try and get one another out of our systems. Maybe this is it, maybe we can both move on now.”
She was trying to make it easy for him, but she was dying inside.
“Move on?” he queried. “Are you serious? We’ve had ten years to move on and all either of us have to show for it is a one busted marriage and a broken engagement.”
“We have to try,” she said and let out a shuddering breath. “I have to try.”
By the time they made it back to the house B.J. and Rick were fast asleep on the couch and Maureen was sitting on a chair in the corner of the living room, reading a magazine.
“Where’s my dad?” Elyse asked when they entered the room.
“In the kitchen staring at his coffee,” Maureen replied and then raised one silvery brow. “Where have you two been for the past…” She check her watch. “Ninety minutes?”
“At the stables with Sonny,” Brett replied without a blip of embarrassment.
Maureen smiled at Elyse. “That must have been a nice surprise for you?”
She nodded. “Yes, it certainly was.”
“Yes,” Maureen said and flipped a page of the magazine. “My son is full of surprises.”
Heat rose up Elyse’s neck. She’d wager money that Maureen knew exactly what they’d been doing in the stables. Blushing, Elyse excused herself and headed for the kitchen. She found her father at the table, staring into his untouched coffee, just as Maureen had said.
“Hi, Dad.”
He looked up, stared at her a little vaguely for a moment, then a small smile creased his face. “It’s nice to have everyone together,” he said, then looked back to his coffee.
Elyse sat down and touched her father’s arm. “It is. And I like seeing you happy.”
He shrugged. “I have my moments. You’re leaving soon?”
One thing she could reply on with her father, he always got straight to the point. “That’s right. But Billy-Jean and Jack will be here.”
“Until they move out,” he added. “Rick will want them under this roof.”
Elyse thought so too, but she didn’t agree. “We’ll see what happens.”
“I’ll be rattling around in that house on my own again soon enough,” he said and grimaced. “Your mother told me as much, right before she left. You know she wasn’t coming back? She was taking my girls and staying away. When she died…” His words trailed for a moment. “When she died, part of me was glad. I know I shouldn’t say that, she being your mother and everything…”
Elyse squeezed his arm. “Dad, I know how hard things were for you when she left. And I know she wasn’t coming back. Don’t feel guilty about it. You did your best for Billy-Jean and me.”
“Did I?” he queried wearily. “Sometimes I feel as though you raised yourself and then you had to raise your sister.”
“I never felt that way.”
His eyes met hers. “But you left?”
“I know. I had too.”
“Before you ended up like your mother, you mean?”
Elyse managed a vague nod. It was so close to the truth. And it was something they’d never spoken about before. Oh, it had always been there, like and elephant in the room. But it was unsaid. Unmentionable.
“I wanted…more.”
Frank nodded. “And now? Has having more made you happy?”
No…
“I’m satisfied with my life. Content.”
“That ain’t happy, sweetheart.”
Heat formed behind her eyes. “I know, Dad. But it’s the best I can do right now.”
He grabbed her hands and squeezed them tightly. “Just don’t go throwing somethin’ away because you’re scared. Your mother and I got married just four weeks after we first met. Now, some people called it a mistake. Some said we rushed into things and didn’t know each other well enough to get married.” His eyes twinkled. “And you know what? Maybe they were right. But if we hadn’t rushed into it…if we’d played it safe because we were scared of the future, she might have figured out sooner than being a farmer’s wife wasn’t for her. And then I wouldn’t have had you and your sister. So, do I regret marrying your mother?” He asked the question almost to himself. “Do I regret goin’ through all the bad stuff…all the pain…all the guilt?” He shook his head. “Not one bit.”
Elyse swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded. “Thanks, Dad.”
He eyes glazed slightly. “For what?”
“For saying that. For this talk.”
He grinned fractionally. “You know, the damnedest thing is, I can’t remember half of what I say these days. Now, leave your old man in peace and go and make up with that boy.”
Elyse gasped. “I don’t know what –”
“I may be forgetful, but I ain’t blind. Don’t be a fool twice in your life.”
Elyse wanted nothing more than to take her father’s advice. But she couldn’t.
She loved Brett. But sometimes love wasn’t enough.
Or was it?
“They look happy,” Brett said quietly to his mother and pointed to the couch on the other side of the room. B.J. and his brother were flaked out, fast asleep and snuggled close.
Maureen smiled. “Yes. Parenthood has worn them out today. But they seem to be pulling through. And he’s a delightful baby.”
“That’s your unbiased opinion?” he asked as he sat down beside her.
“Absolutely. Although, I am something of a doting grandmother. And since you are taking your good time giving me grandchildren, I shall have to focus all my attention on the one I have.”
He groaned under his breath. “Are we really going to have this conversation again?”
His mother shru
gged and closed the magazine in her hands. “Yes. I think you need to hear this. The truth is, I’m worried about you. She’s only been back for three days and you’re already in trouble.”
His back straightened. “I’m fine.”
“And you’re a lousy liar.”
He was a great liar. He’d been lying to himself for a decade. Now he felt like the biggest fool on the planet. “She’s leaving in two days, so stop stressing.”
“It’s what she’s leaving behind that concerns me.”
He frowned. “What?”
His mother leaned forward and spoke quietly. “Your broken heart…again.”
Brett waved a hand, dismissing his other’s words. “Like I said, I’m fine.”
“It doesn’t matter how old you get, you’re still my child,” she reminded him and made him feel about ten years old. “And maybe I sound like I’m clucking around like an old hen, but I don’t care. All I care about is making sure that you’re not falling for her again. Because, as much as hate to say it, she’s not like us, Brett.”
Irritation twitched between his shoulder blades. “She’s more like us than she makes out,” he said quietly. “She was born here, raised here, just like we were.”
“And she left,” his mother reminded him. “Just like Amy Prescott. The fact is, she’s got too much of her mother in her to ever be happy with this life, with Denary, or with you.”
Deep down, he knew that. One of them would have to change. There was no middle road. It was one or the other. City or country. Denary or Sydney.
And they were back to where they were ten years ago. The pain was the same. The anger, the resentment, the disbelief. Every emotion he’d had back then had come rushing back with a vengeance. Making love to her hadn’t gotten her out of his system. It hadn’t been cathartic. It had only galvanized what he already knew. He was still in love with Elyse. More than ever. And he didn’t have any idea how to get past it, through it, or over it.
Maybe there was no way out? Maybe some loves simply stayed, torturing, tormenting, and reminding of what it could have been.
Either way, he was screwed.
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