by Katy Paige
“That’s her,” said Paul softly. “Holly.”
Zoë looked up to see Paul standing in the bathroom doorway with a towel wrapped around his waist. She could practically feel her eyes dilating at the sight of him freshly showered, his hair and chest dripping with droplets of water. She could have sat there gawking at him forever. Except…
Holly. Holly. He’s talking about Holly.
“Yeah,” she said. “I figured.”
He crossed the room and sat down on the edge of the bed beside her, taking the frame out of her hands and looking at it for a moment before turning it over, opening the drawer beside his leg and pushing it inside.
“This isn’t who I am,” he muttered, shaking his head. “I don’t lead women on. I don’t date two women at once. I don’t do this.”
Her heart twisted to see him suffering; he was an honorable man in what he thought was a dishonorable situation and it killed her that she had put him there. She had to tell him. She had to tell him the truth so that he’d know he wasn’t doing anything wrong.
“Paul, what if Holly were here?”
“Like if she was standing here and I had to choose between you two?”
She shook her head. “N-no. I mean—”
“It doesn’t matter. I told you earlier...” He turned to her, pain on his face, but not uncertainty. “…I choose you. I’m breaking up with Holly tomorrow.”
“But you care for her.”
He swallowed and nodded, turning away from Zoë. “I do. She’s great. She deserves a lot more than a guy who falls for someone else over the course of three days.”
It wasn’t lost on Zoë that he said he had fallen for her—for her, as Zoë—but she couldn’t let herself get sidetracked. She wanted to try to tell him the truth. She cleared her throat.
“What if…I mean, what if you could have both of us?”
His head whipped to face her, eyes wide, brows knit together. He blushed as he answered her. “Like at the same time? Like a…a…oh, well, no. Not that it doesn’t sound…I mean—I mean, I guess I’m just not that kind of guy. Call me old-fashioned but—”
“No, you’re not getting what I’m—what if you didn’t have to choose?”
“You’re not making sense. Of course I have to choose.”
Her breathing had progressively gotten so heavy and fast that she felt light-headed. Her blood was rushing from her head, making her heart race. She was panicking. She recognized the symptoms—she’d had dozens of panic attacks the year after the accident. She needed fresh air; she needed to get back to her hotel room.
“Damn it,” she muttered, pressing her cool hands to her cheeks and trying to take a deep breath. She could feel them trembling against the increasing heat of her skin.
“Zoë, what’s going on? Are you okay?”
“I have to go,” she said, scrambling off the bed as her eyes welled up with tears.
“Let me get dressed. Let me walk you—”
“No. You don’t have to.” She hastily tied her shirt at her waist, buttoning two buttons with shaking fingers as she rushed out of the bedroom, heading for the stairs.
“Zoë!” he yelled from his bedroom. “Stop!”
She scurried down the stairs, pausing at the landing to try to get a deep breath into her lungs before reaching for the doorknob. His hand shot out, flattening against the door, holding it closed.
“Please let me go,” she murmured, unable to face him.
“Not until I know you’re okay.”
He took another step closer to her and she could feel the heat of his body behind her. The corded muscles of his forearm brushed against her hair and she stared at his wrist, at the veins running down to his wrist from his elbow. Out of the corner of her eye she could tell that he was only wearing jeans and his chest still glistened from his shower.
“I’m okay,” she whispered.
“I shouldn’t have had that picture out,” Paul said softly, his hand falling away from the door and slipping around her, under her breasts. “I’m sorry. None of this is your fault. It’s my problem and it’s not fair to burden you with it.”
Her eyes shuttered closed and her nose flared with the intensity of her breathing. He was apologizing to her. The guilt she felt was so overwhelming, she felt faint. She let her body go slack against him. His other arm came around her, but he didn’t force her to turn around, he just held her tightly, her back against his chest.
“I wasn’t pushing you away up there,” he said softly, bending his head to move his lips closer to her ear. “I don’t know how this happened between us so fast, but it did. I’m sorry I’m going to hurt Holly, but I’m not sorry for wanting you, Zoë. I’m not sorry you came here for vacation. I’m not sorry you saved my dog. I’m not sorry I kissed you that first time or the second time or any other time after. I can’t stop myself. When I’m around you, I just…just, I don’t know. I’ve never felt chemistry like this with anyone else in my whole life, and I don’t know how it’s possible to feel like I do so quickly, but I do. And if you do too, I just want to give it a chance.”
She leaned her head back against him, her chest rising and falling swiftly under his hands. A tear snaked down her face, following the crevasse of her scar.
“This is crazy,” she whispered, personal agony wrenching her heart.
“Then give me a chance to get to know you better. Come to the Harvest Dance with me on Thursday night.”
“The Harvest Dance?”
“Yeah. Be my date. We’ll go out to dinner first and you can tell me all about Nils and the old ladies. And we can just dance to slow dances if you—”
She spun in his arms, lifting her hands to his face and pulling his lips down to hers without warning. His arms tightened around her and he thrust his tongue into her mouth without preamble, urgent and demanding as he tasted her. The pressure of his fingers intensified in her lower back until his knuckles curled and he pushed her more tightly up against him. Her fingers played with the short hair over his ears and her thumbs stroked the stubble of his jaw gently, memorizing the textures of him, the way he felt, the way he made her feel.
She pulled away from him, breathless and overwhelmed by his goodness, by how much she never wanted to spend another day of her life without him. His surprised lips tilted up in a smile and she felt him chuckle.
“I guess that’s a yes? For the dance?”
She nodded, unable to keep the grin from her face, despite the sheer screwed-upness of the entire situation. He was just too adorable, and she loved him too much.
“Let me walk you home?” he asked.
She shook her head, blinking back tears, backing out of his arms and finding the doorknob.
“No,” she said, swiping at her eyes. “This is a good ending.”
His forehead creased. “Ending? I don’t like that.”
“For tonight. A good ending for tonight.”
His worried expression softened, and he tucked a piece of black hair behind her ear, rubbing the earlobe between his thumb and forefinger gently as he smiled at her again.
“Can I watch you walk away?” he asked, his eyes dropping to her backside before sweeping back up to her face.
“You mean limp away? Does that get you hot?”
“You get me hot, whatever you’re doing.”
She glanced down at his bare chest, muscular and toned, the contours highlighted by the dim light of his front hallway.
“I guess I know what that feels like,” she said, low and silky, letting her eyes sweep slowly back up to his.
He started to reach for her, but she sidestepped him, opening the door and slipping outside into the cool of the evening.
“Thursday?” he asked, looking hotter than fire leaning up against the doorway in nothing but a pair of unbuttoned jeans and a grin.
“Thursday,” she said, turning to walk down the porch steps and heading toward her inn. When she glanced back, he was still there, watching her walk away, listening to her ankle
t tingle softly all the way home.
CHAPTER 16
The next morning something was not sitting right with Paul.
He just couldn’t figure out what.
It was a lump in his stomach, an ache in his heart, a buzzing in his brain. But without a name, without a form or story or hint. Something wasn’t right.
It had nagged at him last night as he finished the dishes, and later he had tried to figure it out as he stared at the ceiling in bed, wishing he could go to sleep, distracted by the faint scent of honeysuckle on his sheets.
As he sorted through his thoughts in the growing morning light of his kitchen, some obvious issues sprang to mind—most notably, the fact that he was going to have to call Holly and break up with her today, and if he couldn’t get a hold of her, he at least needed to text her that they needed to talk. Thinking about that talk made him wince. Was he making the right decision? To push away a girl like Holly? He shook his head as he tapped the on button of his coffee maker. The decision was already made, he thought wryly, remembering Zoë’s head buried in his pillow.
He could still feel her trembling in his arms, still taste her in his mouth. He breathed deeper and grinned, putting his favorite mug under the coffee maker and pushing the bright blue button. Oh, man, she was hot.
He shook his head, heading out to the swing, Cleo at his heels. The cold air was like a slap in the face and made him refocus on the call he had to make to Holly. It made him feel like total crap, what he was about to do to her. She didn’t do anything wrong. She didn’t deserve to get a phone call from him breaking things off before they’d even had a chance to meet. It made him feel like the worst player who ever lived. Paul had never aspired to being a heartbreaker…he wanted to be like Westley. One woman. One man. True love. Instead here he was about to break Buttercup’s heart.
It also bothered him that he appeared so fickle—that his feelings for Holly had been so easy to dismantle. It was as though they hadn’t been as real or powerful as he’d thought as he got to know her. He’d been so sure at the time that what they were building between texts and phone calls was real and lasting, but it wasn’t anywhere near as strong as Zoë’s presence in his life after a mere four days. He sighed, shaking his head at his weakness, disappointed with himself.
Cleo shivered beside him and he reached for the blanket on the back of the swing and wrapped it around her.
Yeah, the situation with Holly definitely wasn’t sitting well with him, and it probably wouldn’t feel better until she’d had a chance to really lay into him and tell him what a weak, shallow, jerk-off he was and how much better off she was without him.
He’d listen to every single word without complaint. He deserved all of it. He should have had the self-control to break off things with Holly before starting anything with Zoë. It’s just everything with Zoë had happened so fast, had felt so…inevitable.
He picked up his phone. It was time to bite the bullet.
He opened a text box and started typing.
Holly, I need to talk to you today. I know you’re busy but it’s important. Please text back or call
He stopped typing, staring at the message. God, he was a selfish bastard. Was it fair to break up with her while she was at a conference? Was it okay for him to interrupt her time there just because he couldn’t handle the guilt for a few more days?
His thumb moved slowly, and his phone clicked softly as he pressed the back button repeatedly, erasing the characters one by one. He needed to wait until Friday. That was the least he could do.
He sighed, checking the time. He had about thirty minutes before he needed to leave for school, and as he erased the text to Holly, his thoughts turned to Zoë once again, to how much he wished she wasn’t going away.
His face softened thinking about her, even as whatever was nagging at him seemed to intensify with thoughts of her. He had known her for such a short amount of time, but she had wiggled her way into his heart with unerring accuracy, and there was nothing he could do about it. And yeah, he hated that she was headed out of town for two nights, but with him in Zoë’s life and Maggie in Nils’s life, he didn’t see anything happening between them.
So, what was it? What was needling at him so insistently? What was the something?
What if you could have both of us? What if you didn’t have to choose?
He heard her words from last night in his head and realized, with blinding certainty, that the something wasn’t his own laughable self-control or the looming doom of having to explain everything to Holly and break up with her.
It was all that business about not having to choose.
He hadn’t known Zoë for very long, but despite her edgy looks, she didn’t seem so free-spirited that she’d be up for an “open” relationship. So what did she mean when she said that?
He rolled the empty coffee mug back and forth in his hands, brows knitted together in confusion. He tried looking at her words from a few different angles, but he couldn’t make sense of them. Did she mean she’d somehow tolerate another woman in his heart? No, that couldn’t be it. No woman would go for that.
He looked at his phone again. He probably had about five minutes before the Lindstroms picked her up; he could easily run over there to talk to her.
Just like you keep bothering Holly. Needy.
Okay. No need to go over there, but a quick phone call just for reassurance couldn’t hurt, could it? He looked up the number of the Mountain View Inn and dialed the number.
The number rang as he walked into the kitchen, putting his coffee cup in the sink.
“Mountain View.”
“Hey Ann Marie, it’s Paul Johansson. How’re you doing today, ma’am?”
“I’m very well, neighbor. What can I do you for?”
“You have a guest staying with you…her name is Zoë Fine…”
“You mean Flannigan. She’s right outside waiting for the Lindstroms. Hold on.”
Flannigan! Zoë Flannigan?
His head jerked back like he’d been slapped, and the rest of her words faded out of earshot as his mind reeled.
Zoë and Holly have the same last name?
“W-wait…did you say…”
Flannigan. His heart started thumping uncomfortably and he heard the innkeeper speaking softly, as if holding her hand over the mouthpiece of the phone.
Finally someone spoke.
“Paul? It’s me.”
It’s me. In Holly’s voice. He’d heard it dozens of times.
“H-Holly?”
He started breathing faster, his mind working wildly to try to figure out what was going on.
He pulled the phone away from his ear to look at the caller ID, which read MtnViewInn. His brain muddled with confusion.
“No. It’s, um, it’s Zoë.”
“Zoë?” he asked, trying to take a deep breath, but unable. Zoë had answered the phone It’s me, in Holly’s voice. He’d bet his life on it.
“Yeah. Zoë,” she said firmly, her voice lower and breathier than it had been a moment ago. “Is everything okay?”
“Y-yeah,” he mumbled.
There was a long silence between them before she offered in a nervous voice, “Thanks for last night. It was great.”
He tried to concentrate on what she was saying, but he couldn’t figure out what the hell was going on. The call was definitely coming from the Mountain View Inn, the voice he’d originally heard pick up the phone was Holly’s, but now it sounded like Zoë. Was this his mind playing tricks on him? Was he going crazy from a mixture of lust and guilt?
“Zoë.”
“It’s me. I’m here…”
“I just wanted to say…I mean, I wanted to ask you—”
“Listen, Nils just pulled up. I have to go. Can we talk when I get back?”
“Do you have a cell number?”
There was a long pause. Too long.
“I don’t, um…my cell isn’t working here.”
“Okay.” He grimaced and
his chest tightened as unfamiliar tears of confusion popped into his eyes, surprising him, burning painfully. Her phone had been working fine three days ago as they drove into Yellowstone with Lars and Jane.
“Paul…I’m…I’m crazy about you. I need you to know that. It’s important to me that you know it. Really know it. Don’t forget, okay?”
His eyes clenched shut painfully and he braced his hands on the kitchen counter. They were the exact same words Holly had used two weeks ago when she told him she was falling for him.
“Hol—Zoë…”
“I have to go,” she said, and it came out a little bit like a sob. “I’ll see you Thursday.”
The line went dead.
He held the phone up to his ear long after the call had disconnected. He absently placed the phone on the counter, his mind reeling. The uneasiness in his stomach made him feel nauseous and he grimaced, swallowing back the cereal and coffee that threatened a reappearance.
Staring out the window, he tried frantically to make sense of what had just happened. Zoë’s last name was Flannigan, and her voice sounded identical to Holly’s over the phone. Could Zoë be a cousin of Holly’s? No. Holly didn’t have a cousin yet. Her only aunt was pregnant with her first child.
Was there any chance his guilt about breaking up with Holly was overriding rational thought? Was his mind playing tricks on him? He might be able to believe that if it was just the familiarity of Holly’s voice when he picked up the phone, but her last name? It was too much of a coincidence. That was Holly on the phone. He was sure of it.
He picked up the phone and hit the caller ID button again to be sure of the number he’d just called. MtnViewInn. There’s no doubt that he called the Mountain View Inn. The voice was definitely Holly’s, even though she said she was Zoë.
What the fuck is going on?
Hearing the roar of a van engine outside, he realized she wasn’t gone yet and he sprinted out of his house just in time to see the Lindstrom & Sons van turn right off his road, headed toward the Roosevelt Arch. He stood under his porch watching as the van kicked up dust, headed for the park.
