Reckless at Heart (The Kincaids of Pine Harbour Book 1)

by Zoe York

  Small, vulnerable, and still brave. He kissed her again, holding her face the way she had held his. She pressed into him and that sunshine-y flood of oxygen filled him once more.

  Not so small. Still vulnerable.

  Together they stumbled to her room. They didn’t bother to turn on the lights. In the dark, they stripped each other down to nothing.

  Kerry took his cock, hard and throbbing, in her hand, and stroked him slowly in the tight space between their bodies. “Do we need—”

  “Nothing. Unless you—”

  “No…”

  She whimpered as he rolled her onto her back. He stroked her breasts, her hips, worshipping the shape of her, before sliding his fingers against her slick pussy. God, she was soaked for him already, and that made him rut against her hip like a monster.

  “Yes,” she breathed.

  Her monster, who loved her so much.

  She hitched her leg around his hip and tried to flip him back. “Owen, I need you.”

  He needed her, too. With a roar, he fit them together and thrust home, sliding into her body where a moment before there had been nothing but desire.

  She fit him perfectly, hot and wet, and when he bottomed out, he thought he might never want to leave. “So good,” he growled.

  And she laughed.

  Fuck, that made him hard. She laughed and her breasts bounced against his chest. “So good,” she repeated in the sweetest, huskiest voice. “I’ve missed you.”

  “I love you.”

  She repeated that, too. They said it back and forth as they found a rhythm. Breath against skin, hands around flesh. Pushing and pulling to get closer, feel more.

  Arousal climbed. It spiralled and bloomed in a kind of technicolour Owen had never imagined. He never wanted to leave her body and he never wanted this to end, but at the same time she was getting closer beneath him, he could feel it. And he wanted to come with her, to chase her orgasm with his own.

  He wanted to fill her up and then hold her after.

  She arched her back, her breath gasping nonsensical words that sounded like music, and deep inside, he felt his response let loose. Darkness closed in around his vision as he pumped his hips one more time and felt the rough first spurt jolt out of him.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  “Where did that fall into the seven steps?” Kerry heard the wild, crazy laughter in her voice. It made her smile, and she didn’t even need to look over at Owen to know he probably had a matching expression on his face.

  He coughed. “We skipped a couple.”

  “I’ll be right back.” She rolled off the bed and went to the washroom, and when she got back, Owen had pushed himself up in the bed and turned on the light.

  She stopped in the doorway.

  His gaze raked over her naked body, making her skin tingle. Slowly, she climbed on top of him and settled on his chest. They were both a bit damp.

  “Should we take a shower?”

  “We should get dressed and go to my house.”

  She raised her head and gave him an are you out of your mind? look. “Why?”

  “Step three.”

  “You’ve already got the girl.”

  “Trust me, I think this is worth it.” She went to move, and he clamped his big hands down her on her butt. “Not yet, though. I like having you draped on me like this.”

  She wriggled against him and fell quiet, listening to his heartbeat.

  When she lifted her head again, he was looking at her. His gaze was relentless. Once upon a time, she’d read it as harsh and piercing. Now it washed over her as gentle and tender. Wonderful.

  “You’re looking at me.”

  “I like to do that.”

  She shivered. “I know.” Reaching out, she traced the hard line of his jaw. “You always have.”

  His eyes darkened, but he didn’t look away. “I couldn’t help it. And then I didn’t want to, because I thought looking at you might be all I’d ever get.”

  Her chest hurt at the idea of not having this love, because of one or both of them being too closed off or stubborn. “I could never have resisted you. Since the beginning, this was what I wanted. You have always been irresistible to me.”

  “Same.” He caught her hand and kissed her open palm. “Do you have any lingering doubts?”

  She thought about it. “No. Questions, maybe, but not doubt.”

  “Questions about what?”

  “Kids.”

  He spread his arms. “I’m an open book. Dig.”

  “Everything you said makes sense. But are you sure you want to start all over?”

  He didn’t answer right away. His gaze dropped away from hers, then came back. “What I have realized is that I was blessed to grow up with a large family, to be able to raise a daughter and support my brothers as they moved into adulthood. That was a joy, truly, as much as I fixated on the negative aspects. But I never chose it. Next time…this time, I want to choose it.”

  “Babies,” she whispered.

  He nodded. “Babies, and maybe we could be foster parents down the road. There are kids who need adults in their lives to make a safe space. Queer kids, kids who have escaped abuse—”

  She climbed up him higher, kissing his face all over. “Yes.”

  “Maybe one thing at a time.” He dusted his fingers over her cheek, then brushed his hand back into her hair. “I want some time with just you, too.”

  It took them another hour to get dressed. He’d offered to go and get the mysterious step three, whatever it was, but he had the bigger bed—and the bigger shower. “I like your place.” Then she corrected herself. “I love your place. It reminds me of you, and it makes me happy to spend time there.”

  “Maybe one day soon we can talk about making it your place, too.” He zipped up her parka. “What would you think about that?”

  “One step at a time,” she said, her cheeks heating up. She thought it sounded lovely.

  Step three, it turned out, was a present. A gift bag of smallish proportions and decent weight, that inside had two boxes, one significantly heavier than the other.

  Each of them had a card that matched the one Owen had left on her door.

  “I had this whole plan worked out,” he admitted. “You would read the note, and then reach out to me, and I would leave this on your doorstep next.”

  A delightfully romantic idea, although Kerry thought the way it had gone was better. She wouldn’t have wanted to wait another day to hear all that Owen had shared.

  She picked up the lighter, smaller box, but her fingers were shaking.

  “Help,” she whispered, and she realized her voice was shaking, too.

  He leaned in and kissed her, softly, then covered her hands with his. “Here.”

  Inside was a cassette tape box. Clear plastic, with paper covered in black marker writing. Owen’s Mix Tape for Kerry, it read in big letters in the middle. Song titles were written in smaller print around the title.

  She picked it up, and it actually felt like there was something inside it.

  It was an actual tape.

  “What did you do?” Now her voice sounded full of wonder, and that was accurate.

  She looked up at Owen, and he flexed one shoulder. A little shrug. “I made you this.”

  “How?”

  “I’ll tell you after.” He reached for his bag and pulled out an honest-to-God first generation Walkman. “I want you to listen to it first.”

  He helped her put the tape in the deck, then he sat in the corner of the couch and pulled her into the crook of his arm. She held the headphones to her ear, angling them a bit so he could hear too, and she pushed the Play button in with a ka-chunk.

  At first there was nothing but a crackle. Then she heard Owen’s voice from a bit of a distance. “This tape is a little bit of a love letter, and a lot of an explanation. It’s the story of falling in love with you, and that started from the very first moment I laid eyes on you. This one’s for you, Kerry Humphrey.�
�

  It was a country song she recognized that was a few years old, but it had been in heavy rotation all summer on the local station. She looked at the handwritten playlist notes. Brett Eldredge, “Wanna Be That Song”. Owen held her as she listened to every word, and tears gathered in the corners of her eyes.

  When the song faded out, Owen’s voiceover returned. “Did you know a cassette tape only holds thirty minutes of recorded material? I had forgotten that. So we’re going to have to zoom way back, to when I was taping songs off the radio the first time around. To when I found out my girlfriend was pregnant, and we decided we wanted a baby long before we were really ready. I feel like that’s been my entire life to this point, Kerry. Never quite ready for what life puts in front of me. I wasn’t ready for you, either. But I am now. So here’s an inside look into that eighteen-year-old boy’s heart.”

  That did it. The tears slid down her face as his voice cracked in her ear, as his arms wrapped tighter around her body. She listened to “November Rain” by Guns and Roses and “My Favorite Mistake” by Sheryl Crow and tried to picture Owen—this mature, capable man—in Becca and Hayden’s shoes. She couldn’t quite picture it, but he would tell her more, over time.

  When his voice came back on the recording, it was to introduce two country songs he listened to a lot when he was away from Becca.

  She turned in his arms, and he relaxed his grip, but gestured for her to keep listening. Biting her lip, she nodded and sank onto her heels, kneeling beside him.

  This was him. He was showing her his life through songs, and it wasn’t just angsty feelings. It was slices of fun, snuck in where he could. It was three lives in one. The father, the single guy, and the responsible firefighter and paramedic determined to have a respectable career. She’d seen all three of those men, and she’d seen them war against each other, too.

  The final song was a Dire Straits song that had been his father’s favourite.

  When the tape clicked to an end, Owen slid the headphones off and their hands stayed tangled around the Walkman. Neither of them spoke.

  She looked at the box. There was no side B.

  Owen followed her gaze. “I thought we could make that playlist together.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  On Christmas Eve, Becca and Charlie went to Hayden’s family get-together, so Owen and Kerry went to the Green Hedgehog with his brothers. They played darts, drank Lore’s dangerously good Egg Nog, and when they were dropped off at home, they had happy, laughing sex under the mistletoe.

  Then they put on matching Christmas PJs, just in case Becca showed up at dawn. The last thing Owen did before bed was slide one more present for Kerry under the tree.

  In the morning, it was Kerry who got up first. He felt her slide out of bed, and told himself he would get up, too, but he drifted off again.

  The next thing he knew she was back with two foaming lattes—because she’d bought him an espresso machine, too. An early Christmas present, and smart planning ahead. She’d decided to give up her lease at the end of January, which would mean she was precariously far from the lattes in the clinic.

  “What time is it?” he mumbled. Owen usually didn’t have any problem getting out of bed, but that egg nog had hit him like a ton of bricks.

  “Just after eight.”

  “I’m up.” He shoved himself out of bed. “Do you know where my phone is?”

  Kerry found it on the bedside table and handed it to him. “Are you okay?”

  He stopped and grinned. “Great. Just… you know. First Christmas in a while that’s a different routine, and I didn’t see Becca and Charlie yesterday, and they’ll be over soon, so…” He tapped his screen. “Nothing yet. I’ll text her.”

  She slid the latte into his hands. “Here. Drink this.”

  He took a big sip, then pulled her against him. “Last night was a lot of fun, but this old man isn’t cut out for early mornings after a party.”

  “You’re not old.” Kerry wiggled her eyebrows at him. “Come on, I’ve got a surprise for you.”

  He followed her into the living room.

  She had been busy this morning.

  “Wow. A year ago, I thought my days of huge present piles under the tree were numbered.” Owen shook his head in disbelief. “Where did all of these come from?”

  “I may have gotten carried away…” Kerry bounced up and down. “I had to get stuff for Charlie, and Becca, and Hayden. Your brothers have presents there, too.”

  “Hayden doesn’t need anything,” Owen muttered, but he didn’t mean it. He had a couple of gifts in the pile for Charlie’s dad, too.

  His phone lit up as he was still taking in the stack of presents.

  Becca: We’re on our way over!

  Owen: See you soon!

  He showed it to Kerry. “Your enthusiasm for Christmas is contagious. Note the double exclamation mark.”

  “I love it.” She picked up a flat rectangle wrapped in shiny red paper. “I want you to open this one before they get here.”

  Owen nabbed his special present for her, too. “Let’s trade.”

  “You first.” She beamed at him.

  He ripped off the paper. Inside was a leather notebook, embossed with his name on it. Inside there were Post-it notes on the first few pages, all in Kerry’s neat handwriting. Things he had said he wanted to do.

  Buy a four-wheeler

  Unplug for a whole weekend

  Smoke a joint

  Spend the weekend naked with Kerry, laughing

  He liked her modification to the last one the best. “This is amazing.”

  He clasped it to his chest and embraced her around it, holding the book between them as he kissed her.

  “I’m still a big fan of your plan to do all the things you couldn’t before,” she said. “I think it’s time to start writing down your wish list so we can start crossing things off.”

  He couldn’t agree more. “Do you have a pen? Let’s start now.”

  She grabbed one from the side table and handed it over.

  “You open yours while I do this.” Owen carefully removed the sticky notes on the first page and put them on the next one.

  As she discarded the gold and silver paper around the ring box, he dropped to one knee, then turned the notebook around so she could see what he had written at the top of page one: Owen Kincaid’s Great Husband Plan.

  “I have a new plan.” He grinned up at her as she bit her lip and bounced in place. “No more bachelor dreams for me. You’re it.” He reached out with one hand and opened the ring box in her hand. “You make me happy every single day. I want to wake up next to you, and tell you that I am in love with you, forever and ever. Will you marry me?”

  Her head bobbed three times in quick succession. “Yes.”

  He jumped to his feet. “Yes?”

  She nodded as he picked her up and swung her around. That was how Becca, Hayden and Charlie found them, spinning in a circle in the living room.

  Becca closed the door behind them. “What’s going on?”

  “She said yes,” Owen shouted.

  Charlie started to cry.

  “Oh, no no no,” Kerry gasped, tossing the ring box to Owen as she reached for the little guy. “Come here. It’s okay.”

  She got him out of his winter bunting bag, then handed him to Owen, who had arms big enough to hold them both. He wrapped Kerry in one arm and cradled Charlie in the other, and beamed at his daughter over both of their heads.

  Becca clapped her hands together, then looked at Hayden.

  It wouldn’t be long before that kid did some ring shopping of his own. Owen didn’t know how he felt about that, exactly, but it was nothing like how he’d worried a year earlier. It would sort itself out, that was for sure. And he’d be happy for the little moments in between, like how Hayden gazed back at Becca, and then stepped forward to take Charlie, who had chosen the most inopportune time to need a diaper change.

  “He knows the number one job of a
dad, at least,” Owen said quietly to Becca as she gave him a hug.

  “Stop.” She poked him in the belly.

  “Probably never,” he chuckled in her ear. “Merry Christmas.”

  “Merry Christmas, Dad.” She turned to Kerry. “Does this mean we get to start planning a wedding? I can get you a good deal at the country club…”

  Epilogue

  August

  Their wedding was not at the country club. They put off the planning too long, not because they didn’t want to get married, but because none of the options Becca suggested to them felt right—and then all the dates filled up.

  Owen and Kerry didn’t mind in the least. Over the spring, they had collected all the pieces they needed to make a wedding happen. But while Adam was away at school, and Hayden was playing hockey every weekend, there was no time when everyone would be available to celebrate together.

  So they waited. And then the perfect opportunity presented itself—Nashville star-turned-Pine Harbour local Liana Hansen announced she was pregnant, and instead of touring, she would headline a weekend of concerts right in Pine Harbour. It would be called County Country, and she hoped to make it an annual event.

  The whole town got involved. Permits were issued to turn Main Street into a walking mall. Farmers’ fields were turned into camping venues, and Owen was tapped to coordinate the safety committee.

  He volun-told Matt Foster to handle it instead. And then he went home and asked Kerry how she felt about maybe not having a wedding reception, but having their first dance in the middle of a street party instead.

  She loved it.

  They exchanged vows in the same church Owen’s parents got married in, then led a parade of friends and family to Mac’s for burgers before dancing the night away on Main Street. Everyone who mattered made it. Kerry’s parents drove up, and were very polite to each other. Adam arrived shortly before the ceremony, but he stayed until the next day.