Нора Робертс - Hideaway

She pulled air in her nose, let it out of her mouth slowly. “I’m not cursing at you. I worried if things ever got close to that, I’d screw it up, or you would, we would. God, I don’t want to screw it up. I just can’t screw it up. I need you, Dillon.”

Wasn’t that, just that, enormous enough? That need for someone else.

“From where I’m standing, nothing’s screwed up.”

Not yet, she thought, and carefully turned the chicken.

“It may be self-defeating to jump to the what-if, but for me … I need you and your family. Since I was a child, since that night. Those emails with Julia helped me through the rough years, just that contact, constant, caring. A touchstone for me.”

“We already made a promise we wouldn’t mess with the family connection.”

“I know. I know we’ll try to keep the promise. I … My father took care of what was his, Dillon, and that was me. He gave up so much to take care of me, give me what I needed. I knew we’d both turned a corner when he felt able to travel for work again. I knew he’d stopped worrying, every minute, and that I was okay again. And even through all that, I had Julia. If I could wish for a mother, it would be Julia.”

He laid a hand on her shoulder. “You’re never going to lose her, or any of us.”

“No?” She whirled around. “And what if I said I didn’t love you? That I couldn’t? That I wouldn’t?”

“Then you’d break my heart. And the pieces of it would still love you.”

Because her eyes filled, she pressed her fingers to them.

“Don’t do that and expect me to keep my distance.”

She pulled one hand away, firmly tapped a finger in the air three times to make sure he did.

“I need to cook,” she said again.

Digging for calm, she took the chicken out to rest, covered it. After adding more oil to the pan, she sautéed the peppers and onions she’d already sliced.

Calmer, because she cooked and had to pay attention, she continued. “I told you about the three men I’ve been with.”

“You did.”

“With Noah, I felt some panic at first, but I recognized that as the normal nerves and excitement a girl, with very little experience, feels when a boy she’s already noticed notices her enough to ask her out on her first actual date. I didn’t feel anything like that with the others. Just attraction, interest. Normal, I’d say, if somewhat limited. I’d really hoped to keep it at that with you—with the addition of solid affection and friendship.”

“That’s not going to work out.”

Without looking at him, she scraped up the brown bits from the chicken to coat the peppers and onions.

She let them cook while she sliced the chicken. “You’re awfully sure of yourself.”

“I won’t settle for it. I don’t know why you would.”

“Because it’s easy. Keep things on your own terms, within your own limitations, it’s always easy. But you’re right, it’s not working out, not when you look at me and say I’m yours. Not when you say that, I see that, and hit the panic button.”

Time for another shaky breath. “I didn’t think I would, and I have been thinking about it, about you, about all of it. But I did panic, and not because I’m stubborn or stupid, but because while part of me wants it to be easy, the rest of me wants to be yours. Wants you to be mine.”

He said nothing while she started one of her fancy arrangements of the food on a platter.

When he did speak, it was quiet, easy.

“It might’ve been that night when I wanted a drumstick, looked over, and saw you. But I really think it was when you drove up, got out of the car with an armload of red lilies. You had eyes like bluebonnets, like spring in the dead of winter, and a smile that slammed straight into me, blew right through me. And those boots.”

He paused, sipped his beer.

“Those really tall black boots. Man, I hope you still have those boots, because I like to imagine you wearing them and not much else. Anyway.” He drank again while she uncovered bowls of grated cheddar, of sour cream.

“I’m pretty sure it was that moment when the rest of you got what it wants. I never got over it.”

“You didn’t even know me.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

Now she blinked at him. He so rarely sounded impatient.

“You hadn’t even seen me in years.”

“I damn well knew you. Through the emails with my mom, through Hugh and Lily, through Aidan and Consuela. I knew when you fell for the dancer, how you studied at NYU, then otherwise, learning all those languages. You’ve been part of my life since I was twelve years old, so deal with it.”

Carefully now, she pulled the tortillas out of the warming oven. “I think that’s the first time I’ve seriously pissed you off.”

“No, it’s not. It won’t be the last either. That doesn’t change a goddamn thing.”

“What if I hadn’t come back?”

“You were always going to come back, but waiting for it was starting to wear some.”

One more breath, and no more panic. “I was always going to come back,” she agreed. “Even when I didn’t know it.” She laid a hand on his cheek. “I’ve got pictures of you, too, Dillon. I’m sorting them out.”

“I told you I came close once, with one woman who mattered to me. But I couldn’t get there. I couldn’t because it was you, Cate. It was always you.”

He set down the beer. “And I’m tired of keeping my distance. That food’ll stay warm enough for later.”

She smiled, expecting him to grab her into a kiss as frustrated as he looked. Instead, he scooped her up as he’d done their first night together.

“Oh. That much later.”

“That’s right.”

“God, I’ve missed this.” She set her teeth on the side of his neck. “I really don’t think I have those boots anymore. It was years ago.”

“That’s a damn shame,” he said as he carried her upstairs.

“But I’m a certified expert at shopping for boots.”

“Black, up above the knee.”

He dropped her on the bed, looked down at her as the light from the sinking sun spread gold over her.

She crooked a finger at him when he dragged off his shoes. When he lay over her, sent her shimmering with the first kiss, she chained her arms around him.

“I love you, Caitlyn.”

So much spilled into her she didn’t know how to hold it. “Give me time to say it back. It may be crazy or superstitious, or both, but I really do believe when I say it, when I mean it, it’s forever.”

“Since I want forever, and forever’s what I’m going to have, take your time.”

“That kind of confidence could be annoying.”

“Be annoyed later.”

He took her mouth again, but tenderly. So tenderly now. Offering love, she knew, and how could she resist it?

She opened herself to it, the simple and stunning gift of it. And opening, taking it in, she felt it smooth over old scars, ease away old doubts.

Take the gift, she thought, take it and give it back. If she couldn’t yet say the words, she could give him what beat in her heart.

She could show him in the language of touch and taste that needed no voice. She could show him by the way she unbuttoned his shirt to skim her fingers over his chest, over those hard-ridged muscles of his back as she peeled the shirt away.

How she rose to him when he drew hers aside, followed the reveal of bare skin with his lips.

The golden light smoldered toward red as they undressed each other. The blue of the sea surging to and from the beach below deepened with it. And he felt her give, and give.

She had so much to give. More than she knew or believed. He’d seen it in her from the very first moment, and in all the moments he’d had with her since. When she trusted herself, trusted them, she’d give him the words.