Chapter Two
“Jesus, Grace, are you okay? Talk to me, honey, please!”
The first thing she saw when she opened her eyes was the battered silver pickup with McLain Homes emblazoned on the driver’s door. Then she looked up. Jared McLain gazed down at her, his dark blond hair falling over his forehead, his roughhewn face creased with concern, and her heart squeezed painfully before starting to race.
Jared—the love of her life and the irresistibly dominant man she’d run away from. The dominant man who’d been dead for thirty years.
“Jared?” Tears filled her eyes and joy exploded in her chest, bubbling outward until she couldn’t draw a breath. If this was a dream, she never wanted to wake up. She reached up and ran trembling fingers over his lips, felt the rasp of his short beard as he kissed the tips. “You’re really here?”
“Of course I’m really here!” He shifted her on his lap until she was sitting up. Then he scowled at her. “And I really would have helped you carry in the groceries if you’d called me.”
All she could do was stare at his beloved face. She was with Jared!
He waved a hand in front of her. “Earth to Grace. Are you sure you’re okay? You didn’t answer me the first time.”
She threw her arms around his neck, knocking him backward onto the ice-slicked sidewalk, and kissed him with thirty years’ worth of pent-up love. The kiss was a frantic, messy thing at first, because for all she knew, she was dreaming and could wake up at any moment, and she wanted to squeeze in everything she could while she had the chance. But then Jared took control, cupping her head in his hands and shifting her, corralling her tongue into a sinuous dance with his, and suddenly something that had been lost to her for half a lifetime flared to life.
My Sir, it breathed. My Sir, my Sir, MY SIR!
By the time he eased her back, tears were streaming down her cheeks.
“Oh, my Sir, I’ve missed you so much!” she whispered, dropping urgent kisses down his cheek. Tucking her face into the collar of his flannel shirt, she sucked in the warm, musky scent of Jared in the morning and just about had an orgasm.
Squeezing her against his chest, he rumbled, “You just left an hour ago.”
Grace raised her head and looked into his achingly familiar blue eyes. “It was the longest hour of my life,” she choked. Then she leaned her forehead on his breastbone and sobbed.
“Hey, hey,” he crooned, stroking her hair as his grip on her tightened. “What’s going on, sweetheart? You’re not supposed to cry on your birthday.”
She gasped and pushed up, blinking down at him again. “Wait, it’s my birthday?”
“Shit, how hard did you hit your head?” he asked, his touch turning from tender to probing as he searched her scalp for bumps.
“Jared, I’m fine,” she said impatiently. “It’s my birthday today, yes?”
“Yes, Grace, and it’s still Christmas Eve too.” He pulled his hand out of her hair and gave her the Vulcan salute. “How many fingers am I holding up?”
Her throat tightened again. “You’re so funny. I’d forgotten that.”
He frowned. “Okay, now you’re starting to scare me.”
“Honestly, I’m fine, just…having a bit of déjà vu.” She looked at her hands, which rested on shoulders broad and hard from years of construction work. Her age spots and bulging veins were gone, and presumably so were her wrinkles and gray hair. “I’m thirty today.”
Her heart thumped when he gave her a sexy grin. “Boy, are you ever. You just about wore this old man out this morning.” Then he sobered, searching her eyes. “You wanna tell me what this is all about?”
She glanced at her watch. 12:05. Love them ’til the stroke of midnight. She had less than twelve hours.
“Is Alec still—” Alive too probably wasn’t the thing to say. “Still coming over?” she amended quickly, wiping her eyes as she scrambled to her feet with amazing ease. “Don’t wait until tonight—call and tell him to come over right now.”
Halfway to standing, Jared zeroed in on her face, a puzzled frown pulling down his brow. “How did you…” Straightening, he brushed the powdery snow from his jeans. Her mouth went dry at the pronounced bulge behind his fly. “There’s no way he told you.”
“No, Sir.”
“Then how…?”
“Jared, I just know. Everything,” she added with a meaningful look
His frown deepened. “Everything?”
“Everything. And it’s okay.”
“Is that right?” he drawled.
“Yes, Sir. And I’m ready.”
He looked as if he might demand more answers, but then his expression morphed into one that stole her breath and sent her stomach plummeting. His stare penetrated to her bones. “So you know what we want from you, Princess Grace.”
“Yes, Sir,” she whispered, suddenly shaking all over.
“Well, it’s your birthday, but I’m not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.” He leaned over and snagged one of the grocery sacks without taking his eyes off her. “Go upstairs and get into the shower while I put this stuff away. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
“Yes Sir.” His gaze burned into her back as she slipped and slithered her way down the slick walk. She hobbled at first, concerned about falling and breaking a hip, but gained confidence when she realized how strong and sure her legs felt and how quickly she reacted when her feet hit a particularly hazardous patch. Suddenly the old saying “You don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone” held vast new meaning.
“Oh my God, youth is so wasted on the young,” she muttered. At the last section of pavement below the front steps, a memory tickled. Spreading her arms, she shoved off with her toe and glided over the slab on one foot. When her slim black boot hit the riser, she bounded up the steps, taking them two at a time, and landed on the porch with a breathless laugh. Her knees had cartilage again! They didn’t hurt at all!
“I saw that.” The amused reproof in Jared’s voice made her cast a flirtatious smile over her shoulder before she slipped through the front door.
The smell of home almost overwhelmed her—that distinctive scent of old house combined with the bacon and caramel rolls she’d made for breakfast. Breathing deeply, Grace unbuttoned her coat and hung it on one of the pegs in the entry hall. Her boots landed in the pile of dirty work boots and worn sneakers, and then she trailed her hand along the smooth, knotty pine paneling as she walked into the living room. It all looked exactly as she’d last seen it—cluttered and comfortable and Christmasy, with electric candles in the windows and a real balsam fir tree they’d decorated just the night before.
The night before she ran away.
Pain tightened her throat. Would Jared and Alec still be alive if she hadn’t reacted so childishly, if she’d stayed and talked through her fears instead of taking off in a panic?
Turning, she gave herself a mental shake. This wasn’t the time for futile regrets. She’d been granted a magical gift, a second chance to experience the kind of passion most women only dreamed of, and she wasn’t going to waste it lamenting things she couldn’t change. Taking a deep breath, she gripped the banister and started up the stairs.