Today was a new day.
A new day, a new beginning, and a new friendship.
Skye had never been fair to Wyatt. She’d blown him off as a pompous jerk who always had to be right.
She’d never considered that he’d simply been showing her affection and friendship in his own unique way, and that he needed friendship and affection and acceptance more than she did.
After having an engagement broken because her own affection for a difficult little boy hadn’t been returned, she knew she’d been wrong to dismiss Wyatt as a jerk without ever considering his side of the story.
But when she pulled herself out of bed to go offer an olive branch, the house was empty.
For the first time in six months—no, the first time in at least a year, she’d overslept.
Wyatt and Nicholas were already gone.
She knew they’d be back, though, so she sank into the overstuffed brown suede couch, coffee cup in one hand, phone in the other while she checked email.
For six months, she’d lived and breathed to the demands of her phone. There was always one more email, one more phone call, one more reminder popping up on her calendar of where she needed to be and what she needed to do.
And now, after being without her phone for a day and a half, with the added bonus of the distraction from Nicholas and Wyatt—but mostly Wyatt—there was a loose sense of freedom sinking into her bones. Tension was melting out of her muscles, and she found herself tossing aside the phone to pick up her old favorite Mae Daniels romance novel.
She also had an itch to get back outside with her digital SLR camera.
Snapping photos had been a minor obsession in her early twenties, but the last six months, she hadn’t been interested. Or the last two years, if she were being honest with herself. She’d gotten wrapped up in Steven’s life, in getting to know him and then in preparing for life as a mayor’s wife, in trying to convince his son that she wasn’t trying to replace his mother.
Her hobbies had fallen by the wayside. Then she’d let herself get obsessed with work, and she’d been afraid she wouldn’t remember what she liked to do with her free time.
But this morning, she simply felt peace.
A creepy sensation told her she was no longer alone.
She glanced up, prepared to swallow her pride and extend that olive branch, but it wasn’t Wyatt peeking in on her through the window.
It was Nicholas.
She smiled at him, then met him at the door and ushered him in. “Hey, bud. How was your morning?” The sky over the mountains was a brilliant blue, and the summer breeze carried a hint of flowers and fresh-cut grass. “You a coffee man? Got some leftover.”
He wrinkled his nose, then looped his arms around her waist and laid his head on her chest. “You’re not leaving today, are you, Miss Skye?”
Unexpected tears prickled the backs of her eyelids.
Somebody wanted her. No complications, no ulterior motives, just pure, simple love. “How could I possibly leave such a sweet boy?” She squeezed him back.
“You should come hiking with us,” he said. “Uncle Wyatt won’t mind. You’re fun.”
Guilt squeezed her chest again.
She shouldn’t have said all those things she said to Wyatt last night. Any of it.
Especially after what he’d told her.
She leaned out the door. Wyatt lifted a hand and waved at her from the back of the SUV he’d brought up here. She waved back—that was platonic, right?—and then turned her attention back to the boy. “You boys go hunting for deer this morning?”
Nicholas laughed. “No, Miss Skye. We went fishing.”
“Ooh, even better. You catch any fish?”
“No, I didn’t like the worms. And then I almost got pulled in by a really big fish, except Uncle Wyatt thought it was probably a branch that shifted. We had to cut the string, and he lost his best bobber.”
“Aw, he must’ve been sad.”
“Nope, he said he’d buy a new one.” Nicholas puffed his chest out, showing off the logo for some military organization on the breast of his dark blue T-shirt. “I told him I’d buy him a new one, because it was my fault, but he says I can’t do that until I have a full-time job.”
She’d seriously misjudged Wyatt.
And she needed to apologize.
Without any more kissing.
Because Wyatt needed Beck and his friends more than he needed her. Which meant she needed to stay out of the way.
She didn’t do relationships well.
Obviously.
“You hungry for lunch?” she asked Nicholas. “Pretty sure we have some Nutella. Or…there might be some Toaster Strudels in the freezer. I love Toaster Strudels for lunch.”
Wyatt strolled into the house in a maroon polo shirt stretched over his broad chest. “How about a ham sandwich and some grapes, Nicholas? Gonna need some good energy for the hike this afternoon.”
Her shoulders bunched, but she made herself keep smiling.
He hadn’t come right out and said she was an irresponsible adult who shouldn’t be trusted to feed children, so she could assume that wasn’t what he meant.
For her own peace of mind.
Besides, with what Beck had told her last night, she needed to give Wyatt the benefit of the doubt.
He had a lot on his plate.
And a balanced lunch was probably better for him than Toaster Strudels.
“I’ve never had a Toaster Strudel,” Nicholas said.
“We could save it for dessert,” Skye said quickly. “After dinner. Your Uncle Wyatt is right. You need a good lunch before hiking.”
He touched his glasses with dirty fingers and shoved them up his nose. “And you too? Since you’re coming with us, right?”
“I—”
“Miss Skye can come with us, can’t she, Uncle Wyatt?” Nicholas said. “We’re just hiking, right?”
Wyatt’s gaze held the same focused intensity it always had, but this time, she couldn’t help wondering what he was looking for.
If, perhaps, he was trying to read her before he gave his own opinion.
“I’m sure it would be a ton of fun, but I haven’t had a quiet house to read a book in forever,” she said to Nicholas.
“You’re staying.”
Wyatt seemed surprised.
Not that she could blame him.
She was surprised. “I… Yes. I’m staying.”
His granite features relaxed while he started pulling food out of the cabinets. “Nicholas is right. Lots of room on the trail. They could squeeze in one more. You should bring your camera.” He blinked. “But we understand if you want a day to yourself. Don’t we, Nicholas?”
That frown was anything but understanding.
But Wyatt’s sly little trick had worked. We understand if you want to chicken out, Skye.
Considering Wyatt’s health issues that Beck had mentioned, she should go. She should’ve been up early today to supervise fishing too.
She was certain the staff at Mountain Ridge Outdoor Adventures could handle anything that came up—look what they’d done for Nicholas yesterday—but that didn’t mean she shouldn’t be there as one more adult Nicholas was familiar with.
Just in case.
“I’d love to go,” she heard herself say.
Mr. Military didn’t smile. He didn’t frown either.
But he did make her eat a banana with her ham sandwich.
* * *
“Wyatt! Hold up.”
He turned from loading his pack in his rented SUV to find Skye darting out the front door. Her thick hair flowed behind her, and her hips swung in her jeans as she approached him. He would’ve smiled at the logo on her T-shirt—she didn’t want to talk about Beck’s modeling career, but she was wearing his company’s clothing—except his heart had gone on a bender when he glanced down at her chest.
“Wasn’t planning on leaving without you,” he said.
“I know. I just—I wanted to say sorry. About last night. What I said.”
“You were being honest.” And her honesty had kept him up half the night.
He should’ve been mad. All he’d ever wanted was to be close to her, to help her. And she’d never appreciated it.
But he’d never realized how his actions came across.
He couldn’t decide if he was mad at himself for not asking first if he could help her, or if he was mad at her for assuming his intentions had been anything less than honorable.
Maybe not honorable, but he’d at least put her first.
“I was being narrow-minded.” She put her hands in her back pockets, pushing her breasts out further, and even though his brain knew she was simply being nice by coming out to talk, his groin was far too primitive to register polite conversation.
“I know this sounds weird since we’ve known each other forever,” she continued, now swaying as she talked, much as she had with the pool stick last night, “but can we start over?”
A single wrinkle creased her forehead, and those deep green eyes of hers seemed uncertain.
She bit her lower lip.
His mouth went dry.
If they started over, would she see him? Not as her brother’s friend, not as the know-it-all neighbor kid, but all of him?
Did start over mean continue to act like that kiss hadn’t happened?
Or had that been the start over?
He nodded. “Sure,” he rasped out.
She angled back half a step. “Great,” she whispered. “Thank you.”
“Hey, Uncle Wyatt, I can’t find my boot,” Nicholas called from the porch.
He lifted a hand while he tried to stifle the twitch in his eye. “Be there in a minute.”
Her low chuckle made his pants two degrees tighter. “You pack up,” she said. “I’ll go help him find the boot. Wouldn’t want your ol’ ticker giving way at the mess.”
She patted his arm, leaving a searing heat behind when she turned away and treated him to a delectable view of her backside.
She’d stayed.
They’d made up.
And she was coming with him and Nicholas this afternoon.
He owed Beck a bottle of whiskey.
And probably a second for himself.
Because he had a feeling he was going to need to forget a lot more than just that kiss before this week was over.
* * *
Skye paced outside the office at Mountain Ridge Outdoor Adventures. She wanted to be in there, seeing how Nicholas was doing, seeing how Wyatt was doing, but she wasn’t family, and they didn’t need to be crowded, so instead, she paced.
And she paced.
And she paced.
“Skye?” A pretty blonde with a sweet smile stepped out of the office. “Nicholas is asking for you.”
She shot into the room. Wyatt was bent over paperwork on the desk, rubbing his temples. Nicholas sat on a couch licking a sucker. The puffiness around his eyes had gone down considerably, and his face lit with a grin when he saw her. “Hi, Miss Skye!”
“Hey, little buddy. You feeling better?”
“Yeah. I just probably shouldn’t be around bees any more.”
“I hear there’s a bowling alley in town.”
“I dropped a ball on my foot once. Mom said I’m a hazard to my own health.”
“Um, miniature golfing then?” Anything to keep both of these two out of trouble.
“Is it outside?” Nicholas asked.
“Oh. Right.”
Wyatt sighed. He stood and handed the papers to the pretty blonde. “Sorry again.”
“Oh, no, please don’t be sorry. It’s not your fault. Or Nicholas’s. Things like this happen. We’ll get your refund for the rest of the week processed right away, Mr. Owens.”
They left Mountain Ridge Outdoor Adventures with Nicholas moving slowly between them.
Despite his allergic reaction to a bee sting at the end of their hike, he seemed to be in good spirits. “I’m hungry. Can we have dinner? And go to a movie?”
Wyatt put an arm around his shoulders. “Sure.” He shot a glance at Skye. “Unless we need to get Miss Skye back to the house?”
She shook her head. “Dinner and a movie sound great. I’ll spring for popcorn.” She eyed Nicholas. “You’re not allergic to popcorn, are you?”
He giggled. “Nobody’s allergic to popcorn.”
They loaded up in Wyatt’s SUV and headed down to Hope Falls for an early dinner. The sky was still brightly lit with fluffy clouds meandering over the mountain tops, and they fell into a comfortable silence.
Halfway to town, she heard a suspicious noise in the backseat.
Nicholas had fallen fast asleep, his head lolling to one side, mouth hanging open, glasses crooked.
“He’s okay to sleep, right?” she whispered.
Wyatt’s gaze went to the rearview mirror, then returned to the road. “Yeah. He’s fine.” He sighed. “I don’t see him often enough. We were supposed to get out and do stuff together this week.”
“You can still do stuff together. Just maybe not outside. He had lots of fun playing pool last night. And I’m sure he’d love to show you his Minecraft world.”
Wyatt’s frown was rugged with his mountain-man stubble thing going on. “You remember being kids? We were always outside. Even after the Wilsons got their Nintendo, we were always outside.”
“He’s not built the same way we were.” She shifted to face him. “And really, considering your situation, you should appreciate a low-key week.”
His brows furrowed. “My situation?”
“Beck swore me to secrecy, but he told me about your job. And the doctor’s report. Why you men can’t listen to doctors is beyond me, but—”
“Doctor’s report,” he repeated.
“Your heart valve? The medical discharge from the military? Can we please not play the Save Skye from hearing bad news game? I’m not a delicate flower.”
His lips twitched. He pursed them together, but then his chest heaved, and a snort slipped out his nose.
She shoved his arm. “Wyatt Owens, did you lie to my brother to get a chance to borrow his vacation house?”
“He’s such an asshole,” he said on a chuckle.
“You did.”
“Of the two of us,” he said, shooting a surprisingly irresistible grin her way, “which one do you think is more likely to make up a story about the other?”
Beck. “I’m gonna kill him.”
Wyatt’s shoulders shook. “I can’t believe you believed him. Did he use real medical terms, or did he make up some Beck-ish mumbo-jumbo?”
She sank in her seat. “He said you had a corollary embotabolism in your right anter-eater valve.”
His laughter rumbled through the car, warming her from the inside in a not-nearly-as-unpleasant-as-it-should’ve-been kind of way.
Had she ever heard him laugh before? Really, truly laugh?
He sounded so different. With that amused light in his eyes, his mouth spread in a wide smile, he looked different.
Relaxed. Approachable. Fun.
“He was calling from Paris,” she said. “I thought the signal was breaking off, or he’d been watching too much badly-dubbed TV while he’s been in Europe. He’s an underwear model, not a rocket scientist. Who expects him to actually say those things right?”
Wyatt laughing—even at her expense—was the sexiest thing she had seen in months.
Possibly years.
“So you stayed in case my corollary had a—jeez, I can’t even say it. What was it again?” he said.
“Not talking to you anymore.”
“But you stayed. For me.” He reached over and squeezed her thigh. “Thank you, Skye.”
His hand lingered on her leg.
She didn’t push it away.
She didn’t want to push it away.
“Do you think he did this on purpose?” she said.
“Did what?”
“Set us up to be here at the same time.”
He angled a glance at her while he navigated past Main Street. “Why would he do that?”
Because he didn’t want her to be here by herself? Because he thought it would be hilarious? Because he knew something about Wyatt—something real—that she had never suspected? “Because he trusts you?”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. “He shouldn’t.”
She set her shaky hand on his and licked her lips.
This was crazy.
She was crazy.
But something about his laugh, his smile, his touch, his kiss—he wasn’t the boy she’d known growing up.
He was a man.
A full-grown, strong-willed, highly-educated military man.
“Why shouldn’t he?” she whispered.
His eyes went dark and his hand trembled on her thigh.
“He knows, doesn’t he?” she breathed.
“That I want you?”
“Yes.”
“That I’ve always wanted you?”
Her breath caught, and a low pull made her ache in all the right ways deep in her center.
“You’re fun, Skye. You’re bright. You’re strong. You’re smart. I made my peace a long time ago with the fact that this would never happen, no matter how much I wanted it. Does Beck know? I don’t know. And I don’t give a damn. The only thing that matters is if you want me. But don’t play with me, Skye. If you’re not interested, if you’re not committed to something real, don’t play with me.”
Her lungs forgot how to function, and her eyes felt impossibly wide.
What was a girl supposed to say to that?
I want you too would’ve been the polite answer. Honestly, the very fact that a strong, handsome man wanted her was an aphrodisiac in itself. Since Steven, she hadn’t felt attractive, or right, or even lovable most days.
But did she want Wyatt?
Or did she simply want to be wanted?
He pulled his hand off her leg, leaving a cold, empty void.
And one long ride remaining up the mountain.