Chapter Fifteen
“Damn.” Nick put the phone down on the center console of the truck and ran his free hand through his hair while he steered them off the grounds. “He’s not answering.”
Eve clucked sympathetically. “I’m sure he’s fine, but we should go check on him before you take me home.”
He was still rankled from the interaction with Eve’s wanna-be beau, Leo, and taking her to see the inside of the house where he grew up didn’t feel good. “I can drop you off at home first. It’s not that far out of the way.”
“No, take me with you. If something’s wrong, you might need help. Besides…” She trailed off, so Nick took his eyes off the road long enough to glance at her.
She had her mouth twisted up like she wasn’t sure if she could say what was on her mind, and she met his gaze, but looked down immediately.
Huh. He returned his focus to the road.
“Besides, what?” he asked.
“Besides, I was kind of hoping…”
Oh. He had been, too, but the evening had gone off the rails early tonight and stayed that way, so he didn’t figure he had a chance. “Besides…you were hoping I’d take you home and teach you all my cornhole tricks?”
She burst out laughing. “I’m not sure I’m quite ready for that. But I guess I was hoping that maybe you’d be interested in a nightcap.”
Yes. That’s exactly what he was hoping. Assuming that “nightcap” really meant “Do me baby.”
“I can’t thank you enough for dragging my mother out to play tonight,” she went on. “I don’t know how long it’s been since I saw her actually participate in anything.”
“Really? She was a total ringer when it came to throwing bags of corn.”
“I know! She loved to play when we were little—we used to have these big family picnics and the Morgans and McGraths and all the aunts and uncles and cousins would come over and play. But then she stopped.”
“Why?”
She was quiet for a minute, then mused, “I think it was because she was so busy chasing around after my dad.”
“Ah.”
“She used to be really fun. She was the mom who always had art projects to do and who would let us paint the driveway or perform our own plays. I didn’t get it then, but now I understand—my dad had started drinking heavily, and she spent more and more time trying to keep him from getting into trouble and trying to keep the peace. It wore her down and she lost her joy, or something. That sounds stupid, but she wasn’t always so crabby.”
“I get it.” And he did, in a different way. “My dad was a pain in the ass. He was a binge drinker. He’d go for weeks without a drop, getting all kinds of things done, working like crazy, making all these plans. And then he’d fall off the wagon and not follow through on anything.”
“That sucks.”
“My mom didn’t try to keep him on track, though. She just let him have it.” He laughed bitterly. “It’s amazing there were any intact dishes for her to take when she finally moved out.”
“I’m sorry your parents split up,” she said.
“I’m not. Best thing that could have happened for my mom. As for my dad…well, he made his bed.”
“Mmm.”
“You disagree?”
“No. I just don’t imagine my mother going through with something like that. She was so worried about appearances and what effect a divorce would have on us, she never could have left.”
“I was an adult,” Nick pointed out. “It wasn’t like I didn’t know what was going on.”
“I wonder, if she’d put her foot down—and kept it down—if I might have grown up with more backbone.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“No. Why?”
“You’ve got more chutzpah than any woman I know,” Nick told her. And he meant it. She was something, his little Eve. “You came out to Raleigh’s house with your damned notebook and whipped me right into what you wanted.” From anyone else, her steamroller approach would have been a total turn-off. Eve had somehow managed to wrangle him into place and made him want to thank her for it.
“Well, if I’ve got my notebook, I can write down the next thing to do, and the next thing after that, and then I can do whatever I need to do, but if I have to come up with it on the fly? I’m a puddle of nothing.”
“What difference does it make if you have to write it all down? Everybody processes shit differently. You get where you need to be.”
“I never thought of it that way,” she said. “Maybe you’re right.”
“I’m not saying you shouldn’t be a little spontaneous now and then,” he hedged. God, what if she had to write down “get naked with Nick,” before they could do it? He’d freaking hand her the pen and hold the notebook for her, he knew.
She patted his thigh, leaving a trail of heat where she touched him. As though she could read his mind, she said, “Don’t worry. There are a few things I can manage on my own.” Then, “Oh, hey. We’re here!”
When he saw the house, a cold familiar fist of fear clutched his gut. “Hell. All the lights are on.” When he was a kid that usually meant Raleigh was loaded and a battle was brewing.
“Then let’s go see what’s what.”
It wasn’t just the practical words, but the calm way she said them that helped him remember he wasn’t that troubled teenager anymore, and he could handle whatever they found.
Eve was out of the truck and on the front porch before Nick had the ignition turned off. She peered through the window on the door.
“I think he’s asleep.”
Sure enough, he was snoring away, Franklin lying over his lap, remote in his hand. No empty bottle on the floor next to him. The phone was on the other side of the room, on top of the television.
Raleigh’s head jerked when Nick opened the door, but quickly settled back onto the arm of the couch, and his mouth opened with a vigorous snore.
Eve slid her arm around Nick’s waist, looking down at his father with him, and it felt intimate and right. “He’s kind of cute when he’s all asleep like that, isn’t he?”
Nick snorted, and Franklin lifted his head.
“Shhhh,” Eve laughed on a whisper.
Who was this woman? This girl who’d had her life torn apart by her own alcoholic father, standing here being so forgiving and protective of another drunk who’d jeopardized her very important project, and yet was still full of energy and ambition.
“What?” she asked. “You’re looking at me like I just landed in your front yard in a clear plastic egg.”
“I—” He stopped himself before he said anything he couldn’t take back. “I’m glad he’s just sleeping. Relieved.” Yeah, that was lame, but better than I think you’re a miracle and I want you to have my children.
“Me, too. Should we wake him up and help him to bed?”
“Let’s just cover him up here.” He pulled an afghan from the back of the couch and Eve helped him spread it out and settle it over his dad.
“You ready for that nightcap?” Eve asked, wiggling her eyebrows.
“I’m really hoping that’s a metaphor,” Nick told her, and she laughed. He loved it when she laughed.
After turning off the light and television, they tiptoed to the front door. Just as he opened the door and held it for Eve to exit, he heard, “Boy, you make sure you glove up, now.”
Everything was dark when they pulled into the McGrath driveway.
“They must have followed us right out of the party, if my mom’s already in bed,” Eve said. Good. She wasn’t waiting up to interrogate her—or give her grief.
Nick put the truck in park, but didn’t turn off the engine, and she turned to look at him. His golden hair glinted in the glow of the security light, but his normally bright eyes were in shadow. What was he thinking?
A brief awkward silence fell.
The shoulder strap of her dress had fallen down her arm and he reached to adjust it, his callused fingers lingering. She watched his hand, barely stroking her skin, until he slid it down her arm to her hand, where their fingers mingled over the center console. Never had almost holding hands felt so sexy.
“Are you—do you want to come in?” she finally asked.
“Do you want me to?”
“I did offer you a nightcap.”
After a brief hesitation, he said, “I don’t drink.”
“I have lemonade.”
His soft chuckle warmed her in all the right places. “Lemonade sounds great.”
“It’s the instant powdered kind.” Why she felt she had to warn him, she didn’t know. So he wouldn’t be disappointed when he tasted it?
“I didn’t know there was another kind.” When had he leaned so close? When had she leaned so close?
Their mouths were so near to one another that she felt his breath on her lips when she said, “Then you should probably turn off your truck.”
“Yeah. I probably should.” His lower lip actually brushed her upper one, sending a wave of electricity through her. He must have felt it, too, because his hand tightened around hers.
The shoulder belt was biting into her upper body, but she didn’t want to move away from the middle of the truck where Nick’s body heat reached across the console and wrapped her in his spell. “I want you to come upstairs with me, but I kind of don’t want to move away from you right now.” His mouth at her jaw now, lightly moved over her skin, barely touching.
“Unless I drag you over to my side, we’re going to have to separate for a few seconds,” he said, his laugh vibrating along her nerve endings.
Holding tightly to his hand, she asked, “If we let go on three, promise to meet me in front of the truck in four seconds?” Oops. She forgot he didn’t make commitments.
“Promise.”
Well, with the unspoken certainty at sex in a very short time at the end of this promise, she understood this was an exception.
“Ready?”
“Ready.”
Eve didn’t remember unbuckling her seat belt or her feet hitting the ground. All she knew was the feel of Nick’s mouth as hot kisses sprinkled over her face and neck, and the rough fabric of his jeans on the insides of her thighs when she wrapped them around his waist. The ticking of the truck’s cooling engine barely registered when he pressed her against the warm metal hood. Instead she heard his breath, and hers, and the low growl he made when he nipped her earlobe.
She put her hands on either side of his face, turning him toward her, and placed her lips against his. He kissed her then, consuming her whole being. Lips, tongue, teeth, she wanted all of him at once. Her breasts pressed against his hard chest and she wrapped her arms around his shoulders tighter to hold him there, but needing more, wanting more. She squirmed against him, needing to make closer contact with the fly of his jeans, which was hard and hot against her core.
He broke away with a gasp and leaned his forehead against hers. “Can we—?”
“Oh yes. Please. Let’s.” Her apartment was clean, she had on nice underwear, and had checked the expiration dates on the condoms she’d taken from the bathroom drawer earlier and moved to her nightstand.
But he didn’t move, just breathed. Then he huffed a laugh. “Darlin’, you’ve gotta let me go. I can probably carry you, but I won’t be able to see where we’re goin’ with you wiggling against me like that.”
“Oh. Okay.” She experimentally loosened her arms, and he lowered her to the ground, the truck still at her back, which was good, because her knees were weak.
“Up there?” he asked, pointing at the stairs that ran up the side of the carriage house to her apartment.
“Yes. There.” She took his hand and tried not to think too much as she led him across the gravel driveway. He pulled his hand away from hers and put one on each side of her hips as he followed her up the steps. At her door, she entered the lock code and turned the knob and then they were inside.
The under-cabinet lights were on in her kitchenette, providing dim illumination to her place, casting long shadows in the corners, but she had no idea if she’d left the pillows out of alignment or if her cat had knocked over the ficus again, because all she could see was Nick looming over her, his wide shoulders blocking out everything but her desperate need to feel him against her—all of him—against all of her.
There was something she should do now, some social grace she needed to observe, but her blood was pumping too loudly in her brain to remember exactly… Oh. “Do you, uh, want something to drink?”
“Just you.”
“Okay. Good. Yes.” What was supposed to come next? The bedroom. That would be good. “So, let’s go…” She waved in the direction of the open doorway at the end of the short hall.
It was his turn to lead. He took her hand and walked the few steps to the door and went in, reaching for the light switch on the wall.
“Lights?” she asked. She’d never done it with the lights on before. This would be wild…not just because it was Nick, who had her more twitterpated than any man she could remember, but because they were going to have sex with the lights on. How sad was that?
Not sad at all, actually. She’d never cared if the few men she’d been with before had seen her, but she hadn’t wanted them to…needed them to. Nick, she wanted him to know her inside and out, she realized. Just as she wanted to know him.
His scent enveloped her when he turned and pulled her against him, smiling down at her. He bent his head to kiss her, and all of the jumbled thoughts, comparisons to previous experiences, flew out of her consciousness and were replaced by heat and passion and need.
She slid her hands under his shirt, pushing it up, and he accommodated her, pulling it off and dropping it somewhere. Then he sat on the edge of her bed, his hands on her hips as she stood between his knees. Watching her face, he ran his hands around her waist to the front of her body, up, up to her breasts, which ached for his touch. His pupils flared when his hands finally closed over her, and she felt his palms graze her nipples through her bra and flimsy dress. He reached one hand to tug the strap of her dress and bra down over one shoulder, then the other, until her breasts were freed. One was immediately cupped in his hand, and his mouth closed over the other, sucking nearly the entire small mound into his mouth.
She gasped and clenched his shoulders as he loved her body with his lips and tongue, switching from one side to the other. As overwhelming as the feelings coursing through her body were, she needed more. The flesh between her legs felt swollen and aching, so she pushed the fabric of her dress down over her hips, ignoring the twisted bra that hung around her waist.
Taking his hand in hers, she guided it over her stomach, down—
He pulled his mouth away from her left nipple to look, and she released his hand, running her hands through his hair, over his shoulders, along his arms.
Hooking a thumb in each side of her miniscule panties, he pulled them down until she could lift one leg free and then let go. But he didn’t let her put her leg back down. Instead, he guided her to put her knee on his thigh, so she was— Oh God, she was open to him. He slid his hand between her legs and she felt how wet she was, and watched his tongue slip out to moisten his bottom lip as he caressed her folds.
Then he hit the spot, right there, and she cried out, tugging at his hair. He laughed and leaned back, pulling her over him, so that she was, holy shit, she was sitting on his face. And he was using his tongue to do things she’d never felt before, not like that.
Heat and tension gathered in her lower body and began to focus between her legs, then she was coming, pulsing against his face, and Christ, he was looking up at her, and she could tell he was smiling, even though she had to be suffocating him with her—
Panting, she pulled herself off of him, scooting down enough to pull him up, so that he was lying next to her diagonally on the bed.
He leaned forward to kiss her neck, traveling over her collarbone and heading back down her body, but she pushed at his shoulder so she could reach the button on his jeans. His arousal tented the fabric, and she paused in her unfastening to stroke him, loving the way he groaned when she molded the fabric around him.
Then she had him free, and he took over, so she leaned up and reached into the drawer of her nightstand. She held the little package up, and he grinned and took it from her. “I got this,” he said and tore it open. He rolled to his side before she even registered that he had himself covered.
Time slowed to a near standstill then. He cupped the side of her face, looking into her eyes. She felt even more naked now, even though he wasn’t looking at her body. It seemed that he could see all the way into her soul, into her heart, which swelled with emotion. “Nick, I—” She was unable to find the words, so she stopped speaking.
But her body wasn’t done—and when he took her upper leg and pulled it up over his hip, she watched him slide his cock between her folds. His heat and hardness as he entered her told her that she was exactly where she should be. Until he began to thrust. Just a little at first, but it was enough that she felt a jolt every time he moved. Then she was where she was supposed to be. Until the next orgasm began to sweep her along…
When Eve’s body began to contract around his, Nick nearly let the idea that was at the edge of his mind out, but he bit his tongue and rode the sensations coursing from his cock to his brain and back again, focusing on getting her over the edge, keeping her there, watching her come apart.
But it was too much, and he couldn’t hold on to himself anymore. His release hit him with the force of a cyclone. He may have even blacked out for a moment because when the pulses slowed and he became aware again, Eve was nearly still, running her fingers through his sweat-soaked hair, staring into his eyes. He saw something there in the aftermath of so much passion. But it was there. The reality had been seeping into his consciousness since the moment Eve McGrath showed up in his father’s front yard. This was the girl he had to keep in his life, the one he would make promises to—the one he’d show himself—all of himself—to, because she would recognize him and understand.
Just one problem. She might be the one for him, but he couldn’t be the one for her. No way did Eve, with her history, need his baggage in her closet. Not now.
Instead of telling her the four million heavy thoughts running through his brain, he forced himself to smile. “So,” he said. “That was okay for me, but maybe we should try again in a minute, see if we can get it right.” He pulled her up over him, loving the way her slight weight pressed him into the mattress.
His comment had the desired effect, and she shoved his shoulder and laughed. Except the laugh caused her to push him out of her body. Which was good. He needed to deal with— “I’ll be right back.” He rolled her away and sat up to take care of the condom with a tissue and the wastebasket next to her bed.
He sat for a moment, desperately searching for stable footing. His world had just been more than rocked. Shit. What now? The way she made him feel was bigger than the sex. He wanted to hold on to this. Never. Let. Her. Go. And that wasn’t part of his world order, because he was his father’s son. He took after Raleigh in looks, in alcoholism, and in the ability to leave wreckage in his wake.
“Hey, big guy, you okay?” Eve’s hand on his back was warm, soothing.
He didn’t know. He couldn’t think, so he did what he knew how to do. “Yeah, just catching my breath.” He turned back to her, leaning down to kiss her sweet mouth, tempted to fall back into those arms, to stay there. To tell her that he’d stay, make sure her visitor center was finished without a hitch, stick around after that and make the rest of her life feel like sunshine and roses. But he knew better than to let anyone rely on him.
As he watched her eyes drift closed, the panic began to build at the base of his skull. He had to get out of there.
“Hey, um—” God, he was a dick. “I’ve got to go.”
Her eyes opened, a moment of confusion blurring her expression before it cleared, and she sat up, pulling the sheet with her, covering those beautiful breasts, putting a barrier between them. “Of course. I’m surprised your dad hasn’t called three times since you woke him up,” she said.
“Yeah. I, uh…need to get home.”
“Let me—” She started to move, tugging the sheet along with her, but he held out a hand.
“Don’t get up. I know the way out.” He smiled then, watching his little goddess of organization look around for her clothes.
She fell back onto the mattress, her eyes even bigger than usual. “Okay. I’m not sure I can walk now anyway.”
Dragging on his jeans and untangling his shirt gave him a chance to retreat a little further into his shell. This was for the best. He needed to regroup and figure out how to get out of this before he hurt her, because as sure as he was standing there shoving his feet into his shoes, he’d hurt her if he didn’t leave.
But he had to.
He leaned over, kissed her, softly, firmly, and saw her smile as he backed away.
“I’ll see you Monday?” she said.
“Yeah.” It felt like a promise.
He let himself out of the apartment and made it halfway across the driveway before he realized Lorena was standing next to his truck. Oh hell.
“Slinking away under cover of darkness?” she asked.
That was exactly what he was doing. Not because he was ashamed to have been in bed with Eve. He wasn’t even embarrassed about getting caught by her mother, but instead disgusted with himself, of his fear. “Is there something I can do for you?” he asked.
“You can keep your penis away from my daughter,” she told him in clear, certain tones.
He nearly recoiled from the blunt speech. “And here I thought we’d found some common ground on the cornhole field.”
She snorted. “She’s had enough trouble in her life without getting messed up with someone like you.”
“What makes you think I’m not good enough?” he asked, not because he disagreed, but because he wondered if she meant because of where he was from, or who he was from.
“For one thing, she works too hard to get mixed up with a man who doesn’t have a real job. But the real thing is, and I don’t talk about this much, you know her daddy had…issues. She’s made a lot of progress, and I don’t want to see her slide backward.”
Didn’t want to lose her own anchor to reality, he figured she meant. “Ma’am, Eve’s a strong, smart woman with a bright future in front of her.”
“Let’s see that it stays that way,” she said and then turned to fade into the darkness.