Two days later on Saturday, Caitlyn was listening to Etta Mae croon and worked on her crocheting of the hats she’d been making for the preemies in the local hospital. There was a group at her local church she worked on these with.
It was dark, not only was it evening but the rain hadn’t left yet and added to the need for lights. So she had her end table lamp on while she worked. Some nights she worked on this while watching television but right now, she had no need to get the crap from the news and all the nastiness that seemed to encompass the world right now.
Listening to Etta relaxed her and allowed her to imagine all was right in her corner of the earth.
The doorbell chimed and she got to her feet after making two more stitches. Placing it down on the tan cushion, she padded in socked feet through her small house to the front door. Caitlyn pushed herself up on her toes and peered out the peephole.
Her throat dried up at the sight of the man standing at her front door. Behind him, she could see his police SUV in her driveway, announcing to her entire neighborhood that a cop was at her house.
“Great,” she muttered. “Just what I needed, them to think the cops had to be sent to my home.” At least the lights aren’t flashing.
Even so, her body reacted on a visceral level to the man out there, as it had since the day she met him. Caitlyn rested her head against the hard plane of the door and sighed heavily.
“I know you’re in there, Caitlyn. Open the door.”
Eyes closed, she used a few more seconds of time to try and find her sensibility so she didn’t just jump on him.
She opened them and pushed up on her toes once more to look out. He was in uniform again but there was no Abel at his side this time. Wonder where he is, maybe he’s in the vehicle where it’s dry.
Rip had his arms crossed over his chest and as she spied on him, he rocked back on his heels, bringing her focus to the package between his legs right at his upper thighs. Both powerful in different ways.
“Caitlyn.” He removed his hat, shoved a hand through his hair, then replaced it on top his head once more.
Something lingered in his voice that told her he wasn’t just going to turn and walk away. With a resigned sigh, she undid the deadbolt and the chain. She then opened the door, stepping back to allow him inside and out of the cold weather.
He pushed the door shut behind him and took a deep breath.
Scrunching her toes in her socks, she watched him, unsure if she should be pleased or worried by the predatory look in his expression. His eyes burned with an eerie fire and made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.
“You were just going to leave me out there, weren’t you?”
“I’m busy, Mr. Walls. What do you need?”
There. I sound respectful but also like someone who is control of their wayward emotions. With the mental hi-five over, she pivoted and marched back to the couch where she picked up her crocheting again and settled back in on the cushion, Indian style. Eyes fixated on her work, she still couldn’t ignore the powerful legs that appeared in her sight. Her gaze drifted right back to his crotch before she forced herself to look elsewhere.
“We need to talk.”
“I thought you’d gotten all you needed to say out. I’m busy and I have no desire to talk to you.”
“Why aren’t you looking at me?” He shifted closer.
She gulped. If he keeps having that body in my line of sight, I’m going to have his cock out and in my mouth. She hated the weakness of the flesh, at least right now, but damn she knew if she were to blow him, it would only lead to nothing but pleasure for her. It’s not the physical pleasure I’m scared of, it’s what comes after when he decides again, I shouldn’t give parenting advice and that my years of being a teacher don’t mean shit when it comes to understanding a child. That had hurt the worst and she did her best to keep that pain held at bay, but late at night, she couldn’t stay away from it.
“Fine, I’ll do the talking, you listen.”
“I’m not your kid, nor someone you can give orders to at your job.”
“You sure as fuck aren’t my kid, what you are is a woman who I’ve fallen for.”
Her hands wobbled and the hook slipped. She gripped it tighter and refused to look up at him. “Sounds like a personal problem.”
His laugh was low and tugged on her heart.
Rip crouched down in front of her and grasped her wrists, halting the one thing that had been doing its best to keep her mind occupied on something other than him. Her ability to not view him. “Look at me, Caitlyn.”
How the hell is it possible to have a voice so deep that it does such things to a person? Namely me. And what things it does to me as well. Damn, I’m in trouble.
Ever so slowly, she lifted her head to find his gaze waiting for her. “What?”
He placed his fingers beneath her chin allowing his thumb to swipe along her lips. Her breath hitched as he swiped them three times. Eyes were locked on one another as he moved closer to her until barely any space was between their lips. The puffs of warm air from his mouth flowed over her skin and gave her goosebumps.
She’d never met a man like him. He was on an entirely new level and quite frankly, it scared the shit out of her. Yes, she could have overlooked his sharp words, she had parents say worse to her and it hadn’t bothered her, but to have them come from him, she didn’t like how it made her feel. And it’s not like they had anything other than that one weekend in the mountains for her to go by. However, that time wasn’t anything she could, or wanted to forget.
“Will you hear me out?”
She shut her eyes and listened to the pounding rain on the roof and windows. What kind of person would I be if I sent him back out in this? “What about Abel?”
“He’s with Ian. Will you hear me out?”
She gave an offhanded shrug, trying to appear hella cooler than she felt at that moment. She wanted to lunge at him, wrap her arms and legs around him, keeping him close until she found one way to somehow appease the hunger he’d woken within her. “Whatever.”
“I’ll take it, even if you don’t sound all that excited about it.”
Look, I managed to be almost adult like.
He backed away, took off his jacket, and hung it over the chair near the door. Then he undid his gun belt.
Stripper music blared in her mind and she did her best to keep the sound contained within her. In her imagination however, she was whipping her head around, the rainbow hues flashing as she yelled, whistled, catcalled, and begged him to take it all off.
It wasn’t fair—the man should have been a stripper. He could have retired by now with the money he would have been able to make.
Of course, I’d be needing a second job to give him more of my money. That physique, the broad shoulders tapering to a lean waist. Powerful legs and arms.
I have to stop this or I’ll be on him like a pole dancer utilizes her pole on stage.
Rip strode toward her, his uniform not helping her rein in the lust threatening to explode out of her. The dark blue of his fatigues brought out a deeper hue in his green eyes.
αβ
Rip wanted to grab a fistful of her shirt and haul her up to his mouth. He craved her flavor and the pleasure of her curves against his body. She was all softness where he was hard, and he didn’t mean as in she had no muscles she was just all woman.
My woman.
Rip and Ian had a long discussion about where they were at in life. It had been rough, eye opening, and soul bearing. But he felt they were in a better place. No, it wasn’t a quick fix, things weren’t all sunshine and roses for them, but at least things were a bit clearer to them both.
Bending at the waist, he carefully moved whatever she’d been working on to the side and claimed the cushion next to her. Logically speaking, yes, he could have sat at the other end of the sofa, or hell, could have occupied a separate chair all together. He didn’t want to. Rip wanted her near him, touching him.
He longed to be able to inhale and have her soft clean scent of the outdoors surround him. So he claimed the spot he coveted.
Her gaze darted to the yarn he’d just moved with the hook to the other end of the couch before settling back on him.
“Are you working on something?”
“Yes.” That was it… she didn’t embellish or share with him what she’d been working on when he arrived at her door.
He wanted her focus on him but swallowed his own need and passed the items back to Caitlyn. The flash of relief was a double edged sword to his ego.
She gathered her feet up beneath her and began again on the stuff she’d been working on.
“What is that?”
“Crochet.”
“What are you crocheting?”
“Hats for preemie babies at the hospital.” Her focus remained on what she worked on.
The colors were all pastel but the yarn wasn’t a solid color. This way, the hats wouldn’t be either. At the corner of the furniture, he noticed a bag and reached over her to pull it near him. Dipping his hand in the opening, he pulled out some of the tiny hats. They were so soft on his skin. “You made all these?”
“Shocked someone with rainbow hair could do something so kind for others?”
“Someone is feisty this evening.” He took a deep breath. “I didn’t mean anything by it, other than I’m impressed.”
“That’s the problem. Why are you impressed?”
“I don’t see you as someone who crochets.”
“Who crochets?”
“Honestly? I picture grandmas doing it, in a circle as they plot and plan for their children and grandchildren.”
She smiled.
He took in a deep breath, her smile was like giving his heart wings to see the small crinkles in the corners of her eyes as she did so.
“I’m pretty sure I’m not a grandmother.”
He chuckled and reached for her hand, pulling it from the work she had on her lap so he could twine their fingers together. “My wife died three years ago.”
Her gaze jerked up to meet his. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I need you to see me and see what has given me my walls.”
“Again, why?”
Don’t lose courage now. Tell her.
Grinding his jaw to keep from snapping at his mental commentary, he skimmed his thumb along the smooth skin of her hand. “Because I’ve fallen in love with you, Caitlyn.”
Her mouth dropped open. Surprise and shock filled her brown eyes.
“I need you to hear me out. Don’t say anything until I’ve said my piece.”
Caitlyn nodded her expression a mix of uncertainty and suspicion.
He returned the finished hats to the bag along her work. Then he tugged her close until she was tucked beneath him.
“Do I have your word you’ll hear me out?”
She rolled her lower lip in her teeth and nodded.
He trailed one hand along her upper arm, exposing her to more tactile experience. He could happily touch her all the time, her skin felt so smooth and supple beneath his fingers. “The night I lost my wife I had gone into work instead of staying home with her and Ian. She was an amazing woman, a wonderful mom, and a saint to put up with me.”
She stiffened and it was like he could read her mind. This wasn’t easy for her to hear.
“I’m not telling you this to make you feel bad, Caitlyn. Trust me. She had to be a saint. I was military then came home and went to become a cop. Dangerous job, we had a child and I just wasn’t around.”
“It’s nothing you have to apologize for, Rip. You’re a warrior, it’s what you do.”
How did she manage to make him feel like a king? “I was also a husband and a father. And a shit one at that.”
“I’m sure she knew you loved her. Even now, I can hear it in your voice. And I know Ian knows.”
This woman is amazing, even now she’s trying to offer me comfort.
He tightened his grip on her upper arm desperate for her to understand how serious he was about the words coming out of his mouth. “He does, now, because of you. I wasn’t a man enough to make sure my son is aware of that.” He cleared his throat. “I saw her on the pavement with a bloody sheet over her, that moment I lost whatever remaining bit of basically anything good.”
Even now, he could feel that moment when it seeped from his body to join the blood from his wife on the cold asphalt. A new wave of icy pain moved over him but for the first time, after that, came a warm touch on his soul that were he a man who believed in this kind of thing, that it was his wife giving her approval.
He tipped his head and stared at the rainbow hued strands sliding through the fingers of one hand. Bringing some of the hair to his nose, he inhaled deeply of that earthy scent around her. “I locked away anything good and focused on the job because if I was turning all my attention to solving other people’s problems and issues, mine no longer existed.”
She shifted.
In response, he tightened his hold on her, scared she was going to move away.
Caitlyn didn’t fight him on it; she just readjusted, actually sitting closer.
Rip talked about how difficult it had been for him to move on.
She listened, didn’t ask questions, but allowed him to talk. In fact, she got so quiet he was worried she’d fallen asleep.
“Caitlyn?”
“You have to learn to forgive yourself, Rip.”
“I don’t know if I can. This is my fault that Ian doesn’t have his mother anymore.”
She smacked him in the chest and leaned back. No, it didn’t hurt but it did shock him. Why is she hitting me?
“She was her own person and damn you for making me do this.”
He shook his head, not following. “Do what?” The tears in her eyes tore at him and he cursed himself, the last thing he wanted was to make her cry.
“Make me out to be this horrible person.” She looked away.
He’d lost the direction of this conversation in a heartbeat. Not a horrible person baby, so not a horrible person.
He tipped her head back so she could no longer avoid his questioning gaze. “What are you talking about? You’re far from being a horrible person.”
She gripped his wrist and tried to move his hand from her chin, but he refused to allow her that win.
“Yes I am. I’m a bitch for being happy a woman is dead. Which I don’t want to be but I am, damn you, I am.”
“You’re glad my wife is dead?”
“Yes and god damn it, I hate myself for it.” She lurched away from him and ran to the far side of the room.
Like that was going to work. She walked away from him in the mountains, and that shit wasn’t happening again. He pushed to his feet and strode over to stand behind her. He knew before he got there, she was crying. Her sobs couldn’t be ignored and her shoulders shook.
“Look at me, Caitlyn. Please.”
“I lied, Rip. I can’t hear you out. Leave.”
He closed his eyes ever so briefly. “Okay.”
She visibly stiffened.
“After you tell me why you feel that way.”
“You have to hate me for even allowing those words to fall from my mouth.”
“You’re wrong, Caitlyn. I love you but I do want to know why you feel that way.”
She angled her head to the right. No, she hadn’t faced him but he at least could see part of her face now. “Because if she were alive, nothing that we shared would have happened. You wouldn’t be in my life.”
His heart swelled. “Why is that important to you?”
Tears lingered on the tips of her thick curved lashes. “Because I love you,” she whispered.
Her answer had been so quiet that he almost didn’t hear her. Almost. “Say that again.” He didn’t raise his voice in fact it was as low as hers, barely over a murmur.
She shook her head.
This time, he didn’t give her a choice and forced her to turn toward him. Eyes imploring her to say those words again, he held her gaze. “Caitlyn,” the word was ripped up from his gut. He understood why she felt her anger at herself, but he didn’t have any towards her. She’d been honest with herself and him. And while he wasn’t happy that his wife had passed, he was happy to have this woman in his life now.
“Because I love you, too.” It wasn’t spoken any louder than the first time, but Caitlyn held his gaze as she said the words.
Dipping his head, Rip kissed her.
They had a start, a foundation. They could build from there. And he was looking forward to every step of what was to come.
Aliyah Burke is an avid reader and is never far from pen and paper (or the computer). She loves to hear from her readers and can be reached . She can also be found on , , , and . You can follow her on her , , or at .
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