A Love Like Ours (24 page)

“No.” He inclined his head so that his forehead rested against hers. Their eyes closed, breath intermixing. She could sense his struggle and his despair.

“None of us are perfect,” she murmured.

His hands rose to frame her jaw on both sides. “I’m more imperfect than most.”

“Not to me.”

He groaned, then kissed her with such fiery need and possession that her mind reeled and joy soared.

He walked her backward, easily lifting her onto the sidewalk, stopping when her hips bumped the fence that enclosed the Candy Shoppe. More long and drugging kisses.

She was gasping and laughing when she pulled back so that she could see his face.

He gazed at her for a moment, then swept her off her feet, carrying her much the way he had the day of her spill at the track. Like she had then, she locked an elbow over his shoulder and ran her fingers into his hair. Unlike that day, he cut sizzling glances at her as he walked around the side of the house and up the back staircase. He set her down on the landing and they were kissing again, his hands on her cheeks, into her hair. He hunched his shoulders protectively around her and his tall body blocked her from the world.

When distant thunder rumbled, Jake’s head jerked up and his hands tightened reflexively around her. She watched him sweep the view as if searching for attackers.

Nothing surrounded them but the silent structures of the neighboring Victorians. Jake’s attackers hadn’t been external for a very long time. They were all internal.

When he fixed his attention on her again, she read conflict in his gorgeous eyes.

Oh dear. “Don’t even think about hightailing it out of here.”

“I never hightail.” He took hold of a lock of her hair, twining it carefully around a finger, then watching as he ran the pads of his fingers down to the end of the strands.

“C—” The thing he was doing with her hair was making her breathless. “Come inside.”

“I can’t.”

“You can.”

He flicked an ominous look at her. “You wouldn’t say that if you knew what was going on inside my head right now.”

Despite how badly she wanted him to come inside so they could kiss longer, the small part of her brain that remained rational knew he had a point. It would be smartest to give them both time to cool down and process things. Rome wasn’t built in a day.

He frowned, taking up another section of her hair, treating it as reverently as the first. “This thing between us isn’t a good idea.”

Such a sweet talker, Jake. So full of flattery. “I disagree. I think it’s a very good idea.”

“You’ve disagreed with every single thing I’ve said tonight.”

“That’s because you’ve been wrong every time.” Her lips curved.

“I’m afraid that I’ve been right.”

“How about we not worry so much about who’s wrong or right? Will you come back tomorrow evening? I’ll make you dinner.”

He hesitated.

“Jake, this is when you’re supposed to say, ‘Yes, thanks, Lyndie. I’ll show up here tomorrow night for dinner.’”

He freed his fingers from her hair. She lifted her hand so that it met his and their palms were aligned, his bigger hand up against her smaller one, somehow perfectly matched. The moment hung, full of fate and beauty, before Jake broke it by stepping back into
a swath of shadow. His thumbs hooked into his pockets. “It’s cold. You should go inside, Lyndie. I don’t want you to be cold.”

“Not until you say, ‘Yes, thanks—’”

“Yes, thanks.” She could hardly see his face now, he was standing in such a pool of darkness. Even so, the weight of his attention on her felt like the warmth of a fire. “I’ll show up here tomorrow night for dinner.” He started down the stairs.

Lyndie resisted the urge to lunge forward and grip his shirt to keep him from going.
How
she wanted to launch herself back into his arms for more of the scorching ecstasy of those kisses.

“Go on in, Lyndie.” He’d paused near the bottom of the stairs, but he hadn’t looked back.

“Okay. I’m going.” She scooted into her apartment but leaned back out her door to call, “Good night.”

No reply. Either he’d already vanished or didn’t feel it necessary to respond likewise, like most humans did. Strange man. Also, a very hunky man who could kiss like nobody’s business.

Lyndie closed herself into her apartment and listened to his truck’s engine fade from hearing. Giddy, she went to sit on her bed and covered her mouth with her hands.
Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness!
What had just gone down between them reminded her of trying on a dress in a dressing room and standing in amazement when it fit every inch of your body as perfectly as if it had been made for you. Kissing Jake had been like that for her. Righter than right. So meant-to-be that it felt like . . . she was emotional and thinking melodramatic thoughts . . . but it truly did feel God-ordained.

At the thought, a quiet alarm went off inside of her. Calling what had just happened God-ordained was probably going too far. Kissing Jake had definitely given her that made-to-fit feeling, but if she was being honest with herself, that feeling might have come straight from her own hopes and not from God at all.

She rested her hands in her lap and squeezed the knuckle of each of her fingers, one by one, as if doing so would give her clarity. Up until this moment, she’d been very confident about God’s call
on her in relation to Jake. She’d known that God wanted her to do what she could to bring Jake back to Him, to life. She’d been doing her best. But along the way, her motivation to do what God had asked her to do had become irrevocably interwoven with her own romantic feelings for Jake. Their romance had taken a step forward tonight, and she wanted to believe that God’s plan had taken a step forward, too.

Only . . . that might not be right.

Worry intermixed with her joy, tugging her back down to earth from the happy clouds where she’d been floating. Jake had distanced himself from God, and Lyndie didn’t believe that God called His people into romantic relationships with unbelievers. Then again, Jake wasn’t
exactly
an unbeliever. He had trusted Christ as a child. She’d known him at the time and had wholehearted confidence in the fact that Jake had been saved. Which meant that his salvation couldn’t be revoked. Once God had you in His hand, you couldn’t be removed, right? What was that verse?

She located her Bible and after consulting the concordance, paged to John 10:28. She’d highlighted and starred the words, which had been spoken by Jesus Himself.
I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my
hand
.

That didn’t mean that Jake needed God any less in the present. In fact, Jake needed Him desperately. Until Jake got himself right with God, nothing would be right with Jake and thus nothing could be one hundred percent right between them in their relationship.

Even so . . . She had hope that Jake would come to lean on God again.

A little chill of foreboding slid down the back of her neck, because she knew that kind of thinking was dangerous. Women since the beginning of time had bought themselves a lifetime of heartache by falling in love with men they hoped would change one day, men who never changed. She wasn’t going to be one of those women, was she? Before Jake, she’d never imagined that she—independent as she was and viewing herself as so secure
in her faith—would even toy with the idea of becoming one of those women.

God had ways of humbling a person.

She’d followed God her whole life. She didn’t want to break from following Him now or ever. But this situation was murky. She couldn’t hear or feel a clear yes or a clear no on dating Jake. And it probably didn’t help that she really, really liked Jake. She seriously, he-sets-my-hair-on-fire liked him.

With a frustrated sigh, Lyndie flopped onto her back on her mattress, the bed bouncing slightly.

God
could
change Jake. She had hope in that. Strong hope. Was it faith to place her trust in that, or selfish idiocy?

Faith, she hoped. She was optimistic and not easily swayed when she set her mind to something. And she’d set her mind on Jake. She’d go forward with him, trying her very best not to hang all her dreams on him, not to fall madly in love with him. It was still best to hold a portion of her heart back.

How was he reacting to their kisses at this very moment, and how would he react tomorrow? At no point had she seen even a flash of peace or lightheartedness in him. It could be that he’d flee now—

No. He’d said he’d come for dinner, at least. And so he would. She could stress about the future and about whether or not he’d ever kiss her again. Or she could pray that God would find a way to help Jake deal with all of this, with her. So she’d pray. And replay in her memory every single detail of tonight. And yes . . . maybe she’d stress just a little bit, too.

Because she dearly wanted him to change. And she dearly wanted him to kiss her again.

A
mber faced a sudden should-I-hide or should-I-face-this quandary.

In order to raise funds, the Society for the Restoration of Holley had set up a fried chicken Sunday lunch buffet at Holley’s athletic fields. Since Jayden would be playing soccer in an hour for the Crazy Cleats, she’d had him change into his soccer gear on the way over from church. She’d planned to knock out a fried chicken lunch followed by his soccer game in just one stop. She hadn’t planned on seeing Will McGrath and his two daughters.

Amber and Jayden had just finished filling their plates and been searching for a place to sit when she’d spotted Will and his girls on a navy plaid blanket under a pecan tree.

If it had been Will by himself, Amber would have said a few words, but his daughters? She’d better go with the hide option.

Just as she took Jayden by the hand to lead him in the opposite direction, Will looked over and saw her. He’d been in the middle of saying something, but his words immediately cut off. Curious, his daughters glanced in Amber’s direction.

Too late to hide. The only option left: face this. Amber smiled at them as she approached. Mother Teresa had once said, “Let us always meet each other with a smile, for the smile is the beginning of love.”

“Hi, Will. How are you doing?”

“Great.” Always mannerly, he pushed to his feet. “How are you today, Amber?”

“Doing well, thanks.”

“How about you, Jayden?”

Jayden busily stuffed potato chips in his mouth. Amber gave him a nudge. He swallowed and straightened. “I’m doin’ good. Thank you, sir.”

“Awww,” the younger of Will’s girls crooned.

“Jayden’s soccer team is playing here soon, so we decided to grab lunch before the game.” Why was she telling them things they could clearly see for themselves? A combo of nervousness and the need to convince Will that she wasn’t stalking him spurred her to keep talking. “I wanted to support the Society for the Restoration of Holley.”

“We had the same idea. Taylor’s playing softball in a little bit.” Sure enough, the smaller of the two girls wore a uniform. She’d swept her hair into a ponytail and tied it with a white ribbon.

Will introduced her to Madison, a high school junior, and Taylor, a freshman. While Amber exchanged greetings and introduced them to Jayden, she tried to look calm and pleasant instead of just tense.

Munch munch munch
. Jayden had returned to the chips. He tugged on her sundress, letting her know he wanted her to finish the boring talking so they could eat.

“Well, we’ll let you enjoy your lunch.” Amber began to edge away.

“Would you like to join us?” Will was still standing. And yes, he still had the dreamiest bedroom eyes in the ENTIRE WORLD.

“No, no, we don’t want to intrude on you guys.”

“You’re not intruding. We’d like for you to join us.” He bent and lifted another navy plaid blanket from behind his cooler. “Here.” He settled it onto the ground so that the two blankets overlapped.

Her heart melting—get a grip, Amber, all he did was lay down a blanket—she toed off her high-heeled sandals and lowered onto
the fabric. “Thank you.” Jayden settled beside her, and she gave his hands a squirt of hand sanitizer.

“Can I get you both something to drink?” Will asked.

“Thank you, but I brought bottled water.” She wasn’t a very controlling mom, but she tried to avoid giving Jayden sugary drinks. She already had her hands full with his God-given level of hyperactivity.

She and Will spoke politely about the Society for the Restoration of Holley and about the improvements the society had made to the old town square. Amber made every effort to eat very politely. And not to stare impolitely at either Will or his daughters.

In the distance, kids’ teams filled the two baseball diamonds and the two soccer fields. The bright spring weather made her want to lift her face to the sun and sigh.

Madison and Taylor said little and checked their smartphones often. They looked enormously alike. Both girls had straight dark blond hair and had inherited their father’s squarish jaw. They were long-legged and pretty. They’d been raised in a small town just like Amber herself had been. But she didn’t catch any signs of the wildness she’d flirted with at their ages. Taylor had on softball stuff and Madison wore a T-shirt and neon Nike shorts with flip-flops. If Jayden turned out half as wholesome as Will’s daughters appeared to be, she’d be thrilled.

“Look at these little tiny shoes, Maddie,” Taylor said, touching a fingertip to one of Jayden’s feet.

“I know. He’s a mini. A mini man. Do you mind if I take your picture, Jayden?”

He set down his chicken leg. “’Kay.”

“Sure?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Awww,” both girls said, then assured him that he could call them Madison and Taylor if he wanted to. They held up their phones and Jayden immediately put on the fake smile he wore whenever Amber tried to take pictures of him. It mostly involved
Jayden stretching his lips as far as they would go and showing his gums.

“You’re super cute, Jayden,” Madison told him.

“Thank you, ma’am.”

“Awww!”

As usual, he was spreading
ma’am
and
sir
on thick, knowing it would win him positive attention.

Amber glanced at Will and found him watching her with a half smile. Her stomach did a lift-and-tingle thing. What if . . . what if she and Will could overlap one day? The way their blankets were overlapping and joining their two families right at this moment?

She was getting way, way ahead of herself, but it was fun to imagine it. The two of them as husband and wife, mother and father. His girls. Her boy. And maybe, Lord willing, one more little baby to share. A big, crazy, blended family with kids spread wildly apart in age. And yet . . . perfect.

So much longing filled Amber that she had to look down and pretend to brush crumbs from the lap of her sundress. She’d never been married. And since she’d left home, her apartment at the Candy Shoppe had been the only place she’d been able to call
hers
. Even that was a stretch, seeing as how she merely rented.

In her worst moments, she felt certain she’d never find a husband or a home of her own. In her best moments, she remembered that she’d found her home in the Lord and needed nothing more to find contentment.

“May I be ’scused?” Jayden asked her.

He’d left his potato salad and green beans untouched, eaten all of his chips and three bites of fried chicken. She nodded. Trying to keep him seated once he’d finished was like trying to pin down a bumblebee. She didn’t have the energy. “Throw away your plate and napkin, please.”

He did so, then grabbed his soccer ball and ran to an open stretch of lawn. “Mom? Will you play with me?”

God had given Jayden to the wrong mother. He should have been delivered to Mia Hamm instead of a woman so uninterested
in sports that she only watched TV during Super Bowl parties when the commercials came on. “I’m not done eating yet, sweetie.”

“I’ll go kick with him, if you don’t mind.” Will stood.

“I . . . ah . . . I don’t mind at all. If you’re sure.”

“I’ll go, too.” Taylor jogged toward Jayden.

Startled, Amber watched them form a triangle and begin passing the ball. Will looked fit and athletic, naturally graceful. Unlike her, he moved to the ball easily and had no problem aiming and controlling it.

She did believe—no, was really pretty positively sure—that she’d never seen a nicer sight than a handsome fireman and his smiling teenaged daughter kicking a ball with her son. The way to her heart was through her son’s soccer ball, apparently.

As if! As if Will McGrath needed another way to her heart. He’d blazed a pretty big trail there already.

She looked over and found Madison studying her.

“Do you play sports?” Amber asked.

“Volleyball.”

“Great. And . . . you said you’re a junior.”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“How’s that going?”

“Good.” Madison ducked her head to peek at something on her phone. “So, yeah. Good.”

Amber had no idea what else to say to a girl her age so she took a bite of potato salad and watched Will.

I know you have bigger issues that you’re dealing with, God. But if you
find the time and if it’s in your plan, I’d really like to go on a date with Will.

Just one solitary date would complete Amber’s deal with Lyndie. They’d both gone on two dates so far. They each only had one date left. If Lyndie’s final date tanked, then Lyndie would most likely return to her anti-social artist’s studio. If Amber’s final date tanked, then she was planning to interpret it as a “not now” from God and extend her long vacation from the world of dating.

One date with
Will to begin with, Lord, would be great. More than
enough! Don’t mean to be greedy. But if it’
s in your plan . . .

One of Jake’s yearlings, a bay colt, loped circles around him inside Whispering Creek’s round pen.

After a night mostly spent pacing his loft, he’d been in a very bad place mentally this morning. He’d needed his work to keep his mind and hands busy, so he’d spent the better part of the day at the ranch.

He stopped the colt, then let him go back out, jogging him in the opposite direction.

For the hundredth time, Jake checked his watch. Lyndie had sent him a text earlier, asking him to arrive for dinner at her house at seven. It was six thirty. If he was going to go, he needed to head to his car.

He pushed the heels of his hands against eyes that ached with exhaustion. Part of him had been counting the seconds until he could see her again. The other part knew for certain that he shouldn’t go to her house because when he saw her again, he’d kiss her again, and he’d done more than enough damage already.

Shoving his hands into the pockets of his sleeveless padded vest, he returned his attention to the colt. He could use a padded cell at the moment more than a padded vest.

He’d told Lyndie straight out that he wasn’t good enough for her. But she wouldn’t see sense. She was determined to believe that he was better than he was. Which meant that if one of them was going to be sane about this, it was going to have to be him. And wasn’t
that
rich? Him. Who hadn’t been sane since the day he’d last ridden in a Humvee through an Iraqi desert.

The colt’s groom opened the door to the round pen and gave Jake a questioning look.

“You can take him.” Jake chirped and the colt slowed. Patiently, Jake waited until the horse approached him, head down. He fished a piece of carrot from the inside pocket of his vest and fed it to
him. Then he issued instructions to the groom, followed them partway down the shed row, and checked his watch again. Six forty.

What good could possibly come out of a relationship with Lyndie? He could only imagine bad endings.

She’d left him once. Back when her family had moved away from Texas. Even as a kid, the grief of losing her had devastated him. If Karen and Mike decided to move Mollie again, Lyndie would go with them. Or Lyndie might date him for a little while, then decide he was boring and flawed. Or she’d take a spill racing Silver Leaf and hurt herself. Or he’d leave for New York just as he did every year when Lone Star closed for the season. And she’d stay here with Mollie.

See? Bad endings.

If they continued down this road and one of those bad endings happened, he feared that it might do him in.

You’ve been done in ever since she came to Holley. What difference will having dinner with her make at this
point? Go see her and take what joy this life has to offer you
.

He should go.

No. He shouldn’t go. He should return to his loft alone, like he’d done for a thousand nights.

He walked to his truck and drove to Lyndie’s. When he arrived, he climbed the back staircase he’d carried her up less than twenty-four hours before, and stood on the platform where he’d kissed her like he was suffocating and she was air.

He shouldn’t be here. His doubts shouted at him to turn back.

“Hey.” She pulled the door open before he’d knocked and motioned him inside with her head. In one hand she held a pair of metal kitchen tongs. “Hungry?”

Hungry?
He almost laughed a wicked laugh.
Yes
.

“C’mon in.” She gave him a light smile and led him into her kitchen. As usual, her dogs went crazy, wagging their tails, jumping up on him. “I’m not that great of a cook,” she was saying. “I can follow a recipe if it’s simple enough for a monkey to manage. Or I can make tacos. Tonight I’m making tacos.” Stopping at the
stovetop, she used the tongs to turn two tortillas browning in a skillet of oil.

Light sparkled along the gold hoops of her earrings. In a pale purple shirt and white jeans she looked like everything he wasn’t: clean and happy and calm. She’d parted her hair on the side and braided a piece of it before tucking that piece under the rest.

He simply stared, struck silent by her, full of embarrassing emotion. He knew why he’d come tonight even though there had been many reasons not to come. He’d come because he’d sacrifice even his sanity for her. If it came down to it, he’d let her break his heart.