Can't Fight This Feeling (15 page)

“I’m fine.”

But his kindness made her weak. It made her want to throw herself in his arms and hold on, clinging to him like she’d clutch a rock in a storm. But, damn it, she needed to be strong. Though it would be a heck of a lot easier if he’d revert to his summer self—cold and distant.

“I’m fine,” she said, already swinging the door closed. “Busy.”

He used his foot to stop the action. His gaze shifted from her to the room behind her. “You started painting.”

“Mmm. That’s why I’m too busy to chat.”

“Babe.” He made a face. “Men don’t chat. But I should inspect your work...as one of the property owners.”

What could she say? Without bothering to hide her irritation, she let him inside. He kicked the door closed behind him.

Okay, he wasn’t intending this to be a brief visit.

Fine. She’d go back to what she was doing. Stomping, she crossed to the ladder set up by the corner windows. A shop light illuminated the casing.

“Wow,” Brett said, tipping back his head to inspect. “The walls are already done.”

She’d done them two nights ago, when she’d been unable to sleep after he’d left.

“I’m doing the trim in a color a step darker than the walls. Too neutral?” She climbed the ladder, then picked up her brush.

“I like it.” He watched her dip the bristles into the paint.

“Darn,” she muttered when she got paint on the side of her right hand. Switching the handle to her left, she wiped it off on her already messy shirt. Then she stilled, sensing his amusement. Frowning, she glanced down. “What?”

“This really is your first time painting.”

“I told you it was.” Looking away from him, she stroked the wood with the newly loaded brush. “Am I doing something wrong?”

“You ever see a professional at work?”

“Maybe...no,” she confessed.

“They get little, if any, paint on anything but the intended surface.”

“Oh.” She took in the smears on her shirt, her old pair of yoga pants, her hands.

Her forearms.

Her elbows.

“Mortifying,” she muttered. She was always making a fool of herself around him.

“Don’t dip so deeply,” he advised. “You won’t get too much paint on the brush and you’ll be less likely to get it on yourself.”

She decided against commenting on the suggestion. Maybe if she didn’t talk, he’d go away.

And as if he heard her thoughts and was determined not to cooperate, he dragged a stool from the kitchen closer to where she was working.

“You’re giving me performance anxiety,” she complained.

“You’re doing fine. My first time I got more paint on Shay than on the fence my dad conned us all into covering.” There was easy humor in his voice.

It was impossible to ignore. “Conned?”

“Think Tom Sawyer. He wanted to get some help with the chore. We wanted to play hide-and-seek or some such kids’ thing. The man could make anything look like fun, though. When he told us we had to audition to be part of the painting crew, we fell all over ourselves attempting to do the best job. He kept giving us second and third and fourth ‘tries’ to get it right...until the whole damn thing was done.”

Angelica could picture the Walker kids striving to outdo each other. “Sounds like he was a great dad.”

“Sure...but he screwed up, too. Before the painting con, he left my mom with three little kids when financial problems made their marriage rocky. Took a mining job in South America with no end date. My mom had an affair with a wealthy guy from down the hill and she got pregnant with Shay.”

Surprised—not as much by the information, but that he was opening up to her when he so seldom did—Angelica stopped painting midstroke and swiveled her head to look at Brett.

He nodded, as if she’d asked a question out loud. “We don’t think of her as anything but fully Walker, and neither did Dad once he pulled his head out of his ass and came back.”

Hmm. Was Brett making a point with this story? She turned back to the window. “Are you saying that I should give my father a second chance?”

“I wouldn’t presume to make that judgment.” He paused. “What about your mother? Where is she in this?”

“Not involved. With the financial scheme—they’ve been divorced for years—nor with me.” She glanced over her shoulder to see Brett frowning. “Her current husband is not that much older than me... I don’t think she likes to remind him of her grown daughter.”

He cursed beneath his breath and she felt heat burn at the back of her neck. In boarding school, they’d trotted out their dysfunctional families like badges of honor.
My sister’s a kleptomaniac. My mother’s been to rehab five times. My little brother made a bonfire out of all my stuffed animals.
But talking about the situation with Brett, whose domestic troubles appeared minor compared to the complete disasters that were her own, embarrassed her.

It was as if she’d done something to deserve the abandonment and duplicity. Not to mention that one episode of groping hands and rubbery lips that had apparently ruined sex for her.

Ruined her for someone as masculine and vital as Brett, anyway.

“Are you ready to talk now?” he asked, his voice quiet.

He was reading minds again! But she wasn’t prepared to talk about
that
, which would only serve to make her feel damaged and...and
less
. Sneaking a glance over her shoulder, she could tell he wasn’t going to be put off easily.

Sucking in a breath, she dipped her brush once again in the paint. “Sure. I’d love to hear more about your growing-up years in the mountains.”

He was silent a long moment. Then he whispered, “Okay. Your way, angel face. For now.”

She ignored the ominous last two words. “What’s your first memory?”

“Skiing,” he said promptly. “We had—have, they’re still around somewhere—a short pair with rubber bindings you slipped your snow boots into. I think I was two or three, and I was determined to make it down this slope in our rear yard without falling.”

“Did you?”

“I don’t remember. I recall my dad hauling me back to the house and my mom pulling me free from my outer gear before distracting me with hot chocolate and cookies. What about you?”

“You know I can be completely sidetracked by cocoa and sweets.”

“First memory, princess. We’re trading or not playing at all.”

“Wearing my mother’s shoes,” she said, thinking back. “You know, fancy high heels. I was running down a marble hallway in them, I remember that, and I fell and bumped my head. My mother fired the nanny. I liked her.”

“The nanny?”

“Well, not my mother.” She shot a look at him. “Sorry. That sounded very poor little rich girl.”

He shrugged. “Was that what you were?”

Instead of answering, she asked her own question. “Halloween costume? Your favorite. The holiday’s coming up... Glory stocked a few things for the hardware store—miniature hard hats and tool belts—though her dad’s going to have a fit when he sees them.”

“Halloween costume...” He seemed to think it over.

“Don’t tell me it was the time you went as a cheerleader,” she teased. “I’ll be very shocked to find you have a perky side beneath your surly exterior.”

He snorted. “No. Somebody gave me a replica of an astronaut’s jumpsuit, though. I think I wore that when I was six, and I thought I looked very cool. After that it was dumb rubber masks and plastic hatchets. I’d scare myself if I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror.”

“An astronaut?” That intrigued Angelica. She tried imagining him in space, far above the earth he seemed so connected to. “An ambition?”

“Never,” he said. “I’ll always be here, feet on the ground, angel face. You understand that?”

It was a message.
I’m a mountain man, and you’re likely not long for this part of the world.
It reminded Angelica of Glory’s bone-deep distrust of flatlanders. The other woman had gotten over her suspicion of Angelica and welcomed a new friendship, but did that make her a real part of this place?

She’d never really belonged anywhere. To anyone.

“I once asked the housekeeper to help me with my costume. My mother had commissioned a Marilyn Monroe outfit from her dressmaker—the famous white dress, complete with wire in the hem so it appeared to be blowing up. And a platinum wig.”

“Glamour girl,” Brett said.

“But I didn’t wear any of it, to my mother’s fury. Our housekeeper was petite and I was tall for my age and I borrowed one of her uniforms. At my mother’s party, I passed around canapés on a silver tray. She was mortified.”

“Photos?”

“God, no. There was a professional photographer there, snapping shots of the ‘beautiful people’ who were Mother’s best friends. He was given explicit instructions to keep me out of every one.”

“Harsh.”

“Not so much. I hated cameras even then. The only reason I did the modeling thing was to make my mother happy. It paid well, but I became horribly self-conscious. They began serving me a few mojitos beforehand to loosen me up.”

He was silent so long she thought he might have left without her being aware of it. She glanced around. His expression appeared unreadable. Then he ran his palm over his hair. “You have a choice next,” he said, his voice casual. “Share about a recurring nightmare or tell me all about your first kiss.”

What if they were one and the same thing?

Suddenly, she recognized the question for the setup it certainly was. It was one thing to trade memories, yet another to be mined for the marrow in her bones. “Don’t go there,” she said, her voice sharp.

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You’re prying.”

“We’re talking childhood. Let me tell you about Nancy Earle. She puckered up for every boy in second grade. The day she came after me, I ran and hid in the teachers’ restroom. That didn’t stop her.”

“I still don’t want to talk about it.”

“My nightmare—” He suddenly broke off. “You’re right. Maybe we shouldn’t talk about those.”

Surprised, she pivoted on the ladder to stare at him. Her abrupt movement set the device rocking and Brett was there in a blink, steadying the thing...and her. His big hand was on the small of her back.

“I’ve got you, princess,” he said.

The simple sentence made her heart quake. Did he get her? Did he know about the insecurities and the loneliness? If he could see inside her as if she were glass, didn’t that mean she was just that fragile?

A terrible thought, when it was time to stand on her own and create a new life for herself.

His hand caressed her and it sent goose bumps racing up her spine. “What do you see in the dark, Angelica?”

Never tell. Never say. No one will believe you. They don’t even want you here. Nobody wants you.
Her insides lurched, but she ignored the sick sensation.

“What I
prefer
is privacy,” she said, firming her jaw. “Peace. Quiet.”

That icy cool came back into his eyes. “Me to go away,” he said.

“Yes,” she whispered. And she watched him go.

Finally.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

G
LANCING
AT
A
NGELICA
’
S
cabin in his rearview mirror, another surge of frustration rolled through Brett as he drove to his office for a morning of catching up on paperwork. He’d gotten exactly nowhere with her. A woman suddenly screams during a scorching kiss that until that moment had obviously been mutually pleasurable, and you’d think she’d be willing to explain herself.

He’d given her time before pressing her—twenty-four hours!—and everyone knew he wasn’t a patient man. Still, she’d stonewalled him for a second time.

So maybe it was better to be done with the whole thing. With her. What was he thinking?
Of course
it was better to be done with her. When it came to women, getting too involved had never worked out for him. He touched the scars on his face, running a fingertip over the jagged lines.

For God’s sake, he wore the reminders every day—and had been grateful for them.

Mac would be in her office this morning and he decided to make a visit. She’d remind him of his attitude toward ever-after. It was fine for other people, but not for either of them.

His sister’s head came up as he breezed through the door. Her eyebrows rose, too. “’Sup?” she asked.

He’d stopped for coffees at Oscar’s. She had a coffeemaker, but she notoriously forgot to count when she dumped in the grounds so it was usually either too weak or strong enough to bring a zombie back to life.

Bumping the swinging door with his hip to pass through the counter, he held out one of the paper cups. “Brought you something.”

“Nice.” She took it from him, but her pale blue eyes remained on his face. “What do you need?”

To remember who I am. To recall the lessons I’ve learned in life.
“A little company,” he said instead. “It’s pretty quiet out on our mountain.”

Mac leaned back in her chair. “I warned you about that when you decided to move there.”

He shrugged and took a sip of his coffee. “After that fire this summer it was clear we needed a more-than-occasional presence out there to keep the riffraff away.”

“Which reminds me—you have company in the cabins now. How’s it working out with Angelica next door?”

He propped the small of his back against the counter that separated the small space into lobby and work area.

“She’s painting.”

“A portrait? A still life with fruit and flowers?”

“The interior of her cabin. Poppy said she could. She gets a discount at the hardware store.”

Mac blinked. “Okay. Does it look all right?”

“Looks great, actually. Classy colors. Neutral enough, but upscale to go with Poppy’s plans.” His sister wanted to create a secluded, rustic retreat, if rustic could include fancy sheets and a gourmet meal service.

“Shay’s plan, too,” Mac reminded him. “I think she’s riding right beside Poppy in that particular train’s engine. You, too.”

He opened his mouth to deny it, but she stopped him with a pointed finger. “Why else would you be living at the cabins, Brett?”

You should build that lodge that you imagined here.
Poppy had her vision for the cabins. He supposed he’d not entirely let go of what he thought might be erected on the top of the mountain.

It was on old dream...something grander than a ramshackle though beloved set of ski runs. Instead, it would be more like what was known today as a boutique hotel...a small and stylish destination for snow sports. A peaceful retreat for hikers and bike riders in other months.

Rolling his shoulders, he shook thoughts of it away. There were several reasons it couldn’t happen, not the least of which was their father having made a financial deal that precluded further development. Maybe if the cabins took off in a big way, they could consider trying to buy out...

But he wasn’t holding on to that as a possibility either. As a realist, about life, about romance, he didn’t set himself up for disappointment.

“You’re like me, Mac, right?” he said aloud.

“I don’t know, bro,” she said with a smirk. “I managed to shave today.”

He palmed the grit on his chin. “I mean we’re not falling in with all this white lace and promises crap like our sisters, despite Poppy finding Ryan and Shay getting ‘be-ringed’ by Jace.”

Mac knocked back a swallow of her coffee. “Prince Charming is not coming by with the glass slipper,” she affirmed, propping the soles of her heavy boots on the edge of her beat-up desk.

Brett narrowed his eyes. Did she look a little sad about that?

The door opened behind him and he swung around to see the local mail carrier, Lewis, come bustling in. He grinned at them both and handed a rubber-band-wrapped bundle of envelopes and advertisements to Brett. “Walkers,” he said, by way of greeting.

“How are you, Lewis?” The older man’s children had been in school with the Walker siblings. “Dinah? Your kids?”

“Good, good.” Wild hairs grew out of the centers of his gray eyebrows, giving him a puckish appearance. “Hannah was asking about you just the other day.”

“Huh.” Hannah had been in the same grade as Brett in school, and she’d married before she turned twenty-one. “How’s her husband... Clyde?”

“Ex-husband. He’s a loser, just like I told her on her wedding day. She’s moved back home and wouldn’t mind getting out for a drink now and then.”

Brett considered it. Acting as rebound man was no hardship when he didn’t plan on sticking with any woman for the long term. “Tell her to give me a call when she feels up to it.”

As the mail carrier signaled a will-do and left, Brett decided his visit could be considered a success. A new woman in the offing—already he felt more like himself.

“Back on the prowl,” Mac said, toasting him with her coffee.

He tried frowning at her, but what the hell? It wasn’t that he was a merciless player—every woman he went out with understood the score—and he wasn’t looking to fill the family Bible with another name in the tree, either. Setting down his coffee, he snapped the band off the mail before handing it over to his sister.

A postcard fluttered free as he tossed her the stack.

She made a grab for it, but it sailed out of her reach and landed near his foot. He bent for it, glanced at the photo of the Golden Gate Bridge and flipped it over to see who it was from. He ignored his sister’s bleat of protest. Come on, it’s not as if postcards were confidential correspondence.

Then he did a double take. Only a single symbol was written in the white space intended for a message. Three lines assembled to make a bold
Z
.

He switched his gaze from the letter to his sister’s face. “Zan? Mac, Zan is sending you postcards?” Alexander “Zan” Elliott, Brett’s one-time best friend and the boy that Poppy claimed had ruined her sister for all other males.

She wouldn’t meet his eyes. Instead, she half rose to snatch the card from his hand. With another quick movement, she opened the bottom drawer of her desk and flipped it inside.

Brett felt the whites of his eyes drying out, they’d gone so round. “What the hell, Mac?” There’d been a heap of postcards in the drawer. “You’ve been writing to Zan and nobody knows about it?”

It pissed him off, thinking that the other man had been corresponding with Brett’s sister and not with him, the best friend who had considered him as close as a brother.

Zan had left at twenty-one, never to be heard from again—or so he’d thought—causing his reputation to morph from Blue Arrow Lake bad boy to the most interesting man in the world. Outrageous rumors circulated every few months or so. That he was the true founder of Bitcoin. A European circus starred him in a high-wire act. He’d been adopted by an indigenous tribe in Antarctica. Brett had snorted at that one, informing the person who repeated this nonsense that unless Zan called a penguin Mom or Pop, this was pure, stinking bullshit.

Mac slammed her arms over her chest. “I’m
not
writing to Zan.” Two spots of color flagged her cheeks. “He sends me the occasional card.”

Ignoring her sputters, he strode over to yank open that drawer and grab a handful of colorful missives from the pile. “Those are private!” Mac protested.

He held them over his head to avoid her reaching fingers. Being the big brother had its occasional perks. Torturing younger sisters being one of them. The cards captured scenes from all over the world. Australia. Sweden. South Africa.

His puzzled gaze sought out his sister’s. “What’s with this? There’s nothing written on any of them but his initial.”

Mac collapsed back in her chair. “Yeah.” She shrugged, indicating indifference.

“The one that just came from San Francisco is no different.”

Her spine snapped straight. “San Francisco?”

He found it, tossed it atop the desk.

Mac watched it as though it was a coiled snake ready to strike. “That’s the closest he’s been,” she murmured, as if to herself. “How many miles away is that?”

“Four hundred fifty, give or take a mile or two.” But Mac wasn’t listening. She’d gone somewhere in her head and it unnerved him. He’d come here to return to his regular skin. He’d looked forward to being resettled like a phonograph needle finding a comfortable, vinyl groove.

Brett Walker, dedicated, enthusiastic bachelor.

But even though he’d been contemplating meeting the postman’s daughter for drinks...

Mac suddenly didn’t look like Mac.

Which somehow threatened his grasp on his usual, cynical self.

Zan had been writing to Mac for, what, years?

His sister apparently wasn’t going to explain any more about that, so after a few minutes Brett escaped. Still hoping to return to his former, comfortable identity, though—the one that didn’t worry about secretive women and mysterious missives—he dropped by the house his youngest sister shared with her fiancé and his daughter. As he pulled up to the massive modern structure, he saw London hop into a light truck and take off in the opposite direction.

“Car pool,” Shay explained, when she let him in the door. “I’m afternoons this week...or Jace is afternoons, if he gets back from LA in time.”

The other man ran a worldwide construction business. Because he loved Brett’s sister and the daughter he was just becoming reacquainted with, he was reorganizing his company so that he could spend the majority of his time in the mountains.

Shay led him to her enormous kitchen and he pulled up a stool to her stainless-steel island. Though he was risking a caffeine overload, he didn’t say no to a mug of coffee.

“What brings you by?” she asked.

Poppy was soft, Mac was flinty, and he’d always considered Shay to be a balance of the two. His littlest sister had also suffered from unfounded guilt over their father’s early death. In trying to help her with that over the years, he’d revealed some of his own interior landscape.

Studying her over his coffee, he took a sip. She had elegant bones and an air of complete serenity. Damn, Jace was good for her. “How are your nightmares?” he asked, knowing they must hardly bother her any longer.

Her gaze narrowed on him, turned shrewd. “How are yours?”

That wasn’t exactly what he’d term them, since they didn’t happen during sleep. They were actually flashbacks to a string of black events that had put increasing pressure on his heart, squeezing down until it was dense and inflexible. Coal.

Instead of answering, he deflected. “I wish you’d talk to Angelica,” he said.

Shay’s fingertips touched her chest. “Me?”

“You’re a good listener. Something bothers her. She has secrets.”

“Everybody knows about her swindling father.”

He glanced down at the gleaming countertop. His reflection was discernible, yet hazy. The outline of himself was there, but it showed him as he’d felt since meeting Angelica...as if his hard edges were becoming blurred.

“This is not about her father,” he said. “It’s something else that I think is hard for her to share.” Something sexual, that was clear. A prior bad experience that had left her skittish. No, scared.

“Try taking her into your confidence,” his sister advised. “Tell her about the things you can’t let go of.”

He looked up, alarmed. “Why would I put what’s in my head in hers?”

“Because that’s how you build trust, Brett.”

“Shay—”

“Listen to me.” She leaned across the countertop, her gaze boring into his. “If you want to lessen her load, you’re going to have to show her some of what you’re carrying yourself.”

His hand went to the top of his hair and he rubbed it there, over and over, as if he could wipe free from his skin what never seemed to wash away. He yanked at his short hair as if he could yank from the roots the memories that had lodged inside his head.

Whop whop whop.
They always started with that sound. Ended with the wash of red, the feel of it, the coppery smell. He didn’t want to tell anyone about that. About life dying out of a pair of pain-filled eyes.

If you want to lessen her load, you’re going to have to show her some of what you’re carrying.