Can't Hurry Love (8 page)

The morning after her first night in Liam’s house, Giuliana awoke rested. As she’d prepared for sleep she’d also braced herself with the knowledge that a strange bed might keep her awake, but the mattress was so much more comfortable than the short couch in her office that her eyes had closed almost immediately.

The kisses and caresses of the evening before had not even interrupted her seven hours of unconsciousness. Probably because she and Liam had retreated to their own rooms shortly after her family had departed. Clearly, they’d both been keen on keeping to their separate corners of the big house.

She had no idea where he slept, actually, and jumped when she stepped into the kitchen and found him at the table with a mug and the newspaper. His hair was damp and he was in jeans, work boots, and a black T-shirt.

“It’s early.” Flushing, she pushed her hair behind her ears and tugged on the hem of her denim shorts. Her agenda for the day contained nothing more formal than continuing to clear out obsolete files and sorting through the detritus in her jam-packed office closet.

“I work for a living, too,” he said, the briefest expression of annoyance crossing his face. “You’ll have to make your own coffee. Charlene only works Monday, Wednesdays, and Fridays.”

Thank goodness for small favors. She hadn’t even considered confronting the housekeeper. “We’ll have to explain to her . . .”

Liam lifted a brow.

To avoid the look, she hurried toward an espresso machine that appeared as if it had the capacity to teleport freshly roasted beans from Ethiopia. Clearly Liam had a thing for state-of-the-future appliances. She just stared at it.

A moment later she heard the rattle of newsprint, the scrape of chair legs on slate, a man’s footsteps. Her gaze took in the competency of Liam’s long fingers as he brewed her a drink. A latté, her morning beverage of choice.

She accepted it, then listened to him return to his seat. “This is how we’ll work it, okay?” The words burst from her mouth. “You do your thing, and I’ll do mine.”

“Sure,” he said, his voice dry. “But let’s note you made that edict
after
I made your coffee.”

Her cheeks warmed. “Well.” The rubber of her cheap thongs flapped against the soles of her bare feet as she crossed to the window over the sink, taking the long way around him. Her big idea to indulge in passion with him yesterday now seemed like just a big,
dumb
idea. “You do your thing, and I’ll do mine,” she repeated.

He made a noncommittal noise, and it hit her, hard, that she hadn’t shared an early morning with him since those love-drenched days in Tuscany. Her heart squeezed and she slid her latté onto the countertop. “I’m off to Tanti Baci.”

“You should eat. There’s fruit, toast, eggs, yogurt. Everything.”

“I ate too much last night.” With her sisters and Penn and Jack as buffers between her and Liam, her nerves had quieted enough for her to feel her appetite. Allie had made a simple but filling pasta dish they’d eaten with chicken breasts and halved zucchinis straight off that fancy grill.

“I’ll see you, uh, later.” She wasn’t accustomed to accounting for her days any more than she was used to playing wife to a husband.

But it wasn’t going to be like that! He’d agreed.
He’ll go his way and I’ll go mine.

His chair legs scraped again. “I’ll grab my car keys.”

“No!” She quieted her voice. “I mean, I appreciate the offer, but I’ll take the shortcut.”

The one that had brought him to her when they were young and impetuous with passion. Despite those wild moments yesterday, she knew better now. She wouldn’t make the mistake of kissing Liam again. Long ago she’d given up on counting on him.

The early-morning air was bracing and she sucked in lungfuls of it as she set out for the winery. The day’s high would hit around eighty, but it started cool, an essential piece of the magic that made Napa wine. Of course, it wasn’t magic at all, she thought, as in the distance she saw workers moving through the Bennett vines.

As she passed the end of one row, she paused to lean down and inhale the scent of a deep red rose on the bush growing there. Winegrowing lore said rosebushes were planted to serve as early-warning indicators of sickness in the vines. They supposedly were also a leftover tradition from the days when horse-drawn plows worked the vineyards—the thorns encouraged the beasts to make wide turns and thus reduce the potential damage to the stakes and wires that supported the rows. Neither was necessary any longer.

Now they had other ways to assess the health of the grapes, and four-legged beasts didn’t work the land any longer. Some vineyards still cultivated roses, but as Tanti Baci did, for decorative purposes on the rows that lined the winery entrance drive and those that faced the tasting facilities. Apropos to their interest in weddings, the Tanti Baci roses were white. However, the Bennett vineyards, for as long as she could remember, had these same bleeding heart–colored flowers at both ends of each row planted on every acre they owned in the Napa Valley.

With the scent still in her nose, she found her feet on the gravel surface that led to the caves of her family’s winery. It was a half mile more to her office from here, and the morning was still. No one was about on the Baci property. Her sisters and brothers-in-law would still be tucked in their beds at the farmhouse that was a quarter mile beyond the administrative offices that still lay ahead.

A breeze brushed across her and she shivered. She rubbed her palms against her bare upper arms, wishing she’d thought to wear a sweatshirt for the trek. But even as the goose bumps on her flesh subsided with the breeze, a new, sudden chill raised the hairs on the back of her neck.

Giuliana’s stride hitched. She lifted her chin, and glanced around, seeing nothing unusual.

No one.

But there was a flock of metaphorical geese and they were doing a determined square dance on her grave. Telling herself she was silly, she took another step forward.

And then something whispered in her ear. Intuition, fear, impulse.
Someone is lying in wait
, it said.
Go, go, go!
The family farmhouse was still far ahead. The closest safety was the way she’d come. Her thongs kicked up gravel as she turned and ran.

She was out of breath when she let herself into the Bennett kitchen via the back door. With it closed behind her, she bent at the waist and placed her hands on her knees to catch her breath. Better rejoin the Y, she thought. Sign up for more kickboxing and self-defense classes.

“What’s going on?”

Hell. She froze. Liam was still here.

Trying to appear casual, she straightened. Not for a king’s fortune would she tell him she’d spooked herself and then come running his way like a scared little girl.

He was standing by the espresso machine. She gestured at it, hoping to distract him from what surely must be her red face and wheezing lungs. “I decided I needed a second cup of ”—she had to stop to take in a breath—“coffee.”

His eyes narrowed. “You’ll have to do better than that. I can hear your heart thrumming as fast as a hummingbird’s wings from over here.”

Making sure she moved no quicker than a saunter, she made her way to the cupboard by the sink. Hah. Guessed right. She found a glass there, and with her back to him, she filled it with water from the tap.

Still turned away, she drained it down.

Then nearly leapt out of her cheap sandals when his hand landed on her shoulder. “Jules?”

Sighing, she slipped out of his hold. Pressing her back to the countertop, she faced him. “It’s silly.”

“Yeah? I like a laugh first thing in the morning.”

Most of the time it looked as if he hadn’t cracked a smile since he’d taken that plane from Tuscany. “I don’t want you laughing at
me
,” she said. “Promise.”

“Pinky-swear?” He held his up.

She wasn’t making the mistake of touching him again, so she shoved her hands in her pockets. When his dropped, she shrugged a shoulder. “I get a little . . . alarmed on occasion. I just spooked myself.”

“Huh?”

“Only occasionally. Since I was mugged.”

His head jerked back. “What?”

“You know.” She withdrew her hands to mime a blow across the head, then a shove to the ground. “I lost my purse and my laptop.”

“
What?
”

“Don’t have a heart attack. My CPR certificate isn’t up to date.”

“I’m not concerned about
my
health. Jesus, Giuliana.” He forked his fingers through his hair.

She frowned. “Are your hands shaking?”

Now it was his turn to shove them in his pockets. “My fuse is real short right now, sweetheart.”

Except he didn’t look the least bit angry or frustrated. Outside of what she’d
thought
might be a tremor or two, he looked perfectly composed. Unruffled, as always.

“Jules . . .”

There
was
a strangely rough quality to his voice. She shrugged again, a little unsettled by it. “I was walking to my car one night. I’d had a late appointment with an account and the parking lot was dark and my car was on the far side. So . . . You know the rest.”

“You were hit in the head and then pushed down?”

“Yep.” She tried not thinking of it again, but the memory was there, in the ringing in her ears and the sting to her palms, knees, and forehead. “The EMTs said I was lucky I didn’t break my nose. The police said it was good I didn’t fight to save my stuff.”

She grimaced. “I replay it, though, and every time I hold on tight. It’s a total pain in the ass to replace your ID and debit and credit cards. Let me recommend writing all the numbers down and keeping them in a safe place at home.”

He was staring at her.

“I didn’t lose my mind,” she said, frowning at him. “So stop looking at me that way. I just lost my driver’s license and some work-related files on my computer. No big deal.”

“Except you experience PTSD.”

Perhaps. A little. It’s why she had that big soft spot for Kohl. She shrugged again. “I’m much better now. You know you mentioned Disney? I had to avoid the park altogether because I would freak a little in the dark rides.”

He spun away from her. “Jules . . .” Again, that rough note in his voice.

It only served to embarrass her. What had she been thinking, confessing her weakness? “You tell me something now,” she demanded. “Something I don’t know about you.”

He hesitated a long moment. Then she heard him blow out a breath and he turned back to face her. There was a weird light in his eyes—tenderness?

His gaze dropped to her feet. “I despise those stupid rubber thongs you’re wearing,” he said.

Tender? He was laughing at her. Feeling heat flush her face again, she stomped toward the coffeemaker. She’d make it cooperate if she couldn’t make Liam.

“Okay, okay,” he said. “I’ll tell you something no one knows.”

She stilled.

“Penn.” He came up behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders. They didn’t caress, they didn’t squeeze, they just rested there, solid and warm. “When I first met him, I . . . I recognized something in him.”

She breathed lightly so as not to interrupt his words.

“Seth took to him immediately, too,” he continued, mentioning his younger brother. “But then, Seth likes everybody.”

And Liam had turned more and more wary, something she’d finally understood that summer in Tuscany. There were those dark pools and hard edges that she’d found so hard to breach.

“I’ve never said, Giuliana . . . I’ve never told anyone. But he feels like the other half of myself.”

Liam didn’t stay to register her reaction. “I’ll get my keys and drive you back,” he said, and then he was gone.

She still felt his touch on her skin. And on her heart. She knew why he cared for his brother so much. Penn was like Liam would be if he let the sun shine on his soul.

A phone rang. A portable handset stood in a base on the granite countertop. When it rang again, and then again, Giuliana crossed to it. Ms. Responsible couldn’t just let the thing peal when it appeared no answering machine would pick it up.

“Bennett residence.”

“Giuliana? Is that you?” Delight infused the familiar voice.

“Bev?” The wife of Edenville’s mayor, Beverly Allen, had a distinctive voice that betrayed her Long Island roots.

“I’m so glad I caught you at home . . .” the other woman started.

When Liam returned, she was just setting the phone back in its base. He quirked a brow. “Everything okay?”

“Oh, sure.” As long as she abandoned her you-go-your-way-I’ll-go-mine plan. “It was nothing much. Just that we’re invited to a party tomorrow night. As husband and wife.”

8

If he’d been in his right mind, Kohl thought as he stared at the person on the other side of his front door, he wouldn’t have responded to the knocking. But he’d been distracted by the hammers doing their own share of banging around inside his brain, despite the cold shower he’d just taken. On his way to the kitchen, with his towel knotted at his waist and water still running down his neck, he’d heard the rap of knuckles on wood and automatically turned the knob.

Grace Hatch stood there, looking wholesome and earnest in a short denim skirt, a white shirt, and squeaky-clean sneakers.

His instincts screamed to shut the door in her face. “I’m busy,” he said first.

Her gaze dropped to his bare skin then jerked back to his eyes. She flushed. “I thought you called in sick.”

He had. After waking up for the second morning in a row in the Tanti Baci vineyard with no idea of how he’d gotten there and with a time gap of six hours or so, he’d decided to stay home and nurse the hangover. Grace’s stare drifted to his naked chest again. The weight of it seemed to tug on his knotted towel and he put his hand there.

Her gaze followed his movement and her eyes widened, then she dropped back a step. “I’ll let you get back to your guest.”

His guest? He wished someone would come along and evict the nasty carpenters erecting a village of hurt in his head. “They’re clamoring for attention, that’s for sure.”

“There’s more than one?” She took another step back. “I, uh, see.”

She was looking at him
there
.

Kohl glanced down.
Shit.
The cold shower hadn’t calmed his other morning visitor. As if refusing to be ignored in favor of his erection, the pounding in his head redoubled. He pushed at it with the heel of his hand. “Later, Grace.”

She shoved a brown bag through the closing gap in the door. “I think there’s enough for two.”

He couldn’t massage his head, shut her out, and grab the bag all at the same time. “Two?” he repeated, letting go of the knob to take hold of the sack.

Her face took on the hue of sunset. “Three? Whatever.”

“Three?”

“Women. Lovers. Playmates.”

Kohl blinked. “It’s a dozen midgets, honey, and they’re not playing inside my skull. They’re working on driving nails into gray matter I can’t afford to lose.”

“Oh.” Her expression softened. “Let me make you breakfast, then.”

And before he could refuse her access, she pushed past him and was inside the tiny kitchen that was part of the vineyard manager’s bungalow on the Tanti Baci property. “Hey . . .” he protested.

“Hey, yourself. Now go get dressed.”

“I don’t want company.”

She peeked inside his refrigerator. “I’m not company, I’m cooking.”

He figured he could get rid of her more easily if he wasn’t nearly naked. It took him just a few moments to step into jeans and a sweatshirt with the sleeves scissored off. Back in the kitchen, he saw that she was halfway through coffee prep and decided to let her finish that up before ushering her on her way.

He wasn’t fit for company like her.

She glanced around. “‘Company like me’?”

Had he said that out loud? But the fact was, he wanted to get rid of her. They had nothing in common and worse, that night of karaoke had been too much work for him. Small talk, song encouragement, and then the effort to restrain his baser impulses.

I wanted to beat the hell out of your ex-husband,
he thought. Only the realization that he would scare her had stopped him, but he couldn’t count on his self-command forever. He had those lock-ups in the local hoosegow to prove it. Lucky for him, the guys with badges understood he’d had a few anger-management issues after returning to Edenville. And though he hadn’t done any damage to himself, others, or property in months and months now . . .

Or so he supposed. Morose, he dropped into a chair beside the table. He just couldn’t guarantee anything because of the damn blackouts.

The coffee had started to drip and Grace was rummaging in the fruit basket on the counter. “What are these?” She held up a couple of small round vegetables, their color a pale imitation of pippin apples.

Just another reason to feel effin’ sorry for himself. “My namesake. Kohlrabi. My mother keeps me supplied.”

Grace ran her thumb over the skin and Kohl gritted his teeth. The damn things always reminded him of testicles and thinking of Grace touching his balls . . .

“You’d better leave.” He ground out the words.

“That’s nice of your mom,” she said, ignoring his last remark in favor of inspecting the vegetables. Her palm cupped the orbs.

Kohl looked away, willing a mug to emerge from the cupboard, fill with the coffee streaming from the maker, and then float its way over to him and his ugly hangover.

Grace sighed. “I always wanted to be one of the Flaky Fridays.”

Startled, Kohl jerked his head in her direction, disturbing the carpenters with their hammers and nails. After a second, they started in all the harder. “I haven’t heard ‘Flaky Friday’ since I split the lip of Alan Prescott in eighth grade.” Somebody had coined that term for Kohl, his sisters Marigold and Zinnia, and his hippie parents Bobby and June Friday.

“It identified you as a group—a family.”

Kohl snorted. “A family of freaks, you mean. You’ve seen my dad in his dead-rock-star T-shirts and my mom—floating around town like Janis Joplin might if she’d ever sobered up and lived to sixty.”

“I love your mom.” Grace sighed again. “At least I think I would.”

Kohl’s jaw clenched. He’d mentioned her meeting both Bobby and June a few days ago—a strategic error. She wasn’t going to make the acquaintance of his parents or hang around any more with him. “They’re good people,” he had to admit to her, however. “Though we grew up in that double-wide they still live in, with the same rusting appliances in the yard and that same organic garden taking up as much of their attention as their kids.”

She shook her head. “They love you a lot. Your dad adopting a stray dog that his son brought home. Your mom keeping you in kohlrabi.”

That would mean so much to a girl who’d been brought up without a mother and who’d been knocked around by the one parent left to care for her. Kohl felt the familiar burn of rage start to fire up in his belly. He jumped to his feet and made for the coffeemaker on the counter.

“Were you aware they’re responsible for the yellow ribbons all over town?”

Kohl froze, then set the mug he’d pulled from the cupboard onto the countertop. “What?”

“Your parents. Right after you left, they delivered them everywhere, anonymously, I think. Stacks at the library, on the counter at the post office, held down by a rock on a bench in the park. Everybody took a few and tied them to doorknobs, to their car antennas, and anywhere else you can think of.”

He’d seen the tattered remnants of them once he’d returned. “How do you know this?” he asked. “My parents were completely against me enlisting. ‘Make love not war’ and all that.”

“I could catch a ride with a neighbor to school, but it meant I got there really, really early. So I’d hang around downtown—which means I saw a few things.” She shrugged. “I know who doesn’t scoop up after their dog during walks and which boys snuck out of which girls’ houses in the mornings.”

He could see it. The little rabbit observing the world around her from the safety of a doorway. Happy to be out of her father’s range. The idea of it wrenched at his heart as much as Mom and Pop delivering secret stacks of yellow ribbons around Edenville. It was so like them. Loving the sinner if not the sin. Loving the soldier if not the fight.

And instead of getting the warm fuzzies from the feeling, his hand lashed out and he brushed the mug off the counter so that it shattered on the linoleum below.

Grace stilled.

Closing his eyes, he realized he couldn’t move. Not yet.

Her hand touched his arm. “Kohl?”

His muscles tensed beneath the pads of her fingertips. “Go.”

She didn’t obey. He could still feel the gentle contact of her hand. Her breath blew against the skin of his bicep. “What happens?” she murmured.

She wanted to know about his PTSD. He didn’t know which he wanted to go away more: the symptoms or the woman asking about them. His chest tight, he forced out the words. “I don’t relive experiences, as a general rule. My symptoms mostly fall into the emotional numbness and withdrawal category, with some outbursts of anger to spice things up.”

“Are they getting any better?”

They had been getting better.
He
had been getting better. The work in the vineyard, the trust that Jules had in him, both had reconnected him to the world in a powerful way. But Giuliana had always been tangled with Liam—he’d known that on some level from the beginning—and that left him with this big-eyed, soft-mouthed little rabbit, who was likely ready to hop out of her skin at his next burst of temper.

Why wouldn’t she just
leave
? That soft breathing of hers was getting on his nerves, grating them rawer than ever. Her cinnamon sugar smell was too sweet for the bitter, dark man he’d become. Pulling free of her soft hold, he stepped away. The broken ceramic cut into the bottom of his bare feet, and he welcomed the sharp sting.

Her gaze dropped to the blood he left on the floor. “Kohl . . .” He saw her swallow. “Tell me where the elastic bandages are.”

“They’re not going to fix what hurts me,” he said, his voice harsh. She wasn’t leaving! Why wasn’t she running from the blood and truths that were leaking out of him? He gulped a breath, and over the coppery scent oozing from the bottom of his wounded feet, he could taste that confection smell of hers.

Suddenly he wanted to eat it. He wanted to eat her up.

Reaching out, he took hold of her upper arms with both hands. His grip was careful, though, because he saw in his mind’s eye those rings of black bruises she’d once worn on them. Still, he brought her closer. Her tennis shoes crunched on the pieces of broken mug. “You should have run,” he said, pulling her so close that he could see her pupils expand into the bright blue sea of her eyes. “I wanted you to go away.”

Her human warmth reached out and wrapped around him as certainly as he was holding her. Her soft pretty lips parted. She wasn’t afraid . . . she should be afraid!

So he kissed her, kissed her like he was some kind of demon out to steal her breath. Maybe he did, because Grace went boneless against his chest. But her mouth was alive, working against his as he sought the right fit. There. There!

His tongue surged into her mouth, and hers didn’t play dead. Instead, she dueled with him, giving as well as getting, exchanging sweet for bitter, light for dark. She tasted like sunshine and he swallowed it down.

Lightheaded, he had to break the kiss for air. Her golden red lashes had half drifted over her magnificent eyes. She looked languorous. Seducible. No, already willing.

It tore at him again. Why hadn’t she left?

“Kohl . . .” she whispered.

And he had to tear away from her. With a wrench, he did it, leaving her swaying on her feet. “I have one other symptom,” he said, his voice rasping. “They call it something like the limited-future syndrome. I don’t want a wife and kids. I don’t expect to live a normal life—or even have a normal lifespan.”

Her eyes were wide now. She had to wish she’d run the moment he’d opened the door. In the silence, he saw her swallow.

“I understand,” she finally said, her voice as hoarse as his. “For a long time, I thought one of them—my father or the man I married—would kill me.”

And then she was gone. Kohl dropped his aching head to his hands. Jesus, Jesus. The one he really wanted to get away from now was no one other than himself.

The evening of the dinner party, Liam’s gaze followed Giuliana’s passage down the curved stairway. He caught a glimpse of her black open-toed shoes, the high heels accentuating the length of her calves. The hem of a dress skimmed her knees. Then she disappeared around the bend and he had a moment to breathe before she reappeared again. The shoes, the calves, the knees, the hem, and then all of her.